Why Are There Different Bibles? (Can I Trust the Bible? Part 2)

9‑minute read · Can I Trust the Bible? - Part 2

Pastor Drake here, writing to you again from the field - where the coffee is bad, the heat is honest, and the questions about God don't get any smaller just because you're far from home.

In Part 1 we looked at the manuscripts - whether the words of the Bible were copied down to us reliably. The answer was yes, and it wasn't close. But a lot of you wrote back with a second question, and it's a good one. It usually comes in three forms:

• Did the Council of Nicaea create Christianity - or even create the Bible?
• Why do Catholics and Protestants have different Bibles?
• And underneath both: can we really trust the Bible we have today?

Let me give you the one sentence I want you to walk away with, and then we'll work it out together. Here it is: the church did not create Scripture - the church recognized the books God had already inspired. Hold onto that. Everything else hangs on it.

Did the Council of Nicaea create Christianity?

You've probably heard the story. It usually shows up in a documentary or a viral post: a Roman emperor gets a bunch of bishops in a room in the year 325, and they vote on whether Jesus is God, vote on which books go in the Bible, and basically invent Christianity to keep the empire in line. It's a great story. It's also not what happened.

Here's what the Council of Nicaea did not do. It did not invent Jesus' divinity. It did not create the Trinity. And it did not choose the books of the Bible - that subject wasn't even on the table.

So what was on the table? One question, and it's the only question that has ever really mattered: who is Jesus? A teacher named Arius had started saying that Jesus was a created being - that, in his words, "there was a time when the Son was not." Meaning Jesus was made, like you and me, and not eternal God. The council looked at that and said no. Not because an emperor told them to, but because Christians had already been worshiping Jesus as Lord from the very beginning - long before any emperor cared what they thought.

The Bible they already had said it plainly:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

- John 1:1

"He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created… all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together."

- Colossians 1:15-17

Read that last one slowly. Jesus is not part of the creation. Jesus is the one through whom the creation was made. So here's the bottom line, and I want you to feel the weight of it: Jesus is not created. Jesus is Creator.

Nicaea didn't invent that. Nicaea defended it. The council was the church putting words around what God's people had believed and worshiped all along - the way a soldier doesn't create his orders, he confirms they're authentic and stands by them.

The church recognized Scripture - it didn't create it

That brings us back to our one sentence. If the church didn't invent Jesus' divinity, did it at least invent the Bible - sit down one afternoon and decide which books would count?

No. And the difference between creating and recognizing is the whole ballgame.

Think about a jeweler. A jeweler does not make gold by looking at it. The gold is already gold. What the jeweler does is recognize it - he can tell the real thing from the fake. That's exactly what the early church did. It didn't make certain books inspired. It recognized the books that already carried God's authority.

Let me put it the way I'd put it to my soldiers. In the military, authentication matters more than almost anything. When real orders come down, a unit doesn't create the authority behind them - it recognizes that the orders are genuine and acts on them. Getting that wrong gets people killed. The early church carried that same seriousness. They tested writings carefully, because truth matters.

So how did they recognize which books were the real thing? Three tests.

1. Was it connected to the apostles?

Jesus gave His authority to the apostles, and He promised them this:

"…the Helper, the Holy Spirit… he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you."

- John 14:26

So the first test was simple: does this book trace back to an apostle or someone close to one? Matthew - an apostle. John - an apostle. Mark - Peter's man. Luke - Paul's traveling companion. The line back to Jesus was short and clear.

2. Did it agree with the teaching of Jesus and the apostles?

Paul drew this line in permanent ink:

"But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed."

- Galatians 1:8

If a writing contradicted what Jesus and the apostles taught, it was out. No vote needed.

3. Was it widely recognized across the churches?

Here's the part most people miss. The New Testament books were being copied, preached, circulated, and read out loud in worship across the churches long before any council ever met to make a formal list. The recognition happened in the pews and the pulpits first. The councils came later and simply confirmed what the people of God had already received.

Now let me clear up a misunderstanding, because this is where folks get the wrong idea about us. Protestants do not think the church is unimportant. Historic Protestantism gladly affirms that Jesus established a church, that pastors and elders matter, that church history matters, that the creeds matter, that the councils matter. We are not lone rangers with a Bible and an attitude.

But here is the line we will not cross: only Scripture is infallible. Church leaders, councils, and traditions are all good gifts - and all of them sit under God's Word, never over it.

Why do Catholics and Protestants have different Bibles?

So if everyone recognized the same apostolic books, why does a Catholic Bible have 73 books and your Protestant Bible have 66?

The difference is a group of writings called the Apocrypha, or the Deuterocanonical books - names like Tobit, Judith, the Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, and 1 and 2 Maccabees. And I want to be fair here, because this is where Christians who love Jesus genuinely disagree. The question is not, "Do these books have any historical or devotional value?" Many of them do. The question is much sharper: are these books God-breathed Scripture, equal in authority to Isaiah, the Psalms, and the Gospels?

There are four reasons Protestants answer no.

1. The Jewish canon didn't include them

Paul says the Jewish people were "entrusted with the oracles of God" (Romans 3:2). The Hebrew Bible they guarded lines up with the Protestant Old Testament - and Jesus Himself affirmed those Scriptures again and again, never adding the Apocrypha to them.

"But," someone will say, "the Septuagint - the Greek Old Testament - included the Apocrypha." Here's the honest answer: the Septuagint was never one fixed, settled collection. Different manuscripts contained different books, and even early Christians debated which ones belonged. You can't appeal to a list that wasn't actually a single agreed list.

2. Jesus never clearly affirmed the Apocrypha as Scripture

Jesus quoted the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms as authoritative Scripture constantly. But He never treated the Apocrypha with that same "it is written" authority.

"But the New Testament alludes to ideas from those books." Sure - and quoting something doesn't make it Scripture. Paul quoted pagan Greek poets in Acts 17. That didn't make Greek poetry the inspired Word of God. A reference is not an endorsement.

3. Some Apocryphal teaching conflicts with the rest of Scripture

This is the big one. Second Maccabees supports praying for the dead, and the Roman Catholic Church connects that to the doctrine of purgatory. But listen to how the New Testament talks:

"…it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment."

- Hebrews 9:27

"For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified."

- Hebrews 10:14

Over and over, the New Testament presents what Jesus did on the cross as sufficient, finished, and decisive. A teaching that adds a holding-cell of further purification after death runs against that grain.

4. Even early Christians debated these books

This wasn't settled quietly and early. Jerome - the man who translated the Latin Bible the Catholic Church used for a thousand years - questioned the Apocrypha. Church fathers differed. Regional councils varied. And here's the historical detail worth knowing: the Roman Catholic Church didn't formally, dogmatically declare the Apocrypha to be Scripture until the Council of Trent in 1546 - during the Reformation. The very fact that it had to be formally settled that late tells you the debate was real and long-running.

Which brings up the strongest Catholic counterargument, and I want to state it fairly: "The church gave you the Bible. Without the Catholic Church, you wouldn't even know which books belong." It's a serious point, and it deserves a serious answer. Here it is: the church recognized the canon - it did not create the authority of Scripture. God inspired His Word. The church received what God had already given. Recognizing gold is not the same as making it.

Two honest places we differ

Two more issues sit close to this one, and I'd rather name them plainly than pretend they aren't there.

Apostolic succession. Catholics put a lot of weight on an unbroken historical line of church authority. The Reformers didn't deny that the church existed all through history - of course it did. Their question was different and sharper: did later traditions stay faithful to apostolic teaching, or did some of them drift? The issue was never "did the church exist?" It was "did the church's added traditions remain true to what the apostles actually taught?"

Praying to the saints. Catholics often compare praying to departed saints with asking a friend on earth to pray for you. And Protestants agree on the front end: believers who have died are alive with Christ, and the church really is one family. But Scripture teaches us to pray for one another here among the living; it never clearly instructs us to direct our prayers to believers who have died. And it keeps the center of gravity in one place:

"For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."

- 1 Timothy 2:5

One mediator. You don't need a chain of go-betweens to reach your Father. Jesus is enough.

Why this matters for you

Maybe you're reading this thinking, this is interesting history, but why does it matter for my Tuesday? Here's why. If the Bible is unreliable, something has to take its place - and something always does. Truth becomes whatever you feel. Culture becomes the authority. Your emotions get to be king. And a king like that will run you straight into the ground.

But if the Bible really is God's Word, then everything changes. Then Jesus has authority. Then truth is objective - it's true whether you feel it today or not. Then salvation is real, and your hope is secure, anchored to something outside your own shaky grip.

"All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness…"

- 2 Timothy 3:16-17

"Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth."

- John 17:17

And John tells you exactly why he wrote his Gospel down in the first place:

"…these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name."

- John 20:31

So here's where we land. The question was never "what feels ancient?" or "what feels emotional?" or "what feels impressive?" The question is the one I keep coming back to out here, where everything that isn't solid gets stripped away: what did Jesus and the apostles actually teach? On that question, Scripture alone stands as the final, infallible authority for the Christian faith.

And don't miss the last thing. The early Christians did not die for a book invented by politicians in a Roman meeting hall. They died because they were convinced that Jesus truly rose from the dead, and that His Word was true. People don't bleed for paperwork. They bleed for the One they've met. You can trust the Bible you're holding - not because a council voted, but because the risen Christ stands behind every word of it.

We love you, Christchurch family. Keep asking the hard questions. The truth can take it.

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