The Apostolic Age (30 AD - 100 AD)

Church history, so it's been said that for many Christians, their knowledge of church history goes back as far as the ministry of Billy Graham. And if someone is well-informed, their knowledge goes back as far as the Protestant Reformation.

So that's either going back, what, 50 years or maybe 500 years, but of course, church history extends for nearly 2 ,000 years. So hopefully this teaching series will help us fill in some of the gaps. But when studying church history, you know, it can get really complicated.

We could spend five years doing this instead of five weeks. And I don't know how many weeks we're gonna spend, but this is just gonna be a general overview. I want it to be sort of church history made simple.

Okay, so you have your handout and we're gonna go over some of it in just a minute, but church history, let's say it begins in about 30 to 33 AD with a small number of Jews who believed that Jesus of Nazareth was Israel's Messiah.

So after Jesus was crucified, his disciples began to proclaim that God had raised him from the dead. So the church started with about 120 people, according to Acts 1, verse 15, and then it quickly grew by 3 ,000 on the day of Pentecost, that's Acts chapter two.

And by the time you get to the third century, Christianity had grown to become the dominant religion of the Roman empire. So I would start by saying this, the book of Acts is the book of church history.

That is, it is the book that is inspired by the Holy Spirit that records early church history. So in studying this subject, I would say, read the four gospels, read the book of Acts, that's a starting point.

And I assume most of you have done that. If you haven't, that's your homework. So that's the starting point. But in this series, we're gonna be covering the rest of church history because the book of Acts really only records the first 30 years.

So about 33 AD to 63 AD, that's the book of Acts.

Yes, Larry.

Well, I was gonna ask if,.

Is there like a timeline for Acts, the book of Acts?

Well, there probably is one. I don't have it here. So remind me later and maybe I can get that. So we're gonna break church history up into sections. So I've given you this handout. There is first the apostolic age.

So that's the time period when the apostles were alive and ministering. That's from 30 AD to about 100 AD. Then the next stage is the early church fathers from the apostles to the council of Nicaea. So that's 100 to 325.

The next section of time, the next section will be titled the rise of the Roman Catholic church. So that's the council of Nicaea to the fall of the Roman empire. So that's 325 up until 590. Then you get into the medieval church, also known as the dark ages.

That's from 590 to 1517. And then what happens around 1517? See, this is where people start, okay, I know something about this. This is the Protestant reformation. So that period will be 1517 to 1648.

Then the church during the age of enlightenment, 1648 to 1789. The modern church, 1789 to 1970. I know 1789 doesn't sound very modern to you, but that's how it's broken up. And then the postmodern church, 1970 to the present.

So what age are we living in? The postmodern period. And if you look up the term postmodernism, that's basically the idea. Postmodern means like we are at a time now where people don't even believe in truth.

We don't even believe in absolute truth. So the church is today, as you can imagine, it's a mess out there. I was driving in listening to someone on the radio and they were talking about how certain denominations, the new thing is to have drag queens come in and minister on Sunday morning.

And yes, that is happening. So yeah, if you don't believe in truth, if you don't believe in any right and wrong or anything like that, that type of thing is gonna happen. But of course there is truth and God's word is truth.

Okay, so let's start out with the apostolic age. So I'll get a new thumbnail up there. The apostolic age. So this is from 30 AD to 100 AD. And if you have any questions, just raise your hand as we go along and I'll try to answer your questions if I can.

But the apostolic period, this is the time where the apostles are alive. They're preaching, they're writing the New Testament books. So basically this is from the day of Pentecost right up until the death of the apostle John.

John's the last apostle to die. He died somewhere around 95, 100 AD, something like that. So this period, the apostolic age covers a period of about 70 years. Acts chapter one, verse eight, Jesus says to the apostles, he said, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

So what was the mission that Jesus gave to the disciples or to the apostles? They were to take the gospel and they were to preach in Jerusalem and just spread out from there. Now it took a little while for them to spread out, but they eventually did.

So the main set, what's the first church? Where was the first church located?

Jerusalem.

Okay, so there's Jerusalem and then Antioch. But yeah, the first church of course was Jerusalem. The second most important location, at least originally was Antioch. And then from there you have Rome, Corinth and Ephesus.

So these were sort of the main churches in the early days. James, the brother of Jesus, ended up leading the church in Jerusalem. So he was the pastor of that church. The apostle Paul began his ministry at the church at Antioch and he was sent out of the church at Antioch.

He was sent out as a missionary, if you remember that. Both Peter and Paul were believed to have ministered in Rome. Now, some people will debate whether or not Peter was ever in Rome, but we know Paul was in Rome.

Peter likely was there at some point. And then Ephesus, that city acquired, that church acquired a special importance. Because why? Who knows why? Why was Ephesus so important, Marcus?

Major trade routes.

Yeah, but think of the apostolic age. Why are these churches? So James, the brother of Jesus in Jerusalem, Paul was in Rome. So yeah, it's believed that the apostle John became the pastor of the church in Ephesus.

Christianity likely spread to Ethiopia by the eunuch who was converted by Philip in Acts chapter eight. And in Romans 15, 24, Paul talks about his plans to bring the gospel as far west as Spain. And we don't know if Paul actually made it all the way to Spain, but if he did, that's as far west as Spain, as far south as Ethiopia.

And then church history says, or there's a tradition that says that the apostle Thomas made it as far east as India. So if that's correct, then you can see that the gospel was really brought to more or less the known world at the time.

So who are the major figures during the apostolic age? It's in the name. Yeah, the apostles. What are some other major figures in this time period? So we would say it's the apostles and some of their close associates.

Who is the man who is the close associate of Paul? He's the one who wrote the book of Acts. Who is that?

Luke.

Okay, and Luke obviously wrote one of the gospels, but he wasn't an apostle, but he was a close associate of an apostle. And of course, Mark wrote another gospel. Mark was not an apostle, but he was a close associate of Paul.

But him and Paul had a parting of ways, but Mark was also an associate of Peter. So we would say that the major figures are the apostles and some of their close associates.

Well, Barnabas.

Barnabas, yep. We could add him because him and Paul did a lot of work together. Silas, obviously. Timothy, there's a lot of men we could mention, yes.

Isn't Barnabas actually referred to as an apostle? Or were there only just the 12?

No, there were more than 12. I mean, there were the 12 that you read about in the gospels, but Barnabas was called an apostle, yes. But we would say he was an apostle of the church. He wasn't an apostle of Jesus in the same way that Peter or Paul was.

But don't you agree that it's important that there was a cessation of individuals that could hold the title of apostle?

Right, right.

I think I'm gonna touch on that. So the apostolic age, well, since you brought it up, the apostolic age, we're saying ended by 100 AD. That means there are no apostles after 100 AD. So there's no apostles today.

There were no apostles in 1517. Martin Luther and John Calvin, they were not apostles. Certain men that were key figures throughout church history, they may be very important, but they're not apostles, yes.

So they needed to be eyewitnesses or alive at the time of the eyewitness? I mean, we know that hearsay evidence is inadmissible in court.

Right.

Are qualifications for apostles?

Well, I would say they need to be eyewitnesses and they need to be chosen by Christ himself. So an apostle of Jesus Christ has to be appointed by Christ himself. And Paul was chosen in a unique way because Christ had already ascended to heaven.

But Paul talks about him being the last. First Corinthians 15, he mentions that, "'Last of all, Christ appeared to me.'". So after Paul was made an apostle, there are no apostles after him.

Barnabas and Silas?

Barnabas was an apostle in the sense that he was sent out by the church. So apostle means a sent one. So someone could be sent by the church and be called an apostle, but the apostles of Jesus Christ are the 12, minus Judas and then add Paul, okay?

All right, so this was a unique time because the apostles were alive and they were ministering. A lot of people will idolize the early church. Maybe you've heard somebody say this, they say, oh, if we could only get back to the purity of the early church.

Well, you know, it's understandable that somebody might think that, but the early church, I don't know if you've read the New Testament, you know the early church had problems, didn't it? Don't get too discouraged today as they see all the problems in the church and in churches.

The early church had problems too. They had to hold a church council in Jerusalem to deal with heresy. That's Acts chapter 15. False teachers were a major problem. In fact, nearly every New Testament epistle deals with the issues of false teachers.

There was violence against the church. Paul, obviously before he became an apostle was a persecutor before his conversion. There was the martyrdom of Stephen in Acts chapter seven. There was the martyrdom of James, the apostle James in Acts chapter 12.

And tradition tells us that eventually all of the apostles were killed for the faith with the possible exception of John. But John, we know late in life when he wrote the book of Revelation, he was exiled to the island of Patmos.

So this was a very challenging time for the church. And if you don't believe me that the church had problems, read 1 Corinthians. It's pretty clear. So church history, here's the thing. Church history from the very early days, it was messy.

It was messy.

Why?

Because the church is made up of people and people make it messy.

Ananias and Sapphira.

Yeah, yeah. In one of the first church services in Jerusalem, or maybe it wasn't one of the first, but it was early on, you had people dropping dead in the church service, struck down by God, right? Ananias and Sapphira were struck down.

So don't get too discouraged by the things that are going on today. As people say, the church is not a museum for saints, it's a hospital for sinners. And that's true enough, but at the same time, we shouldn't use that as an excuse.

We just have an anything goes attitude. But the point is the early church had problems, just like churches today have problems. But God, the Holy Spirit was working then. And as long as the church is here on earth, God, the Holy Spirit is working in and through the lives of his people, yes.

The verse that says, God will build his church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

Right.

Falls through all the way through.

Yep.

So just wrapping up this section, the significant figures, again, obviously the apostles, the significant events of the apostolic age which was the first church council, the missionary journeys of Paul, along with the writing of the New Testament scriptures.

So the first book of the New Testament was probably Galatians or maybe first Thessalonians. And I think we all know the last book written, right?

What was it?

Revelation.

There was a threat of division in the early church because of the false teachers, but the unity was preserved through apostolic authority as expressed in their writings, the New Testament scriptures, which we still have today.

So we can have that unity that the early church had if we just look to the New Testament scriptures.