Church History - What happened to the Apostles?

Easter Rose

I think the mark of a good historian is that he is not in the tank for the subject about which he writes.  Justo Gonzalez then in my view is a good historian.  He has spent a good deal of his life devoted to reading and writing about church history.

Gonzalez:  ‘I first met Irenaeus, Athanasius, and the rest, and as I have read their writings and pondered their thoughts and deeds, they have accompanied me through the many turns and twists of life.’

As dedicated as Gonzalez is to church history, he gives the best information available and then draws conclusions that may be unpopular for those who want only the best light possible shed on their history.

Gonzalez:  ‘Like contemporary friends, they have often been a joy, at other times a puzzlement, and even sometimes an aggravation.’

This is important because as we move away from information recorded in the bible some of the history we encounter may be different than what we thought we knew or different that what we wish it was.

We left off in our last post discussing the culture into which the Christian church was born.  We get a glimpse of what happened from the book of Acts in the bible.  The first Christians of course were the Apostles who were Hebrew Jews (James and Peter were the leaders.) 

The second group of Christians we learn about in Acts was the Greek Jews.  These were Jews who had become Hellenized if you will. 

These two groups were still Jews and tried to evangelize at the temple in Jerusalem about the risen Christ.  After a Greek Jew Stephen was stoned to death we learned that Jerusalem would not be the place where Christianity would take root. 

Gonzalez:  ‘By its ninth chapter, Acts becomes increasingly interested in Paul, and we less and less about the church in Jerusalem.  What was happening was that the ‘Hellenistic’ Jewish Christians were serving as a bridge to the Gentile world, and that Gentiles were joining the church in such numbers that they soon overshadowed the earlier Jewish Christian community.’

In Jerusalem, Peter, James and the others who remained were constantly harassed by authorities.  Some of them were killed.   In 70 AD Roman armies destroyed Jerusalem and the temple.  Around this time, the church in Jerusalem was moved to the desert city of Pella.  There is not much information about this community. 

Most of what we know about the early spread of the church comes from the letters in the New Testament written by Paul.  But it was not only Paul who spread Christianity.

Gonzalez:  ‘Although the New Testament speaks a great deal of Paul and his journeys, there were many others preaching in various regions.  Barnabas and Mark went to Cyprus.  The Alexandrine Jew Apollos preached in Ephesus and Corinth.  And Paul himself, after complaining that some preach Christ from envy and rivalry, ‘rejoices that by all these Christ is proclaimed.’  Philippians 1:18

Gonzalez:  ‘This missionary task itself was undertaken, not only by Paul and others whose names are known-Barnabas, Mark, et al.- but also by countless and nameless Christians who went from place to place taking with them their faith and their witness.’

So what happened to the original Apostles of Christ?  The ones weren’t killed probably fled to the desert.  A few of them certainly went to other places.  As time passed, some of the newly formed Christian communities began to tell stories about the Apostles.

Gonzalez:  ‘From an early date, traditions began to appear claiming that one or another of the them had preached in a particular region, or had suffered martyrdom in one way or another.  Most of these traditions are not more that the result of the desire of a church in a particular city to claim an apostolic origin.  Others are worthy of credit.’

Peter was most certainly in Rome and died a gruesome death there.  There is a cryptic reference to his death at the end of the Gospel of John.

“Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glory God.  John 20:19

We don’t even know what end befell Paul.  He was left in house arrest in Rome when the book of Acts ends.

What happened to John is more complicated because it was a popular name (and a good one I might add).  The book of Revelation tells of its author John who was exiled on the island of Patmos.  There is another story about a John who was a great teacher in Ephesus who died around 100 A.D.

Stories that circulated about the Apostles after 100 A.D. just don’t have much basis.

Gonzalez:  ‘Late in the second century, a development took place that greatly hinders the task of a historian who seeks to discern the later career of the apostles.  What happened was that after the churches in every important city began claiming apostolic origins.’

For example, Mark was said to have started the church in Alexandria.  The church in Constantinople felt it had to gain credibility so it claimed Philip had started its church.

But there are a few places like Spain and India where it is credible that James and Peter visited.

Gonzalez:  ‘In conclusion, it is certain that some of the apostles-particularly Peter, John, and Paul-did travel proclaiming the Gospel and supervising the churches that had been founded…but most of the traditions regarding apostolic travels date from a later period….In truth, most of the missionary work was not carried out by the apostles, but rather by the countless and nameless Christians who for different reasons-persecution, business, or missionary calling-traveled from place to place taking the news of the Gospel with them.’

‘Our true history is scarcely ever deciphered by others. The chief part of the drama is a monologue, or rather an intimate debate between God, our conscience, and ourselves. Tears, grieves, depressions, disappointments, irritations, good and evil thoughts, decisions, uncertainties, deliberations --all these belong to our secret, and are almost all incommunicable and intransmissible, even when we try to speak of them, and even when we write them down.’ Henri Fredric Amiel

When we think about the roots of the church, we might ask ourselves if it matters how a particular church was founded.  Is it still a true church if it was not founded by an apostle?  As the years unfold, we will see division after division within the church.  It must be made clear at every turn that some churches did well and some did not.  I think we can tell the difference between a legend a particular church held on to for fondness sake but which still did the work of the Gospel and other churches that used the authority of the church to seek advantage over others.

As Ameil suggests, digging in to our history is about much more that facts.  We are challenged with the Gospel message using it as a guide to see where its promoters had it right and where others had it wrong.  And certainly more deeply where we have it right or wrong in our thinking today.

 
Source:  Justo L. Gonzalez from ‘The Story of Christianity, Volume 1, the Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation’

Church History - If you can't beat them, join them?

American Fringe Tree

“There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before.”  Willa Cather

The land of Palestine where the bible writers lived has been embroiled in turmoil seemingly since the beginning of time.

Gonzalez:  ‘As we read the Old Testament, we see that, as enemies came and went, they cast a covetous eye on that narrow strip of land; for this reason, its inhabitants repeatedly suffered invasion, bondage, and exile.’

There were lots of pesky enemies of the Israelites in bible times.  Some ‘ite’ or another was always jabbing at them for territorial control.  Their two major foes were the Assyrians and the Babylonians.  The latter destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple.  The Persians came to power after the Babylonians and allowed some Jewish independence in religious matters including rebuilding of the temple.

There is a gap of about 400 years from the end of the Hebrew Scriptures to the first of Paul’s letters in the New Testament (350 B.C – 50 A.D.).  During this period, Alexander the Great used his massive armies to defeat King Darius III of Persia.  Alexander brought Greek culture to the region.  The Greek culture of that era was historically termed Hellenization.  Why was Hellenization such a big deal?

If we go way back in the bible to God beckoning Abraham, we remember that God called a people out of the mainstream society where you could believe anything you wanted and worship anything you wanted.  God said in effect to Abraham ‘I am the one who created the world; stop worshipping images on sticks; seek justice and mercy; strive to be holy like me.’

Abraham started the movement of a people then that believed in one creator and providential God.  Seemingly though at every turn, bible people still got involved with the ideas of the day and worshiped things other than God.  This problem of wanting to fit in with other cultures and ideas was made almost impossible to resist when the Assyrians destroyed the Northern tribes of Israel.  The smart or good looking Jews who weren’t killed were shipped off the live in other Assyrians cities.  The same thing happened when the Babylonians destroyed the Southern tribe and Jerusalem.  It was only the Persians who allowed the Jews to come back to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple.  When this happened, some who went back like Nehemiah held prominent positions in the Persian government:

‘At the time, I was cupbearer to the king. In the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was served to him, I carried the wine and gave it to the king.’ Nehemiah 1:11-2:1

When the Greeks came to power, it was no different with them than with the other conquerors.  If you wanted to fit in you started to speak Greek.  If you wanted to get a good job, you learned to speak kindly of the philosophers.  If you wanted your children to marry well and get in to the best schools you went along with ideas about other gods.  This is really what Hellenization means to me. 

Gonzalez:  ‘In a way, the history of Palestine from the time of Alexander’s conquest to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 may be seen as the constant struggle between Hellenizing pressures on the one hand and Jewish faithfulness to their God and their traditions on the other.’

After the Romans routed the Greeks, there was a period of order and some autonomy for the Jews and early Christians.  But it did not stay that way for long.  The Romans liked many of the Greek ideas and thought they would implement some of them in provinces like Palestine.

Gonzalez:  ‘Herod made an effort to Hellenize the country, and had temples built in Samaria and Caesarea in honor of Roma and Augustus.  But when he dared to place a Roman eagle at the entrance of the Temple there was an uprising, which he suppressed by force.’

The Jews tired in various ways to get along with the conquering armies.  The Zealots, the Pharisees, Sadducees and Essenes all developed differing ideas of the Jewish faith.  But they were always fighting the idea in the ruling culture that there was more than one God. 

Gonzalez:  ‘…monotheism means there is only one God, and that this God requires, just as much as proper worship, proper relationships among human beings.  These various parties might disagree as to the exact shape of such relationship, but they all agreed on the need to honor the only God with the whole of life….All…firmly believed that the day would come when God would intervene in order to restore Israel and fulfill the promise of a Kingdom of peace and justice.’

There were attempts by some like Philo of Alexandria to suggest that the moral teachings of the Hebrews Scriptures were no different than those presented by the Greek philosophers.   

This was a lie then and it’s a lie still today.  We can’t reason things out.  We can’t on the hand have this idea that there is God but on the other hand still do whatever we want

There is only one way and that is stated early in the bible:

Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Deut 6:4-9

Might Bill Clinton, Elliot Spitzer, Mark Sanford or Tiger Woods have fared better if they had marked their foreheads accordingly?

Where are commanded early in the bible; in the end we are warned:

‘I know your works; you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth. For you say, “I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing.” You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.’  Revelation 3:15-17

We can summarize by saying that during the early Christian church Greek culture and strong Roman governments were synthesized into the worldview of the day.  When the Christian movement got underway in earnest, in some ways, the efficiency and order created by the Roman government were favorable to the spread of Christianity.

Gonzalez:  ‘But other aspects of those circumstances were a threat and a challenge to the early Christians.  In order to achieve greater unity, imperial policy sought religious uniformity by following two routes:  religious syncretism-the indiscriminate mixing of elements from various religions-and emperor worship.’

The Romans built the Pantheon which was a temple to hold all the gods.  Every time someone came up with a new god, an artist carved out an image and shipped it to the Pantheon.  If you wanted to fit in, you might pick the newest god to call your own. 

Gonzalez:  ‘In that atmosphere, Jews and Christians were seen as unbending fanatics who insisted on worshiping of their one God-an alien cyst that must be removed for the good of society.’

Questions we might reflect on:

-Would we have had the courage back in the day to be a part of a group that was considered an alien cyst by the mainstream society?

- In many ways, Hellenization was troubling to early Christians.  What aspects of Americanization trouble us today?  Does our best work get exported around the world?  (E.g. Lady Gaga, Just do it, grab some buds, and vitriol politics) Does anything shock us anymore? 

Source:  Justo L. Gonzalez from ‘The Story of Christianity, Volume 1, the Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation’

Church History - 1

Dogwood Cross

I have decided to re-read ‘The Story of Christianity, Volume I, The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation and Volume II, The Reformation to the Present’ by Justo L. Gonzales.  My posts for the near future will be about the church after bible times.

‘The Past lies upon the Present like a giant’s dead body.’  Nathaniel Hawthorne

To understand our own faith, we must learn about the people who ‘walked with God’ from the dawn of humanity to the present.

Justo Gonzalez points out in the introduction to Volume I, ‘History is crucial for understanding not only the life of Jesus, but also the entire biblical message…the bible tells the story of God’s revelation and in the life and history of the people of God.  Without that story, it is impossible to know that revelation.’

For us to know where we are today, we must take some time to reflect on our past.  In my case, I have one grandfather who lived 95 years and walked a postal route for much of his adult life.  In his spare time, he grew vegetables and gave them away to neighbors.  I don’t know much about my other grandfather except for whispered tales of a robbery and the shooting in which he died.

Some parts of our personal histories are good.  At other times, each of us has acted in ways that we are not proud.  The same can be said for the actors in church history.

Gonzalez:  ‘There are episodes in the course of that history where it is difficult to see the action of the Holy Spirit.  As our narrative unfolds, we shall find those who have used the faith of the church for their financial gains, or to increase their personal power.  There will be others who will forget or twist the commandment of love, and will persecute their enemies with vindictiveness unworthy of the name of Jesus.’

Gonzalez says we should remember that though the Holy Spirit was guiding the early church its actors were still sinners.  God used sinners then and uses them still today.  We should also remember that for every person who screwed something up; there were plenty of faithful people doing good work in the name of the church. 

Gonzalez:  ‘Like it or not, we are heirs of this host of diverse and even contradictory witnesses.  Some of their actions we may find revolting, and others inspiring.  But all of them form part of our history.’

Questions we might reflect on:

What do we know about the history of the church?  

What arguments do naysayers make about the church’s past?

What parts of our own personal histories are good / not so much?

Revelation – Apocalyptic literature is in the bible, but that is not all there is.  For some, bible reading is all about end times and signs of the end.  Tune the AM radio dial for a minute and you will likely find some preacher shouting out verses from the book of Revelation.  Be fearful.  Be ready.  The world is about to end.  He will point to news about wars and tsunamis. He will know the modern mark of the beast.  Conspiracy abounds; first it’s a new world currency then it is a proposed superhighway from Mexico to Canada.  He knows the real antichrist, first Gorbachev then Bin Laden.  There have been plenty of end time predictors since Christ; none have been correct.  So what are we to make of the book?

According to the Baker Commentary on the Bible, ‘Apocalyptic is visionary, highly symbolic…written to comfort, encourage , strengthen, quiet doubts, and show God to be the ultimate victor over evil…The book of Revelation touches upon most aspects of early Christian thought…John makes reference to God, Christ, the work of Christ, the Holy Spirit, the second coming, the final judgment, heaven, hell, angels, creation, mankind, sin, Satan, demons, history, prayer, worship, Christian living, the church, prophesy, the Bible, perseverance, saints, and the profound mystery of God’s eternity and its relation to time.’

What we might say about the whole bible, we can say here too. 

Baker Commentary:  ‘Central to the book is the existence, power, sovereignty, justice, wisdom, and goodness of God.  God is….He is the almighty and he is in control of the universe….God is also good.  He made the earth for his glory and in the end restores it to its former glory, indeed, to a glory it never dreamed of having.  God’s goodness extends to the believers in guiding and protecting them from eternal harm and to evildoers in calling them to repentance.’

What does Revelation mean? 

Dennis Bratcher in his article ‘Interpreting the Book of Revelation,’ ‘A text cannot mean what it never could have meant to its original authors or hearers.’

Bratcher:  ‘There are several distinct features of apocalyptic writing:

-It arises out of historical context of great turmoil, persecution, and oppression.

-It is carefully crafted literature.

-It is presented in the form of visions, dreams, and other worldly journeys.

-Its images and symbols are form of fantasy rather than reality, and its language is cryptic, metaphorical, and highly symbolic.’

The author of Revelations knew his Hebrew Scriptures inside and out.  There are hundreds of references to Old Testament scripture in the book.

Bratcher provides a couple of hints for when we read Revelation.  ‘The rich and varied cultural context of the ancient world must be the frame of reference for interpreting the names and symbols of the book, but also with a sensitivity to how creatively they are used in the book.  The visions and symbols should not be pressed into allegory in which every detail has some meaning:  most often the meaning is in the entire vision and its impact rather than every detail.’

‘Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of the prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it; for the time is near.  John to the seven churches that are in Asia…To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us to be a kingdom of priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever…Look, his is coming with the clouds; and every eye will see him…So it is to be.  Amen. Revelation 1:3-7

John had visions and was commissioned to write about them.  He saw the very throne of God.

“When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.  But he placed his right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, and the living one.  I was dead, and see, I am alive, forever and ever, and I have the keys of Death and of Hades.’  Revelation 1:17-18

‘The seven lampstands are the seven churches.’  Revelation 1:20

John then had a word to each of the churches.  Sometimes he was encouraging and sometimes he was correcting. 

‘To the church in Ephesus…I know that you are enduring patiently and bearing up for the sake of my name…But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first….I will come and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent….To everyone who conquers, I will give permission to eat from the tree of life that is in the paradise of God.  Revelation 2:3-7

‘To the church in Laodicea…I know your works; you are neither cold nor hot.  I wish that you were either cold or hot.  So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth.’  Revelation 3:14-16

‘Listen! I am standing at the door; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in and eat with you, and you with me….let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches.’  Revelation 3; 20, 22

Chapters 4-22 describe John’s vision in very graphic imagery.  There are beasts, horseman, and all kinds of other exotic creatures.

Richard and Julia Wilke in their Disciple handbook write about the meaning of these visions that the churches in Asia who were under intense persecution from Rome would have gleaned from the writing:

‘Trouble is coming.  Be sure which side you are one.  The four horseman-conquest, war famine, and death- are coming….You are either in or out, washed in the blood of the Lamb or doomed, wearing either the mark of the Lamb or the mark of the beast.

Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! (18:2)…Stand firm.  The day will soon come when the Roman Empire, awful whore, slayer of God’s people, will be gone from the face of the earth.

Evil will be destroyed once and for all.  Christ is married to his bride, his holy people (Revelation 19:7).  Satan first will be bound (20:2) and then finally thrown into a lake of fire. (20:10) Even death itself shall die (2-:14) and God will bring a new heaven and a new earth.’

‘And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around, and inside.  Day and night without ceasing they sing,

Holy, holy, holy,

The Lord God Almighty,

Who was and is and is to come.’  Revelation 4:8

Scrolls, horses, sadness and devastation.

‘And out come another horse, bright red; its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people would slaughter one another.’  Revelation 6:4

Dragons and angels.

‘And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. ‘Revelation 12:7

Rome is going down.  ‘Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!  Revelation 14:7

‘After this, I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying,

‘Hallelujah!

Salvation and glory and power to our God,

For his judgments are true and just.’  Revelation 19:1-2

‘Then I saw the thrones, and those seated on them were given authority to judge, I also saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their testimony to Jesus and for the word of God.  They had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands.  They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years.’  Revelation 20:4

‘Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth…He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples…he will wipe every tear from their eyes.  Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’

Revelation 21:1, 3-4

‘See, I am coming soon, my reward is with me, to repay according to everyone’s work.  I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end….Let everyone who is thirsty come.  Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift….Amen.  Come, Lord Jesus!  Revelation 22:12, 17, 20

There are lots of approaches to interpreting the book of Revelation, none of them sufficient in themselves.  There are lots of concepts in the bible on which we might dwell other than God; Satan, angels, demons, end times, or the second coming of Christ as examples.  We will not be rewarded by dismissing or placing too much emphasis on any one of these. 

Baker Commentary:  ‘This is perhaps a good note on which to end, for all the views agree that when historical time ends, we shall be forever with the Lord.  With that ultimate prospect before us, let us be content.’

 This concludes my posts of the bible in one year.  Happy faith trails!