This study and understanding of church history is a vital area of concern for all believers. The individuals and events that have helped form and shape the church and the beliefs we hold dear are quite honestly far too often neglected. Perhaps this is due to memories from school of history books and the forced memorization of dates, places, people, and facts, that utmost drudgery that many do not look back upon with the fondest of memories. For those who are not avid historians, Dr. Brian Cosby has written a book that takes a look at the important people, places, and events that have occurred over the last two thousand or so years, focusing on why those people, places, and events are of great importance to our world today.
As far as history books are concerned, as noted earlier, most can rightly be labeled as rather boring unless of course you are a history buff. Dr. Cosby notes in the introduction to his book that his overall effort is to “whet your appetite for a deeper and more-extensive study of God’s story.” It is my opinion he absolutely hits his intended mark in this book. While I enjoyed most of my history classes in high school as well as in my undergraduate and graduate studies, admittedly there were points in those classes where I was tempted to fall asleep or skim through the material just to get the assignment completed. After reading Dr. Cosby’s primer on church history, I have a renewed interest in the history of the church, in particular the lives of the many men (and women) of God who faithfully served the body of Christ and who stood up against the tide of heresy and liberalism, issues we honestly still face today.
Each chapter in this book is devoted to a specific period of church history. I appreciated the fact that Dr. Cosby took the needed time at the outset of his book to ensure the reader understands that the church did not just pop up out of the proverbial blue in the book of Acts. The people of God (i.e. the church), actually finds its roots in the Old Testament with God calling a people to be His. As history unfolds, the plan of God established from eternity past, namely the fulfillment of God calling His elect can be observed. From the times of the Apostolic Fathers to our own time, God has been working in history to bring a chosen people to Himself.
I also appreciated the fact that despite Dr. Cosby desiring this book to be a primer on church history, he was not afraid to include some more “nerdy” theological concepts such as transubstantiation or scholasticism for example. While such issues may seem far removed from our own day and age, the debate on the validity of such positions had a large impact on the church as a whole, especially leading up to the time of the Reformation. In fact, Dr. Cosby spends a good deal of time providing an overview of the Reformation as it unfolded in the period of the 16th and 17th centuries to include a group of people I am becoming rather fond of, namely the Puritans.
Dr. Cosby also devotes some needed time to issues that have had a great impact on how church’s conduct business today, specifically the influence of preachers such as Charles Finney and the emergence of Dispensationalism under the guidance of John Darby. Other important topics such as the impact of theological liberalism, in particular the influence of liberal German theologians such as Friedrich Schleiermacher and his followers such as Paul Tillich and Rudolf Bultmann are discussed. These individuals and the influence they had on theology cannot be overstated and Dr. Cosby does an excellent job of presenting these individuals and discussing their rather negative influence on theology in the late 19th century and on into the present.
The rise of fundamentalism and what is commonly known as evangelicalism to include the various forms both schools of thought take are also noted by Dr. Cosby. The flurry of denominations splits and the establishment of offshoot denominations in response to positions taken on topics such as evolution, neo-orthodoxy, and Pentecostalism are also noted. While some of the important people who were involved at the time, men such as Karl Barth or William Jennings Bryan may not be familiar to most, those who hold to for example the Pentecostal ideal in today’s church are certainly well-known, people such as Kenneth Copeland, T. D. Jakes, and Joel Osteen. Thus, understanding the root of their belief system is vital to grasping the reason for the message they promote.
Each chapter in this excellent book concludes with a series of discussion questions designed to help the reader dig deeper into the issues presented in that chapter. I found all of the questions provided to be very engaging and they will certainly spark some additional study on a number of people, places, and ideas presented by Dr. Cosby.
I highly recommend God’s Story: A Student’s Guide to Church History for all believers, whether they are history buffs or not. This will be a book that will fund its way into the homeschool curriculum for our daughter, especially as we engage facets of church history covered by Dr. Cosby. In a time when the people, places, and events that have helped shape the church as we know it today have more often than not been neglected, Dr. Cosby has provided a helpful tool to once again connect people of today with those who paved the way so long ago.
This book is available for purchase from Christian Focus Publications by clicking here.
I received this book for free from Christian Focus Publications via Cross Focused Reviews for this review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”
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