After Diocletian’s persecution of Christians, many of the later Roman emperors, including Constantine, saw Christianity as an ally instead of an enemy. In 313, when the only other emperor was Licinius, Constantine arranged an agreement between the two of them so that Christianity was no longer an illegal religion. This was known as the Edict of Milan. Later, in 323 when Constantine defeated Licinius to become the sole emperor, he made Christianity the preferred religion (which means he still allowed other religions, including emperor worship).
Constantine was not a theologically strong Christian, even waiting to be baptized on his deathbed with the belief that more sins would be covered, but he still had a large impact on the Christian movement. In the short term, the initial permissiveness toward the movement under cooperation with Licinius and the later preference allowed Christians to more openly profess their faith without fears of persecution. Chrisitianity was formerly in the public square in the form of executions, but now it was in the public square in the form of legal discourse.
In the long term, the effects were not so good. Constantine not only allowed Christianity, but he also wanted to govern it and proclaimed himself the bishop of bishops. This led to many decisions regarding the direction Christianity was to legally move in being made by someone who did not know much about Christianity. As an example, in the debate between Arius and Athanasius, Constantine changed his mind multiple times, always siding for the person he felt would bring the most peace among the people. He did not care about orthodox theology as much as he cared about politics and securing his own power. The good part of this incident, though, were the decisions that came out of the Council of Nicea which Constantine organized, regarding the divinity of Christ.
Although there was a bishop in Rome, where Constantine first lived, the idea that someone in Rome was to control the church was born with Constantine’s rule as head bishop. The bishop of Rome, though, was the bishop that was the most geographically close to Constantine so his opinion became elevated amongst the bishops due to this influence upon the emperor. The bishop’s influence became so elevated that when Constantine moved the capital of the empire to Constantinople, the Roman bishop was in the position to assume control over all of the other bishops. As the lectures indicate, there were many other factors that led to this and the eventual creation of the papacy, but this one cannot be forgotten.
My regular readers have probably noticed that my posts come in themes (you might want to call them “topics”). The most recent theme has been John Calvin.
Here’s a secret: most of my themes pertain to whatever I am studying at the moment. I have been writing a paper about Calvin for a Church History course.
As I was reading through Calvin’s reply to Sadoleto, a Catholic bishop who had written a letter to the city of Geneva asking them to return to Catholicism, I discovered one of the most forceful presentations of the Gospel message that I have ever read:
First, we bid a man begin by examining himself, and this not in a superficial and perfunctory manner, but to cite his conscience before the tribunal of God, and when sufficiently convinced of his iniquity, to reflect on the strictness of the sentence pronounced upon all sinners. Thus confounded and amazed at his misery, he is prostrated and humbled before God; and, casting away all self-confidence, groans as if given up to final perdition. Then we show that the only haven of safety is the mercy of God, as manifested in Christ, in whom every part of our salvation is complete. As all mankind are, in the sign of God, lost sinners, we hold that Christ is their only righteousness, since, by His obedience, He has wiped off all our transgressions; by His sacrifice, appeased the divine anger; by His blood, washed away our sins; by His cross, borne our curse; and by His death, made satisfaction for us. We maintain that in this way man is reconciled in Christ to God the Father, by no merit of his own, by no value of works, but by gratuitous mercy. When we embrace Christ by faith, and come, as it were, into communion with Him, this we term, after the manner of Scripture, the righteousness of faith.
The entire letter, along with Sadoleto’s original, can be found in the book A Reformation Debate
edited by John C. Olin.
A variety of free Christian Audio Book mp3 files can be downloaded from Free Christian Audio Books.
These include:
- All of Grace by Charles Spurgeon
- Absolute Surrender by Andrew Murray
- At the Masters Feet by Sundar Singh
- A Life for a Life by Henry Drummond
- George Mueller Biography
- God of All Comfort by H. Smith
- Heaven by D.L. Moody
- How to Pray by R. A. Torrey
- Imitation of Christ by Thomas Kempis
- Inspiration of the Bible by A.W. Pink
- Life of St. Patrick
- Life of William Carey
- New Life by Andrew Murray
- Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton
- Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
- Prayer and Praying Men by E.M. Bounds
- Reality of Prayer by E.M. Bounds
- Revival Addresses by R.A. Torrey
- Secrets of a Happy Christian by H. Smith
- The Necessity of Prayer by E.M. Bounds
- The Practice of the Presence Brother Lawrence
Covenant Worldwide, a ministry of Covenant Theological Seminary, has made over twenty graduate courses available for free download. These not only contain the audio lectures in mp3 format, but also the original lecture notes along with lecture transcriptions. If you are looking to get a graduate-level education in theology, but don’t want the graduate price tag, then be sure to look at this resource. Even though I am in a graduate M.Div. program at another seminary, I often use these as supplemental material to the courses I am enrolled in. Of course, though, the Covenant Worldwide courses are for personal enrichment only and no college credit or degrees are awarded.
The courses that are available are:
Persecution, although a terrible trial on those being persecuted, has proven to be beneficial to church growth and orthodoxy throughout history. In early Christian history, when the church was originally persecuted with a key factor being the destruction all of its writings and the execution of those who did not cooperate, it was very important to determine which writings were the important ones. Without the printing press or later advances, books were very valuable, but perhaps not always valuable enough to give your life for. This led to the canonization of the books we now have in the New Testament.
Also, as the alleged beliefs of the Christians began to spread throughout the world, some non-orthodox or heretical groups emerged that were often confused with the Christians. There was also some confusion regarding what the true beliefs of the Christians were. Sometimes they were called cannibals because it was thought that they ate flesh and drank blood. Because of all of this confusion, it was important for them to theologically define who they were so that both their own practices were understood (e.g. The Lord’s Supper) and they distanced themselves from the heretics.
In addition, with persecution comes conversion through martyrdom. Of course this is not our preferred method of evangelism, especially if you are the one being martyred, but those who witness someone dying for a cause wonder if they have anything as special or important in their lives that they would likewise be willing to die for. This leads to more hearts and minds that are open to the Gospel message.