Learning From Our Ancient Past
by John Brimacombe

I've been teaching a Church History class for the last few months and the one thing I've had to do is refamiliarize myself with all the past history of church leaders, councils, creeds, and dates. It's actually been a fun thing to do and it has made me reflect some on my own faith lately. How much do we know of our heritage in the faith? Do we know the story of Christianity? And I'm not just talking of the biblical story recorded in the Scriptures.

Roger Olson, in his book, The Story of Christianity, says that Christians know about the biblical narrative; the metanarrative of our faith, which is the overarching story of God's path with his people. What he says we don't know is the secondary narrative, that is, the story of Christianity after the Apostles. We jump, in our own minds, from Paul and Peter to Martin Luther to Billy Graham. He makes the statement that the one who does this is like a person who doesn't know the history of their own country. Imagine a world where people in America didn't know about George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, or Abraham Lincoln.

I've also been reading a book entitled Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers by Christopher Hall. In the introduction he tells the story of Thomas Oden who started out as a Bultmanian liberal, but turned to orthodox Christianity mainly through the writers of the early Church Fathers. This is not to say that the early Apostolic Fathers, Apologists, and Theologians were correct on everything, because many times they weren't. But there is something to the idea of reading those who knew Jesus.

I'm reminded of one who is probably the first early church father in the sense that we're talking about here. Think about the Apostle John. In I John he writes that "what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have observed and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of life, that life was revealed and we have seen it and we testify and declare to you the eternal life that was with the Father."

In the next few blogs I'll be sharing some insights from the early church fathers (and mothers too) that highlight their faith and commitment to Jesus Christ and to whom we owe much of our own heritage and thinking to.