Making application of these principles today, we must not forget that we are not privileged to have apostles of Jesus Christ imparting a spiritual gift. Nor do we have prophets, evangelists, pastors/teachers endowed with the gift of teaching. However, because we are not limited to a gift of grace given to us through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, we do have the full revelation and completion of the very things prophets and angels could only ponder. All of God’s people have access to the same revelation from God and have the same responsibility to read it, live by it, and teach others to do likewise. Do not make the mistake of identifying teachers with public speakers or even public classroom teachers. That is not the setting of 1 Corinthians 14. Following the pattern of 1 Corinthians 14, they could conceivably have six to eight teachers speaking at one setting, if we include tongue speakers and interpreters. It would have also provided the shepherds a perfect opportunity to teach and admonish and thereby equip the saints for service. It would certainly give others the opportunity to use their gift, also.
Today, we have access to the written Word that we should read every day. They did not have a New Testament to read every day. We may think that we have it better. Certainly, we have a great many more advantages than they had, but that on which we can agree is that their method of edification and revelation was very different from today. Peter writes that we should be as newborn babies who “desire the sincere milk of the word” that they may grow (1 Peter 2:2). If we can’t imagine a baby getting fed once a day, we certainly could not expect them to be fed once a week. For this reason, and given the fact that first-century saints didn’t have the written word, they would have reason to meet more regularly than saints, today. They were interdependent on each other and functioned as a living body as each fulfilled a need in the body. Therefore, the gatherings for edification in 1 Corinthians 14 were as often as possible, and probably every day at the very least. Please, keep in mind that this doesn’t have the appearance of meeting in a church building every day. Rather, as a daily way of life saints looked for opportunities to be together for edification just as you and I look forward to opening our Bibles every day.