First Christian Voices: Practices of the Apostolic Fathers

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First Christian Voices

to act not just civilly with one another, but in genuine love for each other. Finally, the early authors shared a deep concern for the reputation of the church in the community. In some cases as mentioned, they warned the church that outsiders were watching and that their actions caused people to be blasphemous (1 Clement 47). On other occasions, they defended the actions of Christians as examples of good citizens living in the Roman Empire (To Diognetus 5). While there are limited examples of the direct proclamation of the gospel, the content of that proclamation is clearly considered: it was about Jesus as both Lord and Savior, God and King. Even so, some have argued that the early church fermented the faith in a slow process of simply witnessing by example. 10 While this is true at some level, the Apostolic Fathers were mostly concerned with the church where it had already been planted rather than the continuing expansion of Christianity in the world. For the testimony of expansion, we turn to the early church histories of Eusebius and Socrates of Constantinople. Nevertheless, these three concerns harmonize well with the writings of Jesus’ apostles themselves. The New Testament letters of Paul, Peter, James, Jude, and John all express concern for proper belief about Jesus, corresponding behavior among His followers, and outward witness to the world. So, we can easily conclude that the selected works of these Apostolic Fathers, those connected in some way with the apostles, express a continuation of the work of Jesus’ disciples and therefore of Jesus Himself. We learn from them something that

10 Alan Kreider, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church: The Improbable Rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016).