Jesus-Centric Christianity

The Oral Tradition in the First Congregations

A little know fact among most church-goers today: the Gospels as we know them didn't come into written existence for at least 40 years after the resurrection.

Seriously.  How can that be?

Is it really true the congregation at Rome (and all the other first century Christians) had no Gospel?  How could a group of people follow a man, even to the point of death, without knowing about Him?

The simplicity of the earliest congregations was part of His genius.   

When Paul or any other Apostle went to a new area to proclaim the resurrection and teachings of Jesus they went there with a certain body of knowledge.  That body of knowledge was carried - verbatim - in their minds and in their hearts.  It was memorized.

The Hebrews used Holy Oral Tradition to pass on the teachings of their great rabbis.  This had been done for centuries before Jesus... and they continued this practice for a short time after Jesus, too.  The deeds and teachings of the great rabbis were stored not on paper, not written, but on people's minds and hearts.  This was simple genius.  The rabbis forbade the writing of their words because if they were written on paper they wouldn't be adhered to easily.  For the lessons to be effective, they mustn't be on a piece of paper somewhere in the learner's home but stored in their heart.  We've forgotten this great wisdom. 

But the first century Christians hadn't forgot this great way.  The Apostle would go to a certain area and proclaim the resurrection.  And to those who believed, the Apostle would then began to give them, orally only, the pertinent deeds and teachings of this Great Risen Rabbi.  And they charged them with the memorization of same.  Along with the words and deeds were lessons - some quite advanced - that were given only to the more mature among the believers.  These lessons had come from Jesus, Himself. 

And so it went.  In the first congregations they were memorizing the words and deeds of Jesus and living them out in their own lives and communities. 

I charge you with thinking on this.  How would this change your community?  What if your church was interested only in mimicking Jesus, person by person, in your community? and nothing else? No politics, no building funds, no great worship productions, etc.  What if they stopped spending 98% of their budgets on themselves and starting turning that money into the community?  What if Christians stopped spending their energies simply on what goes on at church and started helping single mothers and others who needed their help?  This is what the earliest believers were doing.

The first congregations were simple.  Memorizing Jesus and living Him.  Bible studies weren't important.  Jesus studies were.  The Oral Tradition of Jesus WAS the First Century Church.

This could be quite revolutionary if anyone really cared.

Next post: So what exactly was this Oral Tradition?

 

Church or Congregation?

Today we might use these terms interchangeably.  But that would be a mistake.

Many of you already know what I think about our modern-day churches.  Not a fan.  I won't delve off into that too deeply right now. 

Over the first few hundred years of early Christianity, the organization known as the Church was born; it morphed and then evolved eventually into what we have today.  It wasn't what Jesus had set forth and it wasn't what the disciples wanted either.  It became an organization focused on itself rather than an informal gathering about the Resurrected Rabbi. 

In the earliest days, the members of a loosely formed congregation were responsible for doing the work.  A gathering of Christians was called a body.  Many today use that term to mean just a group of believers and nothing more.  But the term body had a very important meaning. 

Jesus spent His days teaching the disciples to do what He was doing.  This is the essence of a true rabbi/disciple relationship.  And when He left He charged them to continue doing what He had been doing.  It was as simple as that. 

A congregation was called a body because it was meant to be His body doing what He had previously been doing.  In other words, the believers, who sometimes congregated in a certain area or place, were mimmicking Jesus in their communities; in their everyday lives.  By doing this, they were allowing Jesus to do what He had been doing even after He was gone.  His BODY was at work.  Make sense?

Now I don't mean to say that there wasn't any informal organization to these congregations.  But the individuals who were believers understood their primary goal/job was to continue to work as His body, doing exactly what He had done.  There were Elders (who were disciples) who taught and at times disciplined.  But it wasn't a group of people worried about by-laws, budgets, parking, child care, worship formats, salaries and all that.  They were not an organization.

As the early church grew they began to formally organize.  They began to own land and property.  They used their communal funds to hire pastors and other clergy to minister.  It was a more 'efficient' way to do the work of Jesus.  They became lazy.  But what actually happened was the ministry of Jesus became crippled.  People were abdicating their responsibility to these paid clergy.  And the paid clergy?  They were there to get paid (commentary for today). 

Without even a simple question, people today project back onto the gathering at Rome (and other congregations) our method of how we currently do church; most believe the earliest churches operated as we now do. It was no coincidence that Christianity flourished in the first and second centuries.  Why?  They were NOT doing business as we do today.  They were focused on the person of Jesus and we're shackled today by an organization and it's self-serving/preserving mindset.

For the church (large and small) today, the first step would be to lose this massive organization and return to being simple congregations; congregations of people mimmicking Jesus in our communities.

The first Christians were simple people learning what Jesus had done (through the Oral Tradition and the disciples) and then doing their best to do just that.  Jesus' body was truly at work. 

Next post:  The Oral Tradition in the First Congregations

 

Restarting The Blog

Over the last few weeks I've received several requests to restart my three Typepad blogs.  So I shall.

As I've gone back and looked at the previous posts I've also come up with a direction for the next few months.  We'll start with a picture of what the First Century Church looked like.  I'll do my best to make one post per week.  Since there are three blogs it may be more like every ten days. 

From there we'll get into looking at what it was like to be a follower, on a personal basis, for those earliest (and most successful) Christians.  Along the way we'll also see what that would look like today.

I'm glad to be back.