How Did Paul’s Letters to the Churches Become a Collection?
We can only speculate. But we do have some evidence to go on. Our best evidence indicates that the book of Acts was widely circulated among Christians around A.D. 90. Acts tell us all about Paul’s life as a travelling missionary for Christianity. These tales of Paul’s journeys, his adventures, his hairbreadth escapes, his hardships and suffering as he sought to spread the Christian faith must have been exciting reading for the early Christians! Many of them would have known little or nothing about Paul. But when the book of Acts was published, they wanted to know more about him. Then, when they discovered that he had died a martyr for the faith, those Christians would have recognized that here, indeed, was a Christian hero! It has been pointed out that the Book of Acts could guide a person interested in collecting Paul’s letters to seven of them. If some early Christian had the Letter to the Colossians and the Letter to Philemon, then the Book of Acts would tell him or her where ...