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1 and 2 Thessalonians

  1. Lesson One
    Overview of 1 and 2 Thessalonians (1 Thessalonians 1–3)
    20 Activities
  2. Lesson Two
    Christ's Return (1 Thessalonians 4–5)
    22 Activities
  3. Lesson Three
    The Man of Lawlessness (2 Thessalonians 1–2)
    19 Activities
    |
    1 Assessment
  4. Lesson Four
    Work (2 Thessalonians 3)
    17 Activities
    |
    2 Assessments
  5. Lesson Five
    Author and Audience (Review 1 and 2 Thessalonians)
    17 Activities
  6. Course Wrap-Up
    Course Completion
    1 Activity
    |
    1 Assessment

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Rather than major evangelistic events or crusades, the growth of early Christianity during and especially after the first century was the result of Christians simply “doing life” alongside non-believers and impressing them with their lives.

Scholars have seen the church’s growth as coming about through something modest: “casual contact.” Contact would come about in innumerable ways through the translocal networks of family and profession in which most people participated. Masters interacted with slaves; residents met neighbors; and above all believers networked with relatives and work colleagues. In all these relationships, “affective bonds” were formed. The most reliable means of communicating the attractiveness of the faith to others and enticing them to investigate things further was the Christians’ character, bearing and behavior. 

Source: Alan Kreider, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church, 2016, p. 81.