Читать книгу Church for Every Context - Michael Moynagh - Страница 49

We can learn a great deal about the new Antioch church from an ancient document known as the Didache – or ‘The Teaching of the Apostles’ – originating, some think, around the years ad 50–70. One of the remarkable actions of these Jewish Christians was intentionally to welcome Gentiles to table fellowship in a house-church setting. This was unheard of in the Mediterranean world, where food and meal-sharing were used to draw strict lines of separation not only between Jews and non-Jews, but between the various class and ethnic divisions in Graeco-Roman society. For Jews, especially, a meal with a Gentile would have been a contaminating experience!

Instead, the Antiochene Christians overcame their fears and prejudices in order to provide hospitality to the strangers in their midst. While ensuring that the food they ate had no connections with idolatry, they sat at table with individuals who had never been circumcised and ‘with the people who are righteous and humbled’ (Didache 3.9).1 Once the Jerusalem Council gave its authorization, they did what Jesus had often done himself. Quite scandalously, he had associated with some of the most marginal and, yes, sinful of people, going so far as to actually dine with them, whether in their homes or in banquet halls.

The Antiochenes knew that sharing a domestic meal with their Gentile neighbours was a personal way of expressing what life was like in the kingdom of God. For their part, the guests would have experienced a family-like atmosphere, with new brothers and sisters in a loving, caring fellowship – perhaps compensating for the loss of family that some had suffered as a result of their conversion from pagan religions.

The Didache shows us what it was like to enter into this new way of life. It began with instruction and mentoring in preparation for baptism. That may come as a surprise if we imagine instruction in the modern sense of classroom lectures or book study. Rather this was a time of learning through participation in the daily and weekly patterns of house church life. The apprenticeship terminology of a master-trainer (such as the use of didaskein as the verb form for training), the second-person singular address (such as ‘my child’) and the overall sequence of formative events indicate that an intimate context of one-to-one mentoring preceded wider fellowship in Agape meals. In these varied contexts, deep spiritual bonds developed as the newcomers became more fully acquainted with the community (Milavec, 2003, pp. 48–9).

It was often the case in the early house church that the Eucharist was celebrated within the context of the Agape meals. We might imagine what it would have been like to have reached the point where the newly baptized were invited to partake of the consecrated bread and wine – with the ‘real presence’ of the Lord modelled in the fellowship of believers. This was a radically new way to practise the presence of God; nothing quite like this had ever been recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures.2

It was an act of hospitality that communicated who Jesus was and what his mission was about at many different levels. There was a sense of gradual initiation in the life of the Didache community – a progression of stages and events that led each person into ever deeper and more meaningful experiences of life with God and God’s people.3 One would learn, fairly quickly, that this life was a matter of continued growth in radically new directions, especially in love and trust toward God and neighbour, and in understanding what life was about and where it was headed according to the mission of God. At each point, basic human needs were addressed – the need to eat and drink, most obviously, but also the need for friendship and community.

Here an individual learned the importance of serving others, especially in the preparation of meals and other aspects of hospitality. Each meal that was shared would have been a major communal undertaking, requiring leadership and coordination by deacons/deaconesses. Resources would have to be gathered from members throughout the church membership (not just from the wealthy patrons) and put to the best use.

The community also had to practise family love, doing what families do at meal time in a domestic setting. Among the instructions given to each member of the community was that they would ‘not turn away from anyone in need but share everything . . . holding back nothing as just your individual property’ (Didache 4.8). To enter into the atmosphere of this family would have been a profound experience of sharing, acceptance, and participation.

There was also a sense of God’s unfolding mission here – what some might call a realized eschatology – a sense of what life is like in God’s kingdom: the gathering of such a mixed assembly, especially at a common table, defied social norms and overcame shameful status, signalling a new way of being together not unlike that anticipated in the eternal banquet with Jesus. In this way, the Didache says, ‘may your church be gathered together into your kingdom from the very ends of the earth’ (9.4).

How had this vibrant community come about? What enabled the early Christians to adjust so quickly to a new culture, a new people? Perhaps the scattered quotations from the prophets that we see in the Book of Acts – the first history book of the church – provide a clue. The newly born church in Antioch was convinced that it was part of an age-old story that was now being fulfilled in a rather strange and marvellous way. It may have heard about the apostle Peter’s startling declaration on Solomon’s Porch: ‘You are the descendants of the prophets and of the covenant that God gave to your ancestors, saying to Abraham, “And in your descendants all the families of the earth shall be blessed”’ (Acts 3.25).4

Knowing the story was one crucial ingredient in this emerging church, but participating in it was even more significant. In a novel act, the mixed membership of this community re-enacted the story by drinking it in. Gathered at table, the fellowship of believers said the words: ‘We give thanks to you, our Father, for the holy vine of David, your servant, which you have made known to us’ (Didache 9.2). At this point, the common cup of blessing was passed, to be followed by the blessing of a broken loaf of bread, and then thanksgivings and petitions. Among the petitions was a prayer that the Lord would ‘remember . . . your church, deliver her from evil, make her complete in your love, and gather her from the four winds into your kingdom you have prepared for her’ (Didache 10.3).

In effect, a new kind of community had formed by grounding itself in an old story. Listening, loving and serving, and building new relationships were necessary ingredients as Antioch became a new centre of missionary endeavour – moving with the gospel of Jesus Christ in service to God and neighbour.