Why Study Christian History?

by

Debbie W. Wilson

In our society history has been lost amidst a hodgepodge called social studies. Our nation suffers through losing a unifying sense of heritage. However, our church has lost more in losing sight of our Christian heritage. Few people in our churches know much of what happened between Paul’s missionary journeys and the latest high-profile minister or evangelist in their denomination. They could not tell you about Constantine, the Great Schism, Augustine, the Crusades, the 95 Theses, the Great Age of Missions, the Wesleyan Revival, the Christmas Massacre, the Great Awakening, or the Second Great Awakening.

Why We Don’t Know. History no longer inspires many historians. Because of evolutionary belief in man’s continual improvement and their lack of belief in absolutes, many modern historians, philosophers, and teachers no longer see that history has any relevance for the average person. Therefore, their teaching of it has changed to what is relevant instead of what has shaped us, the people who have inspired us, and the lessons we should not repeat.

Christian history falls through the cracks because the Church takes pride in teaching the Bible, but schools no longer teach Western history, much of which has been inspired by Christianity. With no one teaching Christian history, few of us learn it. However, God’s story of mankind did not end with John’s writing. He has continued interacting with us, and we need to understand how.

Why We Should Learn. History is the record of God’s dealing with man and man’s dealing with his neighbor. By learning about God’s interaction with man, we see that God is real, that He is still involved, that He is still working His plan. In the book of Daniel God promised that His kingdom would fill the earth. By studying history we see that promise being fulfilled as Christianity expands.

History explains the reasons for some of the problems in the world. Why do the Chinese have a different view of human rights than most Western nations? Why are moderate Islamic nations such as Egypt having trouble with radical Islamic factions? What has caused the conflict between Israel and the Islamic nations surrounding it? Why is the United States more free than almost any country in the world and how do we preserve that freedom? History provides the answers to these questions. By knowing those answers, we can attempt solutions based on knowledge.

History builds our faith. When we look at events in our country, we can become depressed. When we look at God’s dealings with the world in history, we marvel. Our faith grows. Who could have predicted the Wesleyan revivals that preserved England from a revolution similar to France’s? Who could have predicted that the closing of the trade routes to India and China would expand the Gospel to three continents yet undiscovered by Christians? Who could have predicted that Mao’s Communist assault on Christianity in China would purge the Church so that it grows in record numbers, its message being speeded on roads Mao ordered built, carried in a Mao-ordered common language instead of hundreds of dialects, and read by a nation now over half literate because Mao ordered it? Our God, how infinite are His ways! History confirms it.

History, especially Christian history, sets heroic examples for us to follow. We see one lonely monk, Martin Luther, take his stand on the Bible in the face of the religious power that could burn him at the stake. We learn of John Wesley’s taking the Gospel to the poor miners of Bristol though it shut the doors of many churches against him. We fight at the side of Amy Carmichael against child prostitution in the temples of India and we flee with those Harriet Tubman led to freedom.

The lives of those who lived before us show us that one person with courage and a godly commitment can make a difference in the world for God. We learn how to face problems, pressures, challenges, and death. This great cloud of witnesses inspire us to run the race without cutting corners or quitting for we see God’s faithfulness in and through them.

Learning Christian History. At first the idea of teaching Christian history daunts us because most of us have such limited knowledge of Christian history. How can we learn it?

We can read the complete history of the church written by Philip Schaff if we have time or use it for reference, but most of us do not have time to read it all. We can use a Christian history textbook that gives us the basics, such as the Bob Jones or A Beka history books. Also textbooks of western history from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, sometimes obtainable at used book stores and garage sales, recognized the importance of the Christian influence on history more than most newer ones. Francis Schaeffer’s How Should We Then Live? and Russell Kirk’s The Roots of American Order provide a more in-depth analysis of the development of modern society based on the ancient roots. You should probably have a basic overview of Western history before tackling Schaeffer or Kirk.

The Master Christian Library contains ancient and modern works on CD ROM. Wetzel’s Chronology of Bible and Religious History lists historical events with an emphasis on Christian history through 1992. Though it would not analyze how certain events affected people, it does give a basic time line. My copy is a few years old now and very helpful. Perhaps the updated versions are a little more user friendly.

Biographies and historical novels teach history enjoyably. These accounts take you into the struggles of the individual. Augustine’s Confessions, the first autobiography in Western literature, allows you to sit at this man’s feet, to learn the issues of his day, and the seriousness with which he took his faith. Elisabeth Elliot’s A Chance to Die: the Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael fascinates and delights as it describes God’s working in Amy’s life. Walking through history with the men and women whom God has used to write His story helps you to grow with them.

John Whitehead’s film series Grasping at the Wind and Francis Schaeffer’s film How Should We Then Live? depict and analyze history. Whitehead’s video, available through the Rutherford Institute, covers and analyzes the last 200 years of history, while Schaeffer’s begins during the Roman Empire. These are for adults, so please view them yourself to determine whether your child is mature enough to understand what is being discussed. In one of Schaeffer’s films he shows a statue of a Hindu god of death and in another a fertility goddess. These images may be troubling for children.

When learning history, check for a history of a subject that you are interested in. Most subjects have been written about somewhere. For instance, By Their Blood by James and Marti Hefley accounts for the deaths of Christian martyrs in the twentieth century around the world. George Grant encourages the pro-life movement with his history of the fight against abortion from antiquity in Third Time Around. Free Indeed: Heroes of Black Christian History by Mark Sidwell brings to light the lives of African-American heroes of the faith often unknown.

Developing Your Child’s Love of History. Often when you ask a child if he likes history, he will screw his face up, wrinkle his nose, and say, “It’s so boring.” And he is right. Many textbooks are boring, having lost the sense of the story of history. It becomes a hodgepodge of dates, names, and living conditions because the historian himself does not see the interconnectedness, the relationships, the cause and effect in history.

The home schooling parent needs to bring these together. First choose an approach to history that you think will motivate your child. You may try using biographies and historical novels. A Literature Approach to Medieval, Renaissance and Reformation History by Rea Berg is one example. The “Famous Men” approach that Rob and Cindy Shearer have put together combine biographical sketches, specialized histories, literature, music, and biographies. Peter Marshal and David Manuel describe and analyze American Christian history in their series that begins with The Light and the Glory or you may use a classroom style textbook as put out by one of the Christian publishers.

Whichever method you use, include maps and timelines in your study. These help students recognize the relationships between events. They also add another dimension to the understanding.

Students can display their understanding of the history studied in traditional methods such as short answer or essay tests. But you can also have them put together collages about a person’s life or a historical event. They can collect poetry, artwork, drawings of fashions, and other things which represent the time. They can make models of the houses, temples, weapons, tools, and artwork. They can write and put on plays or short stories, compose music, paint, or draw original works. They can sew clothes for themselves or a doll or prepare meals common to the time period.

Influential Christians Who Were Not Politicians. Often, history emphasizes the military and political over other types of influence. Secular textbooks rarely recognize the contributions made by Christians or tell that the person was a Christian. Christian young people do not see that Christianity affected the culture from more than just the pulpits, that Christian faith transcends what has been called “the Christian ghetto.”

Famous Christian poets including John Milton, John Donne, Gerard Manley Hopkins, George Herbert, Christina Rossetti, and others helped make English poetry what it is. For more information on poets, check Lives of the Poets by Louis Untermeyer.

Isaac Newton, the Bernoulli family, Leonhard Euler, Rene Descartes and others helped shape math. Isaac Newton, Philip Lister, George Washington Carver, Louis Pasteur, Robert Boyle and Johannes Kepler based their scientific work on Christian foundations. Men of Science, Men of God tells more about them and others.

Augustine, Dante, John Milton, John Bunyan, Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift, C. S. Lewis, Fyodor Dostoevski, Leo Tolstoy and others appear in The Great Books of the Christian Tradition among those who have used the written word for God.

Christians have played a vital role in the story of history as explorers, artists, musicians, inventors, medical experts, writers, journalists, scientists, educators, astronauts, farmers, and more. Share with your child the mystery, the grandeur, the sorrow, the struggle, the lessons, the challenge that makes His story so important to your child’s life.

(copyright 2000, Debbie W. Wilson)