Reflections from a Protestant Library the Fourth

or Muting History

Protestants have an interesting relation with history. They know it has happened and they see its effect on the past world, yet the often pretend it does not matter in the present life, that everything they do is static and is done the way it always was.

Within the aforementioned library, there were two varieties of history books. The first were biographies, generally about 'great reformers' such as Martin Luther. As history, these are lacking, sense they attempt to great the person as a hero when they often were not and are regularly concerned with presenting them as people who moved the clock backwards, an historic impossibility.

The second category of historical works were those on the early Church, generally collections of documents written prior to five hundred. These seem to exist in a sort of statis, being important documents to any claim of historical Christianity but impossible to reconcile with most distinctly Protestant beliefs.

Within Protestant churches, particularly those over a hundred years old, people constantly work to protect the 'way things were,' the history of the individual church. Things are done in a certain way because "that is how they are done," which is, of course, quite different than tradition. Protestants desire the nobility of age withou actually claiming to be old.

The only two important points in history to most Protestants (especially Evangelicals) are the present and the Apostolic Church of the first century. Everything in between was simply the passing of time with no change to the Church. True worship is identical to that of the first century except in every way its changed.

There are only to ways to understand the link between the first and twenty-first century Church: either they should be completely identical, for Christ founded a Church that could not change, or the latter should have evolved in a holy and productive way, becoming closer to true Christian worship.

Trust me, we won't have power-point in heaven.