New Testament Church Leadership 1

1. Leadership before Christ
1. At some point around AD49, a Christian couple arrived at the city of Corinth named Priscilla and Aquila. I put the wife's name first because the New Testament typically puts her name first when it is referring to their ministry together. This fact suggests that she generally took the lead in ministry between the two.

Acts 18:2 mentions him first when the couple is first introduced. At that point they have just arrived at Corinth from Rome because the emperor Claudius had expelled Christian Jews from the city. However, she is mentioned first the other two times that the couple is mentioned in Acts. She is mentioned first in Acts 18:18 when they leave Corinth with Paul to go minister at Ephesus. Then she is mentioned first in 18:26, when the couple disciple a man named Apollos in the faith.

Once we realize how male-oriented the Roman and Jewish world was, we immediately find this word order striking. It suggests that Priscilla was more prominent in this couple's ministry than Aquila was. It suggests that she took the lead in relation to the church. Acts 18:26 makes this fact especially clear: when it came to discipling Apollos, Priscilla is mentioned first. This is of course the Apollos who would be the second great "minister" to the church at Corinth, following Paul.

When Paul greets Priscilla and Aquila in Romans 16:3, he mentions her first in the same breath that he speaks of both of them as co-workers with him. He goes on to greet the church that meets in their house. 2 Timothy 4:19 similarly mentions her first in its final greetings. He does mention Aquila first when sending greetings from them to the Corinthian church (1 Cor. 16:19).

The bottom line is that she must have been a spiritual force to reckon with, and none of these texts give any indication that she played some secondary role in their ministry. On the contrary, by far the most natural way to read these texts sees her taking the lead in spiritual things. Perhaps in worldly things like tentmaking he took the lead; we do not know. She seems more prominent in ministry matters.

2. Priscilla and Aquila arrive at Rome before Paul does. They had apparently become believers in Christ at Rome. We do not know exactly how the good news reached Rome. Perhaps some individuals heard the gospel of Jesus on the Day of Pentecost and took it back to Rome. "All roads lead to Rome," the saying went, so it was only a matter of time before some Jews would bring the good news there that the Messiah had come.

It is important to keep in mind that Christianity was not distinct from Judaism at this time and would not be for a long time. The first believers were Jews, and they did not see themselves as part of some new religion. For them, Jesus was the promised Messiah and so believing in him was in fact the culmination of all the promises to Israel. They were the true Israel. They were not abandoning Israel.

Of course belief in Jesus as Messiah was very controversial. As Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 1:23, the claim that God had let the Romans crucify the anointed king of Israel was a "stumbling block" to Jews. It was more than an insult. It was outrageous from an earthly perspective. The Messiah was supposed to be a conqueror, not a "loser." Those were more than fighting words. That was the kind of suggestion that could get you killed!

So it is no surprise that controversy over Christ became so heated in the synagogues at Rome that it not only came to the Roman emperor's attention. He expelled at least the Christian Jews out of Rome, perhaps also some non-believing Jews as well. The Roman historian Suetonius (ca. AD69-126) famously wrote that Claudius "expelled those Jews from Rome who were constantly making disturbances at the instigation of Christ." [1]

Priscilla and Aquila were apparently two of those expelled. We can see them telling other Jews in their synagogue at Rome that Jesus was in fact the Messiah, and we can see incredible controversy taking place. Finally, Claudius expelled those he thought were causing the trouble. The Romans did not like civil disturbances of any kind.

[1] Claudius 25.4. There is some debate of course whether this is a reference to Christ or some Jewish instigator named "Chrestus," but most think it is a reference to Christ, especially given Acts 18:2. The Jewish presence in Rome was so great at this time, that it seems far more likely that Claudius expelled a certain group of Jews rather than all Jews.

Early Christian Teaching 2

... continued from Thursday
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Acts surely wants us to see the picture of the earliest Christians in Acts 2:42-47 as an ideal one.  This is the ideal way believers are supposed to behave and relate to one another.  Acts is not some mere, dispassionate history. Luke told the story in a certain way to emphasize certain things about earliest Christianity. Nowhere in Acts do we get the slightest critique of the way these early believers behaved. On the contrary, Acts probably portrays them more ideally than they actually were!

The picture in these verses is thus an ideal picture of what a community of faith should look like when it is full of the Holy Spirit. [1] Acts gives us at least seven features of this early community here, all of which apply equally to today as they did back then.

First, there was teaching. The apostles were no doubt still figuring a lot of things out at this point, but they knew more than the new believers. They had all the teaching they had heard from Jesus before his ascension. And they were now filled with the Spirit to lead them into more truth (cf. John 14:26, 16:13).

But again, Acts is not just giving us history here.  To Luke, the apostle's teaching probably represented more of something like what 2 Timothy calls a "good deposit" and a "pattern of sound teaching" (2 Tim. 1:13-14).  Ephesians 2:20 also says that the church was built on the foundation of the apostles and (Christian) prophets of its formative period. For us today, these things amount to the New Testament Scriptures.

The ideal church thus involves a teaching of the Scriptures. It will not stop with the Bible, of course, because the Spirit has not stopped working in the church.  For example, God used the first few centuries of the church to clarify a number of key things in the Scriptures, like the Trinity.  Even today, God uses the church to help connect past teaching with new issues and situations. And, of course, God speaks to individual Christians to help them make decisions in their own lives.

Another important point is that discipleship--training of believers to become followers of Christ--is not just a matter of filling people's heads with information.  It is more importantly about formation, about seeing people changed to be more like Christ. It is far more about "training in righteousness" (2 Tim 3:16) than a multiple choice test.

Fellowship is a second key element of healthy church life, and it is also a mechanism for discipleship...

[1] We probably should add, an ideal community of believers in the first century, since the picture no doubt changes a little from time to time and place to place. However, the picture here seems to have a timeless quality to it.