First Christian Church

Let's talk about the earliest Christian church.

As many of you are likely well aware, the New Testament (as we have it today) starts with the four Gospels and then proceeds immediately into the "Acts of the Apostles," or just "Acts," the book named so because it describes the actions of the Apostles in the aftermath of Christ's crucifixion. In Christian tradition, it and the Gospel of Luke were written by Luke the Evangelist (and it makes sense, as Acts fairly closely follows him around), but the author of both books never specifies a name.  I will refer to "him" as "Luke," following that tradition, but realizing that it may be horribly, horribly wrong.

In Tulsa especially, chapter 2 gets a lot of focus, as it starts out with the Holy Spirit suddenly filling the room where the Apostles met, appearing as tongues of flame over each of their heads, and causing them to "speak in other tongues" (which I won't get into and you can interpret however you see fit).  A great crowd appeared, and Peter began speaking to them.

Pentecost, by Jean II Restout, 1732.  Louvre Museum.  In Wikipedia.

And then the people assembled there began to fellowship together, as translated in the NIV:

    They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. (Acts 2:42-47)

Chapter 3 describes Peter healing someone and speaking to the crowd again, but then chapter 4 tells us that Peter and John were arrested, and that by this time,

[...] the number of men who believed grew to about five thousand.

It would not be unfair to surmise that this count was the count of people in Jerusalem who were part of their little community.  After the release of Peter and John, they went back to the community, and then we get this further glimpse into the life of this first church:

    All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.
    Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means “son of encouragement”), sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet.  (Acts 4:32-37)

As if it wasn't clear enough from chapter 2, Luke specifies that within this community, the idea of property ceased to have any meaning.  The apostles became the arbiters of who received what, and everyone was taken care of.

The last line about Barnabas seems rather unimportant, given the proceeding paragraph.  Everyone who had owned any property had done the same thing. Given that Barnabas is later integral to the story of the church, after the Conversion of Paul (and that Luke and Barnabas were both part of Paul's inner circle, which we also won't get into here), it seems this was likely tacked on by Luke to show when Barnabas joined the ranks of the church and how he had sacrificed everything for the community, to show him as a Godly man.

Then we get into chapter 5, and one of the most famous stories from the Bible that hinges entirely upon this very concept.  Ananias and Sapphira.

The Death of Ananias, by Raphael, 1515. 
Victoria and Albert Museum.  In Wikipedia.

The story:

    Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property.  With his wife’s full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles’ feet.  Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God.”
    When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. Then some young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him.
    About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?”
    “Yes,” she said, “that is the price.”
    Peter said to her, “How could you conspire to test the Spirit of the Lord? Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.”
    At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.  (Acts 5:1-11)

It's important when reading such stories to read them in context.  In the original Acts, there was no breakdown by chapter - the story of Barnabas flowed directly into the story of Ananias and Sapphira. 

It's easy to imagine, then, that Ananias and Sapphira did what they did out of a hope that they would be recognized as pillars of the community, for selflessly giving their property to the church.

But I think that's a rather American interpretation of it.  It's pretty clear in Acts that the community of believers didn't focus terribly much on individuals, aside from the Apostles.  Even Barnabas only got a shout out, and as I surmised above, likely because of his relationship with Luke or his importance to the later story.

Peter focuses here on how the two "lied to the Holy Spirit."  But let's be clear about what that means.

Ananias and Sapphira at no point said to God, "here you go, God, everything we have."  Rather, they did that to Peter, the other Apostles, and the church as a whole.  As a matter of direct course, their lie was to the church.  It was BY lying to the church that they lied to the Spirit.

Capitalist theologians often point out that it was their lie that got them killed (although it's important to note that we are never told what or who kills them).  But it cannot be overstated that their lie was in telling the church that they had sold everything they owned and given it all to the church, as that is the focus of not one but two sections of the immediately preceding chapters.  We are not specifically told why they did what they did, but when we focus on their greed in holding back a portion of their funds, we forget that they gave a portion, too.  That is, their lie could have served two purposes: to increase their standing in the community, or to join the community in the first place.  We're told that "No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had" (Acts 4:32b) and that "All the believers were together and had everything in common" (Acts 2:44), so even if the community didn't strictly require people to eschew property to join, it's clear that truly being part of the community meant sacrificing everything. 

Which brings us back to the church.  The church in this time was communal.  It shared everything.  Though it had administers, those administers were carefully chosen - first by Christ, and later (in chapter 6), by the people of the church themselves.  

The story in chapter 6:

    In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews [those who spoke Greek and likely incorporated a lot of elements of Greek culture and faith] among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”
    This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.

Thus, by chapter 6, the early church had formed a bicameral political structure - the religious authority, which still held the true power in the church, but also an administrative body democratically elected to oversee the distribution of food and care for the poor.

What this tells us is that the communal system was far from perfect, but that didn't stop it, either.  What did eventually stop it was the persecution of Christians, namely from Saul (who later became Paul, and who joined the ranks of the Apostles in no small part thanks to Barnabas, who defended his conversion).  It's worth noting, as Dr. Michael Mullins (priest of the Diocese of Waterford & Lismore and author of five books on the gospels and the life of the early church) does, that when Christ appeared to Paul, Christ specifically said, "why do you persecute me?"  As with the lie of Ananias and Sapphira earlier, Paul wasn't persecuting Christ directly, but rather the church - which Christ shows to be the same as persecuting Christ. After Saul's persecutions started, the church broke apart, people fleeing in all different directions.

Mullins points out that the idea of community was consistently present in the writings of Paul, saying that "the
community should function in mutual dependence and harmony like the parts of a human body
(1 Cor 12:12-30; Rom 12:4-8)" and that the Holy Spirit is
"the giver of gifts for the building up of the community (1 Cor 12-13; Rom 12:6-8)."
  
Now, I don't know if Mullins would go to the extreme of advocating for communal living, but it is clear from Paul's writings, as he points out, that the idea of community is paramount.

The word translated in the Bible as "church" is the Greek word "ekklesia," and to understand that, we need to briefly discuss the Greek political system.

It's a pretty well-known fact that Greece was the birthplace of democracy.  Though it's pretty clear that democracy grew up in several places on the Balkan Peninsula, Athens is the one with the recorded history to show us what it looked like.  

It looked a lot like the early U.S.

Every citizen could vote.  Unfortunately, as with the U.S., citizenship was only for men 18 years of age or older, and specifically not slaves.  Unlike the U.S., they had no birthright citizenship - to be a citizen you had to be the son of a citizen of Athens and born in the city-state of Athens (or whatever polis you were hoping to be a citizen of).  

Citizens voted in a principal assembly.  If you remember your Plato, the Greeks loved debates, and so they would gather together in an assembly to hear nominations for public office, hear speeches, debates, etc., and then vote as a group (or to decide on major policy changes).

That principal assembly was called the ekklesia. 

Now, shortly before the life of Christ, Greece had fallen and Rome had risen and taken over the peninsula, Israel, and Egypt, but Rome liked to let countries continue to do as they had done, meaning the Greeks still held assembly under Roman rule (even if they weren't as powerful politically as they once had been).  

Paul was no stranger to the ekklesia.  As a citizen of Rome from Tarsus, he would have been exposed to Greek philosophy from a young age.  Strabo describes the city's love of philosophy in The Geography (as translated by Horace Leonard Jones): 

The people at Tarsus have devoted themselves so eagerly, not only to philosophy, but also to the whole round of education in general, that they have surpassed Athens, Alexandria, or any other place that can be named where there have been schools and lectures of philosophers. [...] Further, the city of Tarsus has all kinds of schools of rhetoric; and in general it not only has a flourishing population but also is most powerful, thus keeping up the reputation of the mother-city.

Paul surely had a classical education in rhetoric (with all that that entailed, including the sexual elements, but that's another conversation entirely) as seems evident from his writings.  So the fact that so often the word the Greek writers of the New Testament (especially Paul and those close to Paul) used to describe the church was the same word used to describe the principal assembly seems important in some significant ways.


Also of significant note on this topic is another Greek word - adelphoi.  It's usually translated as "brother" or "brothers and sisters" to avoid gender exclusivity (although it was, in the Greek, strictly male).  It was the word the men in the body of Christ called each other.

The word is the same word used to describe what people could vote in the ekklesia - that is, the citizens of the city-state.  While it could mean literal brother, it could also mean fellow citizen. 

The members of the ancient church were not merely participants in a church, congregants who sat in a pew and then went on with their day, but rather active citizens of Christ.  Citizens met as a body to decide on its leaders (as we've seen with regard to The Seven) and on important issues.  And, as with The Seven, the assembly considered it their national responsibility to care for the poor and the elderly in their Nation of Christ. 


As John said, "If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?  Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth"  (1 John 3:17).

This is not, then, merely a matter of giving and of charity.