C. God Intended the Scriptures to Guide People of Future Generations

The spoken word benefits only people who immediately hear it. It cannot be repeated to others except by memory (with all the fallibility and weaknesses that the human memory involves).

One reason God had the Scriptures recorded as written word was so the message could be copied, circulated, and made available to other people in addition to those to whom it was immediately addressed.

In particular, God intended for the written word to be used to guide and instruct future generations of people, even after the generation in which it was written. This made it necessary to preserve the word in an accurate form.

Old Testament Scriptures were to benefit future generations.

Deuteronomy 17:18-20 - Future kings of Israel were to copy God's law, study it, and obey it strictly without variation. But note that Israel did not even have a king until several generations after this was spoken (v14).

Deuteronomy 31:9-13,24-29 - The words of the law were written down and placed where they would be available to the people. Every seven years, after Moses died, the laws should be read to the people so they could remember them, their children (who did not know the laws) could learn them, and all would obey.

Psalm 102:18 - The psalmist wrote "for the generation to come."

Clearly, the Old Law was intended to be a pattern or standard of authority for future generations. We will see later that this law was preserved and was still being followed as law and authority hundreds of years later, just as God intended.

New Testament Scriptures were also to benefit future generations.

John 20:29-31 - John wrote so people, who had not seen Jesus or witnessed His miracles, could read the eyewitness record of them and so could believe on Jesus and have eternal life. But this means that the record was written especially for people like us today.

2 Peter 1:12-15 - Peter expressly states that he wrote what he did so that people could have the written record of his teachings to remind them in the future, even after Peter was dead.
2 Peter 3:1,2 - Specifically, he wrote so people would be reminded of the commandments revealed by Jesus' apostles.

2 Peter 3:15,16; 1 Timothy 5:18 - Even in the first century people were studying the New Testament writings of inspired men and were citing them as authority. In particular, the writings of Paul and Luke were known to the people to whom other men wrote.

Further, these writings are classified right along with other "Scripture," which shows why they were being circulated and studied. They were recognized as authoritative statements of God's will that people should study in order to obey God, even as the Old Testament had been (cf. 2 Tim. 3:16,17; Col. 4:16; Acts 2:39; Mark 14:9; I Thess 5:27.)

When God inspired men to write the Scriptures, He intended that those sacred writings would be used to teach people His will in other places and future times. This was done with the Old Testament, and He clearly intended the New Testament to be used as the Old had been in this regard. In order to accomplish this purpose, it follows that the Scriptures would have to be preserved accurately for future generations.