Checking in on the Church Fathers

The Apostolic Fathers. Who were they? In the centuries immediately following the birth, after the passing of the original Apostles, the care of infant church passed on to new generations of pastors and leaders. They’re known as the Apostolic Fathers, and they had a tough job. They followed in the footsteps of the writers of the New Testament – those who were literally sent out to start the church by the Ascended Christ. It fell to these pastor-scholars to put the words of the New Testament into practice in a church which was both expanding across cultures and being battered by persecution.

It fell to the Apostolic (also called Church) Fathers to figure a lot of things out – important things like how to talk rightly about the divinity and humanity of Jesus, to try to make some sense of the Trinitarian nature of God, and how to understand the new birth. They argued a lot over these things, and didn’t always get it right. But pioneers often make mistakes that those who follow don’t have to repeat. So we owe them a lot. And they said things at times that just can’t be improved upon. Here is an example of the words of an early Church Father who is now unknown to us. Whoever this brother was, he understood the Gospel, and knew how to rejoice over it.

“O the sweet exchange”

“[God] gave up his own Son as a ransom for us, the holy one for the lawless, the guiltless for the guilty, ‘the just for the unjust’, the incorruptible for the corruptible, the immortal for the mortal.

For what else but his righteousness could have covered our sins? In whom was it possible for us, the lawless and ungodly, to be justified, except in the Son of God alone?

O the sweet exchange, O the incomprehensible work of God, O the unexpected blessings, that the sinfulness of many should be hidden in one righteous man, while the righteousness of one should justify many sinners!”

—Anonymous, “The Epistle to Diognetus” in The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Michael W. Holmes (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1992), 547 (HT: firstimportance.org)