VULNERABLE MISSION

ECONOMY OF GRACE
discovery and the key to embody the Master’s intention in each case. 30 The wisdom and
dispensed power to do God’s will are already present in the church, however latent.
Economy of Grace as the Context of Mission
The earliest Christian mission deeply embraced a vision for life in God’s household economy
of grace. This is well confirmed by the shape that the mission’s communities took
over the following centuries. Joseph Hellerman concludes his substantial study of The
Ancient Church as Family with this observation:
From first century Palestine to third century Carthage, the social matrix most central to
early Christian conceptions of community was the surrogate kinship group of siblings who
understood themselves to be the sons and daughters of God. For the early Christians, the
church was family. 31
The family Hellerman is describing, the “surrogate kinship group,” was an extended
family typically based in the home of a nuclear family, but developing a more diverse
membership over time. 32 As Jesus anticipated, these groups were not merely a metaphorical
family of brothers and sisters. Rather, they became the functional family replacement
for those who had “lost father and mother, homes and lands” for the sake of Christ.
That is to say, they saw themselves as a real family with God as their common Father, and
they treated each other as real siblings. 33 Unlike natural families, however, these groups
were often remarkably non-homogeneous—a living demonstration of the multifaceted
wisdom of God. 34
Karl Sandnes, in A New Family, writes extensively of the vital role these families played in
making it possible for people in the ancient world to consider a new life as Christians and,
having become converts to Christian faith, to survive and thrive in that new life. He concludes:
“The family vocabulary was not only a matter of language; it was put into practice.
The Christians considered themselves brothers and sisters, and lived accordingly.” 35
30 The call for mutual submission (Ephesians 5:21 ff.) can be read in very similar ways as the working out of
church as economy of grace. In each case—wives and husbands, slaves and masters, children and parents—
the reader is called to the way of profound love and respect for the other in light of a shared reality: both parties
belong to the same Master’s household and bear the imprint of the Master’s grace.
31 Joseph Hellerman, The Ancient Church as Family (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 225.
32 “The conversion of the head of the household established a new social unit, basically identical with the
family. It is perhaps more correct to say, not the creation of a new social unit, but the transforming of a family
into a congregation—a household community.” Karl Sandnes, A New Family: Conversion and Ecclesiology in the
Early Church with Cross-Cultural Comparisons, Studien zur interkulturellen Geschichte des Christentums 91 (Bern:
Peter Lang, 1994), 182.
33 A vivid description of such a graced family appears at the outset of the post-Easter mission: “And great
grace was on them all, for there was no one needy among them, because the owners of land and houses were
selling them . . . and the proceeds were distributed to each as anyone had need” (Acts 4:33–35). This text illustrates
the multidimensional and concrete way the early community understood grace to encompass all they
had received from God—as concrete as lands and houses and money.
34 “The house church provides one very important explanation for how it was possible for Christianity to succeed
in integrating individuals from such different social backgrounds into one cohesive unit.” Gehring, 293.
35 Sandnes, 181. This, of course, merely reflects the steady teaching of the early church, e.g., “Be devoted
to one another with mutual affection (family love—philostorgia), outdoing each other in showing honor” (Rom
12:10).
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