TIMELINE

IMPORTANT EVENTS IN CHURCH HISTORY

THE AGE OF JESUS AND THE APOSTLES

30 – Crucifixion of Jesus; Pentecost

35 – Stephen martyred; Paul converted

46 – Paul begins missionary journeys

48 – Council of Jerusalem

57 – Paul’s letter to the Romans

64 – Fire of Rome; Nero launches persecutions

65 – Peter and Paul executed

THE AGE OF EARLY CHRISTIANITY

70 – Destruction of Jerusalem by Titus

110 – Ignatius of Antioch martyred

150 – Justin Martyr dedicates First Apology

155 – Polycarp martyred

172 – Montanist movement begins

180 – Irenaeus writes Against Heresies

196 – Tertullian begins writing

215 – Origen begins writing

230 – Earliest known public churches built

248 – Cyprian elected bishop of Carthage

250 – Decius orders empire-wide persecution

270 – Antony takes up life of solitude

303 – “Great Persecution” begins under Diocletian

THE AGE OF THE CHRISTIAN EMPIRE

312 – Conversion of Constantine

312 – Donatist Schism begins

313 – “Edict of Milan”

323 – Eusebius completes Ecclesiastical History

325 – First Council of Nicea

341 – Ulphilas, translator of Gothic Bible, becomes bishop

358 – Basil the Great founds monastic community

367 – Athanasius’s letter defines New Testament canon

381 – Christianity made state religion of Roman Empire

386 – Augustine coverts to Christianity

390 – Ambrose defies emperor

398 – Chrysostom consecrated bishop of Constantinople

405 – Jerome competes the Vulgate

410 – Rome sacked by Visigoths

431 – Council of Ephesus

432 – Patrick begins mission to Ireland

440 – Leo the great consecrated bishop of Rome

445 – Valentinian’s Edict strengthens primacy of Rome

451 – Council of Chalcedon

500 – Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite writes

524 – Boethius completes Consolation of Philosophy

529 – Justinian publishes his legal Code

540 – Benedict writes his monastic Rule

563 – Columba establishes mission community on Iona

THE CHRISTIAN MIDDLE AGES

590 – Gregory the Great elected Pope

597 – Ethelbert of Kent converted

622 – Muhammad’s hegira: birth of Islam

663 – Synod of Whitby

716 – Boniface begins mission to the Germans

726 – Controversy over icons begins in Eastern church

731 – Bede’s Ecclesiastical History published

732 – Battle of Tours

750 – Donation of Constantine written about this time

754 – Pepin III’s donation helps found papal states

781 – Alcuin becomes royal advisor to Charles

787 – Second Council of Nicea settles icon controversy

800 – Charlemagne crowned Holy Roman Emperor

843 – Treaty of Verdun divides Carolingian Empire

861 – East-West conflict over Photius begins

862 – Cyril and Methodius begin mission to Slavs

909 – Monastery at Cluny founded

988 – Christianization of “Russia”

1054 – East-West Split

1077 – Emperor submits to pope over investiture

1093 – Anselm becomes Archbishop of Canterbury

1095 – First Crusade launched by Council of Clermont

1115 – Bernard founds monastery at Clairvaux

1122 – Concordat of Worms ends investiture controversy

1141 – Hildegaard of Bingen begins writing

1150 – Universities of Paris and Oxford founded

1173 – Waldensian movement begins

1208 – Francis of Assisi renounces wealth

1215 – Magna Carta

1215 – Innocent III assembles Fouth Lateran Council

1220 – Dominican Order established

1232 – Gregory IX appoints first “inquisitors”

1272 – Thomas Aquina’s Summa Theologica

1302 – Unam Sanctum proclaims papal supremacy

1309 – Papacy begins “Babylonian” exile in Avignon

1321 – Dante completes Divine Comedy

1370 – Catherine of Siena begins her Letters

1373 – Julian of Norwich receives her revelations

1378 – Great Papal Schism begins

1380 – Wycliffe supervises English Bible translation

1414 – Council of Constance begins

1415 – Jan Hus burned at stake

1418 – Thomas a Kempis writes The Imitation of Christ

1431 – Joan of Arc burned at stake

1453 – Constantinople falls; end of Eastern Roman Empire

1456 – Gutenberg produces first printed Bible

1479 – Establishment of Spanish Inquisition

1488 – First complete Hebrew Old Testament

1497 – Savonarola excommunicated

1506 – Work begins on new St. Peter’s in Rome

1512 – Michelangelo completes the Sistine Chapel frescoes

1516 – Erasmus publishes Greek New Testament

THE AGE OF REFORMATION

1517 – Martin Luther posts his Ninety-Five Theses

1518 – Ulrich Zwingli comes to Zurich

1521 – Diet of Worms

1524 – The Peasants’ Revolt erupts

1525 – William Tyndale’s New Testament published

1525 – Anabaptist movement begins

1527 – Schleitheim Confession of Faith

1529 – Colloquy of Marburg

1530 – Augsburg Confession

1534 – Act of Supremacy; Henry VIII heads English church

1536 – John Calvin publishes first edition of Institutes

1536 – Menno Simons baptized as Anabaptist

1540 – Ignatius Loyola gains approval for Society of Jesus

1545 – Council of Trent begins

1549 – Book of Common Prayer released

1549 – Xavier begins mission to Japan

1555 – Peace of Augsburg

1555 – Latimer and Ridley burned at the stake

1559 – John Knox makes final return to Scotland

1563 – First text of Thirty-Nine Articles issued

1563 – John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs published

1565 – Teresa of Avila writes The Way of Perfection

1572 – St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre

1577 – Formula of Concord

1582 – Mateo Ricci and colleague begin mission to China

1589 – Moscow becomes independent patriarchate

1598 – Edict of Nantes (revoked 1685)

1609 – John Smyth baptizes self and first Baptists

1611 – King James Version of Bible published

1618 – Synod of Dort begins

1618 – Thirty Years’ War begins

1620 – Mayflower Compact drafted

1633 – Galileo forced to recant his theories

1636 – Harvard College founded

1636 – Roger Williams founds Providence, R.I.

1647 – George Fox begins to preach

1646 – Westminster Confession drafted

1648 – Peace of Westphalia ends Thirty Years’ War

THE AGE OF REASON AND REVIVAL

1649 – Cambridge Platform

1653 – Cromwell named Lord Protector

1654 – Blaise Pascal has definitive conversion experience

1667 – John Milton’s Paradise Lost

1668 – Rembrandt paints Return of the Prodigal Son

1675 – Spener’s Pia Desideria advances Pietism

16
78 – John Bunyan writes The Pilgrim’s Progress

1682 – William Penn founds Pennsylvania

1687 – Newton publishes Principia Mathmatica

1689 – Toleration Act in London

1707 – J.S. Bach produces first work

1707 – Isaac Watts publishes Hymns and Spiritual Songs

1729 – Jonathan Edwards becomes pastor at Northhampton

1732 – First Moravian missionaries

1735 – George Whitefield converted

1738 – John and Charles Wesley’s evangelical conversions

1740 – Great Awakening peaks

1742 – First production of Handel’s Messiah

1759 – Voltaire’s Candide

1771 – Francis Ashbury sent to America

1773 – Jesuits suppressed (until 1814)

1779 – John Newton and William Cowper publish Olney Hymns

1780 – Robert Raikes begins his Sunday school

1781 – Kant publishes Critique of Pure Reason

THE AGE OF PROGRESS

1789 – French Revolution begins

1789 – Bill of Rights

1793 – William Carey sails for India

1793 – Festival of Reason (de-Christianization of France)

1799 – Scheiermacher publishes Lectures on Religion

1801 – Concordat between Napoleon and Pius VII

1804 – British and Foreign Bible Society formed

1806 – Samuel Mills leads Haystack Prayer Meeting

1807 – William Wilberforce succeeds abolishing slave trade

1810 – American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions

1811 – Alexander Campbell begins Restoration Movement

1816 – Richard Allen elected bishop of new AME church

1816 – Adoniram Judson begins mission trip

1817 – Elizabeth Fry organizes relief in Newgate Prision

1819 – Channing issues Unitarian Christianity

1827 – J.N. Darby founds the Plymouth Brethren

1833 – John Keble’s sermon launches Oxford Movement

1834 – George Mueller opens Scriptural Knowledge Institute

1835 – Charles Finney’s Lectures on Revivals

1840 – David Livingstone sails for Africa

1844 – First Adventist churches formed

1844 – Soren Kierkegaard writes Philosophical Fragments

1845 – John Henry Newman becomes Roman Catholic

1845 – Phoebe Palmer writes The Way of Holiness

1848 – Marx publishes Communist Manifesto

1851 – Harriet Beecher Stowe releases Uncle Tom’s Cabin

1854 – Immaculate Conception made dogma

1854 – Charles Spurgeon becomes pastor of New Park St. Church

1855 – D.L. Moody converted

1857 – Prayer Meeting Revival begins in New York

1859 – Darwin publishes Origin of Species

1859 – Japan opens to foreign missionaries

1860 – U.S. Civil War begins

1864 – Syllabus of Errors issued by Pope Pius IX

1865 – J. Hudson Taylor founds China Inland Mission

1870 – First Vatican Council declares papal infallibility

1878 – William & Catherine Booth found Salvation Army

1879 – Frances Willard becomes president of WCTU

1880 – Abraham Kuyper starts Free University

1885 – Berlin Congress spurs African Independent Churches

1885 – Wellhausen’s documentary hypothesis

1886 – Student Volunteer Movement begins

1895 – Freud publishes first work on psychoanalysis

1886 – Billy Sunday begins leading revivals

1901 – Speaking in tongues at Parham’s Bible school

1906 – Azusa Street revival

1906 – Schweitzer’s The Quest of the Historical Jesus

1908 – Federal Council of Churches forms

1910 – Edinburgh International Missionary Conference begins

1910 – The Fundamentals begin to be published

1912 – Social Creed of the Churches adapted

THE AGE OF IDEOLOGIES

1914 – World War I begins

On this day...

• Fear Not God's Promise To Make You Holy - 2011
• Heaven is Taking Over. Yield. - 2011
• Found Wanting - 2008
• Luke 9:23-24 - 2008
• Speculative Thought - 2007
• Jeremiah 2:18 - 2007
• Ephesians 1:14 - 2007
• He Takes Care Of His Creation - 2007
• The Dry Rot of Nonexpectation - 2007
• Only The Lonely - 2007