And so the writings of apostles and evangelists point beyond themselves to the supernatural life of faith of the primitive Church, whence they themselves grew. The New Testament, although as the inspired word of God it claims its special divine authority guaranteed by the Church’s teaching office, stands within this life, for there were many Christian communities already in existence before any apostle took up his pen. Having been written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the New Testament as the unique document of the faith proclaims no other truths than those which were already living in the Church before it was written. Through all its chinks and crevices we descry the gleam of the living waters of the broad stream of the primitive faith, and the realization of this contributes not a little to a complete understanding of the Bible. For the Gospels present us with only a fragmentary record of Jesus, from which it is impossible to construct an exhaustive picture. And so I learn the complete Christ, not from the Bible, but from the uniform life of faith of the whole Church, a life fertilized by the teaching of the apostles. Without the living, uniform tradition of the Church, essential elements in the picture of Christ would remain either enigmatical or hidden from me. And without it I could achieve neither an historical nor a religious sympathy with Jesus. Such is the meaning of that profound saying of St. Augustine: “I would not believe the Gospel, did not the authority of the Church move me.”[3]

The new life, flowing out from the apostolic communities, spread ever wider and wider, and impregnated the world. The preaching authority was taken over from the dying apostles by disciples who had been commissioned by them and appointed as presidents and overseers of the Christian communities. This fact is plainly attested by history. And from these disciples right down to our own day there runs a continuous line of preachers holding this apostolical commission. And along with this authoritative line there arose the space-time fellowship of the faithful, that is the Church. The unity of the apostolic preaching was maintained by steady contact with the churches founded by the apostles, especially by contact with Rome, where Peter proclaimed his message and was buried in his martyr’s grave. With the unity of the apostolic preaching was conjoined the unity, the space-time community of the Holy Spirit. The Pentecostal community broadened out into the universal Church. Certainly, in the rude struggle for existence, its external forms became more rigid and it became more fully organized. But, for all that, it remained with new members ever the same Spirit and the same Body. The same apostolic authority preaches through its bishops the same Christ, and it is the same fellowship of the Holy Spirit in which we receive this preaching, not outwardly merely, but inwardly also.