Archives by: Gary Hoag

“Money is an integral part of our lives. With so much life revolving around money and with the challenges that Christians have in managing money faithfully and responsibly, we can be thankful there are hundreds even thousands of verses in Scripture which give us insight about money and possessions. The number of references in the Bible on the subject speaks to its significance. It is important for us to spend the necessary amount of time to comprehend how money affects our material and spiritual lives.”

Ron and Phyllis Chewning in Financial Counsel from God’s Word: Five Steps to a Transformed Financial Life (Birmingham, MI: Stewardship Advisors).

Clement [c. 4th century]…gives us a glimpse into the institute of widows [cf. 1 Tim 5:3-16] to that of deaconesses [cf. 1 Tim 3:11]

”…there should be three widows in every church, two of whom engage to pray, while the third undertakes the care of the sick and needy. She is to be willing to give her services and temperate, she is to announce the names of the needy to the elders, she is not to be greedy of gain, not given to wine, that she may be able to watch at night services…”

Book of Clement (c. 4th century) a post-Constantinian document describing the role of church officers, uncovered by Paul de Lagarde (1827-1891) and contained in his Reliquary of Ancient Ecclesiastical Laws, as cited by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 172-173.

“The services of the deacon are the most fully described in the book of Clement…

He is to minister to the infirm, to strangers and widows, to be a father to orphans, to go about into the houses of the poor to see if there is any one in need, sickness or any other adversity; he is to care for and give information to strangers; he is to wash the paralytic and infirm, that they may have refreshment in their pains.

Every one is to have what he is in need of with respect to the Church. He is also to visit inns, to see if any poor or sick have entered, or any dead are in them; if he finds anything of the kind, he is to notify it, that what is needful may be provided for every one. If he lives in a seaside town, he is to look about on the shore to discover if a body has been washed ashore, and if he finds one to clothe and bury it…

If the deacons are on the one hand enjoined carefully to assist the poor in every respect, the latter have to render obedience and respect to the deacons. This was of special importance, when the question was, to enable the poor to resume work, and to induce them to earn there own living.

There was a female as well as a male diaconate.”

Book of Clement (c. 4th century) a post-Constantinian document describing the role of church officers, cited by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 164.

“If you want to fast according to Christ and to humble your soul, every time of the entire year is open to you; moreover, hold all the days of your life for humbling your soul, if you have learned from the Lord our Savior that he is gentle and lowly in heart (Matt 11:29). When, therefore is there not a day of humiliation for you who follow Christ who is lowly in heart and a teacher of humility?”

Origen of Alexandria (182-254), Christian theologian and Church Father, in Homilies on Leviticus 10.3.

“Hereby were rich and poor in the first place brought into the right position towards each other.

The rich gave what he gave to God, and the poor receive what he received from God. Thus the temptation of the rich to exalt themselves above the poor, and the humiliation of the poor at being obliged to receive assistance from others, were removed, while at the same time, discontent and murmuring, as well as insolent demands and presumptuous requests, were done away with.

The rich became conscious that he only gave back to God what he had first received. The poor became conscious, that the same God, who had imparted to himself a smaller measure of earthly goods, yet took care that he should not suffer want. It was no longer a disgrace to be poor and to receive assistance from the Church.

The poor, like the officers of the Church, loved off the alter; nay, to apply to the poor in general a much used expression in the Epistle of Polycarp [to the Philippians], with respect to to widows, they were themselves, “the altar of the Church” on which it deposits its offerings.

Such gifts had not the effect, so often occurring in other instances, of separating between rich and poor by increasing and rendering still more prominent the chasm existing between them, but were a bond which united them in God, by making them conscious of their oneness in the one Lord.”

The explanation of first-century expression “the altar of the Church” of Polycarp of Smyrna (69-155) in Letter to the Philippians 4 as explained by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 146-147.

“Lord, remember those who offer these gifts, and those for whom and for whose sake and for whose profit they offer them. Lord, think of those who bring forth fruit and do good works in Thy holy Church, and who remember the poor. Requite them with Thy treasures and Thy heavenly gifts. Give them for the earthly the heavenly, for the temporal the eternal, for the corruptible the incorruptible.”

The Offering Prayer in the Liturgy of St. Basil the Great (330-379) Bishop of Caesarea Mazaca as recounted by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 404.

“And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the president, who succours the orphans and widows and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds and the strangers sojourning among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead.”

Justin Martyr (100-165) in “Weekly Worship of the Christians” in First Apology 67.3.

“Work with self-restraint at your handiwork, that you may always have enough for yourselves and for the poor, and may not be a burden to the Church of God. Idleness is a disgrace, and he who will not work among us must not eat, for the Lord our God hates idlers, and none must be idle who honors God.”

Clement of Rome (This Early Church bishop was martyred in 101 by being strapped to an anchor and cast into the sea) in Apostolic Constitutions 2.63, as recounted by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 135.

“For those able to work, work, for those unable to work, compassion” is a saying which…was the motto of the whole Church.

Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215) Homil. Ep. Clem. c. 8, as recounted by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 125.

The older Fathers interpret our Lord’s saying [in Luke 6:30] “Give to every one that asketh of thee,” to mean quite simply that every suppliant was to receive without distinction. “Give simply to all, without asking doubtfully to whom thou givest, but give to all.”

Shepherd of Hermas (c. 140–155) Mandates 2 as recounted by Gerhard Uhlhorn in Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883) 121.