Note: This review was originally an Instagram story, so the length was limited.
Overview
Church History in Plain Language offers exactly what the title states. This thick book gives a basic description of the history of Christianity. The time periods span from Pentecost all the way to as late as the 21st century.
The language is understandable, each chapter is devoted to important events/people of Christian history all around the globe. The chapters are short and digestible.
I read the 4th edition of this book, 5th edition is the newest.
Why Read This?
If you are someone who is not very good at reading long, voluminous works (like me) but is interested in the history of Christianity, this book is a good place to start. The language is simple, and rather than giving a comprehensive study of each historical event, a summary of the most important aspects is given.
Reading Church history was very rewarding for me, I learned that a lot of the issues the western Church faces today have been experienced by Christians from the distant past. Seeing the mistakes of earlier Christians will also help us not make the same mistakes. There is a lot we can learn from our predecessors.
The most important takeaway for me was this: God's people have gone through no shortage of difficulties throughout history. I'm sure many thought that Christianity would surely have perished because of those difficulties. Yet that is not the case. Even today, in western culture, it seems like Christianity is on its last legs, yet in other parts of the world, it's thriving.
I look forward to the next chapters of Church history. Or perhaps, we are in the last chapter. Whatever the answer is, come Lord Jesus come!
Potential Pitfalls
I felt like a Church history buff after reading this book and acted that way, but I shouldn't have. This book is very basic and simple (it's meant to be that way), so naturally, a lot of nuances are lost in the simplicity. You should study each event described in this book in-depth and see them from different angles.
This particular book lacks citations, there are some in the back of the book and some recommended readings, but for serious studies of history, citations are quite important.
This book also appeared to me as somewhat biased. The authors have a specific worldview that they agree with (they make this clear in the epilogue). That bias does make itself apparent in certain parts of the book. Again, this is just a simple summary of Church history so this isn't such a big deal, but if you want to conduct a serious study, be aware of the biases of the authors.
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