Each day I receive an email reminding me of a significant event that happened in Christian history on that given date. Today, October 31, is the 503rd anniversary of Martin Luther nailing his 95 theses to the church building door in Wittenberg. This date is widely celebrated in Reformed and Evangelical churches as the birthday of the Reformation. you can read more about the remembrance of “Reformation Day” on Wikipedia.
Here are a few resources I would encourage my readers to check out about this event in Christian history: Continue Reading
With my fondness for things in Bible study and teaching which are related to printing, I listened today to the latest podcast from 5 Minutes in Church Historywith more than usual interest. Dr. Stephen Nichols spoke about the coming of Reformation ideas (Lutheran) from Germany to Iceland around 1533. Soon, many of the Catholic churches in Iceland were converted to Lutheran churches.
The Gospel of Judas? Gospel of Thomas? Gospel of Mary Magdalene? In the last few years the popular media has made it seem like new “gospels” have been discovered which should compete with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John for a place in the New Testament. We almost never see magazine articles or TV stories about why they do not belong!
To help my church history students know “the facts” about this imagined controversy, each year we watch a 45 minute video by Dr. Michael J. Kruger. Dr. Kruger is the President and Samuel C. Patterson Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at Reformed Theological Seminary, Charlotte, NC. He is a renowned scholar on 2nd Century Christianity and the New Testament canon (i.e., the books that are in the Bible). Here is the video to watch:
I am very excited about an upcoming series I plan to write for Effective Bible Study (this website!) about Johann Gutenberg and the “Gutenberg Bible.” My enthusiasm is for several reasons:
I am a trained printer with a background in letterpress (what Gutenberg Used), offset press, and digital.
I have owned or helped operate several printing companies as a means of support over the years for my ministry.
I have recently purchased a small tabletop letterpress and some other equipment and hope to spend time in the near future teaching my grandchildren here in Lubbock the joy and satisfaction of printing using this method. (For those with the interest, I purchased a 5 x 8 Kelsey Excelsior Press and am waiting for new rollers to be custom-made for it.)
The invention of printing as done by Gutenberg literally changed the world, including Christian evangelism and education.
The story, as much of it as we know, is a fascinating story.
The Temple in Jerusalem that stood in Jesus’ time is commonly referred to as Herod’s Temple or the Second Temple. It was a total rebuild and upgrade of the much more modest structure built after Jewish people began to return to their homeland at the end of the Babylonian captivity (Ezra 3). It was completed about 520 BC. Herd began his reconstruction in about 19 BC. Parts of Herod’s structures were still under construction even as Jesus visited it during His ministry (John 2:20-21; Matthew 24:1-2).
There are lots of resources available to help us visualize what this structure and the complex surrounding it probably looked like. These resources are helpful because the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70 and the current Temple Mount is occupied by an Islamic Mosque and the Islamic Dome of the Rock shrine.
Motivated by the recent documentary on Martin Luther which we recommended, today I want to touch on another aspect of Luther’s influence on Christianity – the way we “protestants” view music! “Next to the Word of God, music deserves the highest praise,” said Luther. He also wrote, “Music is next to theology!” And, “It (sacred music) drives away the devil!”
This article is not going to be long. Instead it will link to other resources freely available on the internet to let readers learn as much as they will of the work and influence of Luther in the realm of sacred music.
But briefly I would repeat what I tell my students in our History of Christianity course. Luther wrote hymns in the language and style of the people of his day. He even published a hymnbook of his and others hymns to be used in the “protesting” churches. He strongly believed in and practiced congregational a cappella singing.
Martin Luther is one of the most interesting people to me in the history of Christianity. From young law student to monk to college professor to reformer – his impact on church history can scarcely be overstated. And yet, he seemed to be laser focused on knowing and doing God’s will, not on elevating himself or trying to profit from his eventual fame.
This month begins the 500th anniversary of his being excommunicated by Pope Leo X in January 1521… and all the things that transpired afterward. Ligonier Ministries are making a documentary and a new podcast available to commemorate what would turn into a “sea change” in Christianity.
The question in our title is not asking whether someone is a citizen of Armenia. Rather it is framing a question from theology which dates back 400 years, but is still relevant today.
John Calvin was part of the Reformation of the early 1500s in Europe which gave rise to Protestantism and modern denominations in contrast to Roman Catholicism. In his Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin attempted to present a comprehensive view of Christian theology based on Scripture alone. This was in contrast to Roman Catholic theology which was a combination of Scripture, tradition, and papal and church council decrees. Calvin’s theological views are often referred to as “Calvinism,” probably a term Calvin himself would have found offensive.
No secret about it. I love to read and study Christian (i.e., Church) History. Numerous articles on this website are evidence of that. The stacks of books in my library and numerous titles in my Kindle digital book account confirm it.
Recently I wrote several articles on some little-known aspects of Martin Luther’s life and work, including two on this translation of the Bible into the common German language. So I was thrilled to discover this article in the Christianity Today Magazine archives written in 2017 by Ben Witherington, entitled, “The Most Dangerous Thing Luther Did.”I highly recommend it.
Our image is of the original 1534 printing of Luther’s complete Bible in German. Provided by Wikimedia Commons.
On February 5, 2020 I recommended the “Today in Christian History” daily email newsletter published by the Christianity Today Magazine. This daily email is a must-read for me every single day. Of course, this is because I am both a student and a teacher of Christian History, and love to always be learning more about the people and events that have shaped Christianity over the centuries.
So, starting today, I am going to frequently “borrow” ideas from “Today in Christian History” to write mini-posts for this site. These will not be “copy and paste” plagiarized articles, but simply posts inspired by things I read in that newsletter. I hope that these articles will inspire and educate you, my readers, as they do me.Continue Reading
When I teach the course on Christian History (see my videos on YouTube), I always emphasize to my students that Christian or church history is still taking place every day. And on some days, very significant historical events take place that will impact Christianity in the centuries to come. One such recent example would be the great fire that nearly destroyed the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris in 2019.
This week another very significant event occurred affecting a historic Christian structure. The president of Turkey on Friday, July 10, announced that the Hagia Sophia (“Sacred Wisdom”) church building in Istanbul would be converted into a mosque after being a museum open to the public since 1934. Why is this significant?Continue Reading
I am a real knock-over for any documentary that combines either archaeology or history with a conservative examination of some part of the Bible. So when a whole series comes along combining BOTH archaeology and history with the Bible, I am all in!
The Drive Thru History team led by Dave Stotts are the ones doing it again. I spoke about their earlier work over a year ago. Now Stotts is the presenter in a new series called, “Ends of the Earth”, which is examining the spread and influence of Christianity from the 1st Century until the present. Five of the planned 20 episodes have already been released on the Trinity Broadcast Network, with a new episode being added weekly.Continue Reading
The Gospel of Judas? Gospel of Thomas? Gospel of Mary Magdalene? In the last few years the popular media has made it seem like new “gospels” have been discovered which should compete with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John for a place in the New Testament. We almost never see magazine articles or TV stories about why they do not belong!
Martin Luther is one of the most interesting people to me in the history of Christianity. From young law student to monk to college professor to reformer – his impact on church history can scarcely be overstated. And yet, he seemed to be laser focused on knowing and doing God’s will, not on elevating himself or trying to profit from his eventual fame.
The question in our title is not asking whether someone is a citizen of Armenia. Rather it is framing a question from theology which dates back 400 years, but is still relevant today.
