The Illusion of the Untarnished Church

J. Neil Daniels

There is a strange nostalgia in contemporary Christianity, a wistfulness for what some call “organic Christianity,” as though the moment the ink dried on the last page of the New Testament, the church entered a golden age of doctrinal purity and unbroken unity. In this romanticized vision, the church of the late first and early second centuries stands as the standard by which all later theology must be judged. The only problem is that the actual historical record refuses to play along. The earliest days of the church were messy. They were beautiful, yes, vibrant with missionary zeal and sacrificial love, but they were also riddled with error, confusion, and outright heresy. The Apostles themselves were constantly correcting false doctrine, and they were doing so inside the New Testament period, not after it.

Paul did not write Galatians because everything was going swimmingly in Asia Minor. He wrote it because an entire region of churches was defecting from the gospel by embracing a works-plus-faith soteriology. The church in Corinth—only a few years old—was already drowning in factionalism, sexual immorality, and liturgical chaos. John warns of “many antichrists” (1 John 2:18), not one stray teacher; Peter warns of false teachers who secretly introduce destructive heresies (2 Pet 2:1). Even in the apostolic age, wolves were prowling inside the sheepfold. If purity is defined by the absence of doctrinal conflict, then the church has never known a pure moment—not even when the apostles were still breathing.

And once we step outside the New Testament into the post-apostolic era—say, A.D. 110–160—the pattern continues. Ignatius writes to the Magnesians pleading that they not follow “those who bear the name of Christ deceitfully.” Polycarp chastises the Philippians to avoid the “firstborn of Satan,” referring to Marcion, whose truncated Bible removed vast portions of Scripture. By the mid-second century, Valentinus and Basilides were spinning elaborate Gnostic genealogies of cosmic emanations, insisting that salvation required secret knowledge rather than Christ crucified. If that is the supposed “organic Christianity” people long to retrieve, we should at least be honest: the earliest Christians were not gathered around a campfire holding hands in theological harmony. They were fighting doctrinal fires practically every week.

The deeper issue, however, is not merely historical. It is hermeneutical—and ultimately, theological. When people appeal to “the early church” as the final arbiter of truth, they implicitly shift the locus of authority from text to tradition. But the church—whether in A.D. 50, A.D. 150, or A.D. 2025—receives the Word; it does not generate it. The apostles are normative because they were commissioned by Christ to speak His words. Ignatius, as godly and courageous as he was, did not speak with apostolic authority. Polycarp died a martyr, but he did not breathe out Scripture. The moment we treat what the early church believed as inherently definitive, rather than evaluating those beliefs according to Scripture, we commit the same error the Pharisees committed, namely of elevating tradition over revelation.

The church never stands above the Word that birthed her. The church is not the mother of Scripture; she is its daughter. The standard remains what God has spoken, not what any era of the church—primitive, medieval, or modern—has assumed, practiced, or celebrated. Tradition, at its best, is a witness to the truth. At its worst, it attempts to enthrone itself as truth. When we elevate early Christian practice to canonical status, we quietly replace the authority of Scripture with the authority of nostalgia.

I love the church. I love her history, even the parts that are awkward and blemished. But her holiness has never been in her perfection; it has always been in her Head. The ancient church was not “organic Christianity.” It was still the church in need of correction, just like ours. The only pure standard—yesterday, today, and forever—is the voice of God in Holy Scripture. The gold is not in some imagined golden age; the gold is in the Word.

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