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Start here
New to Living the Bible? These three articles introduce the site’s focus on Scripture, history, and the life of faith.
- Begin with the earliest evidence
The Common Ground: Why Christians and Skeptics Should Begin with Paul’s Seven Letters
Explore why Paul’s seven widely accepted letters offer a starting point for Christians and skeptics. - Step into the world of Jesus
The Sons of God: Augustus and the Christ
Read the claims about Jesus alongside the titles and promises of the Roman Empire. - Connect history with daily faith
What I Still Am: Augustine’s Most Courageous Confession
Consider Augustine’s honesty about the person he was still becoming, and what that invites us to examine in ourselves.
Browse by topic
Open a topic for suggested readings and a link to its complete collection. You can always jump to the complete list.
Jesus and his world
Meet the people, empires, and ideas surrounding the earliest claims about Jesus.
Paul and the earliest Christian sources
Explore Paul’s letters, the traditions he received, and how early Christian writings reached us.
- The Common Ground: Why Christians and Skeptics Should Begin with Paul’s Seven Letters
- If These Seven Letters Were All We Had: The Christian Faith Would Still Stand
- Christianity Before Paul: The Traditions He Inherited
- How We Know Paul’s Letters Were Accurately Preserved
- From Eyewitnesses to Greek Masterpieces: The Real Story of Gospel Origins
Life in the early church
Read about Christian communities, their growth, their shared beliefs, and their place in Roman society.
Christian thinkers and teachers
Get to know influential figures through their teaching and the choices they made.
Resurrection, death, and hope
Explore Christian hopes for resurrection and the varied ancient discussions of what lies beyond death.
Living the faith
Reflect on humility, suffering, growth, and the connection between belief and conduct.
Follow a reading path
For a more connected study, work through these articles in the order shown.
Begin with Paul · 5 articles
A suggested route from the evidence of Paul’s letters to the faith and traditions they contain.
Multiplying by Mission · 9 sessions
Read the Mission Lake teaching series from the first session through the ninth.
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 1 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 2 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 3 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 4 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 5 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 6 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 7 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 8 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 9 at Mission Lake
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All articles
The complete chronological list, newest first. Prefer to read the articles one after another? Visit the full-post homepage.
- Could someone belong to Christ before Christ was born?
- When the Savior Entered Hades
- Always Something Better Ahead
- Where Are the Dead?: The Ancient Church on the Intermediate State
- Christ Went First: What the Resurrection Reveals About Our Future
- One Faith Across the Ancient World
- What I Still Am: Augustine’s Most Courageous Confession
- The God the Ancient World Saw in Pieces: Philippians 2 and Ancient Stories of Divine Descent
- Was Jesus Worshiped as God From the Beginning?
- The Same Faith Paul Tried to Destroy
- Paul Would Not Put Words in Jesus’ Mouth
- Did Their Minds Create the Risen Jesus?
- Did Plato Foresee Christ? The Perfectly Righteous Man Who Would Be Condemned
- If These Seven Letters Were All We Had: The Christian Faith Would Still Stand
- The Common Ground: Why Christians and Skeptics Should Begin with Paul’s Seven Letters
- Return to the Resurrection
- Something Divine Among Them: The Letter to Diognetus and the Life of the First Christians
- Priscillian of Avila: The Execution That Haunted the Church
- Augustine of Hippo: The Conversion That Changed Christian History
- Ambrose of Milan: The Bishop Who Taught Emperors to Repent
- Gregory of Nazianzus: The Reluctant Bishop Who Gave the Trinity Its Voice
- Gregory of Nyssa: The Theologian Who Made Slavery Look Absurd
- Basil the Great: The Bishop Who Built a City of Mercy
- Macrina the Younger: The Sister Who Made Saints
- The Theodosian Code: When Christianity Became Imperial Law
- When Emperors Entered the Church: The Road from Constantine to Theodosius
- The Preaching Genius of John Chrysostom
- John Chrysostom and the Question Paul Already Fought: Must Christians Keep the Law?
- The Golden Mouth: Was John Chrysostom the Greatest Preacher of All Time?
- Athanasius: The Bishop Who Would Not Move
- Anthony: The Man Who Walked Away From the World
- Worship or Idolatry? How Arius Forced the Church to Define Christ
- Is Christianity Safe When Favored by Government? A Divide in the Early Church
- Not Just The Soul: What The First Christians Believed About The Resurrection Of The Body
- The Apocalypse of Peter: A Window into Early Christian Judgment and the Formation of Scripture
- Hades in the Ancient World and Early Christianity: What Happens When We Die?
- Not Ours to Take: Why the Early Christians Rejected Suicide While Longing for Heaven
- The Gospel of Peter: A Late Text, A Local Church, and an Early Test of the Christian Message
- Why Romans Confused Christ with the Sun God
- The Battle of the Milvian Bridge
- Constantine Before the Milvian Bridge
- Exile and Empire: The Seven Councils and the Cost of Defining Christ (AD 325–787)
- Moral Transformation as Evidence: The Argument the First 300 Years Would Not Let Go
- Maximus the Confessor and the Enlargement of the Human Soul
- Apollonius or Christ? – A Roman Governor’s Challenge
- Arnobius of Sicca (c. AD 295–305): Writing Christianity in a Dangerous World
- New Book Published!
- Diocletian and the Great Persecution
- When Philosophy Fought Back: Porphyry Against the Christians
- The Forty Year Peace, AD 260 TO 303
- Plague, Persecution, and the Strength of the Early Church: From Decius to Valerian
- Suffering, Fairness, and the Humility of Faith
- From Eyewitnesses to Greek Masterpieces: The Real Story of Gospel Origins
- From Illusion to History: Why the Resurrection Stands Apart from Every Vision
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 9 at Mission Lake
- The Decian Persecution: When Rome Tested Every Soul
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 8 at Mission Lake
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 7 at Mission Lake
- From the Giant to the Wonder-Worker: The Church of Maximinus Thrax to Philip the Arab
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 6 at Mission Lake
- Teenage Emperors and the Triumph of Christian Purity
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 5 at Mission Lake
- Citizens of Rome, Citizens of Heaven: Caracalla, Macrinus, and the Early Church
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 4 at Mission Lake
- The First Critics of Christianity: From Donkeys to Satire
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 3 at Mission Lake
- Conversion Forbidden, Courage Unstoppable: Severus and the Early Church
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 2 at Mission Lake
- Faith in the Age of Commodus: From Senate Martyrs to Catacomb Worship
- Multiplying by Mission: Session 1 at Mission Lake
- Marcus Aurelius and the Martyrs: Stoic Resignation vs. Christian Resurrection
- The Church’s Voice in an Emperor’s “Peaceful” Reign
- When Hadrian Erased Jerusalem and Christians Spoke Up
- Christianity’s Unstoppable Growth in the First 300 Years
- Slaves as Deacons, Christians on Trial: The World of Pliny and Trajan
- Lord and God: Domitian’s Demand and the Church’s Response
- The True Temple Rises: Christianity After AD 70
- Hatred of the Human Race: Rome’s First Verdict on Christianity
- Claudius, the Jews, and the Window for the Gospel (AD 41–54)
- Caligula, the Jews, and the Birth of the Christian Name
- Why Even Atheist Historians Believe in John the Baptist
- The Sons of God: Augustus and the Christ
- How the 7 Letters Show an Unbroken Continuation of Persecution Since Jesus’ Crucifixion
- How We Know Paul’s Letters Were Accurately Preserved
- How Accurate Are Paul’s Letters? What the Manuscripts and Scholars Say
- When Philosophy Clashed with the Cross: Gentile Rejections of the Christ Hymn
- Divergence from Christ’s Divinity: What the First-Century Evidence Actually Shows
- A Hymn Older Than the Gospels Calls Jesus Divine
- Christianity Before Paul: The Traditions He Inherited
- When Atheists and Christians Agree: The 7 Undisputed Letters of Paul
