One question which is sometime posed is a question about how they lived, where they resided, and what their homes may have been like.
In Acts 2:46, the believers “went to” the temple, i.e., they lived elsewhere. They apparently had their own individual houses, inasmuch as they visited “each other’s homes.” Some translators offer that they “attended” the temple.
These earliest followers of Jesus would have been a subset of the large crowd worshiping at the temple. Temple worship included singing of Psalms, and there is a possibility - even a probability - that these first believers joined in with the larger crowd, singing the Psalms together.
If they slept and ate at their own homes, and did their daily work, either at home or at some workplace, the time for worship at the temple would be limited, especially in light of the fact that workdays were not limited eight hours and workweeks were not limited to five days.
The believers had a single purpose and went to the temple every day. They were joyful and humble as they ate at each other’s homes and shared their food.
In Acts 8:3, Saul is in the business of persecuting the earliest followers of Jesus. He is operating in Jerusalem, with sorties in the surrounding countryside of Judea and Samaria. In hunting and finding these believers, Saul goes “from house to house,” indicating many houses, one after another. This would, in turn, indicate that the believers did not live together in some communal arrangement:
He dragged men and women out of one home after another and threw them into prison.
After Saul had changed his name to Paul, he refers, in his letters, formulaically to various groups of early believers. He writes that they “meet” in a certain person’s house, not that they live there. The language is precise, e.g., in Romans 16:5:
Greet Prisca and Aquila, my coworkers in the service of Christ Jesus. They risked their lives to save me. I’m thankful to them and so are all the churches among the nations. Also greet the church that meets in their house. Greet my dear friend Epaenetus. He was the first person in the province of Asia to become a believer in Christ.
Notice that the house is described as being the property of Prisca and Aquila. It was a privately-owned residence, and the owners freely allowed the church’s members, who lived in their own various homes, to gather there.
Paul uses the formula again in I Corinthians 16:19, where Prisca and Aquila are listed separately, followed by “and,” indicating their independent agency. Prisca and Aquila sent greetings, and others also sent greetings.
The churches in the province of Asia greet you. Aquila and Prisca and the church that meets in their house send their warmest Christian greetings.
In his letter to the Colossians, Paul uses the formula again:
Greet our brothers and sisters in Laodicea, especially Nympha and the church that meets in her house.
Paul also uses the formula in his salutation at the beginning of his letter to Philemon:
Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our beloved fellow worker and Apphia our sister and Archippus our fellow soldier, and the church that meets in your house.
In his rebuke to the Corinthians, Paul articulates, first, that the followers of Jesus “gather,” indicating that they each had their own variously-located homes. Second, he indicates that for ordinary meals, they should remain home and dine there; the gatherings were for celebrating the Lord’s Supper and other feasts and festivals.
When you gather in the same place, you can’t possibly be eating the Lord’s Supper. Each of you eats his own supper without waiting for each other. So one person goes hungry and another gets drunk. Don’t you have homes in which to eat and drink?
These texts, and others, constitute a lifestyle in which the first believers lived largely, if not exclusively, in ordinary homes, and met on various occasions for worship and fellowship.
This is in direct contradiction to those who argue that people who follow Jesus should or must engage in a communal lifestyle.
While the ethics of New Testament allow for the possibility that some might choose communal living arrangements, it is in no way set forth as a paradigm for believers. It is one option among many, and in the textual evidence, an option that was rarely if ever chosen.
