Page:The Net of Faith.pdf/277

35* future faithful Christians,, so that all believers can look back to these first Christians and discover in them the evident fruit of apostolic labor, as well as a useful and abiding certainty for their own times. Reason will show that here the apostles' work bore fruit in accordance with the purposes of Christ The future generations can safely emulate their work and expect eternal life.

It is therefore necessary to see where these people were confirmed in their faith and how they were established. In the and other recorded writings we can find that there were believing people in the apostolic days and that their preaching went into the whole world so that there was no nation in which their voice was not heard. From this we can surmise that in every nation and language there was someone who believed the gospel through the apostolic preaching. I am not saying that all were believers who heard the apostles preach, but everywhere there were some whom God had chosen; here more, there less. According to the Acts of the Apostles these groups in cities, villages and all regions of the world were called congregations of believers which united all those of the same faith. A paraphrased translation of several redundant phrases.