Book excerpt: Twenty-four scholars join their efforts to congratulate David Lee Balch for a long career of dedication to scholarship and teaching. Topics range from the life of early Christian house churches to the kinds of challenges that early Christians needed to negotiate in their artistic and literary worlds as they established their own identity. Contributors Edward Adams Frederick E Brenk Warren Carter John R. Clarke Everett Ferguson John T. Fitzgerald Richard A. Freund Ronald F. Hock Robin M. Jensen Davina C. Lopez Margaret Y. MacDonald Abraham J. Malherbe Aliou CissŽ Niang Peter Oakes Todd Penner Leo G. Perdue Turid Karlsen Seim Dennis E. Smith Yancy W. Smith Stephen V. Sprinkle Hal Taussig Oliver Larry Yarbrough