<p>16:23 - see on Lk. 8:3.</p><p><i>Gaius my host (and of the whole church) greets you- </i>Gaius had a home big enough for the Corinth ecclesia to meet in (Rom. 16:23). The social mix amongst believers must have been startling. Excavations at Ostia near Rome have revealed how the spacious homes of the wealthy stood right next to the <i>insulae</i>, the blocks of squalid flats in which the poor lived. There was little differentiation of rich and poor according to which neighbourhoods they lived in. So when we read that the wealthy believer Gaius was &lsquo;host of the whole church&rsquo; (Rom. 16:23), we are to imagine this wealthy man opening his spacious home to the urchins who lived in the neighbouring blocks who had come to Christ. This must have been startling for the surrounding populace. Such was the witness of true Christian unity.</p><p><i>Erastus the treasurer of the city greets you; and Quartus the brother</i>- The list of believers&rsquo; names in Romans 16 is there for a purpose: to show how all types had come together in the Rome ecclesia. Women are named and greeted uncommon in contemporary Jewish letters of the time; some names are common slave names: Phlegon, Hermes, Philologus; whereas tradition has it that the&nbsp;Narcissus mentioned was a famous and wealthy member of the court of Claudius. Greetings are given from two members at Corinth: &ldquo;Erastus the treasurer of the city of Corinth salutes you, and Quartus, a brother&rdquo; (Rom. 16:23). There is an intended juxtaposition here: of the wealthy and powerful brother Erastus, and the unknown slave? Quartus, who all the same was &ldquo;a brother&rdquo;, on the same spiritual standing. Phoebe is described as the <i>prostates</i> of the Cenchreae ecclesia and Paul himself- a word translatable as &ldquo;patroness&rdquo; (Rom. 16:1,2). It could be that she funded Paul&rsquo;s activities at least in part. The same implication may be behind Paul&rsquo;s description of the mother of Rufus as being his &ldquo;mother&rdquo; (Rom. 16:13). This would have continued the example of wealthy women like Joanna supporting the ministry of Jesus (Lk. 8:2). &nbsp;If one goes through the Acts and the New Testament letters and makes a list of all the individuals who are named, we have a list of about 78 people. About 30 of these people have some indication in the narrative as to their social status; and the majority of these are from above average social stations. For example, the way Achaicus, Fortunatus, Tertius and Lucius in Corinth and Clement in Philippi all have Latin names in Roman colonies could well indicate that they were from the original stock of colonists, who tended to be well ahead of the local population.</p>