Beresford Job's Biblical Church - 6

In this series on Beresford Job's Biblical Church, we've been looking at how early, mainstream (small-c) catholic Christianity departed from NT practices. This time, we cover ch. 6, which covers the NT traditions relating to weekly church meetings. (At this point, the book starts to diverge from his shorter lecture series. But those following the latter may want to finish up, with A Summation TR 5, available here.)

If you're like most Christians nowadays, it's hard to imagine!

Church gatherings in New Testament times would be virtually unrecognizable to those whose only experience is that of being part of churches which adhere to the legacy left us by the Early Church Fathers. (83)

In NT-era churches, what was a weekly church meeting? Job turns to 1 Cor 11-14 to see what apostolic-era church meetings were like. The essential points are:

• "a church gathering [is like] the functioning of a biological body" (85)
• It wasn't a service led from the front, but was rather "a time of sharing together in which all were to take active verbal part, and which was completely open, spontaneous and collectively participatory." (85)
• The things to be shared were the spiritual gifts, or their products: as Paul says, "When you come together, everyone has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. All of these must be done for the strengthening of the church." (86)
• Following Jesus' instructions, each meeting included a collective meal, the Lord's Supper, which was a full-fledged meal, and not a token or merely ceremonial one. (88-91)
• All this was done in a home, as no special buildings existed. (91)

Job emphasizes that scholars of early Christianity agree on all this. His main point is this: the early "fathers" - really, early bishop-ruled, mainstream Christianity, invented traditions which conflicted with those laid down by Jesus and his apostles. Better to follow the latter. (92)

Think about a loyal employee. Suppose he's confused about whether the Boss wants him to do A or B. If he knows that the Boss prefers A, he'll do A. "Your wish is my command" will be his attitude. He won't dither about whether the Boss will permit him to do B, or whether or not other employees are doing B.

But suppose other employees have muddied the waters - some say the Boss wants them to do B, and a few claim to have heard someone who heard someone who heard the Boss express a preference for B. But if the faithful employee finds a written memo which clearly implies that the Master wants A done, then he'll hop to it.

Job says

I am simply arguing that Jesus... [and] the Apostles - knew best, and that it is not possible to come up with better ways of doing things than what we see already revealed in the pages of scripture... [which] contains not the slightest hint that its teachings and practices were supposed to be replaced by something different later on. (92)

Next time: The Choice.