• Global ministry celebrates 70 years: In 1955, Brother Andrew began a work that this year celebrates its 70^th anniversary, as the organization Open Doors.
• The hidden scale of the need: 380 million Christians face persecution worldwide—1 in 7 believers.
• What Open Doors does today: Open Doors strengthens persecuted Christians worldwide through comprehensive support programs including Bible distribution, discipleship training, pastoral development, and presence ministry in the most restricted and dangerous places.

ORANGE, Calif., July 29, 2025 — In the summer of 1955, a young Dutch missionary named Andrew van der Bijl loaded a suitcase with Bibles and drove toward the Iron Curtain. What he found behind those borders changed everything: Christians who thought the world had forgotten them.

That first journey of “God’s Smuggler” launched what would become Open Doors—and revealed a truth that still drives the ministry as it celebrates its 70^th anniversary. Persecuted Christians need more than just Bibles. They need everything.

When governments or fringe groups restrict religious freedom, they don’t just ban Bibles—they block Christians from jobs, education, and community life. Open Doors’ response has grown to match. What began with Bible smuggling has evolved into a sophisticated global network addressing every aspect of persecution, providing everything from medical care and trauma healing to discipleship training, legal advocacy to economic development.

Beyond Smuggling: Meeting Every Need

Image: Vladimir Zuhovitsky

Brother Andrew, as he became known, began with Scripture. But as his ministry grew across Europe and beyond, other needs emerged that were just as critical. Isolated church leaders needed training. Families driven from their homes needed food and shelter. Children faced with discrimination needed educational support. Believers under surveillance needed safe spaces to gather.

Brother Andrew and his growing network of friends didn’t have anything like the skills and resources for this scale of a challenge. So they started praying, and sought to keep being faithful to the next thing.

This past year alone, the organization they began has achieved things that are a true “loaves and fishes” story when one thinks back to Andrew’s little suitcase full of Bibles. In 2024, Open Doors reached 9.5 million persecuted Christians in 70+ countries. The statistics tell a remarkable story of expansion: 5.7 million people received biblical training and discipleship. 2.5 million received Bibles and Christian literature. More than 535,000 received socio-economic support. Another 542,000 received advocacy support.

“Brother Andrew’s mission has undoubtedly changed the world,” said Open Doors US CEO Ryan Brown. “One man, through Christ alone, made an irreversible impact wherever he went. That’s how Open Doors started—and it’s how it continues today.”

When Faith Costs Everything

The need has never been greater. Today, 380 million Christians—1 in 7 believers worldwide—face persecution for their faith. In some countries, owning a Bible can mean execution or life in a concentration camp. Yet believers still risk everything to read Bibles buried under trees, awakening in the dead of night to gather in secret.

And when people have this kind of courage, Open Doors is there to make sure they aren’t alone — with an approach mirroring the comprehensive nature of persecution itself.

The Legacy Continues

In the biblical verse that launched Brother Andrew’s mission—“Strengthen what remains and is about to die” (Revelation 3:2)—persecuted Christians found hope. In Open Doors’ comprehensive response, they find practical support that helps them not just survive, but thrive as witnesses in their communities.

As Open Doors marks its 70th anniversary, the mission that began with one man’s courage continues through thousands of supporters who understand a simple truth: when someone comes alongside you in your darkest moments, everything changes.

Today, that “someone” continues coming for 380 million persecuted Christians worldwide.

About Open Doors

Open Doors works in the world’s most oppressive regions, strengthening Christians to stand strong in the face of persecution and equipping them to share the gospel in their communities. Since Brother Andrew started the work in 1955, the ministry has mobilized prayer, support and advocacy for Christians living in places where faith in Jesus can be costly. Now working in more than 70 countries around the world, Open Doors is committed to standing with persecuted Christians through Bible distribution, training and socio-economic aid. Learn more at opendoorsus.org.

Who Are Oral Learners?

“An oral learner is someone who chooses to learn and communicate by oral means rather than written. They can be completely illiterate, functionally illiterate, visually impaired, or hearing impaired, or simply part of an oral culture. Oral learners are people all over the globe whose mental processes are primarily influenced by spoken rather than textual forms of communication. Two-thirds of the world’s population are oral learners.” (from Bing search)

Oral communicators are people from all over the globe, from all walks of life and all levels of education who communicate primarily or exclusively through oral, not textual means. Their lives are therefore more likely to be transformed through stories, songs, drama, proverbs and media. (orality.net/about/who-are-oral-communicators)

Scriptures In Use estimates there are an estimated 5.7 billion people who are oral learners. This includes 3 billion adults, 900 million very young children, and 450 million children.

The wonderful folk at the International Orality Network and Visual Story Network among many others have made huge contributions in helping the Church to become focused on developing strategies for oral learners, who, according to ION, constitute at least 80% of the unreached.

A Proclaimer MP3 layer is the “preacher” during this service in rural Uganda

How Does Cybermissions Reach Oral Learners?

Cybermissions reaches oral learners:

1. Through its Internet radio station called Eternity Radio which can be found at EternityRadio.org – this large website has two English language programs (Insights for Eternity – 30 minutes, and Uplifting Moments -15 minutes), an ISOM School of Missions in Sundanese (an Indonesian language), and church-planting training audio modules from Harvestime.
2. Radio programs. We buy time on the airwaves in areas where God is calling us to minister the grace of God (mainly in the Majority World).
3. Solar-powered MP3 player distribution and training
4. Distributing audio on SD cards through our partner BibleSeed
5. And soon we want to start producing audio books that meet Amazon ACX standards.

Why Not Video?

Audio is easy to produce, takes up much less bandwidth that video, costs less to download in rural areas where the Internet is still expensive, and takes up far less space on SD cards and mobile phones. MP3 files are also more private since the listener can use headphones and no one can look over their shoulder to see what they are watching like they can with video (this is important in areas which may be hostile to the gospel).

Reaching the Unreached

If 80% of the unreached are oral learners, and if the only technology they own is a radio and a basic mobile phone, then audio is going to be one of the best media strategies for sharing the gospel.

Christian History Institute (CHI), publisher of Christian History magazine (CH), announces the publication of issue #148, titled: Lilias Trotter – the life, work and surprising legacy of an unsung artist and missionary. The issue includes four Trotter articles and a large collection of Trotter paintings to further document the life and times of Lilias Trotter (1853-1928), an unsung but  pioneering woman of the Victorian era, whose inspired literature, art and life-long commitment to missions exemplifies the Christian calling to go forth and disciple nations (Matthew 28:19).

Early in her ministry and while in her hometown of London, England, Trotter served alongside D. L. Moody and Hannah Whitall Smith, and the leaders of the YWCA movement. But, most notably, her inspired vision helped pioneer the independent & voluntary missionary work in Islamic French Algeria. Trotter tirelessly and faithfully reached out to the diverse people groups of North Africa from 1888 until her death in 1928.

Fueled by an enduring passion for making known the universal love of Christ, she uniquely influenced Muslim Sufi mystics, with whom she recognized a familiar zeal and passion to know God. Her spiritual and artistic legacy continues to influence the North African culture into the present.

The leading European art critic of the day, John Ruskin, recognized Trotter’s potential when she was but 23 years of age and promised a stellar art career. “Trotter turned Ruskin down,” said CH managing editor, Jennifer Woodruff Tait. “She continued to paint, she continued to serve, and she eventually went to Algiers as a missionary—not with an organization, but on her own. … She managed, in the course of her life and work, to meet, influence, and be influenced by many famous people, and to leave a legacy you may not even realize belongs to her, from many modern missionary methods to the song ‘Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.’ But she did not follow any expected path.”

Issue #148, contains seven full-length features and six side-bar articles; illustrations, photos & rare artwork; a chronological timeline, and an extensive reading list of related books & materials.

Did you know? Lilias Trotter - Lilias Trotter’s life intersected many trends in Victorian art, culture, mission, and service work by the editors

Editor’s note: Lilias Trotter – Trotter loved art but loved Jesus more by Jennifer Woodruff Tait

Artists, angels, apostles, and the abode of peace – Some of Trotter’s friends, colleagues, and mentors by Jennifer Boardman

“The marvel of springtime” – Hope in Christ for your soul’s next grace by Lilias Trotter

“The heart of every flower” – Lilias Trotter and George MacDonald by Jennifer Trafton

Minds occupied with heaven – Organizing lay people for piety and service in the Nineteenth Century by Kevin Belmonte

“Life is reigning, not death” – What it means to be born again by Lilias Trotter

Christian History Timeline: Lilias Trotter – A life of art and service. Trotter’s experiences amid the cultural and missional currents of the nineteenth & early twentieth centuries by the editors

God told her to go – Like Trotter, Amy Carmichael blazed her own missionary trail by Jennifer Woodruff Tait

“Joy and peace from the first step” – Christ for the Sufis by Lilias Trotter

“Turn full your soul’s vision to Jesus” – An ocean of grace and power lying all around us by Lilias Trotter

“A long drink of cool water” – After she resolved the role of art in her life, Trotter went back to her London work with renewed fervor and dedication by Miriam Huffman Rockness and the editors

Lilias Trotter: art, culture, mission – Questions for reflection

Recommended resources: Lilias Trotter - About the life and work of Lilias Trotter, Victorian art, piety, and missions, in these resources recommended by authors and CH staff by the editors

The entire archive of Christian History magazine issues is searchable, along with related books, videos, and study-guides, using the website’s search engine feature. A magazine subscription, available only by donation, is offered at no-cost as a study resource for homeschoolers, church libraries, middle/high schools, and colleges & universities. It is the mission of CHI donors and staff to make this resource as widely and freely available as possible (donations gratefully accepted). The archive of CH issues can be read online at: https://christianhistoryinstitute.org/magazine

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Dr. Elijah Kim reports on the 7th Manila International Mission Conference that took place on August 5-6, 2022. The theme of the conference was “Revive Us in the Midst of COVID-19,” attracting nearly 2,000 delegates from 17 countries.

Read the biographies of the speakers

After finishing the Manila International Mission Conference of 2022, it really feels like we’ve been running at supersonic speed on a moving train. I, along with my wife, Rev. Amy, and members of A Grain of Wheat Christian Ministries in the Philippines made preparations for the Manila International Mission Conference of 2022, with prayer, fasting, and great devotion that brought about some wonderful results. The next day, we celebrated the 30th anniversary of the founding of A Grain of Wheat Christian Ministries. The Manila International Mission Conference was held on August 5th and 6th in the Grand Sanctuary of A Grain of Wheat Christian Ministries in Tay Tay, Rizal. Our worship should always be like what we experienced at this conference. How can I express our thrill and surprise? My words cannot adequately describe our joy and the amazing work of the Holy Spirit in our midst at this time.

We thought that the Manila International Mission Conference of 2022 would be attended by 1,500 people. However, 1880 people registered and in the night session we had 3,000 attendees. A Grain of Wheat Christian Ministries members fasted and prayed with the hearts of martyrs. They rallied around my wife, Pastor Amy Kim. The whole church worked as one for three months in order to prepare for the conference. There was incredible dedication to singing, orchestra, venue preparation, meal serving, accommodations, modern dance, tambourine dance, traditional Korean fan dance, Nanta (traditional Korean drum dance) performance, choir, and the media. We had a number of amazing messages that told us how the church should move forward after the pandemic. As a result, there was a remarkable response as 1,200 out of 2,000 people committed themselves to missionary service.

Meals for the conference were provided with the support of Yoido Full Gospel Church. But from the very first day we did not have enough, so we had to buy meals for an additional 500 people.

Dr. Younghoon Lee of Yoido Full Gospel Church, the largest church in the world, delivered two very powerful messages. The ministry that the Yoido Full Gospel Church has consistently practiced for 66 years was concisely shared so that churches around the world can follow it.

1. Ministry of the Word of God
2. The Ministry of the Holy Spirit
3. The Ministry of Prayer
4. The Ministry of the Cell Group Meetings
5. The Ministry of Evangelism and World Missions
6. The Ministry of Charity Missions

Among the Filipinos, Bishop Efraim Tendero, who has been working internationally like the UN Secretary-General, proposed the Galilean Movement, a global mission movement, under the theme of “Finishing the Task.” He suggested a movement to produce one million disciple leaders. He hopes that this movement will surpass the Lausanne Movement and the World Evangelical Alliance. After graduating from seminary in Canada, Bishop Efraim Tendero entered the ministry at the age of 21 and served for 15 years. When he was 36 he served as a national director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches (PCEC) for 22 years, and then joined the World Evangelical Alliance, which leads 600 million evangelical church members around the world. After serving as the Secretary-General and CEO of WEA for 6 years, he now serves as a global ambassador for WEA. He gave us a message of challenge concerning the Galilean movement, which is now working on making one million disciple makers. Dr. Hyoungsik Yim spoke about creation, the flood in the days of Noah, and the changes in the global ecosystem of this era as well as the significance of hydrogen rich water. My lectures covered all possible mission principles, and provided analysis and direction for the church after the global pandemic. The post COVID-19 era demands that we undertake a new normal mission model and reach the third and fourth generations, mobilizing the global south to all missions. We must take full advantage of the great opportunities brought about by the 4^th industrial revolution: digital technology. Innovations like cloud computing, big data analytics, artificial intelligence, and immersive media provide virtual formats that enable us to share the gospel in revolutionary ways from anywhere to everywhere. Now is the time for Christian mission agencies and organizations to collaborate together to bring the whole gospel using digital technologies and platforms to the global village.

Senator Mani Pacquiao (center)

Most amazing was evangelist Manny Pacquiao, who won eight world championship boxing awards, ran for Congress, then Senator, and even ran for President. A large number of high-profile leaders who could relate to the entire Filipino community, participated as Manny Pacquiao was commissioned and consecrated for evangelization in the Philippines and the world. Next, there was a message from Bishop Noel Pantoja, the National Director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches, and Dr. Peirong Lin, the Deputy Secretary-General of the World Evangelical Alliance who set forth the biblical foundations for post pandemic Christianity. Bishop Noel Pantoja, the National Director of the PCEC, shared the realities of the Philippine churches during the pandemic and preached that the pandemic should be seen as an opportunity, an Open Door.

Prayer of consecration

With the messages from this conference attended by 1880 people from 17 countries, the mission statement was divided into three directions such as backward, forward, and inward for Christian missionary work after the pandemic: I made it clear.

We pray that you will always be filled with the grace of the Lord.

Dr. Elijah Kim and Rev. Amy Kim

2022 MIMC video links
Opening service, Bishop Noel Pantoja, National Director, Philippines Council of Evangelical Churches
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2-0cKqqOQI&t=582s

Session 1 “The Secrets of the Success of the Yoido Full Gospel Church” I Dr. Younghoon Lee, Senior Pastor, Yoido Full Gospel Church, South Korea
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U4wIc-z2zs&t=1521s

“The Secrets of the Success of the Yoido Full Gospel Church” II Dr. Younghoon Lee, Senior Pastor, Yoido Full Gospel Church, South Korea
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6GitOrZtuc

Session 2 “Finishing the Task” Bishop Efraim Tendero, Global Ambassador
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxEdSUg4rro

Session 3 “The Living Water in the Bible”, Dr. Hyoungsik Yim, Professor, Yanbian University of Science and Technology
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyqjJuMtKlQ

Session 4 “Revival and Post-Pandemic Christian Missions” Dr. Elijah Kim, Founder and Chairman of A Grain of Wheat College and Graduate School, Philippines
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dys9MYURjLw&t=1331s

Testimony, Sen. Manny Pacquiao
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHw-NMMURTY

Commissioning Sen. Manny Pacquiao as a global evangelist by Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC747kM0iYo&t=658s

Session 5 “When God Uses Crisis as an Open Door for Missions” Bishop Noel Pantoja, National Director, Philippines Council of Evangelical Churches
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhnPqaZnRok&t=616s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ef4dsSgsB0I

Session 6 “Our Responsibility in the Midst of COVID” Dr. Peirong Lin, Deputy Secretary-General for Operations of World Evangelical Alliance
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zJqXAEWt34

Closing service, MIMC 2022 Mission Declaration
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do-x3x6RXWU&t=1s

Read the MIMC 2022 declaration

Christian historian Woodrow Walton continues his investigation into the origins of the modern movements that inspired Christians to go and share the mission and message of Jesus throughout the world.

George Müller

When studying how living out the gospel changed the social fabric of the early nineteenth century England, Europe, and North America, several figures must be considered. How their charitable work thrust the gospel into the societies of both England and the young United States of America should not be forgotten or underestimated.

The first of these was George Ferdinand Muller [also spelled Müller or Mueller], who was born in Kroppenstedt, Kingdom of Prussia (now Saxony-Anhalt Germany) and later moved to England. In 1829, Muller offered to work with Jews in England through the London Society for Promoting Christianity among the Jews. He gained his fame as a man who cared for 10,024 orphans during his life time and provided educational opportunities for them. He not only preached the gospel but also established 117 schools which offered Christian education to more than 120,000 children. In England, he associated himself with the Pilgrim Brethren Church. He and his wife, Mary Groves, had four children, two of which were stillborn.

The New Orphan Houses in the Ashley Down district of Bristol, England.
Image: The George Müller Charitable Trust/Wikimedia Commons

Muller, after early bouts of illness, and the death of his wife, in 1871 married again. His second wife was Susannah Grace Sanger. Together, beginning in 1871, they began a 17–year period of missionary travel that took them to the United States of America, Canada, Germany, India, Australia, Palestine, the Straits of Malacca, and New Zealand. When in the U.S.A., he was welcomed by the President of the United States of America. He died at the age of 93 on March 1898 and has been honored throughout the world ever since as the director of the Ashley Down orphanage in Bristol, England and the care of 10,024 orphans over the years, and as man who never asked for support for his work but when support was given by churches and individuals, he kept account of it and wrote “Thank You” letters to every donor. His example defies any estimate.

This article is part of The Gospel in History series by Woodrow Walton.
Image: The Books of Kells by way of Wikimedia Commons.

Simultaneous to the years of Muller’s life was the ministry of Frances Willard, the founder of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, which challenged the liquor industry in the countryside and urban areas of both the frontier and growing cities. Willard was not only a stalwart defender of women’s rights but also one of the earliest of Christians to see the mission of God within the socio-cultural context and thus living out the ministry of Jesus as spelled out in the tenth chapter of the gospel of Luke. At the same time the Society of Friends and many of the Mennonites and Moravians were binding the wounds of soldiers and were given exemption from military service and recognized as peace churches, an exemption which exists into the present.

Frances Elizabeth Caroline Willard (1839 –1898).
Image: Gamaliel Bradford (1919) Houghton Mifflin Company/Wikimedia Commons

Simultaneously in this era the Congregationalists, Baptists, Dutch Reformed, and Methodist churches established schools for Native Americans. After a childhood of abuse and impoverishment, William Apess [originally spelled Apes] served as a soldier in the United States army during the War of 1812, became a Christian and entered into the ministry of the Methodist Church. He rose to fame as a preacher and as a lecturer giving protest of the plight of Native Americans in New England and beyond. His autobiography, A Son of the Forest, published in 1829, was the first published by a Native American writer. In 2014, Philip F. Gura, with the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, wrote a biography of William Apess. This writer owns a copy of Gura’s The Life of William Apess, Pequot. During the years of both his ministry and his series of lectures, he gained support from churches outside of the Methodists and public recognition. Slowly but surely, co-operation among churches of Arminian and Reformed backgrounds brought them together in different areas of Christian ministry and mission outreach.

The Pietists had great impact within the colonies from the time of the Great Awakening and into the Second Great Awakening. In time, their influence was to lead to the formation of the Free Methodist Church, the Evangelical Free Church, and others who broke from synodical and presbyterian polities common among the Lutherans and Reformed Churches. It is against this background that Alexander Campbell during the Second Great Awakening welcomed any one of any Christian persuasion to participate in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. We are all “disciples of Christ,” he proclaimed. Barton Warren Stone, the “New Light Presbyterian” felt much the same but simply used the term “Christian” no matter a person be Baptist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Lutheran, Moravian, Quaker, or Mennonite. The Anglican Church in America dropped the term “Anglican” from it vocabulary and re-named itself “Episcopal.” The Methodists in America under the leadership of Francis Asbury and others shortened their identity from “Methodist Episcopal” to simply “Methodist.”

In 1826, the American Society for the Promotion of Temperance was formed. However, there were many precursors of such public charity, many from the earlier years of the Christian faith. Basil of Caesarea initiated the first hospital for the sick and feeble. In the Middle Ages, the Beguines, a laywoman’s ministry initiated in the pre-Reformation era, reached out to the neglected, the homeless, the lame, and the poor, and wrote devotional and theological works which made for conflict with some of the “professional” clergy. But of great significance to the Reformation era and the years of the global expansion of the gospel was the initiation of Sunday Schools by Hannah Ball in High Wycombe of England in the late 18^th century but carried further by Robert Raikes in 1780.

Robert Raikes the Younger (1736 –1811) promoted the Sunday school movement, raising awareness of a need for public education before state-run schools existed.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The start of the Sunday Schools began with a school for boys in the slums. Raikes had been involved with boys incarcerated at the count Poor Law which was part of the jails at the time. Raikes believed that vice would be better dealt with school as a preventive and held on Sundays as the boys were frequently enlisted to work in factories the other six days. The best available teachers were among the laity of the churches. The basic textbook was the Bible. The originally intended curriculum began with learning to read the Bible and then progressed to the catechism of the Anglican church. The first Sunday School class started in July of 1780 in the home of a Mrs. Meredith with boys and then extended to girls. By 1782 several other Sunday Schools opened around Gloucester, England.

On November 3, 1783, Raikes published an account of the Sunday Schools in the newspaper he started. Later news of the spread of the Sunday Schools appeared in the Gentleman’s Magazine and by 1784, a further account of the spread of the Sunday Schools appeared in a letter to the Arminian Magazine.

Children laboring in a cotton spinning factory in 1835.
Image: illustration from The History of the Cotton Manufacture in Great Britain (1835), by way of Wikimedia Commons.

Little by little, Jesus’ great commission was being realized as a missionary mandate that was greater than proclamation and fulfilled the whole missionary made enunciated by Jesus and recorded in Matthew 25:35-40; 28:18-19; Luke 10:2-9; 18-20; and Acts 1:8, and universalized in Mark 16-18. The missionary mandate included healing the sick, discipleship, and entering the domain of the “serpent” to release the imprisoned, the afflicted, the haunted, the down-trodden,” and penetrate the darkness of the world with the light of a greater kingdom not of this world but of the one who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

PR

Christian historian Woodrow Walton continues his investigation into the origins of the modern movements that inspired Christians to go and share the mission and message of Jesus throughout the world. In Part 3, he invites us to learn more about the Quakers and other marginalized groups whose convictions had them following God on paths often disdained by other Christians.

In the 17^th and 18^th centuries, events were unfolding in England, Europe and North America that would change how the gospel message was being proclaimed. Although little was being done in the strict evangelical sense of proclaiming the message (kerygma), much was done in the area of the living out of the Christian message and in the complexion or appearance of the total church in Europe and especially in North America.

During this time, Southern Europe, especially along the Mediterranean coastline, remained dominantly Roman Catholic, from Portugal all the way to the Balkans and no further. The Balkans were strongly Orthodox within a growing Islamic presence. Slavic Europe, outside of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was also Orthodox. Austria-Hungary and the Czech and Slovak areas remained Catholic but were quickly experiencing the effects of the Protestant Reformation and the Anabaptist Radical Reformation. The Hussite Brethren, better known as the Moravians, were leaving for western Europe and then continuing to go overseas. However, similar Brethren bodies, such as the Mennonites, the Amish, and the Hutterian Brethren, remained. These had a significant impact on the Christian complexion of Eastern Europe outside of Russia.

To see the unfolding of the worldwide Christian mission, let us look at England and Germany in particular. First, there are two Englishmen worthy of attention, George Fox and William Penn.

George Fox was born on July 1624 in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicester, England, and is credited with being the founder of the Society of Friends, now known as the Quakers. By the time that he turned 19 years of age, he was conscious of an “inner voice” which evangelicals and Pentecostals would identify as the leading of the Holy Spirit. Fox became an assiduous student of the Bible. He was the first person on record to argue for the equality of women with men in the propagation of the gospel. In 1647, Fox began preaching publicly. He preached in fields and markets. He attracted gatherings of people who flocked to listen to his messages. At times, they gathered in houses after the services. Originally, the new believers referred to themselves as “Children of the Light” or “Friends of the Truth” and later still “Friends,” a term which continued to be in use along with “Quaker.” Fox became a public figure, but not of his own making. Officials were suspicious of him because of the stands he took on military service, the place of women in home and in public, and how the incarcerated and children should be treated.

George Fox refusing to take the oath at Houlker Hall, 1663. From a painting by John Pettie (1839-1893).
Image: Wikimedia Commons

At the same time, he gained approval from people in prominent positions: James Naylor, a prominent preacher in London, became one of Fox’s first converts to the Quaker position. By the end of the 1650s, the Society of Friends became more organized. The British Commonwealth under Cromwell in the 1650s was also the Friends’ most creative period. Even though the restoration of the monarchy was threatening for the Friends, now characterized as Quakers, it became the era when believers migrated to North America and settled in Puritan New England. The revolt in 1661 by the Fifth Monarchists led to the suppression of the Quakers and the repression of other dissenters, instigating an exodus. It was in the aftermath of the Fifth Monarchist coup that Fox and eleven other leaders among the Friends issued a statement which became known as “the peace testimony” from which stems their stand against military conscription.

A woman preaches during a Quaker Meeting in London (circa 1723), engraving by Bernard Picard (1673-1733).
Image: Wikimedia Commons

Their stand against military conscription and for equality of rights between men and women in both civil matters and the ministry of the church. This did not sit well with many in either England or Puritan New England. When some of the New England Quakers came to London to plead their case, Fox met with them. After his release from prison in 1666 for refusing to swear the oath of allegiance to the existing political regime in England, Fox set about normalizing a system of monthly and quarterly meetings throughout Great Britain, extending to Ireland’s Quaker population, a system which has persisted to this day. In 1669, Fox married a widow with eight children, Margaret, at a Quaker meeting in Bristol. They shared together in the administration the Society of Friends. In 1671, George and Margaret Fox embarked on a voyage to the West Indies and North America where they visited groups of Quakers who had earlier left England for Barbados, Jamaica, Maryland, and North Carolina. After the travels abroad, the Foxes returned to England. It was there that George and Margaret met with William Penn and Robert Barclay, men of wealth and position who became allied with the Friends.

In 1683, Penn, who had been granted land in North America, turned 1,000 acres of land in the colony of Pennsylvania to Fox and the Quakers. Although Fox was never able to visit for himself the Quaker colony in Pennsylvania, he was overjoyed with what was granted. Penn, himself a Quaker, furthered the ministry within Pennsylvania. The Act of Toleration of 1689 put an end to the uniformity law under which the Friends and other dissenting Christians had been discriminated against and persecuted. It was a great day for Fox and the expanding Quaker movement, both within what would later become the United States of America, and in the Netherlands, Poland, Denmark and Germany. Fox died in January 13, 1691, soon after preaching at the Gracechurch Meeting House in London. He left a journal and letters and other writings which were subsequently published after his death. His name is immortalized at the prestigious George Fox University with campuses in Portland, Salem, Newberg, and Redmond, Oregon.

Of equal importance was the Quaker emphasis on the leading of God’s Holy Spirit in a person’s life and, thereby, an increase of Christian witness. The spiritual health of the witness is as important as the sermon that is preached. Walt Whitman, who was raised by parents inspired by Quaker principles, wrote of George Fox: “George Fox stands for something too—a thought—the thought that wakes in silent hours—perhaps the deepest, most eternal thought latent in the human soul. This is the thought of God, merged in the thoughts of moral right and the immortality of identity” (Prose Works, Philadelphia, David McKay, 1892). Modern Christians have taken seriously the writings of Elton Trueblood, who for years taught at Earlham University in Indiana, on how Christians are yoke-fellows in Christ’s work of outreach and ministry. This writer has met Dr. Trueblood in person at a meeting in Fort Worth, Texas, around 1956, at the Texas Christian University.

This article is part of The Gospel in History series by Woodrow Walton.
Image: The Books of Kells by way of Wikimedia Commons.

The work of Richard Foster, who inspired the Renovaré moment and the Renovaré Spiritual Formation Study Bible, is another example of Quaker influence. The Renovaré Study Bible is an inter-denominational venture that seeks to plumb the spiritual depths of the Scriptures using quotations of Christians from the past with the intent of deepening the devotional life of the believer and consequently improve the quality of Christian witness.

A side effect of Penn’s donation of land to the Quakers was to encourage the settlement of the same area by other dissident Christian groups, particularly those with pacifist leanings such as the Mennonites of the Netherlands and the Amish of Switzerland. The designated land was composed of what is now known as Lancaster County, which historians consider the birthplace of American agriculture. The new Mennonite and Amish immigrants were principally farmers and agriculturists. Their children would later migrate into the American Midwest, during James Monroe’s presidency in the early 1820s, taking their agricultural skills with them. These migrations saw the development of farmlands in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa. Cedar Rapids, Iowa, proudly displays a billboard advertising Quaker Oats as you enter the city. These families also displayed a quality of Christian life that enabled them to relate to the Native Americans of that section of our country. One of the earliest of these was the family of Daniel Boone. His earliest portrait identified him, by way of personal adornment and headwear, as a Quaker, a portrait that dispels the myth built around him by the Motion Picture industry and modern television frontier drama. Boone and his family of six children were able to balance the scales between the way of life of Native Americans and that of the immigrant settlers coming from the East.

What this did was to give a larger scope to the mission of the church beyond the preaching and purely evangelical to include the presentation of the Christian life lived out beyond that of preaching. The role of the church is not only that of the kerygma (proclamation) and the didactic (teaching) but the presentation of a kind of communal life which reaches outward beyond itself to reconcile, heal, extend mercy, befriend, encourage, and inspire.

What would become the United States of America was not merely a haven for different Christian groups from England and Europe. For many colonial American Christian leaders, it was also a model of what was envisioned by Peter the apostle when he spoke at the festival of the Pentecost a short time after Jesus’ ascension and by John, years later, when, banished to the island of Patmos, he envisioned those who were redeemed “out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9-10). It is important to note that within that vision, the redeemed were not identified by their church polity, interpretive stance, racial or ethnic origin, but having come from every tribe, tongue, people and nation whether Slavic, Germanic, Scandinavian, African, Asian, or whatever. It would take another century for some incoming church groups to set aside prejudices and begin to co-operate in both evangelism and outreach and in some cases merge.

Adoniram Judson in 1846.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

In the young USA, only sixteen years old, a meeting occurred near the newly formed Williams College that sparked America’s initial entry into the Christian world mission. This event is referred to in American history as the Haystack Meeting in August of 1806. Several students of Williams College at Williamstown, Massachusetts, gathered for prayer in the shadow of a haystack close to the school. Among the students were Samuel Mills, James Richards, Adoniram Judson, Robert Robbins, Harvey Loomis, and Bryan Green. The news of Carey, his wife, and family departing from England to spread the gospel in India and translating the Scripture into the language spoken near Calcutta reached America and spread to Williams College. The news lit a fire in the hearts of the six young men. Of the six of them, Adoniram Judson decided to meet William Carey in India.

The Haystack Prayer Meeting of 1806 has been considered the beginning of America’s entry into the Christian world mission. It was, however, in 1810, that the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions was formed by Baptist churches who set aside their extreme congregationalism to in order to have a General Convention the purpose of which was to enable and support Baptist missionaries around the world. It was under this Board that Adoniram Judson and his wife were able to make contact with William Carey in Calcutta and then go on to southeast Asia.

The evangelistic outburst in mid-America, often referred to as the Second Great Awakening, was not an altogether novel idea. It was a sudden earnestness in Christian devotion and discipleship. It made headway from the leadership of Timothy Dwight, president of Yale University, grandson of Jonathan Edwards. As it spread into the trans-Appalachian west, two of the leading figures were Thomas and Alexander Campbell in Pennsylvania, Barton Warren Stone, a New Light Presbyterian, in Kentucky, and Peter Cartwright, a Methodist Circuit Rider who once took evangelism into a dance hall. He later served in the United States Congress as a representative from Illinois.

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Christian historian Woodrow Walton continues his investigation into the origins of the modern movements that inspired Christians to go and share the mission and message of Jesus throughout the world.

The Making of the Christian Global Mission

Part 2: Missions to the First Americans

Before proceeding to dealing with the spread and growth of the Christian gospel into the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there is also the need to look at the contribution of a lone figure of Norman-French heritage who as a Jesuit missionary opened the pathway for mission and evangelism in North America. In his travels in Canada, he not only spread the gospel among a particular native American people, the Hurons, but also lived among them for several years and penned the lyrics of the first Christmas carol written and composed in North America. This song was later translated from the Huron language by Jesse Edgar Middleton in The United Methodist Hymnal, No. 244 “Twas in the moon of wintertime.”

Huron moccasins (circa 1880 CE) on display at the Bata Shoe Museum, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

I want to introduce the figure of Jean de Brébeuf, whose biography Saint among the Hurons: The Life of Jean de Brébeuf  was first written in 1949 by Francis X. Talbot and published by Harper & Brothers and most recently republished in 2018 by Ignatius Press. Brébeuf was a Norman from the north of France, the descendant of Scandinavians who invaded northern France in the early 1500s. He was born in what is now know as Condé-sur-Vire, March 25, 1593, in the diocese of Bayeux in eastern Normandy. In 1617, at the age of 24, after finishing his schooling and settling family affairs, he applied for entry into the Society of Jesus and thereby became a part of the missionary-minded Jesuits, an independent minded order not initiated by the Church but by Ignatius Loyola and which had gained later recognition as a missionary arm of the church. Even after gaining such authorization, the Jesuits were allowed to function as an independent mission arm of the Roman Catholic Church under its own umbrella, the Society of Jesus. This same independence also affected the relationship of the Jesuits with the different countries in which they operated. In some cases, they were regarded with suspicion from the political realm of the countries in which they served as missionaries of the Gospel. Mexico was one such country as were Brazil and Argentina in South America.

It was in 1625 that Jean de Brébeuf learned that the Jesuits were opening a mission in New France (Canada). This was five years after the founding of the Plymouth Plantation in New England. The year before, in October of 1624, Brébeuf met two Récollet [a Franciscan order] missionaries just returned from the New World.

This article is part of The Gospel in History series by Woodrow Walton.
Image: The Books of Kells by way of Wikimedia Commons.

In March of 1625, with full royal assent, the Viceroy of Quebec issued a decree authorizing the establishment of a residence in Quebec and other parts of New France for the Jesuits and to associate its members with the Récollets in the conversion of the “savages.” On April 24, 1625, after several delays resulting from opposition by the Montmorency Company in both Paris and Rouen to the proposal, the authorization came through, and Brébeuf and the other missionaries crossed over into the open waters of the Atlantic for New France (Canada). They entered into Canada by navigating around Cap Gaspé and through the Gulf of St. Lawrence and to Quebec. From 1625 to 1649, the year of his death at the hand of the Iroquois, de Brébeuf labored among the Huron who lived along the borderlands of the Great Lakes all the way from southern Canada to Michigan’s shoreline to Sault Ste. Marie.

The point of this short excursus is that the Jesuits did not engage in general evangelism among Native Americans but focused their attention on specific people groups, both in Canada and Brazil. The 1986 motion picture The Mission portrayed the Jesuit work and also their conflict with the political regime of the Portuguese which governed Brazil at the time of the Jesuit mission work. The independence of the Jesuits in their missionary evangelism also brought them into an adversarial relationship to the Spanish viceroys which governed out of Mexico City.

John Eliot

Mamusse Wunneetupanatamwe Up-Biblum God, also known as The Algonquian Bible.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

Concurrent with Brébeuf in North America was John Eliot in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the first Puritan missionary to Native Americans who concentrated on the Algonquian language of the local Massachusetts. Helping him learn the language was a young Native American named Cockenoe. The youth had been captured in the Pequot War of 1637 and was a servant of an Englishman named Richard Collicot. Eliot later wrote in his diary that Cockenoe “was the first that I made use of to teach me words, and to be my interpreter.” Cockenoe could not write English but he could speak it as well as he could speak Algonquian. He was able, thereby, to help Eliot translate the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer and other portions of the Bible and prayers. His first attempts at sharing the gospel with the Native American in 1646 were meager, if not failures, but eventually met with success. He also became able to produce printed publications for the Indians in their own language. In 1663, Eliot completed a translation of the whole Bible into the Massachusetts language, Mamusse Wunneetupanatamwe Up-Biblum God. The printer who did the printing issued 1000 copies on the first printing press in the American colonies.

Three years later, in 1666, Eliot published The Indian Grammar Begun.

Through the succeeding years, fourteen towns of “praying Indians” grew up in Massachusetts Bay Colony, the best documented of which being the one at Natick, Massachusetts. Other missionaries also established praying Indian towns, one of whom, Samson Occom, was himself half Mohegan.

Eliot and his wife, Hanna, had six children, five sons and one daughter. Two sons, John Eliot, Jr., and Joseph Eliot, both became pastors of churches themselves. Joseph Eliot, a pastor in Guilford, Connecticut, and his wife, were parents of Jared Eliot, who also became a minister of the gospel was also a noted agricultural writer.

David Brainerd is another significant figure, not only in mission among Native Americans but also upon the future development of the missionary enterprise world–wide. Brainerd was born April 20, 1718, in Haddam, Connecticut, the son of a Connecticut legislator, and his wife Dorothy. Although he died young at the early age of 29 from tuberculosis on October 10, 1747, his ministry intersected with that of George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, Gilbert Tennent, James Davenport, and Jonathan Dickinson.

From David Brainerd, the apostle to the North American Indians, published in 1891.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

In 1742, at the age of 24, he was licensed by a group of Presbyterians known as the “New Lights” which included such figures as Barton Warren Stone, Jonathan Dickinson, and the initiators of the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge, the first-known organized missionary society.

Brainerd’s ministry in New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, and Long Island became an inspiration for William Carey, Brainerd’s cousin, James Brainerd Taylor (1801-1829), and the 20^th century’s Jim Elliot who ministered among the Aucas (Huaorani) in Ecuador, South America. Brainerd was the forerunner of the evangelical missionary enterprise[1] which emerged with William Carey in England and the Haystack Prayer Meeting of 1810 in Massachusetts.

Thomas Bray, the founder of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign parts and also the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, supported the ministry of Whitefield both in England and the English colonies which were to become known as the United States of America. Because the focus was upon North America and the British isles, the site of the activities was not global but British North America. A world, or global focused evangelical witness, first became reality with the initiation of the Particular Baptist Society for the Propagation of the Gospel Among the Heathen in 1792 in Kettering, England, where 12 ministers signed an agreement to support the missionary work of William Carey and John Thomas in Bengal, India. Carey and Thomas were first sent out in 1793. To this day, William Carey is considered to be the initiator of the Christian world mission with schools and organizations and a book publishing house named after him in both the United States and Canada. This first missionary society is still in operation to this date. In A.D. 2000, its name was changed to the Baptist World Mission and presently supports over 350 workers in 40 countries.

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Notes

[1] The reason to not consider George Whitefield and John Wesley as the forerunners of the evangelical missionary enterprise is that both Whitefield and John Wesley were more revivalists than missionaries. Their preaching missions were to revive Christian faith in believers and reinvigorate a Christian witness that would lead others to faith in Christ.

Dr. Richard Noble is the founder and director of the Center for Missional Engagement. He is also a pastor, an adjunct faculty member at Geneva College and Crown College, and the missions mobilizer for the Christian & Missionary Alliance denomination. As you can see missions is a major focus of his ministry. In this book the reader will see that he wants missions to be the major focus of every Christian church.

The main body of On Mission Together consists of nine chapters, an afterword, and six appendices. In the chapters the author covers many topics. The following is a sampling of a few  of the chapter titles: “In Partnership with God,” “What the Bible Says About Missions,” “Missions Awareness and Education,” “Praying for Missions and Missionaries,” and “Giving to Missions.” The main focus of this book is global missions (xviii). In the appendixes one will find, among other things, ideas for hosting a missions conference and some thoughts concerning short-term missions ventures.

Dr. Noble has a passion for missions, he was raised in a family that supported missions (page xv). This passion becomes clear near the very beginning of the book. In the preface he says that “missions is not just a particular ministry program of the local church but rather a priority and a lifestyle for every follower of Jesus Christ” (page xvii). He points out that as Christians we have been called out of the world and then sent back into it in order to transform it (page 24). Jesus said that we are to be salt and light in the world (Matthew 5:13-16). The author makes the observation that both salt and light “change the environments that they come in contact with” (page 44). The same holds true for us, we, as believers, are to change the world. Noble sees missions as the priority of all ministries in the church (page 25). This includes ministries to adults and children (page 27). While local missions are important Noble gives great attention to cross-cultural missions. Christians should be open to the idea of going overseas, at least for the short-term and possibly for the long-term. However, he recognizes that not everyone is called to go. Those who are sent are important but so are those who send them. Believers who remain at home need to pray, give, and minister to missionaries. The author is an advocate for missionary care and he offers a number of suggestions for how churches can provide this important ministry.

On Mission Together is a very practical book. The text includes biblical teaching but it also contains a wealth of information and ideas about how to actually make missions the focal point of church ministry. Some of the chapters contain a section called “Principle in Practice.” In these sections the author gives examples of what specific churches are doing in order to actively participate in a particular aspect of missions ministry. The examples he cites are diverse, they come from churches in different locations, different denominations, and different congregational sizes. The message that emerges from all this is that all churches can be mobilized for missions. In appendix F the author supplies a significant list of books about various topics related to missions. This is a great asset and may be of interest to those who want to read further on a particular topic.

One point that the reader will glean from this book is that churches need to be intentional about missions. And their intentionality needs to go beyond financial giving. In order for missions to take its rightful place in the church the involvement of the pastor is very important (pages 141-151). However, it is not just the pastor’s job to promote missions, Dr. Noble recommends having a team involved in the promotion of missions.

On Mission Together is a great resource, it is clearly written and easy to understand. This book will be a welcome addition to the libraries of missions directors, missionaries, pastors, missions committees, and anyone else who is interested in missions. Hopefully Bible schools and seminaries will become aware of it and use it in training their students. If the message of this book is taken seriously much more will be accomplished for the Kingdom of God around the world.

Reviewed by John P. Lathrop

Christian historian Woodrow Walton investigates the origins of the modern movements that inspired Christians to go and share the mission and message of Jesus throughout the world.

The Making of the Christian Global Mission

Part 1: Jan Hus and the Moravians

It may seem odd to associate the making of the Christian global mission to the trans-oceanic voyages of the maritime ventures of the merchant ships of Spain, Portugal, The Netherlands, England, and the Baltic countries of Europe in the 16^th and 17^th centuries. Yet it is not without reason when one considers what was happening in the world at that time. A trans-oceanic trade network was opened between East and West, North and South. The ports of entry receptive to the merchant marine also became the harbors who welcomed the newcomers who were tradesmen, many of whom were Christians.

1587 woodcut of Jan Hus by Christoph Murer.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

It would be easy to think of Western European Christians going overseas to the Americas or to the East Asian landmass without considering what was happening to Christians in central and eastern Europe, places where Christianity was more Orthodox than Catholic or Protestant. We seldom consider the reverberations of the Protestant Reformation upon those areas. We focus primarily upon Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Menno Simons, and William Tyndale who reshaped the Christian landscape of western Europe and the British Isles. We forget that it was a Christian priest in Moravia, now known as the Czech Republic, known as Jan Hus (also spelled John Huss), who lit the fire of the Reformation. Before the Lutherans, there were the makings of the Moravian Christians who in later years had a significant impact upon John Wesley. Another seldom considered contribution to the Christian world mission came out of Russia and the Russian Orthodox Church. Among the Orthodox Churches, the Russian Orthodox were probably the most mission oriented, spreading Christianity across the Asian steppes and beyond the Ural Mountains. This became more so in the late 1600s as a result of Patriarch Nikon’s move to modernize the Liturgy of Worship which caused the first major split.

Those who split referred to themselves as the “Old Believers,” and it was they who spearheaded a mission clear across the top of Asia to Siberia and to the coast of the Bering Sea. That is a story in and of itself, and it becomes part of a larger story played out through the 18^th and 19^th centuries when Slavic Christians started spreading out beyond their initial homelands.

Jan Hus at the Council of Constance, by Karl Friedrich Lessing (1842).
Image: Wikimedia Commons

Reverse image of the German or Austrian 16th century Jan Hus Centenary Medal.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

]]> https://pneumareview.com/the-making-of-the-christian-global-mission-part-1-jan-hus-and-the-moravians/feed/ 0 https://pneumareview.com/healthcare-and-hospitals-in-the-mission-of-the-church/ https://pneumareview.com/healthcare-and-hospitals-in-the-mission-of-the-church/#comments Thu, 26 Mar 2020 22:11:20 +0000 http://pneumareview.com/?p=16121

As a virus pandemic rages across the globe, Christian History magazine reveals how Christians founded “Healthcare and Hospitals – in the mission of the church,” Issue 101.

Christian History Institute (CHI), publisher of Christian History magazine (CHM), offers its latest issue, #101, titled: “Healthcare and Hospitals – in the mission of the church.” The issue examines how a core Christian belief, that humans are made in the image of God, inspired the notion of healthcare and founded the institution known as the hospital. These two ideas help define the modern world where solutions are sought and care is provided in contrast to a pre-Christian era in which the sick were cast out and the dead were left to rot unattended, causing increased suffering and death.

This issue, #101 Healthcare and Hospitals – in the mission of the church, features a collection of in-depth articles chronicling how, from its earliest days the Christian church carried out active ministries of philanthropy and care for the sick. Christian medical care is founded on the biblical belief that human beings are created in God’s image. The Bible reads: “And God said, “Let us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness….” God’s creation of human beings in his image (rationally, spiritually, morally, volitionally) implies that human life is precious and must be protected.

Early Christians valued the body and the medical arts necessary to heal it as gifts from a loving God. The roles of the doctor and nurse emerged from Christian communities and European monasteries that during the Reformation began to practice and model the Great Shepherd. Christians taught  the parable of the Good Samaritan, Luke 10:25–37, as did Jesus, who stated that it was the despised Samaritan who proved himself a neighbor, having compassion on a wounded man and giving him medical aid when even priests and Levites of his own religious community passed him by.

The editor and contributors to this issue, ask challenges questions that are faced the world today: How should the church respond to the devastating global epidemics and pandemics being faced today? How can healthcare workers bring their faith to bear within today’s secular institutions? How can family members and ministers help patients to negotiate the maze of the twenty-first-century healthcare system while keeping a sense of God’s presence in the process of healing? As in so many areas, there is still much to learn from our forebears.

CH issue #101, contains 14 features and shorter side-bar articles; a chronology timeline; an archive of rare artwork & photos; a ‘letter to the editor’ section and an extensive reading list compiled by the CH editorial staff. The magazine is fully available on-line and can be conveniently read on screen at: https://christianhistoryinstitute.org/magazine/issue/healthcare-and-hospitals-in-the-mission-of-the-church

The following major articles (click to select) can be accessed on-line and reprinted with permission:

A New Era in Roman Healthcare  by Gary B. Ferngren, professor of history at Oregon State University.
How the early church transformed the Roman Empire’s treatment of its sick

Basil’s House of Healing  by Timothy S. Miller, is a professor of history at Salisbury University (Maryland).
How a fourth-century monk pioneered the hospital

From poorhouse to hospital  by Timothy S. Miller, professor of history at Salisbury University (Maryland).
How the Christian hospital evolved from a house of charity that cared for the poor to the medical institution we know today

The hospital experience  by Jennifer L. Woodruff Tait is adjunct professor of history/church history at Asbury Theological Seminary, Huntington University, & United Theological Seminary.
What would it have been like to receive care in a medieval hospital?

“Our lords the sick”  by Theresa M. Vann, the Joseph S. Micallef Curator of the Malta Study Center at the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library, St. John’s University (Minnesota).
Christian thinkers Adopted Jewish symbols—but mistrusted their sources

The charitable revolution  by Adam J. Davis is associate professor and chair (Medieval Europe) in the history department of Denison University, Granville, OH.
Why did the twelfth century bring a wave of new hospitals?

Christian History Institute
www.ChristianHistoryInstitute.org
Worcester, PA, March 24, 2020