Study to be quiet
The phrase “study to be quiet” sums up in a sense the Christian way of life. The New Testament word “study” means to put all your energies forward — it does not mean to read books. It means apply yourself. Conybeare and Howson say that the nearest equivalent you can get in English is to say: “Make it your ambition to be unambitious.” It is a play on words. You are to strive to lead a quiet life, to work with your own hands, to go about your daily business. So what Paul was really saying to the Christians of the first century was that they were called not to do spectacular things, but to be something; to be the kind of people that God wanted them to be. To live the Truth out in their daily life. To lead a quiet life of faithfulness and service and love towards others, so that men would be able to see, by the quality of their life, what changed people you were since becoming members of the Christian religion.
This was the task of every Christian. It was the task of some in apostolic times to go and preach the gospel in far-off lands. It was the task of some to have the ministry of healing and miracles. It was the task of some to be “prophets” in the ecclesia. But it was the task of everybody to be “examples of the believers, in word, in conversation, (which means your manner of life) and in godliness.” And in the quiet life of the everyday to display the love and the warmth and the enthusiasm of men and women called to be saints.
We go back to “the love chapter” and we put it into its context in Paul’s writing. “Though 1 speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity [love], I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal” (1Cor 13:1). Now, why did Paul write all that? It was not intended as an “essay” on Christian love. What he wrote it for was to try to drill into their minds that this is what Christianity is all about. There they were, arguing about which was the more important of all the Spirit gifts. They have to write to Paul and say; “Look, give us your ruling about it, Apostle Paul, we would like to know. There are some of us who think that the gift of speaking with tongues is the most important, and there are others who say that it is the gift of prophecy, or miracles.”
Paul has to say to them in effect, “This is the way you ought to look at it. If you really want to serve the Lord, then the gift of prophecy is the most important, because you are able to instruct others, and to help others in their understanding; so if you want to have a gift, aspire to prophecy first of all. All these more spectacular gifts, such as speaking with tongues, are well down the list, right at the bottom. They do not really matter very much.” So, “covet, the best gifts,” is his advice. If you want to serve the ecclesia, if you want to be one of the serving brethren, this is all right, as long as you want it for the right motives. There is work to be done, there are offices to be held, but I am going to tell you something that is more important than all of it, and show you a more excellent way.
“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Cor 13:1-3).
All these other things, he says, are not really important. They have their place, — and their part to play in the building up of the church. They were necessary, and God bestowed the gifts. But these were not the lasting qualities, for “but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away” (1 Cor 13:8). There are some things on the other hand, he says, that shall never cease. And these are the work of God’s spirit in men’s lives throughout all ages, and they apply today as well. These are the things we must keep central, always central, in our thinking about religion; in our thinking about what we like to call “the Truth”; in our thinking about the Bible, and Christianity, and the New Testament church, these are the central things. “Faith, hope and love, these three, and the greatest of these is love.”
The evolution of the Church’s attitudes: The adaptability of the Church: Jerusalem to Rome
WE have already seen in our previous studies development taking place even in the apostolic church. As numbers increased, the organization to meet the needs of the increasing number became necessary, and the small group of enthusiasts in the Jerusalem Ecclesia who shared everything in Acts 4 became an organized body having various parts and functions. It became necessary to have more specialization in the work as seen, for instance, in Rom 12:6-13. By the second century this simple and necessary organization of the work appears to have grown already into a rigid hierarchical system. Though still simple, as we move into the second century, it is nevertheless much more advanced than in the New Testament church. By the end of the third century we clearly have a world-wide highly organized church and early in the fourth century, in the Constantinian period, something very similar to the Roman Catholic system had emerged, which survives to this day in various forms: Roman; Anglican; Greek Orthodox; and so on. Perhaps it was inevitable that with the massive increases in numbers there should be a dilution of the primitive simplicity of Christianity, or perhaps it was the dilution of the original simple gospel by philosophical considerations which led to the increase in numbers.
There were certainly some adaptations made to meet the changing situation of the church in New Testament times and some of these we have already seen. The first church at Jerusalem was clearly Jewish in origin and in membership. It still gravitated to the temple and to the synagogue. So in Acts 3:1 we find Peter and John going up into the temple at the hour of prayer, and it would seem probable that they were going up there to take part in the temple service. Later on, when Paul and Barnabas took the message out to the Gentile world they always seem to have gone to the synagogue first of all. Acts 13:5 and verses 14-15 are examples of this. We have already looked from another angle at the Council at Jerusalem in Acts 15, which was clearly making new decisions in the light of the changing circumstances brought about by the influx of Gentile Christians. And in the pronouncement made by “the apostles and elders with the whole church” which we have looked at already we see the transitional period brought to a head in the declaration sent out to all the churches for their obedience.
“For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things; that ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well” (Acts 28:15).
A transition period
Now it seems to me that the church here, in this Council at Jerusalem, is meeting a new situation and devising a form of words, which is a compromise to help their Jewish brethren over a difficult period. It was a transition period. The church was having to adapt to the idea that the Gentiles, to whom Paul was preaching the gospel of grace, were not in any sense nurtured in the Laws of Moses, but because this offended their Jewish brethren, who had been brought up in the rigid obedience to the Law, this pronouncement was made, I think, as a temporary measure. That is to say, it would not appear to have relevance at all to the days in which we live.
I would not think that even the Apostle Paul later on would have viewed this as being a good definition of the Christian position in regard to the Jewish law. It was simply a transitional judgment for the time then present which the church decreed, and the apostles and elders and all the brethren felt to be a necessary thing. I know that from time to time brethren still argue whether or not we should eat black pudding or blood sausage and things of that kind, but I do not think, personally, it has anything at all to do with us today. Paul has made it clear that whatever is sold in the market place you can eat, “asking no questions for conscience sake.” The only overriding principle in the matter is the good of one’s brother — the fear of offending (or “causing to stumble”) one of one’s brethren.
This is just one example of the way in which the attitude of the Christian church grew and adapted to its changing membership. It is only by realizing that there was this shift of emphasis taking place, this changing attitude, that we can understand the apparent inconsistency of Paul:
- “Taking and circumcising Timothy,”
- Associating himself with the Jews who were under a vow,
- Appearing to be anxious to prove himself to be a good law-abiding Jew.
Because this is what they were urging on Paul: they were saying, “There are all these Jews here and they have heard that you do not keep the Law, and that you are saying the Law does not matter any longer. Now prove to them that you are a good Jew and put yourself at charges with these men and associate with them in their vow.”
Because he wanted to win the Jews to hear his message, Paul was willing to do this thing. In fact, of course, he was putting into practice his own teaching, when he said “For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; (1Cor 9:19-20). But let us be clear that when Paul adapted himself, he always compromised from strength. He always maintained what was right. For example, he declared the true position to be that “an idol is nothing in the world and that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is nothing” (1 Cor 8:4). We know that, he says, so start from there. Now having accepted this as the true position, he could begin to bend over backwards to accommodate the Jewish brethren who have doubts and difficulties over this matter.
There is a lesson here for us. We must always maintain the principles of the truth. We must always maintain what is clearly and Scriptural laid down. But having maintained that, we must always be prepared to meet the other man half way in the difficulties that arise among us. Many of our ecclesial problems, I believe, have arisen from a refusal to compromise. We have made some kind of great virtue out of being uncompromising. But compromise from strength, from righteousness, from principle, is a good thing. We should seek unity and not uniformity, and this is what Paul was doing. He wanted to gather in as many as possible, so he held his own position, but was prepared to bend towards others in order to help them, if it were possible, to see the truth that he had to proclaim. However, when the church compromised its principles then it became “the mother of harlots” as we well know.
The same adaptability to changing conditions is seen in other ways and these I want to go on to now, because we have already looked often enough at the way in which the church had to deal with the Judaizing element.
We have seen previously the establishment of ecclesial officers in the New Testament and the growth of the church organization to a quite complex order of ministry. From very simple beginnings when the apostles were clearly the leaders appointed by the Lord Jesus himself, and Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples and they listened to what he had to say, we go on into later New Testament times when we have the whole order of bishops, elders, evangelists, pastors, teachers, deacons, ministers and so on which we have already studied. There was a development here, a necessary development, and this is the point. All these evolved in order to adapt to the changing conditions; increased numbers; the growth of the church; and the bringing in of the Gentiles: That was why these things took place.
The lesson we may take is that although necessary developments take place, the danger is that they may accelerate and go too far. Thus, from a reasonable development in New Testament times, in which the various ecclesial offices and officers were clearly developed, and wisely so, under the guidance of the apostles, we only have to move into the second century to find the breach growing between the clergy and the laity, and the bishops taking more power and riches to themselves with the growth of the church hierarchy to which I have already referred.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One