Church History: From the First Century to Today

Church History: From the First Century to Today is a Religion & Theology course that traces Christianity from its apostolic beginnings to its global presence in the modern world. Students gain a clear, chronological journey through Christianity’s people, councils, conflicts, reforms, and global expansion while learning how major beliefs, institutions, and movements developed over time.

Explore Church History From The First Century To Today

• Follow Christianity’s development from the first Christians through the global church of today.
• Understand key councils, theological debates, reforms, and turning points in Christian history.
• Connect major figures such as Augustine, Constantine, Luther, and reform leaders to lasting historical change.
• Build Religion & Theology knowledge that supports deeper biblical, doctrinal, and cultural understanding.

This course offers a structured overview of Christian history, doctrine, reform, and worldwide expansion.

Beginning with the world of the first Christians, this course examines the apostolic church, the New Testament witness, early worship, leadership, persecution, and martyrdom. Students will see how Christian identity formed under pressure and how the early church defined its faith, community, and mission.

The course then moves through the major doctrinal and historical developments of late antiquity and the medieval period. Lessons cover heresies, apologists, Constantine, the Roman Empire, Nicaea, Chalcedon, Augustine, monasticism, the papacy, Eastern Christianity, the Great Schism, scholasticism, cathedrals, and medieval theology.

Students also study the crises and reforms that reshaped Europe, including late medieval calls for renewal, Luther and the Protestant Reformation, Reformed, Anglican, Radical, and Catholic reform movements, and the rise of confessional Europe. The final lessons connect these developments to Pietism, evangelical revival, modern missions, and Christianity in the global age.

By the end of Church History: From the First Century to Today, students will understand the major people, councils, conflicts, reforms, and global expansion that shaped Christianity. They will be better prepared to study Religion & Theology with historical depth, clearer context, and a stronger grasp of how the church’s past continues to influence Christian life today.