Recording: The Community through Time

Continuing on my comments on my Sunday School class discussion, I will be talking about tradition in the sense that it is part of scripture. Simply claiming that something is inspired by God doesn’t not make it authoritative scripture for the church as a whole. I may hear from God something that is just for me.

Scripture that is authoritative in the church goes beyond “inspired.” It is accepted as authoritative to many people in many places, and at many times. One of my major contentions is that the work of the Holy Spirit goes on well past the simple inspiration of a prophet to speak and/or write. I know that among theologians, this is hardly surprising. But what I hear commonly in the pews is the idea that God inspires the prophet, that’s scripture, and the rest of it, such as the collection of authoritative texts we call the Bible, is sort of an afterthought.

So today we’ll be discussing how scripture comes into existence, is transmitted, accepted, and then made available to us. We’ll probably touch on the question of the closed or open canon, so we’ll have fun, I think!