Introduction to Christian History

Church History offers a contextual view of how the Christian church spread and developed. It did so not in a vacuum, but in a setting of times, cultures, and events that both influenced and were influenced by the church. Church History looks closely at the integral link between the history of the world and that of the church

"Christianity in the Twentieth Century charts the transformation of one of the world's great religions during an age marked by world wars, genocide, nationalism, decolonization, and powerful ideological currents, many of them hostile to Christianity. Written by a leading scholar of world Christianity, the book traces how Christianity evolved from a religion defined by the culture and politics of Europe to the expanding polycentric and multicultural faith it is today--one whose growing popular support is strongest in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, China, and other parts of Asia."

"'Ecumenism' and 'independency' suggest two distinct impulses in the history of Christianity: the desire for unity, co-operation, connectivity, and shared belief and practice, and the impulse for distinction, plurality, and contextual translation. Yet ecumenism and independency are better understood as existing in critical tension with one another. They provide a way of examining changes in World Christianity. Taking their lead from the internationally acclaimed research of Brian Stanley, in whose honour this book is published, contributors examine the entangled nature of ecumenism and independency in the modern global history of Christianity. They show how the scrutiny afforded by the attention to local, contextual approaches to Christianity outside the western world, may inform and enrich the attention to transnational connectivity"

Continues the story of the development of Christianity from the mid-fifteenth century up to the dawn of the twentieth century. Beginning with the missionary expansion of the fifteenth century, the story goes on to trace the fracturing of the Christian movement among Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant versions; the impact of modern colonialism and the emergence of a new global reality; the wars of religion, the impact of the Enlightenment, the rise of Christianity in North America, and the modern missionary movement. Throughout, the authors emphasize the expression of local forms of Christianity in diverse cultures, and the role of Christianity in helping to shape distinct national identities. They conclude with a forecast of a new century of globalization.

The Disruption of Evangelicalism is the first comprehensive account of the evangelical tradition across the English-speaking world from the end of the nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. It offers fresh perspectives on conversionism and the life of faith, biblical and theological perspectives, social engagement, and mission. Tracing these trajectories through a period of great turbulence in world history, we see the deepening of an evangelical diversity. And as events unfold, we notice the spectrum of evangelicalism fragments in varied and often competing strands. Dividing the era into two phases?before 1914 and after 1918?draws out the impact of the Great War of 1914--18 as evangelicals renegotiated their identity in the modern world. By accenting his account with the careers of selected key figures, Geoffrey Treloar illustrates the very different responses of evangelicals to the demands of a critical and transitional period. The Disruption of Evangelicalism sets out a case that deserves the attention of both professional and arm-chair historians.

"This book continues a compelling series of books charting the course of English-speaking evangelicalism over the last three hundred years. Evangelical culture at the end of the nineteenth century is set against the backdrop of imperial maneuverings in Great Britain and populist uprisings in the United States. Meanwhile, the industrialized West begins to enjoy the fruits of the Industrial Revolution, as British and American commerce become unstoppable forces on economies worldwide." "Theology, hymnody, gender, warfare, politics and science are all taken into consideration in this sweeping discussion of a critical period in religious history, but the focus of The Dominance of Evangelicalism is on the landmark individuals, events and organizations that shaped the story of a high-water mark of this Christian movement."

In The Expansion of Evangelicalism, John Wolffe provides an authoritative account of evangelicalism from the 1790s to the 1840s. Making extensive use of primary sources, Wolffe balances British and American developments, and also discusses Canada, Australia, the West Indies and other regions. He covers aspects of the movement such as spirituality and worship; the place of evangelicalism in the lives of women, men and the family; and its broader social and political effects--giving particular attention to the question of slavery.

"This volume in the History of Evangelicalism series offers an authoritative survey of worldwide evangelicalism following the Second World War. It discusses the globalization of movements of mission, evangelism, and revival, paying particular attention to the charismatic and neo-Pentecostal movements. Extended treatment is given to the part played by southern hemisphere Christianity in broadening evangelical understandings of mission. The trends in evangelical biblical scholarship, preaching and apologetics were no less significant, including the discipline of hermeneutics in key issues.While the role of familiar leaders such as Billy Graham, John Stott, Carl Henry, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Festo Kivengere receives full coverage, space is also given to lesser-known figures, such as Edward Carnell, Agnes Sanford, Orlando Costas, John Gatu and John Laird. The final chapter considers whether evangelical expansion has been at the price of theological coherence and stability, and discusses the phenomenon of "post-evangelicalism."

In the second of this three-volume history, Gary Dorrien explores American theological liberalism in its heyday-at the advent of the research university and the institutionally identified schools. He argues that in its prime theological liberalism effected a creative blending of theological schools, featured a tension between its evangelical and modernist impulses, and was fueled by its expectation of social and cultural progress until its optimism was subjected to withering internal criticism in the 1930s.

In this concluding volume of his magisterial trilogy, Gary Dorrien sustains his previous definition of liberal theology and his mixture of theological, philosophical, and historical analysis, while emphasizing the unprecedented diversity of liberal theology in the postmodern age. Dorrien argues that liberal theology has been in crisis for the past half-century, yet despite the crisis, and also because of it, it has also experienced a "hidden renaissance" of intellectual creativity. Liberal theology in the early twenty-first century is more diverse, complex, and marginalized than ever before in its history, he concludes, but its essential idea-creating a progressive, credible, integrative third way between orthodox over-belief and secular unbelief-remains as necessary as ever.

"A fascinating history of dispensationalism and its influence on popular culture, politics, and religion. In The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism, Daniel G. Hummel illuminates how dispensationalism, despite often being dismissed as a fringe apocalyptic movement, shaped Anglo-American evangelicalism and the larger American cultural imagination. Hummel locates dispensationalism's origin in the writings of the nineteenth-century Protestant John Nelson Darby, who established many of the hallmarks of the theology, such as premillennialism and belief in the rapture. Though it consistently faced criticism, dispensationalism held populist, and briefly scholarly, appeal-visible in everything from turn-of-the-century revivalism to apocalyptic bestsellers of the 1970s to current internet conspiracy theories. Measured and irenic, Hummel objectively evaluates evangelicalism's most resilient (and contentious) popular theology. As the first comprehensive intellectual-cultural history of its kind, The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism is a must-read for students and scholars of American religion."

This inaugural book in a series that charts the course of English-speaking evangelicalism over the last 300 years offers a multinational narrative of the origin, development and rapid diffusion of evangelical movements in their first two generations.

The Spirit of Early Evangelicalism sheds new light on the nature of evangelical religion by locating its rise with reference to major movements of the 18th century, including Modernity, the Scientific Revolution, and the Enlightenment.

1. What Made the Great Awakening Great?; 2. The Evangelical Encounter with the Enlightenment; 3. Disestablishment as American Sisyphus; 4. Antebellum Reform; 5. The Rise of the Domestic Ideal in the United States and Canada; 6. The Civil War and the Making of Conservative American Evangelicalism; 7. The Rise of Fundamentalism; 8. Urban Pentecostalism: Chicago, 1906-1912; 9. The Great Migration; 10. The Global Turn in American Evangelicalism; 11. Billy Graham's 1949 Los Angeles Revival.12. Lausanne '74 and American Evangelicalism's Latin Turn.