I think you have a point here John but it needs some careful thought.
Thank you, Vanellus.
Jesus was an itinerant teacher or rabbi whose disciples followed him from place to place, on foot we assume.
Most likely on foot. Certainly they didn't have cars, and probably they didn't splurge on horses and chariots, even though this raises a rather fascinating question; why didn't they? I mean, if the idea was to spread the gospel as quickly and as far as possible, why not buy horses and chariots? We don't see anything like that in the record. I'm guess that's because Jesus thought it would be better spiritual conditioning
not to use community resources on extravagant expenses like horses when walking would not only present a more humble testimony, but would give the disciples practical experience with denying themselves.
I am reminded of the account from Luke where Jesus and his disciples had been traveling throughout the day and found themselves without any shelter at night (Luke 9:58). They petitioned a nearby village for shelter, but the village rejected them (Luke 9:52-53). James and John were so upset by this that they asked if they should call down fire from Heaven to destroy the village. Jesus rebuked them, saying they had a bad spirit and that he had not come to destroy men, but to save them (Luke 9:54-56).
And, sure enough, later that night some villagers came to Jesus secretly to find out what he was all about (Luke 9:57-62).
Yet in the early churches set up by Paul et al the Christians mostly stayed in one place.
This is partially true. We have 14 accounts of Paul's actions/writings, and in most of them there's
a lot of travel, not only from Paul himself, but he regularly refers to sending people here and there. In the book of Acts, there's a lot of travel, to cities all over the place, to the point that they cause riots and the people say, "The people who have turned the world upside down have come here also" (Acts 17:6).
I'm not saying a large portion of them didn't settle for periods of time in one place or the other, but rather that the point is they were living by faith, rather than continuing their participation as loyal consumers in the world's system of wages.
Lesson: don't imitate the practical aspects of the lifestyles too much.
Pardon me if I sound a bit crunchy here, but this is totally opposite to Jesus' message. He said, "follow me" (Mark 8:34-35). He said we should take up our cross and deny ourselves. He said that if we follow him, we will be persecuted the same as he was persecuted (John 15:20). He said we should obey him (Luke 6:46). He said we will be judged by his teachings (John 12:48). He said there are many people who will honor him with their lips, but who's heart will be far from him (Matthew 15:8).
His followers said he gave us an example to follow (1 Peter 2:21) . They said we should imitate him (1 Corinthians 11:1). They said we should walk as he walked (1 John 2:6).
Jesus disciples didn't use the Internet.
This is a weird argument; the internet did not exist at that time. It's hardly fair to make an argument that people did not use something which did not exist. I think this might be an example of protesting too much...
Christians in the early churches were encouraged to work diligently in their jobs.
This is inaccurate. They were encouraged to work diligently, yes, but when you ad, "in their jobs" the implication is "for money". That is not Jesus' message (See Matthew 6:24-34). People tend to to interpret any instance of "work" in the Bible as "for money", which is an assumption they make because they themselves are lovers of money.
Having all goods in common in Jerusalem later became making a collection for the poorer church in Jerusalem due to the later general economic hardship in Palestine.
There is no formula which can guarantee faith. Jesus said his followers should forsake all and share all things in common (Luke 14:33). We see examples of that from Jesus and his disciples (Matthew 4:20, Luke 5:28) and later with Paul and thousands of new disciples (Acts 2:44-45 and Acts 4: 32-37), but this does not mean no one ever deals with greed again.
The church was constantly struggling with their fears about materialism and very real persecution, which resulted in a lot of poverty. Paul regularly encouraged and, in some cases, admonished the churches to remember that they need to share with one another, especially from those churches which may have had more opportunity and resources at the time.
I agree that Christians and non Christians can be similar as far as loving family, going to work, obeying the law and paying taxes. But there still can be differences.
Those differences are usually quite superficial. When the Atheist and Christian both work 40 hours per week in the same job, what difference is there, really?
This is a superficial issue. God doesn't care about the words we use, whether we consider them bad or not; he cares about the motivation behind
why we use them. I'm sure you've experienced situations where people have not used "bad" words, and yet you knew they were still being mean and hateful, right?
No one always tells the truth and in some cases telling the truth would be immoral. Hiding Jews from the Nazis is a classic example of this. A less intense example would be saying, "Fine" when someone asks how you're doing, but you don't really feel fine; you just say you're fine because you understand the exchange is a pleasantry rather than a genuine inquiry into your psychological state.
God isn't looking for people who always tell the truth; that's a self-righteous image of respectability that we have created. What he's looking for are people who are sincere, even when they're telling an untruth or leaving out information, etc.
simple acts of kindness done without expecting anything in return
Of course, this would rule out working for money, since the whole point of working for money is an expectation of payment for services rendered.
I would amend this to, "not getting hateful" since both Jesus and God expressed anger and Paul makes it quite clear that it's okay to be angry, so long as we don't sin (Ephesians 4:26). The implication is that anger is not wrong in itself, so long as your anger is justified; we should never let that anger tip over into hatred.
putting family above career,
I don't disagree with this, but it's a false equivalence; Jesus said we're supposed to put him before both.
The kind of Christianity Jesus preached is so different to most of what we see in the world today.
