The early church believed that the church is the body of Christ and constitutes the temple. Jesus said this about their temples IF THE TEMPLE WAS DESTROYED HE WOULD BUILD A NEW ONE IN 3 DAYS the Jews thought He was talking about their temple the building, but Jesus was referring to His body that was raised up on the 3rd day
Since Jesus has risen, we believers are now the temple of God as He has taken up residency in us. It is for this reason that the new testament ALWAYS reserves the word …CHURCH… for the people of GOD (maybe the royal community would be a better translation) and NEVER A BUILDING.
Christianity was the only thing on earth that had no sacred objects, persons, or spaces and did not erect sacred buildings for their worship. The Christian faith / church was started outside (day of Pentecost) and met in homes, courtyards, and roadsides. The Christianity that conquered Rome was A HOME / HOUSE CENTERED MOVEMENT. It was a conscious choice of the early believers not to build buildings and meet in houses. Christians did not begin to calling their buildings temples until the fifteenth century.
SACRED SPACES AND OBJECTS
IN THE 2ND AND 3RD CENTURY’S A SHIFT OCCURRED, and believers began to accept the pagan view of reverencing the dead and prayers for the saints and later prayer to the saints began. Then holy spaces as they erected monuments over the grave sites and was also a pagan practice. Then art came in and they began to decorate the tombs, interestingly THE CROSS as an artistic reference of Christ death cannot be found prior to the time of Constantine. Christ on the cross made its first appearance in the fifth century.
So by the 3rd century Christians had sacred spaces and objects and they would soon have a SACRED PRIESTHOOD. Now that Christians had begun to think like pagans it set the stage for the man who would be responsible for the CHURCH BUILDING.
CONSTANTINE
By AD 324 this man was the emperor of the Roman empire, shortly afterwords he began ordering the construction of Christian church buildings.
HE DID SO TO PROMOTE THE …POPULARITY…AND…ACCEPTANCE…OF CHRISTIANITY.
If the Christians had THEIR OWN … SACRED BUILDINGS…….like the JEWS and PAGANS…..their faith would be regarded as…..L E G I T I M A T E ………
WOW I have to talk about this for just a moment as this is an incredible thing to happen to the Church (the people of GOD) Christians had been martyred, mistreated, rejected, and despised for a long time. Being legitimate and accepted would have been a great temptation for sure, BUT AT WHAT COST did this happen…well by the end of the 5th century it went into the DARK AGES.
Think about what was accomplished thru the early people of GOD (the church) believers, the world was turned upside down (or right side up), many signs and miracles were done, great power was upon them as they told of the mighty resurrection of Jesus, the world new who these people were and many believed with them, they sold land and houses (OK LARRY YOU HAVE GONE TO FAR NOW DONT EVER EXPECT US TO DO THAT KIND OF STUFF) they had ALL THINGS in common, met daily from house to house, and on and on.
BUT IN THOSE WONDERFUL DAYS OF ACTS…..THEY WERE…NOT
ACCEPTED……..NOR WERE THEY……LEGITIMATE……….
AS COMPARED TO THE RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS OF THEIR DAY.
Now we have lost what the early believers (the church) had, and it must be restored in these last days, they new nothing of church in a box (church building) they were the CHURCH… A LIVING , BREATHING, MOVING ABOUT, ORGANIC, POWERFUL, LOVING, CARING, GIVING, ORGANISM.
The church building would change everything for the people of GOD and along with many other traditions of man would in a short time bring on the dark ages. Even tho many truths have been restored…the order of the service and most of the practices and where we meet are still in the dark ages.
And now for the good news…there is an awakening in the land... I dont expect the old ways to change much (cant put new wine into OLD HARD DRY wine skins) but we can be a part of a new way (for us) to do things and that my friends will bring about a dynamic change from the status quo (means THE MESS WE ARE IN) of today’s idea of what church is.
So if your tired of the mess hang in there and believe GOD with me for the change IN US FIRST then in those around us.
God bless you and be a blessing to some one today…they really need it.
Larry
PS- as far as the objects I talked about, crosses and such I am not talking about you getting rid of all of that stuff….this is just the history of where all of this stuff that isn’t in the Bible came from and not that its all bad, it just isn’t in the word or was it practiced by the early church….as always BE LED BY THE WORD AND THE HOLY SPIRIT. And dont worship the object.
Acts 29 Today 