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The early church has a certain glow about it. The Apostles were still alive. Pentecost had just happened. The gospel of Jesus Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection was new. Believers joined the church in droves despite regular persecution, held everything in common, and devoted themselves to the Apostles’ teaching, to fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer (Acts 2:42–44). Christianity was fresh, and the Spirit was moving as the Word did its work (19:20).
But if we glorify the early church without seeing the full picture, we miss something important. There were real problems. The religious establishment that had opposed Jesus extended its persecution to His followers, forcing the early Christians to scatter beyond Judea (Acts 8:1–4). Sexual immorality plagued Corinth (1 Cor. 5). False teaching infected Galatia (Gal. 1:6–7). Christians struggled to define themselves against the Judaism out of which the church had been born (Col. 2:16–17).
The picture, in other words, is complicated. And our tendency is to simplify complicated things. We want either to dismiss the early church for its problems or to hail it as a golden age that we need to recover. But maturity resists that impulse. Both realities are true at once: The early church was messy, and it was glorious. There is much to imitate and much to learn from—both in what people got right and in what they got wrong.
What stands out most to me, though, is the early church’s simplicity. These believers didn’t have shelves of theology books. The New Testament was still being written. When Paul’s letters circulated, they were read aloud to the whole congregation (Col. 4:16), and listeners carried that word with them through the week. The early church was less occupied than we are today with maintaining programs, systems, and institutions. These things aren’t bad, but they can be distracting. From elders to laypeople, their questions were direct: How do we love one another? How do we live faithfully? How do we carry the gospel to the next city?
These are the very questions that the New Testament answers. The concerns of the modern church aren’t trivial, but the danger is when inessential matters distract from Christianity’s beating heart: Jesus Christ, who saves sinners and gives His life so that we might live. We have been crucified with Him, and it is no longer we who live but Christ who lives in us (Gal. 2:20). Walking by the Spirit requires daily dependence on His person and work (Gal. 5:16) and devoting ourselves to the Word, to the church, and to prayer (Acts 2:42–44). Does that describe our lives?