No man on earth has ever completely understood history except the Son of Man, Christ Jesus. You don’t and I certainly do not know near enough about the history of the Bible and history attested to by the Bible. We know very little of Empires other than a few. And what do you understand about centuries of church history?
With History in mind:
So in this brief 3-part series we take a prerequisite look at some events from the timeline of history. More specifically we look the beginnings of the English Bible, the fall of the Roman Catholic church and other historical issues.
Note that I have reversed my original title of eight years ago with the intention of bringing us into focus on Church Doctrine. - RH
History QUIZ:
ANSWERS found in linked post.
Why did the British Empire ban Roger Williams from its colony August 8, 1635 AD?
What does the date of 24 July, 1567 have to do with the Bible?
And in 1525-26, what did William Tyndale do to oppose Papal authority that led to impact the Colonies and all the British Empire?
featuring Santa Claus suggesting the best Christmas gifts &
a love story matching mates for a little girl (Natalie Wood)
(and let’s not forget appearances by Mr. Macy & Mr. Gimble)
A Christmas Carol (1843)
Book by Charles Dickens
Focused on a stingy Ebenezer Scrooge & destitute poor employee with an ill son and
a ghost of Christmas Past
a ghost of Christmas Present
a ghost of Christmas Future
At issue is generosity and Christmas celebration with loved ones.
Various stage plays, animations and movies have followed for nearly two centuries.
Christmas the Setting, Not the story
We could mention many more ‘Christmas’ traditions which include books, movies, art and most of all children’s stories.
I love them all. Liked them as a kid and still find much joy in most of them. For by now (especially in this year) many of us have become a Scrooge or a Grinch, desperately in need of a smile-cracking child-like moment of escape from every-day cruelties cinching our lives.
Christmas, however, is not our holiday here – at least, not yet. So today only, I will focus on the ‘traditional and uniquely ‘American’ holiday of Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving – A Family Holiday for US
OCTOBER – Christmas ‘stocking’ stores & ONLINE
NOVEMBER – Daily ‘Black Friday’ Early ‘Deals’
November 25, 2020 – ‘Christmas’ Marketing BLITZ
November 26, 2020 – Thanksgiving (US)
Shop online while you watch our National FL traditions
NOVEMBER 27, 2020 – BLACK FRIDAY
November 28, 2020 – Small Business Saturday
November 29, 2020 – 1st Sunday of Advent
November 30, 2020 – CYBER-MONDAY!
Thanksgiving was always a big family celebration for the Harned’s. We celebrated with the traditional turkey at home on Thursday, then my grandparents welcomed extended family to an even larger feast on Friday.
(I guess we have some COVID concerns about such gatherings this year.)
Things don’t always work out the way we plan for pandemic famine or previous feast. Our on-line grocery order sent a turkey large enough for us to invite a couple dozen guests.
We ordered the ‘smallest‘ turkey for just three of us this year. Yet even as I write during preparation for a scaled-back Thanksgiving dinner, two of the three cooks definitely overstocked.
Our expectations all seem as misguided as the annual telling of indians (now properly, ‘native Americans’) serving turkey to those English Pilgrims in the funny hats.
Pilgrims & the Mayflower
You may relate to the illustrations of the Pilgrims and important historical documents of America such as the Mayflower Compact, but as important as these foundational documents and principles may be, many just don’t get it.
History taught to children in school in not a chronicle of fact, but rather an agenda of culture continued.
Roger Harned
In fact, most school children never get past the quaint pictures of grammar school, leaving American adults with a fairy-tale application of American history and fractured foundation of government.
Briefly, let’s examine what Thanksgiving was to one of many groups of Europeans from several nations who colonized the New World, the English separatist Pilgrims.
Allow me just one personal commentary:
In fact, observe China, Russian and various Arab nations colonizing natives of other lands and continents even in this 21st century. You may not agree with their overriding storyline of these international powers subjecting others to their culture either, but a true history of the millennia reveal many motives and much sin.
The Mayflower
A ship and its cargo (including passengers) sail with a contract – getting from point A to point B. It’s a business proposition.
In the case of the Mayflower and most ships settling the east coast of the ‘New World,’ its owner conducted the business of England (and its king). But as is the case today, not all agree with the current king on all matters of government.
The Mayflower was chartered by a group of English merchants called the London Adventurers. Its paying passengers were Puritans, part of a group of more than 300 English separatists living in exile in Holland.
They encountered many difficulties which prevented them from sailing on 15 August 1620, from Plymouth England with another ship that leaked and was found not to be sea-worthy. The Mayflower departed finally on 16 September 1620, to establish a New Plymouth near the Hudson Valley just north of the struggling Jamestown colony of 1607.
We now know this to be the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season and as expected they encountered life-threatening rough seas.
The living quarters for these 102 Pilgrims on the gun deck of the Mayflower was cramped.
If you can picture the inside of a tractor-trailer [53′ x 13.5′], add about 50% in length & about 6′ in width — but LOWER the ceiling a full 8′ to just 5’6″! Toss it into a raging cold ocean and picture the worst days of their pilgrimage.
About halfway into the journey (late September?), the Mayflower ran into bad weather. A series of storms caused the ship to leak and the main mast to crack. The pilgrims worried the ship would not be strong enough to make it America. The crew managed to fix the beam and fill some of the leaks.
The passengers sighted shore on November 9. Although the pilgrims had intended to land in northern Virginia, when they reached the shore they realized they were in New England.
Bradford records, they resolved to sail southward to find someplace about Hudson’s river for their habitation.
Because of the change of course, the passengers were no longer within the jurisdiction of the charter granted to them in England by the Virginia Company.
Within this legally uncertain situation, friction arose between the English Separatists (the Pilgrims) and the rest of the travelers, with some of the latter threatening to leave the group and settle on their own.
The Mayflower Compact bound its signers into a body politic for the purpose of forming a government and pledged them to abide by any laws and regulations that would later be established “for the general good of the colony.”
Once they agreed to settle and build a self-governing community, they came ashore.
Being thus arrived in a good harbor and brought safe to land, they fell upon their knees and blessed the God of heaven, who had brought them over the vast and furious ocean, and delivered them from all the perils and miseries thereof, again to set their feet on the firm and stable earth, their proper element.
William Bradford, second Governor of the Plymouth Colony
Here is the first Thanksgiving in this Promised Land for a new colony of Christians persecuted for their beliefs by other Christians.
Freedom of Religion
The American national holiday, Thanksgiving, originated from the first Thanksgiving feast held by the Pilgrims in 1621, a prayer event and dinner to mark the first harvest of the Mayflower settlers.
The emigrants weren’t just ordinary passengers but had distinguished themselves as being in religious conflict with the then accepted rites of worship in England and who were viewed as ‘dissenters’ and dangerous rebels. These English Puritans as they were to be known believed that their only means to practice their way of life and radical form of Protestantism was by creating their own Garden of Eden in the colonies.
Such an exodus from a Europe besieged by economic depression and the threat of war (the Thirty Year War) was essentially a journey into the unknown, a world of alien geography and strange indigenous peoples and little understanding of what would become of them.
Many of the refugees sailing on the Mayflower were regarded as dangerous religious and political dissidents who, having been in conflict with the Church of England for their unorthodox religious beliefs, had to worship in secret (or flee to another European country).
Mostly made up of evangelical Protestants who declared themselves as Separatists,
other passengers also included Quakers, who equally found themselves in disaccord with the religious laws of England
forbidding any form of worship other than the established rites of the Church of England.
German Princes (there were 225 princes) could choose the religion (whether they were Lutheran or Catholic) in their states
People that lived in a state that had chosen Lutheranism or Catholicism were not allowed to change their religion
Calvinism became the theology of the majority in Scotland (see John Knox), the Netherlands, and parts of Germany and was influential in France, Hungary, Transylvania, and Poland. Calvinism was popular as well for some time in Scandinavia, especially Sweden, but was rejected in favor of Lutheranism after the synod of Uppsala in 1593.
Most settlers in the American Mid-Atlantic and New England were Calvinists, including the Puritans and Dutch settlers of New Amsterdam (New York).
Into this new ‘land of the free,’ Protestants of varying beliefs, Roman Catholics, Jews and others sought refuge from the politics of local wars that had plagued much of Europe and brought desperate men and women of faith to their knees in hope of a new promised land.
The Mayflower Statement of Faith and Government
I ask you in this divisive year of our Lord (Anno Domini) 2020, to note that the God of the founders of this great nation is part and parcel of their purpose of establishing this land – a land of promise in the New World, free from war by division of religion or political subjugation by kings or princes – princes of land or of aristocratic ownership of the freedoms of its peoples.
Although these religious pilgrims and sojourners departed from England, spoke English and certainly carried the printed King James Version of the Bible into their new promised land, our English founders feared and ‘dreaded‘ this same King James.
They refer to themselves as ‘loyal subjects,’ although many had fled to Holland. The Pilgrims represented a church, that is a community in Christ, exiled and persecuted for their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Pilgrims have risked and nearly lost their very lives for their stated purpose, most thankfully put to pen before they set first foot on the rock of dry land.
..for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith..
Mayflower Compact – 11 November in the year of our Lord 1620
It is a covenant of cooperation ‘into a civil body politic,’ .. ‘unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.’
Thanksgiving, A.D. 1621
It must have been a year of struggle in a New World far removed from Eden while somewhat short of a Promise Land.
Perhaps every year in America since has been, to a lesser extent, seen as a struggle short of that for survival. The plague of this present year threatens US no more than the troubling times of our founding fathers. (and mothers, to remain P.C.)
America seems to have glorified our past, forgetting to glorify Almighty God who has mercifully spared US.
We have not given thanks to God for mercy and grace through our Lord Jesus Christ, who even used a dreaded King James to translate the Holy Bible from Latin and Hebrew and Greek.
The Pilgrims of an uncivilized New England could have starved (as unseen homeless do in our US streets today).
They might have been killed by native princes, defending the sustenance of native animals and crops of their lands West of Eden, an untamed wilderness from where they fed the families of their own tribes.
Yet the Lord sustained the Puritan Pilgrims in a land where they could worship God freely – a new world with no fear of kings, princes and popes.
For this they gave thanks.
To the Name of God they gave glory.By the grace of God they gave thanks.
Therefore I will give thanks unto thee, O LORD, among the heathen, and I will sing praises unto thy name. – 2 Samuel 22:50
I will give thee thanks in the great congregation: I will praise thee among much people. – Psalm 35:18
And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves.. And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me. – Luke 22:17,19
Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. – 2 Corinthians 2:14
And when those beasts give glory and honour and thanks to him that sat on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever,
The four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying,
Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.
The Revelation of Jesus Christ to John 4:9-11 KJV
Thank God
America, bless God.
All you Nations, bless God.
By the grace of God, the glory of Christ Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit, let US give THANKS to the LORD our GOD, that He might bless and keep US.
We have again been working through the Gospel of John with specific focus on the Trinity of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Before moving on to more signs of Jesus as the Messiah, I thought it appropriate to take a brief look at the Gospel’s author John.
About the Author John
In a larger sense the Author of Scripture is always the Lord God and specifically the Gospel author John refers to Jesus as, “the Word,” in effect crediting the Lord Jesus for Scripture.
The Good News of the author John and three other Gospel writers is that Jesus IS the Messiah of God, fulfillment of the Lord’s promise to redeem Israel.
John’s Gospel differs some from those of the Apostle Matthew, another Jewish author, and that of two gentile author’s, John Mark and Luke. (God-willing I may share more about these Gospel authors at a later time in separate posts.)
a First century story
I would like to relate a story to you which involves the author John, who wrote not only the Gospel, but three letters and the Revelation (or Apocalypse) of the New Testament. But first let’s consider the genre of my story to follow.
Fiction or Nonfiction?
Although we step away from the Bible and specifically the Gospel for a moment, I have crafted the following “biography” to make you think.
You might ask of any story, a classic novel, Scripture or a television script: ‘Is it true?’ That is, does this story I’m reading, hearing or seeing represent reliable truth? Is it nonfiction or is it (at least in part) fiction?
“Fiction or nonfiction,” we may ask thoughtfully?
If Scripture is true, then our only conclusion must be that the Bible is ‘nonfiction;’ therefore our compelling question must address God’s will, “How should I apply these truths?”
I caution however of entertainment which claims ‘authoritative’ speculation that misleads the masses into false and dangerous applications. Just one example would be “The History Channel.”
We naturally assume anything claiming history or science to be a reliable true source of researched fact. Yet what about a fantastical speculation proclaiming possibility of “Ancient Aliens,” which invades our thinking as pure fiction with no basis in fact?
Many writers of supposed ‘scientific fact’ place such nonsensical fiction in the same speculative category as they do the Bible. Their heretical premise implies that God does not exist anymore than ancient aliens do (therefore both are fiction). These authors create gods of their own making, denying the glory of the Living God.
Of course not all fiction denies the truth and historicity of Christ. Thankfully some fiction pursues a higher calling to give us insight into the historical men and women of the Bible, or even the true nature of faith following the Lord Jesus as a true Christian. Perhaps one of the best of these would be John Bunyan’s “The Pilgrim’s Progress.”
Historical Fiction
If a story, i.e. nonfiction, doesn’t qualify as fact, then what kind of fiction is it?
Some stories illustrate imagined or actual characteristics of historical characters who actually existed. One example might be the story of George Washington chopping down the cherry tree. (Certainly you can think of others.)
I would caution that many such stories have hidden agendas often opposed to the Lord God. So a story may pose as historical fiction when in fact it is not historical in any way (other than taking the name of its lead character in vain).
Some so-called ‘christian’ cults would have you believe that Jesus was nothing more than a character in the historical fiction of the New Testament of the Bible. It’s also important here to point out that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is NOT a “historical fiction,” acknowledging that Jesus was real and did exist in the first century, while denying Christ’s deity.
No deception of the devil will lead your soul astray more than this lie against the saving Son of the Most High! Many will concede and even preach the existence of Jesus, without worshiping Him as Lord.
A Father of Thunder
The following story hopefully will illustrate a helpful perspective as historical fiction from the first century A.D.
Although based on the characters discussed, including the author John, this fictional account is not intended to provide evidence for John’s Gospel, but to provide circumstance into its writing by the author John.
Israel & Sea of Galilee – crossroads of cultures and trade
And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?
Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life:
but teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons…
Deuteronomy 4:8-9 KJV
Introduction
Men call me Bonerges for my thunderous commands they hear ‘mongst my fleet on the Galilee.
Sea of Galilee at inlet of Jordan River in the north
I thank the LORD for my blessings and that of my boisterous leadership, but mostly I call out for the supply of my business. Though faithful to the LORD in every area of my life as a Jew, I am no hammer upon the anvil of Israel’s hard-forged apostasy.
Now that my double blessing of sons join my fleet as young men of God, I must teach them not only of fishing but of the leading of men.
The LORD made me a man of modest means, so now I may send them to any man of God of my choosing to learn more of the LORD’s will for their lives. It’s not so simple though; for our life as Jews in the land which was once Israel had never been simple since Solomon.
Whether here in Bethsaida or on journeys to Jerusalem (also never the same again) all we seem to argue is how the LORD wants us to follow in a strange land which was once our own.
I should even say it was once HIS, but is no more. God help us.
Ahh, who would have thought that Israel could become a land which is not ours or the Lord’s?
(the second Law) דברים
We are sons of Moses; I have been praying on this Scripture.
Where shall I send my sons to learn the faith of our fathers?
“Give ear, O heavens, and let me speak; And let the earth hear the words of my mouth. “For I proclaim the name of the LORD; Ascribe greatness to our God!
“Then He said, ‘I will hide My face from them, I will see what their end shall be; For they are a perverse generation, Sons in whom is no faithfulness.
from the song of Moses – Deuteronomy 32:(1,3,)20 WLC;NASB
What is the will of the Lord God for my sons James and John?
