Q. What did the early church do on Sunday?
A. Historically, every Sunday Christians came together for a very specific kind of worship. They didn’t just come together to pray or to sing hymns, or to listen to a sermon. They didn’t come together to read their New Testaments — they didn’t yet have them — though they read the Old Testament. Certain important letters which became what we call the New Testament were sometimes read aloud to them when they gathered, like the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans, or to the Corinthians, or Galatians, etc.
But what they really came together for was what Christians for centuries have called the Holy Communion. In Scripture this event is sometimes called “the breaking of bread,” such as in Acts 20:7, which says, “Now on the first day of the week [Sunday], when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them …” So, from the very beginning of the Church of the New Testament, Christians came together on the first day of the week to break bread. In other words, they came together on Sundays to receive Holy Communion.
Many churches, Trinity Anglican Church included, continue the historic practice of partaking of Holy Communion every Sunday. We do so in continuity with the apostles and with the testimony of the ancient Christian church. For example, all the way back in A.D. 155, the early Christian leader, Justin Martyr, explained Christian worship to the Roman emperor, saying, “On the day we call the day of the sun [Sunday], all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read … Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the one who presides over the brethren in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings … And this food is called among us [the Eucharist],” which in Greek means thanksgiving. [St. Justin Martyr, Apology 1, 65-67.] “The Eucharist” is another historic name for the millennia-old service of Holy Communion.
It was the universal testimony of the early church that all baptized Christians come together on the first day of the week to give thanks to God through Jesus Christ and to celebrate the Holy Communion.
Come continue the tradition with us at Trinity Anglican every Sunday at 10 a.m.
I’d be happy to answer any questions you may have about the Christian faith. Send your questions or comments to pagosapriest@gmail.com. Christ be with you.
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