LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW - Brock University

SCHAEFFER: HOUSE CHURCHES 29
within that household. The conversion of domestic units meant households
of Christians became the basic social/cultic centres, economic support
systems, and practical means for the extension of the Christian movement. 17
The Christian households, especially the more wealthy ones, would open
their home to other Christians for worship, hospitality, and outreach.
The birthing of house churches was a natural development of the early
church’s theology and missionary methodology. The “seed” of theology and
the “seed” of missiology united to produce the house church.
These house churches, usually consisting of about forty to fifty
people, 18 were planted by Paul and others in important cities located along
the trade route. 19 In some of the larger cities a number of house churches
were planted. For example, if we look at Romans 16, we see there were at
least five separate house churches—the ones which met in the home of
Priscilla and Aquila (v. 5), Aristobulus (v. 10), and Narcissus (v. 11),
along with the two house churches which were greeted in verses 14
and 15. 20
The house churches were sacramental communities. They were not
primarily prayer meetings, although liturgical prayer borrowed from
Judaism 21 and “free” prayer 22 were a very important aspect of their
community life. House churches were not a church within a parish church
(i.e., like a cell group of a larger congregation). The house church was the
whole church in microcosm.
Christians usually gathered on the first day of the week 23 for
catechesis, 24 that is, instruction in the teachings of the prophets, the stories
and teachings of Jesus, and the writings of the apostles, if the autograph or
copy of an autograph, were available. A simple liturgical order which varied
from area to area in the first century would have been used in house church
17 Elliott, A Home for the Homeless 188-89.
18 John Koenig, New Testament Hospitality (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1985) 61,
65; Banks 41-42.
19 Oetting 24; Abraham J. Malherbe, Social Aspects of Early Christianity (Baton
Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1977) 63; Gerd Theissen, Sociology of Early
Palestinian Christianity, trans. John Bowden (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1978) 117-
18.
20 Banks 39.
21 Herman Wegman, Christian Worship in the East and West, trans. Gordon W.
Lathrop (New York: Pueblo Publishing Company, 1985) 21-23.
22 Meeks 147-50.
23 James F. White, Introduction to Christian Worship, rev. ed. (Nashville, TS:
Abingdon Press, 1990) 55-57; Shepherd 142-43.
24 Meeks 81-84; Roland Allen, Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours (Grand
Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1962) 81ff.