II The Assemblies of Christians
The Acts of the Apostles, the Pauline and other New Testament Epistles, bear witness to the favourable reception of the preaching of the new faith. Paul’s success in Macedonia, Achaia, in the province of Asia, and in Galatia had been extraordinary. Peter in his First Epistle addresses the converts already scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. Paul again expressly mentions in a letter to the Roman Christians, that the faith of the Roman Church was spoken of throughout the whole world.
The story of the progress of Christianity was taken up by the pagan writers Tacitus and Pliny, and was dwelt upon by Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Hermas, Justin, Irenæus, and the other Christian writers of the first and second centuries already quoted.
Thus the great numbers of Christians in Rome and in other centres dating from primitive days, already dwelt upon with some detail, is a clear and indisputable fact.
Nothing did more for the progress and extension of the Christian religion than the constant meeting together, the assemblies of the various congregations of believers.
This was recognized from the earliest days. We read in the Epistle to the Hebrews (x. 25) a solemn injunction to Christians not “to forsake the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is.”
Definite allusions to such “assemblies of believers” occur in the New Testament writings, in the Acts and in the Epistles, e.g. 1 Cor. xi. 20 and following verses, Jas. ii. 2–4.
The importance attached to these meetings of believers by the rulers and teachers of the Church of the first days, is manifest from the chain of reminders and injunctions to the faithful which exists in the contemporary writings we possess of leading Christians, dating from the latter years of the first and all through the second and third centuries.
The words they heard, and the matters decided upon at these gatherings, more or less coloured and guided the life and conduct of Christians in the world. From the first the Sunday meeting seems to have been obligatory; but these meetings of the brethren were by no means confined to the general assembly on Sunday. So we read in the Didaché (the Teaching of the Apostles), a writing probably dating from the latter years of the first century: “Thou shalt seek out every day the company of the Saints, to be refreshed by their words.”51 “Let us,” writes Clement, bishop of Rome (circa A.D. 95), “ourselves then being gathered together in concord with intentness of heart, cry unto Him as from one mouth earnestly, that we may be made partakers of His great and glorious promise.”52
So S. Ignatius (circa A.D. 107–10) in his Epistle to the Ephesian Church53 writes: “Do your diligence therefore to meet together more frequently for thanksgiving to God, and for His glory; for when ye meet together frequently the powers of Satan are cast down, and his mischief cometh to nought in the concord of your faith.”
In his letter to Polycarp he says: “Let meetings be held more frequently.”54
Barnabas (circa A.D. 120–30): “Keep not apart by yourselves, as if you were already justified; but meet together, and confer upon the common weal.”55
Justin Martyr—in his first Apology, written in the middle of the second century—describes these meetings of the brethren with some detail.56
A very striking passage occurs in a writing of Theophilus, the sixth bishop of Antioch, addressed to his friend Autolycus. Its date is between A.D. 168 and A.D. 181. The power which these meetings of the brethren exercised over the life of Christians is described as follows:
“As in the Sea there are Islands... with havens and harbours in which the storm-tossed may find refuge, so God has given to the world, which is driven and tempest-tossed by sins, assemblies... in which survive the doctrines of the truth, as in the island-harbours of good anchorage; and into these run those who desire to be saved... and who wish to escape the wrath and judgment of God.”57