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Greetings. This is Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church with a moment

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of truth where we challenge you to think through an important issue of life and faith. Today,

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I want to challenge you with the seven great myths of church history. What are the seven great myths

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of church history and how do we avoid them? Church history is important to study because

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it helps us avoid so many pitfalls and errors. And we have already begun our church history

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course at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church. By the time that you hear this,

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we will have had our first lesson under our belt. And we have been meeting at Leo's Place

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in Idaho Falls at seven o'clock on Thursday evenings. And we met for the first time this

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past October 14th. And we'll be meeting on Thursday evening every week hereafter, well into the month

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of June. So we invite you to come and join us for our church history course. We'll be using the book

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Church History in Plain Language by Dr. Bruce Shelley. Church History in Plain Language. And

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I encourage you to get a copy of this and begin reading it with us. And we'll be discussing it. I've

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got some provocative questions for you throughout the course and hopefully help to jog your thinking

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in so many areas. And part of that jog of human memory and part of that jog of your thinking to

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provoke your thinking is to shoot down seven myths of church history that I've encountered all of

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my life. What are those seven myths? Seven great myths. There's many of them, but I've got seven big

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ones here for you. Number one, of course, church history isn't important. Church history isn't

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important. What I believe here today. That's the important thing. Wow. We dispel that myth pretty

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quickly. Otherwise, you end up running into the old cliché of those by George Santayana who said

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those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it. And that's precisely what happens so often in the

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lives of Christians who fail to study church history. And secondly, second myth we dispelled,

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I can leapfrog over 2,000 years of church history and do things just like they did, like the pure,

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pristine church in the book of Acts. And that is the myth of primitivism. And we dispel that one as well.

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And the third myth is that soon after the death of the apostles, the true church disappeared and has

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only been recently, excuse me, recently restored by blank. And you can fill in the blank because this

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myth of restorationism has been throughout the history of the church. And we, of course, treated

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particularly of that of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The fourth myth we dispelled is

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the Catholic Church has only and always been one monolithic apostate church filled with funny hats,

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rosaries, Hail Marys, and no meat on Friday. That, of course, is one of the myths held especially

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by Protestant evangelicals. And we helped to dispel that myth as well. Number five,

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things like creeds and confessions and liturgies, deep theology, these are all just unnecessary,

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complex layers of junk. All I need is Jesus and my Bible. All I need is Jesus and my Bible.

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And we made short work of that one as well. These are all online. You can find all of these

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treatments of these five myths that I've just mentioned for you. You can find them at our

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website at omnisprotestas.org. O-M-N-I-S dash P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S dot org. Omnisprotestas.org.

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That's Latin for all authority. And of course, all authority belongs to Jesus. O-M-N-I-S dash P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S dot

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org. Well, myth number six, what is it? What is myth number six? Dear listener, listen closely.

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Myth number six, those people in the church of the past were so hopelessly out of touch with what I

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believe today that they could not possibly be saved. Oh, yes, this is the thinking that the past,

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the church of the past was so out of touch that it couldn't possibly be a true church. This is the

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thinking explicitly said or implicitly thought that one's own belief and practice of Christianity is

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the zenith of faith in history, the peak and the pinnacle, while all others are the nadir or the bottom

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of true Christianity. What I think and believe today is obviously true, while what they believed

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and practiced back then is obviously in error and very faulty. Of course, this manifests itself

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in things like this, right? Christianity has done nothing but get in the way of progress with its

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religious beliefs and superstitions. That's more of a secular argument against Christianity.

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And that's especially true when it comes to the progress of science, they say. Christianity is

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seen to have been nothing but an obstacle to the advancement of the scientific enterprise. Now,

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we'll deal with this myth in church history, too, and see how, in fact, just the opposite,

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the church and scientists in the church helped to foster the scientific spirit, not to defeat it.

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Or, this is a big one today, Christianity has perpetuated and approved of the sinful, evil

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practice of slavery. Now, because the faith was born into the pagan cultural world of slavery,

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there's always been slavery. Slavery is alive and well today. But because Christianity was born into

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that world, it was a reality from the beginning of our race. Christianity is condemned out of hand,

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even though Christianity was instrumental in eliminating slavery from its domains. And we will

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review this, too, as well, in our church history course, how Christianity indeed has been instrumental in

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eliminating slavery. Or because the church had things like popes and priests and monasteries and statues

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and stained glass windows, rosaries and holy water. Well, that church could not possibly have been filled

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with true believers, right? Now, this thinking assumes that because some of these elements were present in

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the church of the past, that nothing true and real and substantial about Christianity could possibly

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be present. No one could possibly be saved in such an environment. We can dismiss them, therefore,

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as serious believers. All of these and more are expressions of a major ever-present fallacy in all

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of society today, I submit to you. And that fallacy is that of historical anachronism. Now, that's a

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technical term that historians use, but it is indeed true for those who look at church history and see

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nothing but darkness. Historical anachronism, because they didn't believe what I believe, right?

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Now, anachronism is a Greek word composed of two words, ana, meaning across, or over, and chronos,

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meaning time. So, we're looking at ideas dropped and placed and imposed across time. It's the practice

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of imposing modern judgments and values upon cultures and societies of the past. And this is

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one of the most ubiquitous fallacies in America today. It's a blind spot in what passes for thinking

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in the modern generation, and it assumes that our values and judgments are superior, that we are more

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enlightened and advanced than our predecessors ever could have been. David Hall has coined the apt phrase,

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the arrogance of the modern. I like that phrase, because it captures the superior mindset of the

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modern progressive. For example, just one example, Robert E. Lee owned slaves. Therefore, he was racist,

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and we must tear down his statues and vilify his name and memory forevermore. Well, of course,

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this type of hateful harpy pours out his vitriol atop a history that has morphed over 150 years since

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the Civil War and not necessarily for the better. That same progressive will also maintain that a black

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man does not have the intelligence or the wherewithal to obtain a photo ID, for example, with which to

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vote. And consequently, we must do away with those voter requirements for that poor benighted person of

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color, which is a situation that Thomas Sowell calls the soft bigotry of low expectations. I love that

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characterization. He gets it so well. The soft bigotry of low expectations. This attitude that

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persons of color do not have the intelligence or wherewithal to obtain a photo ID is demeaning to

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people of color. It is paternalistic and patronizing. It is racist in and of itself. And it is a racism,

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I might add, that not even Robert E. Lee would have engaged in. Historical anachronism fails to take

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into account the situation in life of those in the past and the realities with which they had to

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deal. Read a biography or two of Robert E. Lee, and you will find a far more complex and honorable man

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than the cardboard cutout caricature that progressives construct in order that they might have an object

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of hate and vilification. Lee faced real life circumstances and situations that would make your average

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progressive wet himself and cry for mommy. And he faced them with courage and integrity. Real people

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are always more than one thing. And Robert E. Lee was more than a slave owner. Robert E. Lee could not

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have given to Black Lives Matter or joined Antifa or prostrated himself at a local Maoist struggle session

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and abjectly confessed his sinfulness as an evil racist like a good virtue signaling millennial does,

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excuse me. Robert E. Lee was a man of his own times, and it's manifestly unfair and unjust to judge him

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by modern standards. That's historical anachronism. And it is also fair to ask, then, how will the future

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judge this hysterical, ignorant generation? When the demonic madness is exercised from our collective

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consciousness and sanity and biblical reason is restored, how will your generation be judged,

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opus unanimous progressive? Even when our children's children have checked themselves for their own

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historical anachronism, they will rightly lament the fear, superstition, and slavish ignorance of this

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generation. A generation that butchers its young in the womb as a sacrifice to Moloch. A generation that

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has surrendered the constitutional republic for a few virtue signaling slogans and platitudes like

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diversity is our strength. My body, my choice, except when it comes to vaccines. And we're all in this

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together. And of course, racist, racist, racist. Oh, they will lament a generation that has succumbed to

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fear such that they exchange the real God-given health and well-being that is natural immunity and

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freedom with a certain amount of calculated risk. They'll exchange this for sickness and death that

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passes for health and well-being. And that is masks, excuse me, lockdowns and kill shots. Well, historical

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anachronism, the arrogance of the modern, is a fallacy which has to be considered when reading church

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history as well. It assumes, historical anachronism assumes that what we believe in practice today is

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right and true and biblical. While those people of the past were hopelessly ignorant and superstitious

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in what they believed and practiced. After all, they didn't have the Schofield-referenced King James

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Bible and all those cool YouTube videos about end times that we have today. Instead, they went around

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mumbling in Latin, crossing themselves and reciting Hail Marys all day. They couldn't possibly have been

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born-again Christians like me. But of course, this is imposing modern judgments and values upon cultures

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and societies of the past. It fails to consider the real-life, on-the-ground situations believers of

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the past coped with. One of my favorite exercises in historical imagination is to ask a modern believer

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to put himself in the place of an average believer in a village in Europe in the early 9th century

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under Charlemagne. Let me ask you first, if you were one of these average believers in a village in

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Europe in the 9th century, where would you have gone to church? Consider it for a moment. There were

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no brick, glass, and stainless steel megachurches every few miles to choose from. There was no

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directory listing the various Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Pentecostal churches in town.

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And even if there was such a directory, you wouldn't be able to read it. Because all through the Middle

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Ages, the literacy rate was a mere 2%. The only church in town was the local Catholic church. Upon it,

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you would be dependent for teaching and worship and pastoral care. How important would that be to you?

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Most likely, a peasant believer under a feudal system. And me, my first response is, well, I wouldn't

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stand for it. I'd start my own house church and have family worship around our Bible. We'd sing hymns and

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pray. And this impulse or something close to it is usually one of our first instincts as moderns.

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That's what we would do if the Catholic church was the only one in town. But remember, dear listener,

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you would most likely be an illiterate peasant who couldn't afford a Bible, even if you could read.

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Bibles were painstakingly hand-copied by monks who took anywhere from two to five years to produce

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one Bible. And the cost would be far beyond your abilities. An average copy of the Bible costs two

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to three years' wages of the average working man of the time. The cost and wait time for your CBD

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order, in other words, was unbelievable. But on the positive side, there were faithful pastors

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and conscientious churches who loved and ministered to the flock. The historical record is clear on this,

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and we will unfold this in our church history course, too, and hopefully dispel some of the

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historical anachronism that surrounds our understanding of the past. And we will meet in

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that church history course at 7 p.m. every Thursday night hereafter for the year at Leo's Place, 7 p.m.,

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and you can find us in one of the party rooms. We'll be there studying church history using

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Bruce Shelley's book, Church History in Plain Language. And you will help to dispel in your own

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lives, perhaps, a measure of historical anachronism, or what Dr. Hall calls the arrogance of the modern.

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And you will find, as we study church history as well, that while there was no such thing as personal

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copies of the Bible in the 9th century, churches did seek to obtain a Bible as of first importance.

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The local prince, or perhaps a few of the wealthy merchants, would contribute generously to the church

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to buy a copy of a Latin Vulgate Bible. But that was no guarantee, even then, that the local priest

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could even read it. If you lived in the 9th century, in Charlemagne's day, he was eventually

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crowned Holy Roman Emperor by then Pope Leo III, and we'll look at this as well. Well, if you lived

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under Charlemagne, many of the priests in his realm could barely read their own names, much less a Bible.

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And so Charlemagne set out upon a program of education in his kingdom, where he insisted that

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not only his priests and bishops, but also the princes under him, learn how to read and write.

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If you were fortunate enough to live in a town or city that had a large church or a cathedral,

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then you probably had the luxury of things like stained glass windows and statues of biblical

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characters and paintings of biblical scenes all through the church. For most of the history of

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the church, these objects were used as teaching tools, dear listener, teaching tools, not as objects

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of veneration and worship. No, no, no, no. That assumption is historical anachronism, a presumption

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of the arrogant modern, that things like stained glass windows and statues and paintings were used

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as objects of veneration and worship from the very beginning. No. Well, if you lived in the 9th century,

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a skilled priest would use the depiction of Noah and his ark in a stained glass window, for example,

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to take his illiterate congregation through the redemptive history of the flood. You would most

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likely have been illiterate. Remember this. And this priest would use that window in conjunction with

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portions that were read and translated from the Bible. And if they were fortunate enough to have a Bible,

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that is. And part of the arrogance of the modern is his tendency towards historical anachronism is to

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impose his weak and feeble memory on the poor, benighted people of the Dark Ages, too, right?

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Ah, human memory. Just because the modern human memory has atrophied to a point where we can barely

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remember a phone number without keying it into a device, well, that's not the heritage of the human

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memory through history. We'll learn about this in our church history course as well. And that's

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meeting at 7 p.m. Once again, just a reminder, 7 p.m. at Leo's Place on Thursday evenings. And we

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encourage you to join us for that. Well, the human memory is actually prodigious when it's trained and

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exercised. Entire books, great swathes of biblical text were routinely memorized. And the portions that

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were read in church were remembered word for word by those who heard it read to them. Our brothers and

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sisters in the past may have been illiterate, but that does not mean that they were stupid or incapable

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of remembering what they were taught and read. And we'll see this brought to life in our church history

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course, too. Come and join us. We're using Dr. Bruce Shelley's book, Church History in Plain Language, and

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we'll see these things come alive. Well, as humble as these priests and bishops' circumstances

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and education might have been, do not neglect that many thousands of nameless, faceless pastors and

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priests through the centuries preached and taught and ministered sacrificially to their flocks in Jesus' name.

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They are nameless and faceless to us, but they are known and loved by their over-shepherd, that is

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our Lord Jesus Christ. They will hear those precious words, well done, good and faithful servant,

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at the last judgment. So beware of this great myth of church history, dear listener, the fallacy of

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historical anachronism. Do not be an arrogant modern who reads back into the lives and souls of past

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saints, the assumptions and values of today. Don't put that on them. Take some time to learn what their

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lives were like and put yourself in their place before you judge them too quickly. And we'll do this

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once again in our church history course. We'll be on top of this all the way through a chapter after

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chapter of Bruce Shelley's Church History in Plain Language. Well, the last seventh myth, great myth of

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church history is, I can draw one continuous line of belief through church history of those who believe

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what I believe. I can draw one continuous line of belief through church history of those who believe

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what I believe. Now, our myths begin to spill over into one another after a while, don't they?

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There's a bit of the historical anachronism in this one too. Oftentimes, in an attempt to see parallels

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with what one believes today, an imposition of one's own beliefs and practices can be foisted on

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someone else in history in order to prove a point. But the impulse to find a continuous stream of belief

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is good, I might add. I might add that. And this becomes a myth only when the past is distorted

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or forced into a mold, not of its own making. Be cautious about this, dear listener. Christianity

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is a monotheistic religion whose life-saving message depends upon the faith once delivered

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unto the saints, as Jude says, as the apostles would all assert. And Paul puts it strongly when he warns

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the Galatians that even if I or an angel from heaven brings you another gospel, then that which I first

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delivered to you, let him be accursed. And so, the task of theology and the church is not to see how

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creative we can be in bringing new things and innovations in teaching and doctrine, but rather

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in being faithful, in being consistent in transmitting the gospel of Jesus Christ as once

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delivered to the saints. St. Vincent of Lorraine, he lived in the early 5th century. He puts it succinctly

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when he says that the mark of true orthodox teaching is, all possible care must be taken,

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he says, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all.

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Ah, very succinctly put. We must hold the faith which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all.

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What is that faith? Held by everyone, everywhere, by all, right? Well, we will unpack that in our

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church history, of course, too. We'll be constantly monitoring that rule of faith. And if that's true,

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if you can't draw a pretty long and consistent line through church history of what you believe,

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for example, then odds are you've got it wrong, and you're a heretic or a schismatic or a cat with some

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plain kooky beliefs on your plate. The cliche is generally true. If it's new, it ain't true. If it's

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new, it ain't true. Most Christians understand this principle intuitively. And so, when they do study

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church history, it is, in part, to justify what they believe by being able to say, see, the true

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church, you know, Saint so-and-so and Saint so-and-so other, right? These guys in the past

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believed what I believe, so it must be true. Ah, but the other cliche also goes, the devil is in the

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details. Actually searching honestly for and finding and confirming what the church of history

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believed everywhere, always, and by all is not as easy as it might first sound. That's why we're

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studying church history on Thursday night at New Geneva, and we're doing it at Leo's Place, a great

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place to gather and to fellowship, and we're doing it by reading Dr. Bruce Shelley's Church History in

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Plain Language. And we encourage you to come and join us, too, for that study, seven o'clock on

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Thursday nights. We know that, for example, large portions of the church at time embraced heresy,

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as when several of the barbarian tribes that overran the Roman Empire brought the Trinity-denying

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teachings of Arius with them. It almost completely supplanted the true church at one point. Are you

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able to identify these soul-shrinking heresies? And sometimes it's very difficult to find the true

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church that is teaching the true biblical gospel, as in the days of the latter Renaissance Catholic

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church, for example, just before the Reformation. And we'll look at this in our course, too. That

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church was so corrupt and wicked that true pastors and faithful churches were hard to find. They were

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few and far between, but they were there. And we'll go through this in our church history course.

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And then there is the temptation, as well, to find a historical figure or movement in church history

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that kind of fills the bill for what you're looking for, but not quite. But since there's no one

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else around, you use it anyway. Now, dear listener, you can put a pig in a tutu for your production of

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a nutcracker this Christmas because you can't find a ballerina, but she'll still be a pig and it won't

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be hard to hide once the overture begins, right? So it is when many of my fellow Baptists, for example,

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try and find predecessors in church history. The church has uniformly baptized babies. Just get over

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this, okay? The church has uniformly baptized babies throughout its history. But as Ernest

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Pickering discovered, while tracing the so-called crimson thread of Baptist history,

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he seized upon the Montanists who existed in the second century, for example, who baptized only adult

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believers by immersion. Oh, so while he did find a stitch for his historical thesis, he quietly passes

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over the fact that they also prophesied quite sensationally. They spoke in tongues and they had

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women preachers and prophets. And all of this is decidedly un-Baptist by today's standards.

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They were a group of co-religionists, maybe, who are useful insofar as they can make a timely

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historical point, but none of whom would be welcome in the door of today's Baptist church

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on the corner. No. As well, Dr. William Criswell, another fundamentalist Baptist preacher at First Baptist

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Church in Dallas, puts the Waldenses, and they existed in the 12th century in his line of scarlet

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thread of Baptist church history, successfully making another historical link with a group that

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practiced adult believer baptism by immersion. But once again, overlooked is the fact that they

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practiced seeing visions or spirit possession and prophecies. And they also attended the Roman

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Catholic Mass regularly. Now, these are certainly strange bedfellows for any Baptist and certainly would

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not be allowed as dance partners on the dance floor of faith, would they? Oh, so if one is going

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to trace his beliefs through church history to see if they truly are believed everywhere, always and by

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all, and thus dispelling this myth, then one had better be careful and honest in his pursuit. And this

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we will try to be in our church history course. No guarantees, but we will try with might and main

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to be honest and careful in our pursuit of the truth in church history. We invite you to join us

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as New Geneva launches out on a study of church history using Bruce Shelley's book, The Church

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History in Plain Language. And you can join us for that on Thursdays at 7 p.m. at Leo's Place. And we

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invite you to join us. We're having fun already. And we'll explore and dispel these myths and also find

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just some great nuggets in church history. And we also meet, New Geneva Meets for Holy Worship on

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Sundays at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard. And you can call us for more

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information and answer some questions or maybe register some complaints. Call me at area code 208-523-0196.

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208-523-0196.