First Christian Voices: Practices of the Apostolic Fathers

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First Christian Voices

Superior Gospel I gnatius to the P hiladelphians 8 b –9: I trust in the grace of Jesus Christ who will free you from every chain. And I urge you to do nothing out of dissension, but according to the teaching of Christ. When I heard some saying, “If I do not find it in the ancient Scriptures I will not believe the gospel,” I said to them, “It is written.” They replied, “That remains to be proved.” But to me Jesus Christ is in the place of all that is ancient. His cross and death and resurrection and the faith which is by Him are undefiled monuments of antiquity by which I desire to be justified through your prayers. The priests indeed are good, but the High Priest is better. To Him the Holy of Holies has been entrusted, and He alone has been trusted with the secrets of God. He is the door of the Father, by whom enter Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the prophets and the apostles and the church. All of these join together in the unity of God. But the gospel possesses something superior; namely, the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, His passion, and resurrection. For the beloved prophets announced Him, but the perfect gospel is eternal. All these things together are good if you believe with love. A Call to God T o D iognetus 10: If you also desire this faith, you must first of all receive the knowledge of the Father. For God has loved humanity, on whose account He made the world, to whom He subjected all the things that are in it, to whom He gave reason and understanding, to whom alone He imparted the privilege of looking upwards to Himself, whom He formed after His own image, to whom