It is generally held that from the middle of the first century to the middle of the second century the church became more tightly organized. Most would put the kind of development evident in the years shortly following the resurrection of Jesus, as exhibited in 1 Thessalonians, at some distance from the more ‘settled’ church life reflected in the Pastoral Epistles. However, the nature of the historical circumstances related to the formation of a more established church continues to be a subject of debate. This socio-historical study traces the institutionalization of various aspects of community life: attitudes to the world/ethics, ministry structures, ritual forms and beliefs.

The Pauline and deutero-Pauline writings perhaps provide the most revealing material for a study of change in the early church; they have the advantage of manifesting continuity as works either written by Paul himself or by one of his disciples in his name. The Pauline corpus contains both the earliest church writings available to us (the authentic epistles) and writings dating from the early second century (the Pastoral Epistles). The documents probably bear witness to at least three church generations.

Demonstration of the thesis that the Pauline corpus reflects a movement that received its initial formation at the hands of Paul and his group of fellow workers but continued to develop after the death of the Apostle, depends on an illustration of continuity between Pauline and deutero-Pauline writings.