I doubt you’ve ever been to a church that does what we do. A few times a year we upend the tradition Sunday model and head to our fellowship hall for a service we call Communion Fellowship. Here we attempt to put into practice what we see in the early church according to the book of Acts. Since we are a Small Church we are able to accommodate our entire community in a service that is born directly out of the example set by the first churcehs.
The earliest Christian church services were shaped by Jewish synagogue worship, the teaching of the apostles, and the institution of the Lord’s Supper by Christ. The clearest biblical snapshot appears in Acts 2:42: “And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” From this brief summary, along with other New Testament passages, we can reconstruct the basic structure and character of the earliest gatherings.
First, apostolic teaching stood at the center of Christian worship. The church gathered to hear the Word of God explained in light of Christ’s death and resurrection. Acts 20:7 describes believers assembling on the first day of the week to hear Paul preach. This pattern likely developed out of synagogue practice, where Scripture was read and expounded. The difference, however, was that the apostles proclaimed Jesus as the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets. Christian worship was therefore Word-centered from the beginning.
Second, prayer was a defining feature of these gatherings. Acts repeatedly shows believers praying corporately (Acts 2:42; 4:24–31). These prayers likely included Psalms, petitions, thanksgiving, and intercessions. Paul later instructs churches to sing “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Ephesians 5:19; Colossians 3:16), indicating that singing was also part of corporate worship. The earliest services were therefore participatory and saturated with Scripture.
Third, and most significant for understanding early church structure, was “the breaking of bread.” This phrase can refer generally to a meal, but in several contexts it clearly points to the Lord’s Supper. In Acts 20:7, believers gathered specifically “to break bread” on the first day of the week, suggesting that the Supper was a central purpose of the assembly.
Importantly, the New Testament indicates that the Lord’s Supper was originally connected to a larger communal meal. Acts 2:46 describes believers sharing food together with gladness and generosity. The strongest evidence appears in First Epistle to the Corinthians 11:17–34, where Paul rebukes the Corinthian church for divisions during their gathering. Some were eating ahead of others, the wealthy were feasting, and the poor were left hungry. Such abuses only make sense if the Lord’s Supper was embedded within a broader shared meal—often referred to as a “love feast.” Paul’s correction did not abolish the Supper but clarified its sacred meaning and communal responsibility.
Over time, however, the full congregational meal appears to have been separated from the sacramental observance. As churches grew and logistical challenges increased, and as abuses such as those in Corinth persisted, it became prudent to distinguish the sacramental elements from an ordinary meal. By the mid-second century, Justin Martyr describes Christian worship as including Scripture readings, a sermon, prayers, and the Lord’s Supper—without mention of a common meal. This suggests that the church retained Word and Table as central while discontinuing the larger feast.
The earliest Christian services, then, were Word-centered, prayer-filled, and marked by both fellowship and sacrament. They were covenantal gatherings of a redeemed community meeting weekly—typically on Sunday—to hear Christ proclaimed and to remember His death through bread and wine. While later liturgical forms became more structured, they preserved the essential pattern already visible in the New Testament: teaching, prayer, and the Lord’s Supper at the heart of Christian worship.