Video Transcript: Why Study Church History?

If you're going to start a class on church history, you kind of would like to know the point to know that there's at least some value in doing this. Timothy Paul John, in his book, Christian history made Easy, makes the point that one major reason to study church history is that this is the history of your family, you are a Christian, and if you belong to the Christian church, then church history is your family history. 

And just for the sake of interest and trivia, it's often nice to know a little something about your family. But it's not just trivial. The more you understand about your family, and about the people and events that shaped your family, the better you can understand where you are today. And the better you can shape your future. Once you know the things that have shaped you, you can be a little more conscious of decisions you make as you move forward. 

Now, a lot of us are fairly ignorant about church history. Charles Schultz makes fun of that, in his cartoon peanuts, when writing about church history, we have to go back to the very beginning. Our pastor was born in 1930. And that's about where church history begins, for a lot of it and often later than 1930. Whenever we happen to have joined the church, and whatever our last few years of experience are, we have the impression that that's the way it's always been. And maybe that that's all that's been important, is what we've experienced lately. 

Well, as we move into this question of why church history matters, let's just find out how much we know, a few quiz questions, so to speak, to start with, who is it that was probably crucified upside down? Because he felt unworthy to die like his savior? Well, if you don't know, here's another hint, he was a major apostle in the early church. And the answer is Simon Peter, who was probably crucified around the year AD 64, on the orders of the Emperor Nero. 

Here's a weird question, not just to who but a weired, where did the earliest Christians probably meet for worship? Well, that's an easy one. We all know that Christians meet in church buildings, and that they gather in the places of worship with nice steeples and fancy things that we're accustomed to today. Well, the answer is that for the first three centuries or so, Christians met in homes, and there were no church buildings as such, whatsoever. Pretty interesting fact about our history may suggest that even today, we don't always need a large and expensive church building to have a church. 

Another question, who was it that claimed he saw a vision of the cross of Jesus Christ in the sky, just before he fought an important battle? He was the first Roman emperor to claim that he was a Christian. Well, maybe you know that the answer is Constantine. And maybe you don't know that Constantine saw a cross in the sky just before the Battle of Milvian. Bridge. Who was it? 

That read had a great reputation as a preacher and he preached so eloquently that he was nicknamed golden mouth. That'd be a great name to have as a preacher, wouldn't it golden mouth, he was exiled in at 403, by the Empress of the eastern half of the Roman Empire. And he got into trouble because he was not only golden tongue, then, and could speak very well. But he had this habit of telling the truth, telling the truth about Jesus and sound doctrine, even when some people didn't like it, and also telling the truth about slaves, and how masters should not have slaves if they're Christians. He said, the only good reason to buy a slave is to train him for an occupation, then pay to launch him and then set him free. 

Well, that didn't go over very well with some of the rich people who were slave owners of that time, at any rate, John Chrisostom, golden mouth, that's what Chrisostom means, was one of the great Christians in the history of the church. Who was it that led a community of nuns in Venom and believed that she experienced divine visions? She thought she had these divine visions, and she was also accused of heresy in the 12th century, but since then, is no longer regarded as a heretic. Well, that's a little tougher one. That's Hildegard of Bingen. 

Another question? Who's been called the Morningstar the Reformation. You guessed that one yet? Well, here's another hand. He translated the Bible into ordinary English in the 1300s. Well, maybe you've heard of Wickliffe Bible translators and John Wycliffe was the Wickliffe Bible translator who gave us the Bible in English. Who was it, that wrote the hymn? A mighty fortress is our God, maybe you've sung that him and you're not sure who wrote it? Well, he's also the one famous for nailing 95 theses to the door of a chapel in Wittenberg, Germany, his name was Martin Luther, and he's credited with starting the Protestant Reformation. And we're going to learn a lot more about Martin Luther, who was that wrote the great book called Institutes of the Christian religion, and he became famous for his particular doctrine of predestination, although a lot of the other reformers held that same doctrine in a very similar way. 

Well, this was John Calvin and other of the great reformers. And again, as you study church history, you're going to hear a little bit more about Calvin. And if you're a Calvinist, it's probably good to know something about Calvin, if you can't stand Calvinism, it might help to know a little bit what Calvinism is, and who John Calvin was, who was it, that studied scripture to impress others. He was a great student of Scripture and learned a lot, but then he realized he hadn't even trusted in Jesus himself. He became a leader among the Anabaptist who believed in baptizing people as believers only, and many of those Anabaptist became Mennonites. 

Well, that's a pretty good hint. The man's name was Menno. Simons and Mennonites are named after him to this day. Who was it, that was the first priest to perform a mass in the Western Hemisphere. He also was known to side with the natives who are being exploited by the Spanish and Portuguese powers. Maybe you've seen a movie called the mission, which loosely drew upon some of the aspects of his life, although he wasn't killed like the person in the mission. Well, that was Bartolomei de las cosas. And he was a Roman Catholic missionary in South America. 

We're going to learn a lot more about missionaries as we go through church history. Who was it that wrote hymns such as Anncan it be that I should gain and oh for 1000 tongues to sing and Hark the herald angels sing and old bunch of other hymns that have been sung by millions of English speaking Christians around the world. While he also helped form with his brother, something called the Holy Club that led to the formation of the Methodist Church. If you're a Methodist, you know that it was the Wesley's who did that. 

And Charles Wesley was that great hymn writer. If you aren't a Methodist or didn't know very much about church history, you're going to learn about the impact of the Wesley's not just on writing hymns, but on church life and on the Christian life and on personal piety, who was called the prince of preachers. He was a famous 19th century British pastor who preached at the Metropolitan tabernacle in London. 

Now their hint, he denounced American slavery. Well, that was Charles Spurgeon, a great preacher, you can still learn a lot from his sermons today, you can learn a lot from his life too. And we're going to hear a little more about Charles Spurgeon as we study church history. Who was it that wrote a commentary on the book of Romans that challenged 19th century liberalism, view of Christianity that was very, very positive. And this man challenged that positive outlook on man and saw how sinful man and it is, and how desperately humans need a savior. 

He also had to leave Germany in 1934, because he resisted Hitler and spoke against Hitler's attempt to impose his ideology on the churches of Germany. Well, that was Karl Barth, a great Swiss theologian, who was in Germany for a while and then had to return to Switzerland, again, had a major impact on 20th century Christianity. Here's another German and Who was this man who was imprisoned by the Nazis and executed in 1945, because as a pastor, he participated in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler.

He wrote a famous book that is still in print today that a lot of people still learn a lot from called the cost of discipleship. If you guess Dietrich Bonhoeffer, you're right. If you didn't, it's good to learn a little more about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his heroic pursuit of discipleship even to the point of death. Who was it that preached to the largest audience in recorded history in Seoul, South Korea, in 1973? 

Well, he also preached to a whole bunch of other huge audiences throughout his preaching ministry and he was once called the best loved American Christian. Maybe you know that picture. Maybe you know who it was, if not milligram? Well, those are some of the names and bases from church history that we're going to be looking at why study them? Well, to know something about your family history, but also to just experience some of the other benefits of studying church history. 

One thing that church historian Martin Noll brings out is that church history is God's story. It's a way of looking at what God has been doing throughout the centuries. And learning from that. And in his book, Turning Points at the beginning, Martin talks about that. Another thing Martin also highlights is that Christians throughout history have been studying the Bible. And a valuable part of studying church history is to find out how others at different times and in different cultures have understood the Bible so that we can check our own understanding as compared to their understanding. 

Another reason for studying church history is that a lot of things have been tried throughout the history of the church, and some of them flopped miserably, some of them went very well. And it'd be really helpful to find out what was successful and what was a disaster. So we don't have the disasters again, and so we can do what God blessed. 

Now, the reason for studying church history is to be grateful, because there are a lot of people whose lives and work built much up that we still benefit from today. And we can be thankful for that. And we can also be encouraged by their heroic example, let's look at these just a little more closely. One reason to study church history is that it's his story, we can see God at work. 

The Christian faith involves not just dogmas, or moral codes, or a worldview. But the Christian faith involves God in action. The Bible contains lots of stories and events. And church history has tons of stories and events where we can see God's hand at work in time and space. And that's a valuable reason to study church history. 

Another reason to study church history is that we want to understand the Bible. And you might say, well, we have the Bible. So why don't we just pick it up and read it, and then learn directly from the Bible? Well, it is important to study the Bible and read it for yourself. But the fact is, you are not the first person in the world who has studied the Bible, and to think that you are going to know the Bible better all by yourself, then many greater minds, and greater Christians in holiness, and to just go on yourself on your own and study the Bible for yourself, but not pay attention to anybody else. Well, that would be a big mistake. 

Many others before us have sought to understand the scriptures and to apply the Scriptures. And we can learn a lot from them. One thing we can also learn as we look at their interpretations is that sometimes some very godly and smart people were wrong. And they came up with bizarre interpretations that seemed like the right interpretation to them. I'll take one of the most ridiculous examples. There was one of the early church fathers, a man named Origen, who was just a brilliant mind, and who wrote huge books. 

Now, one thing he sometimes did was he would take very literal passages of the Bible. And he would give them a very, very, very figurative meaning. But then he came to a statement of Jesus, that some people have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the gospel, and he took that one literally and castrated himself. Now, you'd say, I don't think that's the kind of interpretation I want to follow. But there are many others where Christians have used the Bible, for example, to descend slavery, or to interpret the Bible in other ways that have been harmful. And it's humbling to see that even some very great Christians can make some very serious mistakes, and it can humble us and be alert to our own mistakes.

But beyond that, we also want to see where many great and godly people have insights into the scriptures that we might miss. Because we're at a point in history and in a cultural situation, where sometimes we get blinders. And we don't see what the Bible is really saying, the way somebody in a different age might have perceived it. And their understanding might be better than ours, and it might correct ours. 

Another reason to study the Bible is that or to study church history, we should always study the Bible. Another reason to study Christian history is that it does give us a kind of a lab. You don't just want to experiment all the time with church and with truth. And if you've got 2000 years of history, 2000 years of case studies or almost experiments, if you will, then you can learn a lot from that and you can see how Christianity impacted different societies and what the results were. One area where we sometimes can get hung up as church music. 

Some people think that the only kind of godly music involves a pipe organ. Others think that only guitar and drums is holy. If you study church history, you'll find that for most of the church's history, there was no pipe organ at all. You'll find that in some cultures, the only end instrument was the drum, you'll find in others that they thought all instruments were evil and only the human voice should be used to sing. And so you get a sense of proportion. And you say, You know what, I don't think musical style is the core definition of Christianity. 

At different points in history, there have been systems of government that were praised as the Christian way of governing, some like monarchy, and they came up with a theory of the divine right of kings. And anybody who's a Christian knows that having a king is the only right way of governing others like aristocracy ruled by an educated and elite few, and they were sure that this was the God given form of government.

A more common one today might be that democracy is the only way to really be governed Christianly. And if we look at church history, we'll find people who lived under a variety of different kinds of government, and where the church was able to flourish in quite a variety of situations. That was structures have varied somewhat. In our culture, mom and dad and kids is often understood to be the family structure. 

But in other cultures, mom and dad and kids are very important, but extended family and household and employees are all considered kind of part of household and family. And that gives a little different coloring to how we understand the scriptures, how we apply the Bible. There have been different education approaches, in the way we train pastors in the way that we train children, and it's good to see what was pursued at different points in history. 

Christians have had different opinions on whether war is ever justified or whether pacifism is always the Christian way. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, by the way, was a pacifist his entire life right up to the point where he took part in the plot to kill Adolf Hitler, because he ran into an evil so great that he didn't believe that he could stick with his pacifism on that some Christians have thought the King James Bible is the only real word of God. 

Newsflash, most people in the world don't speak English. And the King James Bible is English, and other news flash Wickliffe translated the Bible in the 1300s and William Tyndale, Myles Coverdale also translated the Bible before the King James Bible was translated into English. And so we should be a little careful about getting too hung up on the one godly version of the Bible to which all people should forever adhere.

Christian history gives us a sense of proportion as well and shows us now what's been held in common over the centuries, where has the variety been? And if we look and see that some things have been held by almost all Christians, throughout almost all of history, we say, Boy, that's likely to be very core Christianity. And if we see some things that are just all over the map, and all kinds of different opinions, we may still find that the Bible defines it or we may just find that it is something of relatively minor importance that the Bible doesn't even address. And studying church history gives us a sense of what is common to Christianity throughout different eras and different cultures. 

We also simply need to, to be grateful, grateful to God, and grateful to other people, Hebrews 11 speaks of a great cloud of witnesses who came before us, many of them gave their blood for the faith. Many of them gave their blood so that the Bible could be in our own language, or gave their blood so that the gospel could spread to a new culture. And we can be grateful to such people. And we can also be encouraged and inspired by such people. If you're living in a society, where Christians have gotten kind of comfortable, kind of fat and lazy. 

And you read about the great martyrs, or you read about the great champions of the faith and some of the opposition they had to face, then you get inspired and encouraged not to wimp out, but instead to be bold and strong in the Lord. And when we're honest about the Christian wrongdoing and error, it shows us how much we owe to God because despite the ways people throughout history have blown it, God has kept his church and has maintained it and has spread the gospel despite human wickedness, despite demonic opposition.

A couple of reasons that Martin Noll doesn't mention, but that I think are important is that Christian history can also help us in our preaching and teaching when you've when you're a preacher, but when you're teaching a class, there are going to be some exciting stories and some inspiring heroes that will serve as excellent sermon examples. People who did great things for God who stood up for the faith. 

And you can mention these people in your sermons and you'll find that the people who listen to you will benefit from those examples. Church history helps us also to see how some things got into the church. We're never in the Bible, for instance, the prohibition among Roman Catholics against having married people as priests, how did that ever get in there? It it's not in the Bible, the Bible speaks of a man being able to take good care of his family as one of the qualifications for leadership. It came in later and you can learn in church history when that happened. And I could give a lot of other examples of things that that pop up in church history, but really weren't in the Bible itself. And it's kind of helpful to know where those ideas came from. 

Church history helps us to recognize some things that are supposed to be new teachings and new and improved practices and helps us to see them as old discredited errors. Take, for example, a recent book and Brian McLaren's a new kind of Christianity. Whoa, that's exciting. A new kind of Christianity. Brian McLaren is an author who's known as part of the Emergent Church part of this new and fabulous thing. 

Hey, I read a new kind of Christianity and thought, but I've seen this movie before. It's just a recycling of unbiblical social gospel liberalism, that was popular in the late 1800s. And then kind of collapsed of its own weight, because it had no real gospel in it. And so it's helpful to know your church history, just so you know, some of Satan's tactics that have come around before and you don't want to be full, they got fooled back then let's not be fooled right now. 

Another value of studying church history as you see that things aren't the way they they are right now among us history can give you some alternatives to present patterns or paradigms in our own cultural setting. Let's just take the example of church buildings. church buildings aren't the only place to worship God. In the first few centuries, there were no church buildings. If you studied the history of missions, the gospel spread, and many people worshiped in the open air. In the time of Charles Wesley, he said the word John Wesley's brother said the world is my parish, and he was sometimes opposed for preaching in the open because you're supposed to preach in churches, that Lesley took the gospel to the streets. 

And in many overseas missionary situations, people today still are worshiping in homes and spreading the gospel in that way. And it helps to study what some of the possibilities are, besides what we're accustomed to. Full time pastors are not the only kind of leaders by vocational leaders, people who have a full time job and then Minister in their off work hours is very common throughout the history of the church and throughout many parts of the world today. And it's important for those of you who are students who are right now studying as by vocational leaders, to see that this isn't something new and weird, but it's in fact quite common and important throughout church history. 

And seminary educated scholars aren't the only preachers in the 1800s, the circuit writing preacher, some of them trained in log cabin colleges, some of them hardly trained at all had a huge impact on the spread of the gospel. And on the churching of North America. Indigenous evangelists in missionary settings, in many different areas of the world, have been mighty for the Lord, and they were not trained in a seminary. 

Tthat's not a blast at seminaries either. I'm simply saying that when you study church history, and different eras and cultures, you understand that there are a variety of ways of doing things. And it may give you some new ideas of things you could do, and leadership approaches you could take. And so those are some of the benefits of studying church history. 

Going back to Martin Noll again, he suggests in his book, Turning Points that the great commission could give us a good framework in our study of church history. Jesus Great Commission comes from the end of Matthew 28, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me, Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. 

Now know suggests that that gives us a good framework and looking at church history. Jesus says, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. And so when you study church history, you see that the Lord Jesus is sovereign over all things. Nothing that happens is irrelevant to Jesus Christ, the living word, and you want to study history to see his hand in it, he reigns over all the experiences over all the events that affect his church. Jesus said, Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations. 

The church keeps moving outward to reach more and more peoples in church history is in part a record of how that gospel has kept moving into new nations into new areas reaching new peoples and what kind of impact it had, what kind of opposition was faced, how the church took shape in those settings. The church also keeps moving inward. Throughout history the church has dug deeper into the scriptures as been challenged by its own experiences, to learn more of Jesus Christ, and to teach more of Jesus Christ and studying church history can help us to learn that experience of discovery and a moving inward and learning along with the historical church. 

Christianity takes root in various cultures and influences them, says Martin Noll but it is not identical to any culture. And it's very important to realize that our own particular culture is not the sum total of what Christianity is. And then Jesus says, surely I am with you always to the very end of the age. And this is really important because as we study church history, we're gonna see a lot of bad stuff too. But whatever the church is wanderings and sins, Christ's presence, sustains and builds His church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Jesus promised I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. One author said that a number of times it seemed the church had gone entirely to the dogs, and each time it was the dog that died