To learn more about William Wilberforce and the end of the British slave trade, read this introduction from Eric Metaxas or this summary from C. Ben Mitchell. 30 Days through Church History: Day 24
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Church History: How Christians Settled an Argument About Election
:: Defenestration and Divine Election in Seventeeth-Century Europe :: By the opening years of the seventeenth century, the Reformation had turned European Christianity into a conglomeration of conflicting sects. The Roman Catholic Council of Trent drew a firm line between Catholics and Protestants by declaring that Roman Catholic tradition represents the final authority when it […]
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Church History: How the Anabaptists Challenged the Place of the State in Matters of Faith
The first wave of Reformers never quite escaped the idea that the church and the government ought somehow to be linked with one another. This arrangement had been around ever since the fourth century A.D., and it wasn’t easy—even for Scripture-saturated, gospel-loving preachers like Luther and Calvin—to see any other way to sustain society. In […]
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Church History: The Centrality of Preaching in the Ministry of John Calvin
Martin Luther wasn’t the only lawyer who became a leader in the Reformation. In 1534 another lawyer traveled along another rutted road. His life had been shaken in much the same way that Luther’s had been—though not by a storm that drove him to call out to a saint. This lawyer was a Renaissance humanist […]
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Church History: How a Tract About a King’s Marriage Cost William Tyndale His Life
Video courtesy of Rose Publishing While Martin and Katie Luther were turning Wittenberg into a launching-point for the reformation in Germany, King Henry VIII was launching a very different reformation in England. To learn more about Henry VIII, William Tyndale, and the English Reformation, watch this video; then, listen to this fascinating lecture from my […]
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Church History: Was Martin Luther Crazy?
For me, this video, entitled “The Insanity of Luther,” from R.C. Sproul is far more than a history lecture. I first watched this lecture in an earlier iteration, on VHS tape at a church in rural Kansas in the summer of 1992. A few months after that, a seven-year theological tribulation began in my life […]
[Read More...]Church History: Martin Luther Meets Manic Monday
30 Days through Church History: Day 16 Bonus
[Read More...]Church History: Reformation Day Meets Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Skip the opening minute of “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God” and enjoy a Martin-Luther-meets-Mary-Poppins-mashup of the history of the Reformation. 30 Days through Church History: Day 16 Bonus
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Church History: How Did the Fall of a City and the Invention of a Printing Press Open the Door for Reformation?
Enormous tragedies struck Europe and Asia Minor throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. At one point, three different Roman Catholic bishops each claimed to be the legitimate pope. The Black Death claimed millions of lives. Muslim soldiers conquered Constantinople, the last remaining fragment of the ancient Eastern Empire. In the midst of these tragedies, God […]
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Church History: Why You Might Want to Avoid the Fourteenth Century in Your Time Travels
Video courtesy of Rose Publishing Someone, somewhere, reading this post could be an inventor—perhaps even someone who could someday invent a time machine. If so, I’d like to offer a simple suggestion. Don’t aim your machine in the direction of fourteenth-century Europe. A move in the direction of the fourteenth or early fifteenth centuries might […]
[Read More...]Church History: The Rise of Islam, the Clash Over Icons, and the Crusades
Video courtesy of Rose Publishing :: The Rise of Islam :: In the early seventh century, an Arabian merchant named Muhammad claimed an angel had entrusted him with a message from the one true God. Muhammad began to rail against the idol-worship that he saw around him. At first, no one minded his message. Then, […]
[Read More...]Church History: The Fall of the Roman Empire and the Church Planter Whose Planting Didn’t Go According to Plan
Video courtesy of Rose Publishing By the end of the fifth century, the western half of the Roman Empire was crumbling into a conglomeration of barbarian kingdoms. The city of Rome remained central for churches in communion with the Roman church, but Rome wasn’t nearly so central for the new barbarian rulers rising in the […]
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Church History: What Did the Real St. Patrick Do?
Video courtesy of Rose Publishing The real St. Patrick wasn’t Irish, he never sent a snake to England, and no one has ever even officially declared him a saint. So why do people celebrate St. Patrick’s Day? Mostly because they like to party and to pinch people who forgot to wear green, I guess. But […]
[Read More...]Church History: Who Was Augustine and Why Does He Matter?
As a young man in North Africa, Augustine traded the Christian faith of his mother Monica for the pursuit of personal pleasure and prestige. Despite her son’s descent into deeper rejection of God, Monica never stopped praying for him. And the more Augustine chased after the things he thought would make him happy, the more God […]
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Church History: How Did Church Councils Clarify What Christians Believed About Jesus?
Video courtesy of Christianity.com It’s one thing to live as a Christian in a world where your faith is persecuted and oppressed. Life may be hard but the boundaries between belief and unbelief are fairly clear. It’s quite another to remain faithful when the name “Christian” is not persecuted but praised and even endowed with […]
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Church History: What Was the Real St. Nicholas Known For?
Today, St. Nicholas is mostly known as a paunchy old geezer who spends one night each year breaking into people’s houses and stealing cookies before escaping to an Arctic hideaway where enslaved elves do his work for him. Kind of creepy when you think about it. The good news is that none of this was […]
[Read More...]Church History: How Did Christians Decide Which Books Belonged in the New Testament?
Video courtesy of Christianity.com To learn more about how Christians determined which texts were true and authoritative, read these articles: Who Decided Which Books Belong in My Bible? and Why No Baptized Lions or Talking Crosses Made It Into Your Bible. 30 Days through Church History: Day 8
[Read More...]Church History: Who Were the Gnostics and What About Their Gospels?
Video courtesy of Christianity.com To learn even more about the Gnostics and other challenges to second-century Christians, read these four brief articles from Ligonier Ministries: * Montanism * Gnosticism * Marcion’s Challenge * Irenaeus of Lyons 30 Days through Church History: Day 7
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Church History: Do the Dead Sea Scrolls Have Anything to Do with Jesus and the Early Church?
Near the northwest corner of the Dead Sea, there is a long-deserted settlement known as Qumran. Here, it appears that a discontented Jewish sect maintained a thriving religious community in the second century B.C. and again in the first century A.D. At one point, this community’s library contained more than a thousand sacred scrolls. Some […]
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Church History: What Happened to the Jewish Temple?
When Jesus walked along the dusty roads of Judea and Galilee, the Jewish people had a temple in Jerusalem. But today, there isn’t one. So what happened to this temple? First, a bit of background: The temple in the time of Jesus was the second Jewish temple. The Babylonians had burned the first temple in […]
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