The Christian History Devotional: 365 Readings and Prayers to Deepen and Inspire Your Faith

January 1 · BATTLE FOR LIFE

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

ROMANS 12:21

404: Blood flowed, men died, crowds cheered—such was the entertainment enjoyed by the ancient Romans, which is familiar to us thanks to movies such as Gladiator and Spartacus. In the gladiatorial contests, combatants greeted the emperors by shouting, We who are about to die salute you! The loser in each contest was usually stabbed through the throat, while the crowds roared. The bloody sand was raked over, and a new contest would begin. Such bloodbaths were not just for the dregs of society but for everyone, including the emperors.

Constantine, the first Christian emperor, ended the gladiator spectacles in 313—but apparently the ban was not enforced for long, for the games were revived later. The emperors, even though they were Christians, feared to take away something that gave the masses such pleasure.

The early Christians lamented the evil of Roman public amusements. One Christian author called the games cannibal banquets for the soul. Other Christians claimed that the public shedding of blood for sport encouraged crime and a general disdain for human life. Even though many gladiators were convicted criminals under a death sentence, sensitive souls grieved that citizens enjoyed watching the butchery. Churches refused baptism to a gladiator unless he changed professions. Pastors taught their flocks that Christ’s people had no business attending such spectacles, and some congregations refused holy communion to Christians who did.

One Christian tried a more drastic approach. In the year 400, Telemachus leapt into the arena to stop a gladiatorial contest. The mob (composed mostly of citizens who were nominally Christian) stoned him to death. The emperor eventually ordered the contests stopped permanently. The last gladiator contests were held January 1, 404. They did not end solely because of Telemachus’s martyrdom. They ended because enough Christians, and people influenced by Christians, saw the games as the vulgar, inhumane outrages that they were. Faith in the Prince of Peace had triumphed over the spirit of cruelty.

Prayer: Lord of life, make us beacons of light in a dark world. Amen.

January 2 · THAT HEART-THUMPING HYMN

The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.

2 CORINTHIANS 10:4

1924: How did a man with fifteen children ever find time to write hymns— or write anything, for that matter? An ordinary man could not, but Sabine Baring-Gould was no ordinary man, for his mind ranged over so many things— Christianity, folk songs, ghosts and werewolves, and archaeology.

Born in 1834, he studied at Cambridge and was ordained in the Church of England. In forty-eight years of marriage, his wife, Grace, bore him fifteen children. While pastoring a church, he found time to collect and publish English folk songs. Appropriately for a pastor, he was fascinated by Christian history, and he wrote a sixteen-volume Lives of the Saints. He also wrote books on ghosts, werewolves, and superstitions. He was an amateur archaeologist, often digging in prehistoric ruins.

Sabine Baring-Gould is mostly remembered as the author of one of the church’s greatest hymns—which he wrote in about fifteen minutes. This was Onward, Christian Soldiers, written for a church parade of children held on Pentecost in 1864. His title for the hymn was Hymn for Procession with Cross and Banners. For the music he lifted a melody line from a symphony by Joseph Haydn. The hymn might have been forgotten had not the composer Arthur Sullivan in 1871 written the rousing tune that is so familiar. (Sullivan would later become famous for the music in the comical Gilbert and Sullivan operettas.) Not surprisingly, it was often used by the street bands of the Salvation Army.

The song has nothing to do with actual combat—the war is a spiritual one, between God’s Christian soldiers united in faith against the forces of darkness. Sadly, this superb hymn has been criticized and even dropped from some hymnals for its militarism, even though its mentions of war, battle, and army are obviously spiritual.

Sabine Baring-Gould died on January 2, 1924, the author of dozens of books—and remembered for a stirring hymn he dashed off in fifteen minutes.

Prayer: Father, thank you for hymns that stir the soul and deepen faith.

Amen.

January 3 · MISSIONARY MAID

Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you.

ISAIAH 41:10

1970: In a movie titled The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, the strikingly beautiful actress Ingrid Bergman portrayed an English missionary named Gladys Aylward. The real Gladys was not beautiful on the outside, but everyone who met her knew her to be beautiful within.

Born in London in 1902, Gladys worked as a maid but aspired to be a missionary. The China Inland Mission turned her down, saying she did not have enough education. Not one to be thwarted, Gladys saved enough money to pay for her own passage to China in 1930, which required a ponderous train trip across Russia, a voyage to Japan, then to China, then a trek by mule to a mission station north of Beijing, where she and an older missionary woman turned their home into an inn, a stopping point for trade caravans passing through. The entertainment the women provided was telling stories about Jesus, and in time they made many converts. Gladys gradually perfected her use of Chinese and began dressing as a native.

Gladys took in an orphan, then another, until in time there were a hundred. Japan invaded China in 1938, and Gladys and the band of orphans had to flee, journeying on foot for twelve days, sleeping some nights in the open. When they reached the Yellow River, there was no way to cross, all boat traffic having stopped due to the war, but Gladys and the children began to pray and sing hymns. A Chinese officer heard them and arranged for safe passage. Having found a safe home for the orphans, she started a church and later worked in a home for lepers.

Gritty though she was, Gladys’s health was broken by the war years, and in 1947 she returned to England for medical treatment. For the rest of her life she preached and lectured on her China adventures. She died on January 3, 1970, respected as a woman of deep faith and boundless courage.

Prayer: Lord, as we face obstacles and adversities, remind us of your unfailing love. Amen.

January 4 · PRAYING IN THE POWER PIT

Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations.

PSALM 46:10

1947: What would you say if you had two minutes to address a room full of the most powerful politicians in America? That question must have occurred many times to Peter Marshall, one of the most-quoted preachers of his day.

Born in 1902 in Scotland, Peter arrived in America when he was twenty-four. He made friends at a church who financed his education at a seminary in Atlanta, was ordained, and served a small church. He moved back to Atlanta to pastor another church and met his future wife, Catherine Wood (who, as Catherine Marshall, became a noted Christian author). In 1937 he was called to be the pastor of the power church, New York Avenue Presbyterian in Washington, with its pews full of political VIPs. Marshall’s sermons drew crowds and were often reprinted in Reader’s Digest and The New Yorker.

The U.S. Senate asked Marshall to serve as its chaplain, a position he assumed on January 4, 1947. The chaplaincy was mostly ceremonial, consisting of the chaplain opening each day’s session with a prayer. Marshall saw this mere formality as a means of speaking truth to the powerful. In one of his first prayers in the Senate chamber, he prayed, We are at cross-purposes with each other. Take us by the hand and help us see things from Thy viewpoint. Marshall’s prayers were collected and published as Mr. Jones, Meet the Master.

Peter, with his Scots accent, oozed charm and warmth. He had a contagious zest for life, which helped to draw young people to his church. He packed a great deal of living and life-changing influence into a few years. Peter had a heart attack, then a second, and he died January 26, 1949, at the age of forty-six. His widow published his story as A Man Called Peter.

Prayer: Father, let our faith in you be a life-affirming thing that draws others to you. Amen.

January 5 · FREED TO THINK—AND SERVE

He made the earth by his power; he founded the world by his wisdom.

JEREMIAH 51:15

1943: A noted scientist who died on this date saw no conflict at all between science and faith. On the contrary, he was certain that without God to draw aside the curtain, I would be helpless. His name was George Washington Carver, and few people ever started life with more handicaps. Born about 1864 in Missouri, he was the son of illiterate slaves, though all slaves were legally freed while he was still a toddler. A white couple whose last name was Carver were his owners, then guardians, and he referred to Mrs. Carver as Aunt Susan. The Carvers saw a lively intellect in the child, as did all who met him. He attended Simpson College in Iowa (one of the few colleges of the time that would admit blacks), but due to his knack for growing plants, he transferred to Iowa’s agricultural college.

In 1896 Booker T. Washington invited him to teach agriculture at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. He taught there till his death, while conducting research into the uses of soil-enriching crops like peanuts and sweet potatoes and urging farmers of all races to diversify their crops instead of relying on cotton, notorious for exhausting the soil. In the last years of his life, Carver was an international celebrity, meeting with three U.S. presidents and writing a syndicated column, Professor Carver’s Advice. Carver’s fame increased when Southern farmers began growing peanuts after their cotton was devastated by the boll weevil.

Carver was certain that it was God who gave him success. He had become a Christian at age ten and read the Bible constantly. While teaching agriculture at Tuskegee, he also modeled character development, and for years he taught a Sunday Bible class. He firmly believed that nature was one means by which God spoke to man, and though he enjoyed and encouraged reading, he believed his discoveries arose from communing with God.

Prayer: Lord, bless all those who study your creation and use their knowledge to benefit others. Amen.

January 6 · READING CREATION

How many are your works, O LORD! In wisdom you made them all.

PSALM 104:24

1884: Are religion and science opposed to each other? Gregor Mendel, who died on this date, did not think so. He is known as the father of genetics, but when he died, very few people knew of his scientific work, though many knew him as the head of a monastery in the Austrian Empire. It wasn’t until many years after his death that the world saw the significance of his work.

Born in 1822, Mendel grew up on a farm and learned to cultivate plants and tend bees, two skills that would prove useful years later. He joined a monastery in 1843, and the abbot there shared Mendel’s interest in science and gave him leave to study at the University of Vienna. In the monastery’s garden Mendel cultivated thousands of pea plants and maintained bee hives and through experimentation in making hybrids, formulated Mendel’s Laws of Inheritance. Scientists had always assumed that inherited characteristics blend, but Mendel discovered that heredity is affected by the interplay of dominant and recessive genes. He wrote up his findings in a paper presented to several scientific societies, but at the time no one really understood the importance of Mendel’s Laws.

Mendel became abbot of his monastery in 1868, and his administrative duties gave him little time for scientific pursuits. When he died in 1884, he was beloved by all who knew him and admired him as a Christian but were barely aware of his being a scientist. It would have amazed this gentle man that in the following century scientists and Christians would see each other as enemies.

Sometimes fame comes after death. There is a Mendel University in the Czech Republic, and the monastery where he lived and died has a Mendel Museum that includes his garden. These places honor a man who was a sincere Christian in his own time and an honored scientist afterward.

Prayer: Creator God, we give you thanks for your beautiful and intricate world, and for minds that understand it. Amen.

January 7 · KNOCKED DOWN, NEVER OUT

I call on the LORD in my distress, and he answers me.

PSALM 120:1

1676: The great Reformation leader Martin Luther insisted that people needed the Bible and hymns in their own language. So Luther not only translated the Bible into German but also wrote several hymns, and he insisted that hymns be an important part of Protestant worship. He started the rich tradition of hymn singing and composing in Lutheran churches.

A follower in that tradition was Paul Gerhardt, born in 1607. He studied at the University of Wittenberg, the very spot where Luther had launched the Reformation years earlier. Gerhardt became a pastor in Berlin, where he and composer Johann Cruger collaborated in writing hymns. Gerhardt’s preaching and songs attracted many people, and in a time when denominational differences mattered, Gerhardt, a Lutheran, reached out to other Protestants. Sadly, he lost his post due to a conflict with the local ruler, Elector Friedrich Wilhelm. He could not even hold services in his home. In the meantime, his wife died, as did four of their five children. Having lived through the turbulent Thirty Years’ War, in which a third of Europe’s population died, Gerhardt had seen his share of suffering.

Sustained in all this sadness by his faith in God, Gerhardt wrote some great hymns, 123 in all. They were written in German, of course, but many of them have been translated into English. John Wesley, founder of Methodism, rendered one of Gerhardt’s hymns into the English Jesus, Thy Boundless Love to Me, a song Wesley had heard onboard ship as he sailed to America. Wesley also translated Gerhardt’s Give to the Winds Thy Fears, and both these hymns are found in most English-language hymnals.

Paul Gerhardt died on January 7, 1676, having witnessed much sadness in his life but also having experienced the sustaining love of the Lord.

Prayer: Almighty God, you give us hope through our many trials. Teach us patience, and give us strength to endure whatever this world does to us. Amen.

January 8 · EARTHLY POWER

My kingdom is from another place.

JOHN 18:36

1198: How much earthly power should a spiritual leader possess? In the Middle Ages most of the popes would have said, As much as possible. For centuries the popes were not only the heads of the Roman Catholic Church but also ruled over a large part of central Italy (a region known as the Papal States). Possessing the power to excommunicate anyone, a pope held great power over even the mightiest of kings. Not surprisingly, the office of pope attracted many ambitious, unscrupulous men. And yet, the most powerful pope of all was a reasonably moral man, though definitely an ambitious one.

That man was Innocent III, whose reign began on January 8, 1198. Many high officials in the church were corrupt, but Innocent (true to his name) had led a scandal-free life. Taking office at the age of thirty-seven, he had no qualms about using his power to bring some of Europe’s wayward rulers into line. One example: Innocent appointed a man to the office of archbishop of Canterbury, head of the church in England. King John of England had his own candidate for the post, and when John resisted, Innocent excommunicated John and put England under an interdict, meaning that, technically, the whole country was outside the church. John, fearing a rebellion, gave in and accepted Innocent’s appointee.

In one of his writings, Innocent stated that the power of the pope and the power of a king were like the sun and the moon, meaning that the sun (the pope) was a greater light since the moon (a king) only reflected the light of the sun.

Despite the great impression Innocent made on his contemporaries and on historians, he has never been officially made a saint, nor was he ever referred to as Innocent the Great. Perhaps the church has never been quite comfortable with the awesome amount of worldly power Innocent wielded, given that Jesus said his kingdom was not of this world.

Prayer: Lord, keep us from the lust for worldly power and let us rely on you. Amen.

January 9 · FREE NATION, FREE CHURCH

Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

2 CORINTHIANS 3:17

1724: Isaac Backus, born on this date in Connecticut, was a firm believer in the separation of church and state. At the time of his birth, the colony had an established church, and all citizens had to pay taxes to support it. Isaac studied for the ministry, pastored a Separatist church, and in 1749 refused to pay the church tax, though a friend paid it for him. He took the case to the Connecticut assembly and reminded them that their ancestors had left England to escape a state church and be free to worship as they please—and support any church that they pleased. He did not change the assembly’s mind.

Backus joined the Baptists, who were at the time a new and small denomination in America. He spent much of his life in the saddle, traveling and preaching to a large circuit of Baptist churches. In 1777 there were 119 Baptist churches in America; by 1795 there were 325. He supported the founding of Rhode Island College, later known as Brown University. And he continued to press for the disestablishment of churches in America, freeing people from having to pay taxes to support a state church they did not attend.

Something called the American Revolution settled the issue. England, the mother country, had a long tradition of a state church, but a new country was emerging. Baptists backed the American side in the war, hoping there would be no established churches in it. They were disappointed—in Massachusetts, anyway, which kept its established church for several decades. But in the south and west of the new United States, there were no established churches, and the Baptists flourished there. In time there would be no established church anywhere in the United States.

The driving force of Isaac Backus’s life was not the issue of an established church: like most preachers of his day, he wanted to save souls. But his beliefs about established churches had a profound effect on the new nation.

Prayer: Lord, we praise you for freeing us from sin and empowering us to live for you under any political system. Amen.

January 10 · FULL HOUSE

Sons are a heritage from the LORD, children a reward from him.

PSALM 127:3

1863: Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, recalled that the home she grew up in was full of moral oxygen and intellectual energy due to the personality of her father, Lyman Beecher, one of the great American preachers of the 1800s. The home was full of moral energy as well, for Lyman Beecher had pronounced opinions on every issue of the time: some he opposed (dueling, slavery, liberalism, drunkenness); some he supported (religious revivals, higher education, Bible societies, women’s rights). Born in 1775, Lyman Beecher was in a sense born with the nation, and like many people of the time, he had great reverence for the Founding Fathers. He was one of a generation of preachers who had no qualms about discussing politics and culture from the pulpit. In fact, in a day with no mass communications except newspapers, Christians expected their pastors to be zealous, biblically astute, knowledgeable about the world—and opinionated.

Raised in New England, Beecher later joined many fellow Americans in the move west and became president of Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati. When his students found out that he favored a gradual (as opposed to immediate) emancipation of slaves, most of the students departed. Beecher spent the last years of his life as pastor of a Presbyterian church in Cincinnati.

Lyman Beecher died on January 10, 1863, in the middle of a war that had split his country in two. Friends said that he believed his ministry had been a failure. But he had overlooked something: from his three marriages he had thirteen children and an impressive brood they were, not only novelist Harriet Beecher Stowe, but renowned (and controversial) preacher Henry Ward Beecher, preacher and abolitionist Edward Beecher, and women’s rights activist Isabella Beecher, just to name the most famous. No wonder historians have called Lyman Beecher the father of more brains than any man in America.

Prayer: Lord, bless all fathers and mothers who raise their children to love you and to do good in the world. Amen.

January 11 · A VOICE IN THE CROWD

He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

MARK 6:34

1740: If colonial America had a superstar that everyone wanted to see, it was George Whitefield, the most famous preacher of his time, not only in America but in his native England as well. It was on this date that he began his great preaching tour of the American colonies.

Whitefield, born in 1714, was a friend of John and Charles Wesley and a member of their Holy Club at Oxford. Like them, he was ordained in the Church of England, but despised the spiritual deadness in that Church. Despite being cross-eyed (as all his portraits attest), he was not shy about speaking in public, and the greatest actor of the time, David Garrick, was in awe of Whitefield’s speaking voice.

Americans turned out in droves to hear that voice. When Whitefield preached in Philadelphia, young Benjamin Franklin estimated that Whitefield’s voice was audible to the very back of a crowd of twenty thousand. But there was more to Whitefield than his voice. The message was the key: man needs salvation and attending church (or even being a clergyman) does not assure salvation, for there must be a change in the heart with the sinner in a warm, personal relationship with God. This was not a message people often heard in English churches, especially the Church of England. Many clergymen barred Whitefield from their pulpits, but this was a moot point, since the enormous crowds required him to preach outdoors. His preaching not only led to many conversions but to the founding of numerous charities and schools.

The spiritual revival known as the Great Awakening would not have been the same without this amazing man. Some historians credit Whitefield’s interdenominational revival with uniting the thirteen colonies spiritually, paving the way for the political union that would result in the American Revolution that began shortly after Whitefield’s death in Massachusetts in 1770.

Prayer: Merciful Father, we thank you for those who preach your word faithfully, who call for a revolution of the heart. Amen.

January 12 · THE STORM-WATCHER

They were looking for a better country—a heavenly one.

HEBREWS 11:16

1729: Edmund Burke, born on this date, was that rare combination of deep thinker and practical politician. In his lifetime he watched two world-changing political revolutions unfold, and he saw a place for religion in this new world that was taking shape.

Burke was born in Ireland to a Protestant father and Catholic mother, and this interfaith marriage taught him an early lesson about different denominations living peacefully together. Like many future politicians, he studied law, though he preferred to make his living by writing. In 1765 he was elected to Parliament, and his maiden speech impressed everyone who heard it. Within a few years one of the great issues before Parliament was the matter of the American colonies revolting. In Burke’s view, the colonies’ grievances were legitimate, and he opposed the use of force to put down the rebellion.

It was another revolution in that century that brought out Burke’s eloquence and also his devotion to religion. The French Revolution broke out in 1789, and Burke soon realized that this revolution that claimed to support the rights of man was executing thousands of people, all in the name of creating a new world order. Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France laid out his view of politics: not all change is good; radical revolutions are dangerous, especially those led by atheists who have no God to hold them accountable; slow and gradual change rooted in tradition is best. Burke understood that political revolutions are rooted in the desire to create a heaven on earth—yet they always fail and often make matters worse. He would not have been surprised that in the twentieth century atheist governments in Russia and China were cruel and repressive. He understood that mankind had advanced in science and technology but not in morality, for the moral teachings of Christianity could not be improved or updated. God has given us all we need to know about living the good life.

Prayer: Lord, we thank you that our citizenship is in heaven, and that we may see clearly the limitations of this world’s politics. Amen.

January 13 · LIGHT-MINDED

I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light.

ACTS 26:17–18

1691: William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, was a member of the Society of Friends, better known as Quakers. According to Penn, George Fox, the founder of the Quakers, in all things acquitted himself like a man, yea, a strong man, a new and heavenlyminded man. Fox made a similar impression on almost everyone he met.

Born into a devout working-class home, George Fox was serious about religion from his youth, and he had no use for professors, his name for superficial believers. Like many people of his time, he found the state church, the Church of England, to be full of professors, so although he felt called by God to minister, it would not be within the Church of England—nor any other. None of the existing sects satisfied him.

Wandering about England, he began to attract people who responded to his talk of the Inner Light that can guide the Christian’s steps. His followers were called Friends of Truth, then simply Friends. The name Quaker arose when Fox, seen as a troublemaker, found himself before a judge whom Fox told to tremble at the word of the Lord. This judge, and many other Englishmen, looked askance at these people with their talk of Inner Light, fearing they were dangerous radicals. More than once Fox found himself in prison. The Quakers were persecuted by the Church of England, but during the short rule of Oliver Cromwell in the 1650s, they were tolerated.

Never one to keep still, Fox took his message all over Britain, to America, and to the Caribbean islands. He preached peace, abolition of slavery, and simplicity of dress and manners. The Quaker meetings had no clergy, rituals, or music. Rather, members would wait in silence for the Spirit to move one of the members to speak a word from the Lord.

Fox died on January 13, 1691, leaving behind his fascinating journal, the spiritual record of a truly unique man.

Prayer: Lord, help us to be sincere and zealous in our faith, not mere professors of religion. Amen.

January 14 · UNITING THE TWO-BIBLE NATION

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.

PSALM 119:105

1604: The King James Version of the Bible was the result of a conference that met on this date at Hampton Court palace in England. The new king, James I, agreed to meet with the Puritans, those members of the Church of England pushing for more reform than the previous ruler, Elizabeth I, had allowed. James saw the Puritans as troublemakers and had no intention of giving them an inch.

But one of the Puritans, John Reynolds, made an interesting proposal: a new version of the Bible. England at the time was a two-Bible nation: most people read the popular Geneva Bible at home while the church used the official version known as the Bishops’ Bible, which no one liked much. Since the Geneva Bible had been the official Bible of Scotland, James’s home country, Reynolds hoped James would approve it for England. But James claimed he thought the Geneva was the worst translation ever. In fact, he claimed he had only seen one once—which was a blatant lie, since the Geneva was read in all churches in Scotland. Instead of giving his approval to the Geneva, he commissioned a new version, with the work farmed out to committees of scholars. The conceited king would have been pleased to know that centuries later many people still read the version named for him.

The most important thing to know about the KJV is that it was not a translation. It was a revision of previous versions, and much of it resembles the Geneva Bible—and much of it is, word for word, like the translation William Tyndale did in the 1520s. When it was finally published in 1611, it was criticized by many and ignored by others, and many people went on reading their Geneva Bibles. But in time the goal of the Puritans at Hampton Court was achieved: one Bible read in both church and home. And no English Bible has ever been so widely quoted and loved.

Prayer: Lord, we praise you for all who have labored to bring to life your Book of Life. Amen.

January 15 · REPENTING FOR HYSTERIA

Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong.

EXODUS 23:2

1697: One of the black marks in the history of Christianity is the church’s treatment of those who were accused of being witches in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692. People hostile to Christianity point to this episode as an example of Christianity’s cruelty and intolerance. The executions are indeed part of the Christian story—but not the whole story, for the follow-up to the 1692 incidents is, sadly, forgotten.

Samuel Parris, a minister in Salem, was like most Christians in Europe and America at that time: he believed that witches were real. Several adolescent girls in Salem, including Parris’s own daughter and niece, claimed they had been bewitched by Tituba, the Parris family’s black slave woman. The girls also accused two old women of the town of being witches. By the summer of 1692, the jail was filled with people the girls had accused of witchcraft, the evidence being that the girls went into convulsions in their presence, or that the girls had seen an apparition of the accused person.

But not all the accused were executed. Most, finding themselves in the difficult situation of either having to confess to something they did not do or be killed, confessed to witchcraft and said they were repentant. These were released. But by September, nineteen of those who would not admit to practicing witchcraft were executed by hanging. While many supported the trials and executions, there were many Christians in Salem and elsewhere who protested the way the trials were conducted. (Note that no one was executed by burning, a common accusation made against Christians.)

Now for the part of the story that is seldom told: the Massachusetts legislature declared January 15, 1697, to be a day of public penance and fasting, expressing remorse for what had happened in 1692. The judge and jurors all confessed their errors, Samuel Parris was expelled from Salem, and some of the families of the victims were given compensation. The Salem witch trials are indeed a shameful episode in America’s Christian history, but the remorse and confession are also part of the record.

Prayer: Lord, none of us is sinless. Fix our gaze on our own failings, not those of others. Amen.

January 16 · A MISSION TO RUN

I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free.

PSALM 119:32

1902: Thanks to the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire, audiences became familiar with a great Christian athlete, the Scotsman Eric Liddell, born on this date. His birthplace was not Scotland but China, where his parents were missionaries. At age five he was sent to a boarding school in England, where he was an outstanding athlete, excelling not only in track but in cricket and rugby also. The headmaster of his school remarked that young Liddell was entirely without vanity.

Active as an athlete, Liddell was also involved with Christian student groups and often witnessed to his deep faith. He continued in his Christian work and in sports when he enrolled at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

As seen in Chariots of Fire, Liddell represented Great Britain in the 1924 Olympics, held in Paris. Although he excelled in 100-meter races, he would not compete in the Olympic 100-meter since it was held on a Sunday. However, he did compete in the 400-meter and won the gold medal, and he also won the bronze medal in the 200-meter.

After his Olympic wins Liddell returned to his real life’s work, the mission field in China. Teaching at a school for Chinese boys, Liddell found that boys around the world were more likely to listen to a message from a renowned athlete, so his fame aided his success as a missionary.

As a result of Japanese aggression in World War II, Liddell and his family found themselves working as medical missionaries among poor Chinese. The Japanese took over the mission and put Liddell and his family in a prison camp. He died of a brain tumor in the camp in February 1945, to the last deeply impressing the other prisoners with his warmth, humility, and wideness of heart. No one who met the Flying Scotsman could ever forget him.

Prayer: Almighty God, teach us to be faithful witnesses for you, no matter what the circumstances. Amen.

January 17 · MATERIAL MINIMALISM

Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear.

MATTHEW 6:25

356: What is the key to living to the age of 105? An Egyptian Christian named Anthony would have said, Faith. Born in the year 251 into a well-to-do Christian family, Anthony was deeply affected by a sermon on Matthew 19:21: If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor. These were Jesus’ words to the rich young ruler, but Anthony believed they were meant for him. He sold his family property, gave the money to the poor, and retired to the desert.

He was walking a familiar path. Since Emperor Constantine had made Christianity the favored religion of the empire, it was no longer risky to be a Christian. Being martyred for the faith was no longer possible, so Christians with heroic hearts opted for a life of self-denial and solitude, forsaking the comforts of civilization.

But solitude was the one thing Anthony did not get. Like many of these desert-dwelling saints, Anthony gained a reputation as a fount of wisdom, and many people sought out Abba (Father) Anthony. For twenty years he lived in an abandoned fort, subsisting on bread, salt, and water, and sleeping on the bare ground. When too many people sought him out at the fort, he moved even farther into the wilderness, but to no avail. His location was always discovered. People found him wise—and, surprisingly, they found him cheerful also. There are no portraits of him, but considering his meager diet, never bathing, and having a wardrobe of one garment, he must have been quite a sight. And yet something about him impressed all who met him, all the more as he lived to, and beyond, the age of one hundred. A life such as his reminded Christians that material possessions are not so important. He died on January 17, 356, one of the most respected men of his time.

Prayer: Father, teach us to rely on your love, and free us from the worries about material goods. Amen.

January 18 · ARM IN ARM WITH THE LORD

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.

JAMES 4:8 (NKJV)

1917: One of the pleasures in reading the history of Christianity is discovering how multinational and multiethnic the body of Christ is. Consider the case of Andrew Murray: ethnically, he was a Scot but he served as a missionary in the Dutch Reformed church and was born in (and ministered to) South Africa. Born the sons of missionaries, Andrew and his brother were university-trained in Scotland and the Netherlands. At this time, the 1840s, the Dutch church was going through a spiritual dry spell, but Andrew and his brother were active in a revival movement, calling on believers to make their religion a matter of heart as well as head.

The two brothers were ordained and returned to South Africa, where both were key players in the South African Revival of 1860. Andrew was active in missionary work to both black and white residents of South Africa. Like many Christian workers in this bilingual nation, Murray was fluent in both Dutch and English.

But Andrew Murray’s chief claim to fame is as a devotional writer. Considering how much time he gave to preaching and missions, it is amazing that he wrote more than two hundred books. Probably the most-loved of these is Abide in Christ, consisting of thirty-one meditations of what Jesus meant in John 15:4 when he told his disciples, Abide in me. Murray understood that most Christians see Jesus as someone to obey or to pray to in times of need, but the truly pleasurable life is one in which every moment the believer feels the closeness of Christ. Christians live divided lives, setting aside moments to read the Bible or devotional books, when in fact Christ desires all of us, all the time.

Murray died, aged eighty-nine, on January 18, 1917, but his writings live on, touching those who desire a closer walk with God.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, we acknowledge you as Savior and King, but we also acknowledge you as Friend and Companion, desiring our fellowship every moment. Amen.

January 19 · CRUEL CHANGE

You saw my affliction and knew the anguish of my soul.

PSALM 31:7

1918: The Russian Revolution is remembered as being aggressively antireligion. Curiously, it did not begin that way. When the government of Tsar Nicholas II collapsed in 1917, the new government made up of moderates gave the Russian Orthodox Church freedom, even allowing it to restore the office of patriarch, chief bishop in the church. A man named Tikhon was appointed to the post. He was in for a rough ride.

The hard-line Communists edged out the government’s moderates. In December 1917, the government decreed that all land was government property, including church land. The government took control of all schools, including seminaries, and religious instruction was forbidden. Marriages were to be civil unions, not religious ones, and registration of births and deaths, formerly handled by the church, were now civil matters. Technically, people had religious freedom—so long as it did not interfere with public order.

Patriarch Tikhon was horrified at these changes. On January 19, 1918, he publicly denounced the government’s acts, including the murder of the tsar and his family. He called on Christians to resist the state—and the state responded by throwing resisters in prison or, more often, shooting them without trial. While killing off adult Christians, the government stepped up anti-Christian propaganda among the youth. Restrictions were tightened, and no professed Christian could teach school. Thousands of clergy and laity were sentenced to slave labor in cold Siberia. Beautiful cathedrals were turned into museums of atheism. The Communists broke Tikhon—or so it seemed. After serving a year in prison, he emerged to tell the Orthodox Christians they should not resist the government. Was he playing along, hoping that by his seeming cooperative the government might ease its pressure on Christians? No one is quite sure. The Orthodox