The importance of church history, pt. 1
A Q&A with our resident church historian, Jarrett Vandiver
It’s important to have friends you can learn from, and I truly believe I hit the jackpot in that category.
Jarrett Vandiver, who I’ve known for as long as I can remember, is one of those friends.
Jarrett received his bachelor’s degree in history from the University of North Alabama (roar lions!!) in 2019, and then got his Master of Arts in History of Christianity from Wheaton College in 2021. Now back in North Alabama with his wife, Mattie (who is also one of my very best friends), Jarrett teaches English, New Testament, and Systematic Theology classes to middle- and high-schoolers at Decatur Heritage Christian Academy.
We went to high school together, were in each others’ weddings, and now convene for book club and impromptu game nights on a regular basis. He’s also been extremely influential in my own desire to learn more about the history of the church, which is why I knew we needed to have a conversation about the topic to share with you ASAP.
Jarrett shared so much great stuff with me that I’ll be thinking about for months and years to come—so much, in fact, that I’ve decided to make this a two-parter, so you’ll have to come back next week for the rest. Here’s the first part of our Q&A:
Q: How and why did you decide to study church history?
A: I became highly interested in church history after taking classes on the Middle Ages and the Bible in college. The otherworldliness of the ancient church gave me a sense of wonder and motivation to learn from the church fathers and mothers in their theology.
I was also mentored by Joel Anderson, a professor at UNA at the time, who modeled for me what it looked like to be a great teacher and lover of Scripture and history. I knew that since I had been so impacted by my study of Scripture and the history of the church, God was opening doors for me to imitate teachers like Joel Anderson in passing on the church’s tradition to others.
Q: What even is church history?
A: “Church history” can actually be a vague term, as there are two primary branches of study in church history: history of Christianity and historical theology. While the two are very similar, they are slightly distinct. History of Christianity is more concerned with the historical events surrounding the church’s history (i.e. what were the historical circumstances that led to the Council of Nicaea?) while historical theology tends to focus on the theology of one particular person or group (i.e. what did St. Augustine believe about predestination?).
To put both of these disciplines together, I would liken church history to be the journey of development as expressed by John Henry Newman. Newman famously wrote about “doctrinal development” in the 19th century, not to say that Christian doctrine has changed over the course of its history, but to say that the church’s understanding of our doctrine has developed (much like a seed grows into a tree; they are both ontologically the same, but the seed will develop and look externally different over time).
Journeying through church history, for example, is seeing that the earliest Christians believed that Jesus’ divinity was true but it took years of development and conversation for the church to explain how it is true. To put it in the words of the old Latin adage, lex orandi, lex credindi, “the law of worship is the law of belief.” The church’s beliefs and developments are built on the solid truth of worship in the God who became man to save us. Our faith is not built on philosophical speculation; it is based on irrefutable experience.
Q: What role has church history played in your faith?
A: Church history gives me a more complete understanding of Christian community. I grew up in a loving Christian home, a Bible-believing church, and a vibrant youth group; the people in my life from youth at First Baptist Killen to my college years at UNA’s Baptist Campus Ministries strengthened my faith through accountability, small groups, Bible studies, great food, and everything in between.
During my time studying history at UNA, though, the Lord began to show me that this was only the beginning of what it means to be a member of the Christian family. I remember one of my professors casually bringing up stories about ancient Christian martyrs during Nero’s persecutions, 4th century bishops punching heretics, and some weird stuff about so-called “transubstantiation.”
The professor mentioned these things in passing, but something about the “otherness” of these ancient Christians fascinated me to the point that I thought about nothing else during his two-hour lecture. After class, a classmate and I mused over the facts about these ancient and medieval Christians that seemed so foreign to my theological sentiments. But one question from that conversation has stuck in my head to this day. Following our confusion over the otherness of these ancient Christians, he asked me: “Do you think anyone actually got saved back then?”
That question forced me to consider whether these Christians of old had any connection to me. Who were these early Christians who succeeded the apostles? Are we related? I went back to my Bible and tried to figure out who the “church” actually is and what Jesus promised about this community. I began to meditate on Jesus’ promise to Peter in Mt. 16:18: “I will build my church, and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it.” I realized that my classmate and I spoke of the church that day in class as if it ceased to exist: at some point in history, perhaps people “stopped getting saved.” But did my attitude reflect a trust in Jesus’ promise?
As I studied Paul, I ran into his passage on the mystical body of Christ: “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12). Later in Hebrews, the writer speaks of the whole family of God from the beginning as an arena of supporters who advocate for us and cheer us on in the faith (Heb. 12:1-2).
These passages helped me understand two things about the church from all ages: (1) It has never failed to “get people saved” because Jesus is the head of the church, not us; (2) Because Christ is the eternal head of the church, those ancient Christians are equally a part of my family as the living Christians who walk beside me today. Georges Florovsky said it well: “The ultimate purpose of historical inquiry is not in the establishment of objective fact, but in the encounter with living beings.” All those who are in Christ are fully alive with him, whether or not they are awake in body.
In studying the church fathers and praying the prayers of the great saints of our tradition (Ancient, Medieval, Reformation, and Modern), I have grown closer to God through his community. I belong as a member of their story, just as each part of the body belongs to the others (Rom. 12:5). These historical Christians, who are currently more alive in Christ than I, lived out examples to imitate, just as they imitated Christ. I am a work in progress, but I have 2000 years’ worth of family to show me the way.
Q: Any fun facts, favorite stories, or great bits of trivia from church history that we should know?
A: Everyone should know:
The historical evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the very first Christians from the 30s A.D. worshipped Jesus Christ as God. This makes a pretty remarkable case for the resurrection of Jesus.1
Our idea of Santa Claus comes from St. Nicholas of Myra, a 4th century bishop known for his holiness and generosity. He took part in the council of Nicaea in 325 and, as some legends have told, apparently punched Arius for denying Jesus’ divinity.
Athanasius was exiled five times for preaching the divinity of Christ, even after Nicaea declared it in 325. His book On the Incarnation was one of C.S. Lewis’ favorites. Read it!
It was the Christian church that effectively ended the practice of slavery by the early Middle Ages. The spirit of Paul’s message to Philemon made the previous Roman practice irrelevant.
Come back next week to see Part 2, where Jarrett talks about the role of history in the modern church.
Now, LMK:
What role, if any, has church history played in your faith? What questions do you have about it? I want to know your thoughts!
And a recommendation:
Jarrett introduced me to Dr. Ryan Reeves’ YouTube channel, which has dozens of great, half-hour long videos about the history of Christianity. The video below will take you to the Early & Medieval Church History playlist, which is a fantastic place to start (and is awesome to listen to while driving, cooking dinner, or exercising).
See Hurtado’s book Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity.