Welcome to Authorized Sword Ministries. This is Lesson 3 in our series, Why We Use the King James Bible. Today's lesson is called How God Preserved His Word.

We're so glad you're here.

In our first lesson we looked at where the King James Bible came from and compared it with some newer versions. Today we want to go back one step further and ask a simple question. The prophets and apostles wrote thousands of years ago. Their first handwritten pages are long gone. So how can we know that the words we hold today are the words God gave? The answer starts with God's own promise, and then we'll look at how He kept it.

Our Key Verse

Today's key verse is Psalm 12:6-7.

"The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever." — Psalm 12:6-7 (KJV)

Notice two things. First, God's words are pure, like silver that has been refined seven times, with nothing false left in it. Second, God Himself takes the job of keeping them. "Thou shalt keep them, O LORD." Preservation is not left up to men. God said He would do it, for ever.

God Gave His Word

Before God could preserve His Word, He had to give it. Paul tells Timothy where the Scriptures came from:

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." — 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (KJV)

And Peter tells us how it happened:

"Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." — 2 Peter 1:20-21 (KJV)

The Bible did not start as a good idea that men came up with. God breathed it out, and holy men wrote as the Holy Ghost moved them. A God who can give His Word that way is able to keep it.

God Promised to Keep His Word

The Bible doesn't just say God's Word is true. Over and over, it says God's Word will last.

The Lord Jesus said:

"Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." — Matthew 24:35 (KJV)

Think about that. The ground under your feet and the sky over your head will pass away before His words do.

Jesus went even further. He said not even the smallest mark would be lost:

"For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." — Matthew 5:18 (KJV)

A jot is the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet. A tittle is a tiny stroke on a letter. Jesus cared about the very letters.

The psalmist said:

"For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven." — Psalm 119:89 (KJV)

And Isaiah wrote:

"The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever." — Isaiah 40:8 (KJV)

Peter quoted that same truth and tied it to the gospel we preach:

"But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you." — 1 Peter 1:25 (KJV)

So God's promise is clear. His Word will not pass away, will not be lost, and will stand for ever.

Men Have Tried to Destroy It

God's Word has had enemies from the start. In the days of the prophet Jeremiah, the king of Judah had Jeremiah's scroll read to him. Here is what he did with it:

"And it came to pass, that when Jehudi had read three or four leaves, he cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth, until all the roll was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth." — Jeremiah 36:23 (KJV)

The king thought that was the end of it. But God told Jeremiah:

"Take thee again another roll, and write in it all the former words that were in the first roll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah hath burned." — Jeremiah 36:28 (KJV)

And the Bible tells us that when Baruch wrote it again from Jeremiah's mouth, "there were added besides unto them many like words" (Jeremiah 36:32). The king burned a scroll, and God gave back more than he burned. That has been the story of the Bible ever since. As we saw in our first lesson, church leaders in England burned William Tyndale's New Testaments, and today the Bible is in homes all over the world.

How God Kept the Old Testament

God used people to carry out His promise. For the Old Testament, He used Jewish scribes. Paul says the Jews were trusted with this job:

"What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God." — Romans 3:1-2 (KJV)

Over the centuries, Jewish scribes copied the Hebrew Scriptures with great care. In the period roughly from the 600s to the 1000s A.D., a group of scholars known as the Masoretes worked mainly in Tiberias, by the Sea of Galilee, and in Jerusalem and Babylon. They became known for how carefully they copied. They counted the verses, the words, and even the letters of the books, and they marked the middle of each book. If a copy came out with the wrong count, they knew something was missing. At the end of the five books of Moses, their notes give the totals: 5,845 verses and 79,856 words.

The Hebrew text that came down through their hands is called the Masoretic Text. As we saw in Lesson 1, it is the Hebrew text the King James translators used for the Old Testament.

A Witness from a Cave

For a long time, the oldest complete Hebrew copies of the Old Testament came from around a thousand years after Christ. Then in 1947, Bedouin shepherds found scrolls in caves at a place called Qumran, near the Dead Sea. They are now called the Dead Sea Scrolls.

One of them is the Great Isaiah Scroll. It is over twenty-four feet long and holds all 66 chapters of Isaiah. It dates to about 125 to 100 years before Christ, which makes it about a thousand years older than the oldest Hebrew Bible manuscripts known before it was found.

So how did it compare? The Israel Museum in Jerusalem, where the scroll is kept today, says its wording "substantiates to a remarkable degree" the wording of the later medieval copies. It does have spelling differences and copying mistakes, as any handwritten copy does. But across a thousand years, the book of Isaiah had been carried down faithfully. We believe that is the Lord keeping His promise.

How God Kept the New Testament

For the New Testament, God used the churches. The apostles' letters were read aloud in the churches and passed along to others. Paul told the Colossians:

"And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and that ye likewise read the epistle from Laodicea." — Colossians 4:16 (KJV)

Believers copied these books by hand, generation after generation, and the copies spread to many lands. As we said in Lesson 1, the large family of Greek manuscripts that the churches read and copied is the family behind the Received Text.

When printing came along, that text was put into print. In 1516, a scholar named Erasmus published the first Greek New Testament ever put on the market. Others followed. A printer named Robert Estienne, also called Stephanus, printed editions in 1546, 1549, 1550, and 1551. Theodore Beza in Geneva printed more editions in the late 1500s. Those printed Greek texts are what we call the Received Text, or Textus Receptus. The name itself came a little later, from a 1633 edition whose preface told the reader, in Latin, that this was "the text now received by all."

The King James translators chiefly used Beza's editions from 1588 and 1598, and they also checked the editions of Stephanus and Erasmus. In other words, the King James New Testament stands on the text the churches had been reading and copying for centuries.

Why This Matters

Some people say, "We don't have the original pages, so we can't really know what God said." But God never promised to preserve the paper. He promised to preserve His words. The paper wore out. The words did not.

We believe God kept His words just as He said He would, through faithful scribes, through faithful churches, and through the hard work of men who brought those words into English. That is why we can open the King James Bible and say, "Thus saith the LORD," with confidence.

And since God kept His Word, He expects us to keep it too, in our hearts and in our lives:

"Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee." — Psalm 119:11 (KJV)

A Simple Step for This Week

Here's our challenge for this week. Pick one of the promises in this lesson, maybe Psalm 12:6-7 or Matthew 24:35, and memorize it. Write it on a card and keep it in your pocket. Every time you read it, thank God that He kept His Word so you could hold it today.

A Prayer

Let's pray together.

Heavenly Father,

Thank You that Your words are pure words, and that You promised to keep them for ever. Thank You for the scribes who copied them with care, for the churches that read them and passed them on, and for the men who gave their lives so we could read them in our own language.

Lord, help us not to take Your Word for granted. Help us to read it, to believe it, and to hide it in our hearts.

In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Thank you for spending this time with us.

This is Authorized Sword Ministries. God bless you.

Study Questions

1. Read Psalm 12:6-7. What two things does God say about His words?
2. What do 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and 2 Peter 1:20-21 teach about where the Scriptures came from?
3. In Matthew 5:18, what are a "jot" and a "tittle," and what does Jesus promise about them?
4. What happened to Jeremiah's scroll in Jeremiah 36, and what did God do about it?
5. According to Romans 3:1-2, what was committed to the Jews?
6. How did the Masoretes check their copies of the Hebrew Scriptures?
7. What is the Great Isaiah Scroll, and what did it show about the book of Isaiah?
8. Who were Erasmus, Stephanus, and Beza, and how are they connected to the King James New Testament?
9. Why does it matter that God promised to preserve His words, not the original paper?
10. Which verse from this lesson will you memorize this week?

---

Verified Scripture References (KJV)

All quotations were checked word for word against the King James Version (bible-api.com, translation=kjv) on October 26, 2026.

1. Psalm 12:6-7 — "The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever."
2. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 — "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works."
3. 2 Peter 1:20-21 — "Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."
4. Matthew 24:35 — "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away."
5. Matthew 5:18 — "For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled."
6. Psalm 119:89 — "For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven."
7. Isaiah 40:8 — "The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever."
8. 1 Peter 1:25 — "But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you."
9. Jeremiah 36:23 — "And it came to pass, that when Jehudi had read three or four leaves, he cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth, until all the roll was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth."
10. Jeremiah 36:28 — "Take thee again another roll, and write in it all the former words that were in the first roll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah hath burned."
11. Romans 3:1-2 — "What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God."
12. Colossians 4:16 — "And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and that ye likewise read the epistle from Laodicea."
13. Psalm 119:11 — "Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee."
14. Jeremiah 36:32 (phrase quoted inline) — "...and there were added besides unto them many like words." Full verse: "Then took Jeremiah another roll, and gave it to Baruch the scribe, the son of Neriah; who wrote therein from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire: and there were added besides unto them many like words."

Historical Sources

All sources were opened and checked on October 26, 2026.

1. The Masoretes (dates, places, careful copying): "Masoretic Text," Wikipedia, section "The Age of the Masoretes" (schools of scribes working between the 7th and 11th centuries, based mainly in Tiberias, Jerusalem, and Babylonia). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masoretic_Text
2. Counting verses, words, and letters, and marking the middle of books: Geoffrey Khan, A Short Introduction to the Tiberian Masoretic Bible and its Reading Tradition (Gorgias Press), p. 1 and note 1 ("counting letters and words to ensure the correct preservation of the text was one of the activities of the Masoretes"). https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781463235857_A38591837/preview-9781463235857_A38591837.pdf ; Casper J. Labuschagne, "Counting Hebrew Letters, Words, and Verses in Jewish Tradition" (Masoretic note at the end of Deuteronomy: 5,845 verses and 79,856 words in the Torah). https://labuschagne.nl/z%26oz/1.pdf
3. Dead Sea Scrolls found in 1947 at Qumran; the Great Isaiah Scroll (all 66 chapters, about 125 to 100 B.C., about 1,000 years older than the earlier oldest manuscripts; "substantiates to a remarkable degree the wording and orthography of medieval manuscripts"): The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, "The Great Isaiah Scroll MS A (1QIsa)," https://www.imj.org.il/en/collections/198208-0 ; The Digital Dead Sea Scrolls, "The Great Isaiah Scroll" (734 cm long, dated about 125 BCE; "generally in agreement with the Masoretic or traditional version... but it contains many variant readings, alternative spellings, scribal errors, and corrections"), http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/isaiah ; "Isaiah Scroll," Wikipedia (found by Bedouin shepherds in 1947), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Isaiah_scroll
4. Erasmus's 1516 Greek New Testament, the first one published (put on the market): "Navigating the Textus Receptus," BYU Studies, Essential Tools for Understanding the New Testament. https://byustudies.byu.edu/online-book/essential-tools-for-understanding-the-new-testament/navigating-the-textus-receptus ; William W. Combs, "Erasmus and the Textus Receptus," Detroit Baptist Seminary Journal 1 (1996). https://biblescienceforum.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/erasmus_and_the_textus_receptus__william_combs__1996.pdf
5. Stephanus editions of 1546, 1549, 1550, and 1551: Trinitarian Bible Society, "The 1551 Greek New Testament of Stephanus." https://www.tbsbibles.org/page/1551StephanusGreekNewTestament
6. Beza's editions in the late 1500s: J. K. Elliott, "Novum Testamentum editum est: The Five-Hundredth Anniversary of Erasmus's New Testament," The Bible Translator (2016) (Beza folio editions 1565, 1582, 1588-89, 1598). https://translation.bible/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/elliott-2016-novum-testamentum-editum-est-the-five-hundredth-anniversary-of-erasmus-s-new-testament.pdf
7. The name "Textus Receptus" from the 1633 Elzevir preface ("Textum ergo habes, nunc ab omnibus receptum"): Combs (above) and BYU Studies (above).
8. King James translators chiefly used Beza's 1588/89 and 1598 editions, also consulting Stephanus and Erasmus; Old Testament from the Masoretic Text: "King James Version," Wikipedia, sections "New Testament" and "Considerations for a new version" (citing Scrivener 1884, p. 60). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_James_Version