Adventures in Reading ... "Pagan Christianity" by Viola and Barna (more thoughts)

A note to Brothers Viola and Barna, on returning to a "first century organic church":

So when do we turn in our Bibles?

The New Testament tells us that Paul's letters were read aloud in the church meetings (for example, 1 Timothy 4:13). As you surely know, it was very difficult for individual believers in those times to possess any type of manuscripts (for starters, paper manufacturing would not be imported from China until centuries later). Even when paper and movable printing became available to print books, Bibles had to be chained to the front of English sanctuaries in the 1500s (even then, a problem arose when believers, overjoyed at having a Bible to read, would read them aloud during the church services!).

So if you REALLY want to go back to the "organic" church, you should only have ONE PERSON reading out of the ONE Bible available in those meetings.

A side note: underground churches around the world may only get a page or two at a time of God's precious Word to read. Guess they are not reading the NT "panoramically" enough?