Where did the early church meet? Houses or Church

[Sister Alvear]

This thread is interesting. I may be wrong and let me state we have many house churches like all foreign countries however it is good to have a building big enough to do other things also... When the emphasis moves to the building and not Christ then something is wrong with our focus and balance.

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by ManOfWord

Regularly? Please explain and give examples of the frequency of these occurrences.

Well... that will take time. I will see what I can pull together.

But, to me, the whole point concerning the capacity in which they visited the temple is explained in this one scripture.

Act 5:42 And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ.

[Twisp]

Originally Posted by coadie

The dangers of the most famous house church is very clear, it is a pastor, children and sons and daughters in laws plus grand kids.

It is a powerfull set up to prevent the questioning of false doctrine.

It like most house churches doesn't do baptisms and grows by reason of children being born.

Mormon churches grow roughly equal to birth rates. Most people don't know this. Mormons have a few children per family and if you count growth of people not born into a Mormon Home, the number coming roughly equals the number leaving





Can you give us some real numbers?

The grocery bill for the singular gathering for home churches is something regular churches do not have,

I cringe when i hear people claim to cringe about a church being called the house of God.


It proves they had an ungodly attitude when they enterd the sanctuary.

That one struck me as interesting. Invalid doctrine is held onto in a church building as much as in a home church.

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by Twisp

That one struck me as interesting. Invalid doctrine is held onto in a church building as much as in a home church.

So true. This is seen so often.

By the reasoning presented... it is dangerous to meet in a church building because false doctrine is known to be spread there.

[ManOfWord]

Originally Posted by Digging4Truth

Well... that will take time. I will see what I can pull together.

But, to me, the whole point concerning the capacity in which they visited the temple is explained in this one scripture.

This is true, obviously from scripture. However, we only have a few instances where there was trouble because of it. Trouble for sure, but even Jewish history records the "Nazarenes" being a part of the synagogue for quite a while. The Christians were NOT kicked to the curb on the day of Pentecost or even shortly thereafter. That is historical record that the Bible does contradict.

Here is a case in point: From what I have studied of the history of the Judaism of Jesus' time, there were 2 main schools of thought regarding the law. Hillel & Shammai. Hillel was regarded as the kind Pharisee and Shammai was very rigid and legalistic in his approach. (almost like the 1 step vs 3 step views) Hillel was the Nasi and Shammai was #2 under him. Normally, Hillel's interpretations were accepted, which constantly put them and their followers at odds with each other.

It is believed that when Jesus came against the Pharisees that He came against the "school" of Shammai and their legalistic interpretations of the law. Without knowing this bit of well documented history, it is easy to come to the conclusion that Jesus spoke out against ALL Pharisees, when in fact, He did not. In fact, nothing Jesus said or taught, disqualified him from being a normative Rabbi of the sect of the Pharisees. Shammai was an aristocrat and Hillel was a man of the people.

This is just a teeny tiny bit of info stemming from a study of the Jewish Roots of Christianity.

[tbpew]

Originally Posted by ManOfWord

This is true, obviously from scripture. However, we only have a few instances where there was trouble because of it. Trouble for sure, but even Jewish history records the "Nazarenes" being a part of the synagogue for quite a while. The Christians were NOT kicked to the curb on the day of Pentecost or even shortly thereafter. That is historical record that the Bible does contradict.

Here is a case in point: From what I have studied of the history of the Judaism of Jesus' time, there were 2 main schools of thought regarding the law. Hillel & Shammai. Hillel was regarded as the kind Pharisee and Shammai was very rigid and legalistic in his approach. (almost like the 1 step vs 3 step views) Hillel was the Nasi and Shammai was #2 under him. Normally, Hillel's interpretations were accepted, which constantly put them and their followers at odds with each other.

It is believed that when Jesus came against the Pharisees that He came against the "school" of Shammai and their legalistic interpretations of the law. Without knowing this bit of well documented history, it is easy to come to the conclusion that Jesus spoke out against ALL Pharisees, when in fact, He did not. In fact, nothing Jesus said or taught, disqualified him from being a normative Rabbi of the sect of the Pharisees. Shammai was an aristocrat and Hillel was a man of the people.

This is just a teeny tiny bit of info stemming from a study of the Jewish Roots of Christianity.

IMO, two things that are noteworthy for folks holding on to the central building system:
1. The FORMER tabernacle was a building; the new tabernacle is something very different...a BODY.
2. God's wisdom saw fit to allow the big bad Roman army to come and dismantle the former thing, stone by stone (brick by brick).

Rebuilding a former thing that God has replaced (even one that may have had some activity for some transitional period), would be contrary to God.

[coksiw]

I stumbled across this thread while reading about the role of synagogues in early christianity.

I want to clarify here that the Bible doesn’t say that Christians met at synagogues, instead that their visits to synagogues were mainly evangelistic in nature according to context. The verses posted by the OP do not prove his point.

Maybe the reason synagogues were not used was because their membership fee that they, to this day, still charge their members. Just speculating.

We all know by the Scripture that Christians used to gather in houses and in large areas when doing city wide gathering, as long as they could. But all instances of meetings in synagogues I see in the Bible were evangelistic in nature.

[votivesoul]

Originally Posted by coksiw

I stumbled across this thread while reading about the role of synagogues in early christianity.

I want to clarify here that the Bible doesn’t say that Christians met at synagogues, instead that their visits to synagogues were mainly evangelistic in nature according to context. The verses posted by the OP do not prove his point.

Maybe the reason synagogues were not used was because their membership fee that they, to this day, still charge their members. Just speculating.

We all know by the Scripture that Christians used to gather in houses and in large areas when doing city wide gathering, as long as they could. But all instances of meetings in synagogues I see in the Bible were evangelistic in nature.

See James 2:2, where "assembly" is the Greek word συναγωγὴν or synagogen.

https://biblehub.com/interlinear/james/2-2.htm

Does James here mean, just a place of meeting, where the saints gather, or does he mean an official synagogue?

[Esaias]

Originally Posted by votivesoul

See James 2:2, where "assembly" is the Greek word συναγωγὴν or synagogen.

https://biblehub.com/interlinear/james/2-2.htm

Does James here mean, just a place of meeting, where the saints gather, or does he mean an official synagogue?

Synagogue also meant a gathering of people for a (Judean) religious purpose, not just a location where the meeting took place. Most synagogue buildings are called "temple" or "house".