What Makes a New Testament Scripture?

Luke 1:1-3

Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us,

Even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses, and ministers of the word;

It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus,

Luke was aware of many attempts to put in writing a record of the life of Jesus Christ. How many were written, we do not know. That there were others, (one that I am aware of) discovered in later years, is indisputable. But in the end only four of them are considered part of the canon of the Bible. Several documents have been written to explain the history of and the reason behind these sixty six books being considered infallible Scripture while other documents

·       From the same era

·       With the same general subject and

·       From the same region of the world

are not considered Scripture.

Most of those documents credit the Catholic Church with the canon. I dispute that; among other things, because their canon includes a number of books that were rejected by the majority of Christians worldwide. Any numbers of criteria have been suggested as qualifiers for the canon of the New Testament. All of them are extra biblical and therefore are of questionable authority. The best explanation for the canon is, I believe, in the obvious:

·       These are the books that have endured as Jesus His Word would

·       These are the books that have proven valuable through all of the ages of Christianity

·       These are the books that Christians have always known and accepted are the Word of God.

Many wrote. These proved themselves to be inspired.