Video Transcript: Q & A with Henry Reyenga

Henry - Carolyn, one of the things I was fascinated about as I've been listening to your  presentations is this concept as house churches started to emerge, and then how houses  were situated with a terrace. And there was customs that certain people would sit in certain  places. And that was latent in the culture in general. And then we hear like in somebody's, like the book of James, my brothers, as believers in our glorious, Lord Jesus don't show favoritism.  Suppose a man comes into your meeting, that's assembly, you know, house church, with a  gold ring and fine clothes and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in, if you show special same attention to the men wearing fine clothes, here's a good thing for you, let's say for the  poor man, you stand there, you sit on the floor by by feet, have you not discriminated among  yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts. That's fascinating language.  

Carolyn - And it's about social discrimination. Really. It was in the culture, to treat someone  who was well dressed and apparently, obviously, upper class, you know, to treat them better  than the poor person in in the shabby clothes. Maybe it still is as part of our culture, you  know. And, and James is very strong about this.  

Henry - what I read in this passage, I heard this because one of the passages that motivates  my heart to bring free high quality ministry training to anyone and turn no one away, and not  just high quality administrating. We're talkng like people like Dr. Osiek here who study this  their whole life. I don't want to just make any of this up. I want the best. Because in some  ways, we want to welcome everybody. We don't want to like, Oh, you have to pay you have  $50,000 for this education to get that? No, it's for everyone. I know, there's all accreditation  or all kinds of complicated complications, but at the end of the day, Christianity is always  welcoming and inclusive. And  

Carolyn - comment about I think your translation says favoritism, some translations say,  partiality. The Greek word is prosópolémpsia, which is receiving the face, to receive the face  to pay attention to the face, you know, and you're not to do that, and not to to, in other  words, don't go on first appearances, or outward appearances or first impressions.  

Henry - Now, I will talk about Philemon household, the house church, there's Apphia in there  and what about a house church look like do you think in your opinion, since you're educated  opinion?  

Carolyn - Well, the household of Philemon hosts the house church that that's quite sure. And  there are three names at the beginning of the letter, it's Philemon, Apphia, and Archippus.  And we don't know how they're related. But within a verse or two, the plural address, switches to singular, Paul is now writing to a single single person who is masculine. So it's presumably  Philemon. But we don't know whether Apphia is his wife. Or if Apphia and Archippus are  married, or if they're all three siblings, we don't know. But the fact that he writes to all three  of them, indicates that they somehow together are some kind of a household team and  perhaps a ministry for what's going on in that household.  

Henry - Interesting. And they obviously included slaves and then a larger gathering. Now I find it's fascinating in like in Corinthians and this is of very early Christianity, where these house  churches are dealing even with variations, like, you know, even addressing, you know, sexual  deviation of the reports that this is somebody sleeping with that person you know it comes  back to being with the house church structure is the structure strong enough to hold such  accountability. You know, I just think about that's fascinating that that something like this  could get in, you know, he specifically now get with HIPAA laws and with shaming, we don't do that in churches. I've been in plant churches, church, planting. All these things are extremely  confidential and private, but they really didn't do this back then.  

Carolyn - Paul is throwing his weight around and trying to use his authority to say, Don't do  this. We just don't do it that way. Whether see that's again, we'd love to have their response 

we'd have we'd love to know what actually happened when they got that letter. We don't  know.  

Henry - One more thing when someone was ordained as a minister, a diakonos minister was it very typical to have a house church, how typical was a house church? Like? If you became a  believer? And you sense you know like in a sense we think of ministry calling as sort of  ministry training now would have been similar then or do you think that a lot of people had  house churches?  

Carolyn - I think there were as many house churches as there needed to be to fit to  accommodate the number of people. Yeah. And if one got too crowded, they'd look around  and then say, Okay, we got to we've got to meet somewhere else now. who is going to host  this and and who's going to lead it? So it was a question of discernment, to meet the needs?  

Henry - One last question in that culture, a female hosting a house church would that have  been considered, like odd or extraordinary.  

Carolyn - That's hard to say. Unusual, I guess, unusual, it was happening, it was happening,  Oh, of course, it was happening. And there are other there it's not only in Christianity, there  are other women who own their own houses, and are operating a household with hospitality,  having their own parties, entertainment, this kind of thing, you know, so. So it's not unheard  of the model. And when we talk about household codes, which I think is the next lesson  coming up, when we talk about the household codes, I will talk about some of the background on treatises on household management. And they all assume a male head of household. And I have worked with Roman social historians to say, give me examples of women who are  running households and there, and there are a few, they aren't talked about, because they're  not the norm. But they are there they exist. And having a woman running a house or house  church is an adaptation of it. It's her house. And she's the one who offers the hospitality. So  she's the normal person.  

Henry - Now, if what you say is true, that, in general culture in the Roman culture where that  we actually have mentioned, Nympha and other gals Phoebe, that have house churches, you  know what that tells me that women really were on the forefront of putting their lives on the  

line early on that, because, you know, it's almost like the statistics thing, you know, you'd  expect it is possible that that one mention of one woman's house church it is possible that  that could have occurred, but because the cultural setup was mainly men who ran  households, and but the fact that we actually have documentation of these women who led  households is extraordinary. Because it would have been somewhat extraordinary in its day.  And, you know, sometimes we like to say to ourselves, Well, isn't it great the province of God  included a couple of women to encourage all our sisters who are called in ministry to go  forward. That's great. But there's also the Pure Truth that it's very exceptional in that. That  happened and these are exceptional women. Yeah, that's right. Just like now you're an  exceptional woman in the calling of God as you are called, and your exceptional manners you  are open to the gifts of men and women. So it's kind of an interesting observation that there  actually is documentation of women who run house churches. Very good. I'm enjoying this  whole class. I'm sure you are too, and I'm looking forward to our next session.