Imagine that when Henry Ford built his first Model A assembly line, he made daily visits to examine the progress. Whenever he saw something that needed correction, he would jot off a short note. If things were going fine, rather than take the time to write a note, he would merely smile, nod at the foreman, and move on. Suppose then that later after he died, all these notes were gathered into a book. Would this collection of notes, which only contain his corrections to daily problems and little mention of the things that were going right, be an adequate manual for building an automobile manufacturing plant? Would this random collection of notes give everything necessary to build a car? This is a little bit of what it is like when one uses only the documents of the New Testament to describe the structure, beliefs, and practices of the Early Church.
Marcus Grodi and Jim Anderson continue to prepare for their study of Ephesians by looking first at the Early Church in the Acts of the Apostles.
