Festival days
The first day of the week was observed as Remembrance Day — the remembrance of the Lord. Luke records: “And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight” (Acts 20:7). This is a simple reference, among others, that establishes this fact. The Jewish church probably continued for a time to observe some of the annual feasts of the Law— the Passover, Unleavened bread, and Pentecost were all Jewish feasts, and they all find mention in the Acts of the Apostles. You will notice in Acts 12:4 we get, in the KJV, the word “Easter”, uniquely in the Bible. Of course it should not be translated Easter: the word is “pascha”, Passover, and all modern versions so translate it. It was the Authorized Version translators who called it Easter, so do not be misled by people who say the Authorized Version is the pure truth, because here we have “Easter” in the Authorized Version, and it ought never to be there.
It is an interesting fact that the date of “Easter” became the subject of controversy very early in the history of the church1. The church was riven apart and torn asunder by arguments about this trifling matter. (The Eastern Church and the Western church fail to agree on it even to this day.) The Christian Jews in New Testament times would appear to have still observed some of these Jewish feasts and fast days. It was not very long before they were taken over, adapted, adopted, and developed by the church, and by the second century you have got all kinds of arguments blowing up, as, for example, the particular day on which Easter ought to be observed.
Other special days were clearly being introduced in apostolic times — in Paul’s own lifetime. “Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy-day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days: which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ” (Col 2.16). Here again Paul is establishing the principles. These things he said are shadows. They do not mean very much at all. The substance is Christ, as Christ is the substance of everything in the Old Testament, as Christ is the substance of everything in the Law; the substance is Christ, but do not let a man judge you in respect of these things. In other words Paul was willing to accept people’s scruples, their little foibles, and their difficulties. They found it difficult to extricate themselves from their Jewish background and they still felt they ought to observe some of these Jewish feasts and fast days, and as far as Paul was concerned that was all right as long as they remembered that Christ was “the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Rom 10:4).
So also in Galatians, because they had now tried to establish some of these days as being binding upon the Church, we find him fighting against it:
“But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, where unto ye desire again to be in bondage? Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain” (Gal 4:9-11).
They were observing these feast days, and festival days; and he says he is afraid of what is going to happen. He does not like what is taking place. He does not like to see these things growing up in their midst. The new churches obviously adopted some of the Jewish feast days, and just as obviously adopted others from the pagan festivals. And it was not very long before the calendar became full of festivals and fasts which helped to “sell” Christianity to the pagan world. Thus, what began as a sensible compromise ended in a corruption of the simplicity which is in Christ. And that is why we should spend time considering these things. They were, after all, sensible compromises. Paul allowed for them. They were not to judge one another in respect of “days.” If one man wanted to esteem a day let him esteem it. If another did not want to esteem it then let him not esteem it. This man esteemed it to the Lord, and this man did not esteem it to the Lord, and God was glorified. It was a sensible, realistic compromise if you like. An adaptation to the situation. But there were dangers in it, and these grew very quickly, until the fast days and feast days and festival days riddled the year for the Christian church, and became a source of argument and strife and debate; and almost took over as the important thing of their religion.2
Fasting
What about fasting? We do not fast today, do we?3They used to in New Testament times, and we are “apostolic Christianity revived.” When do we do our fasting and the laying on of hands? For they are generally associated, in fact, in New Testament times, along with prayer. Prayer, and fasting, and the laying on of hands — often as a means of dedication to a particular task. Now I wonder if again this was one of these transitional things, or whether it was a permanent institution which we ought to practice today. We must not say of any of these things, because we do not do them, that they are not necessary. We must be taught by the Word. We claim that we follow the apostolic practice. Now clearly the apostolic practice was to pray and fast and lay their hands on somebody, as a means of dedicating him to the task he had to do for the Lord.
You will remember how Jesus himself, when the disciples were all at sixes and sevens over the man whose son we would think was epileptic (“possessed with devils”) said, “This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting” (Mark 9:29). I wonder why fasting, as well as prayer? And: “when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away” (Acts 13:3). That was Paul and Barnabas, ordained for the work of the ministry, sent out on their missionary journey: “So they, being sent forth by the Holy Spirit, departed unto Seleucia; and from thence they sailed to Cyprus.” They fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them.
There is another interesting verse (I do not know what you make of this one, because it seems to be one of the “first principles” — what about this for a first principle then?) “Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.” (Heb 6:1-2). There are those (e.g. Bro. John Carter) who interpret this verse as being the principles of the Law for the Jews, and not for Christians, and it could well be that they are right.4All the same, I have heard this verse used a good many times as an evidence of the first principles, because it mentions baptism and resurrection and judgment — but it also mentions laying on of hands as one of the first principles.
Today, we all acknowledge the need for prayer, though I suspect not many of us acknowledge it so directly and purposefully as they did in New Testament times. I do not think as a community we are very good at prayer. This may sound an awful thing to say, but I do not think we are, and I do not think we believe in prayer anything like we should, or anything like they did in New Testament times. So, before we too easily congratulate ourselves on being “apostolic Christianity revived,” or the New Testament church in the 20th century, let us be prepared to compare ourselves with them. We do not give the value and power and importance to prayer that they did in New Testament times, and we certainly do not do much about fasting, at least I do not.
We do not fast in the New Testament sense at all, nor do we lay hands on anybody. It is fair to point out that there is no specific command to do these things. There is nowhere in the New Testament, so far as I am aware, that specifically says we should fast. We are told to pray. “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17), “be constant in prayer” (Rom 12:2 ESV). Prayer is given tremendous prominence and importance, and is commanded, but fasting and laying on of hands are not. But it clearly does seem to have been a common practice of the first century church. And again, of course, it was later on developed in the Catholic and in the Protestant systems as a ritual.
The Catholic fast days and ordination ceremonies and the Protestant ordination ceremonies as well have frightened us off. We have been frightened off a good many things because “they” do it. Because they do it we must not! Of course, it is reasonable to be frightened when you see how these things grew, and how they developed. It is reasonable to be aware of the dangers, but that should not frighten us off if they are right to be done. We ought, if we are sensible Christian men and women, to be able to see that this is right, as it was practiced in New Testament times, and wrong as it developed in the Catholic system in later times.
We do not, as I see it, have any counterpart to the New Testament formula of prayer and fasting and of laying on of hands. Bro. J B Norris in his book, The First Century Ecclesia, takes up this point. Perhaps he does not belabor it quite as much as I have been doing, but he suggests that we should at least have public prayers for brethren commencing a term of office, or before embarking on any special project, and we should say “Amen” to that!
In other words, we may say we do not like the idea of fasting, but it might be good for our souls. We may say we do not like the idea of laying on of hands because look what happened in the church, how it became a ritual and a ceremony. Very well, but one cannot say anything against the idea that we ought to publicly commend our brethren to the service of God when, for example — they are elected to office; or when a brother is going abroad, perhaps on mission work; or when we are going to have a special effort in the ecclesia; or anything of that kind. The very least we ought to do, not the most, but the least, is to have a public acknowledgment of our need for God in prayer on such occasions, and send our brethren off with the prayers of the whole church strengthening their hearts for their work.
Summary
Let me then try to summarize. The church at the end of the first century was organized very differently from its inception in the early chapters of Acts. That seems to me to be axiomatic. When we come towards the end of the first century, when we come even to 35-40 years after the inception of the church, from those early primitive enthusiastic men and women of Acts 4, we have a different set-up. Numbers have been tremendously increased and the Gentile churches were flourishing, and these things were bringing inevitable changes with them. There was an adaptability and a flexibility about their arrangement to accommodate the new situation. Organization and administration developed in New Testament times under the guidance of the Apostles. Increasing numbers required suitable housing and church buildings became a necessity.
Christian worship necessarily became more formalized. Christian hymns took their place alongside Jewish psalms. Regular breaking of bread meetings became a feature of their weekly life. Collections took the place of communistic living. Outside influences crept in from the pagan world. Jewish and even heathen feast days and festivals began to be adapted for Christian uses. The seeds for future hierarchy and apostasy were being sown. The church of Jerusalem was on the way to Rome.
- The Council of Nicea, famous for the Nicene Creed, also decided to change the date for the Remembrance of the death of Jesus from that of the Jewish Passover.
- And still for us in our days: what to do about Christmas is still a matter of dispute among Christadelphians.
- The use of Fasting in these days was discussed in The Tidings, 2010, p 293.
- John Carter, in his “Epistle to the Hebrews” on this section.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One