Historical Theology II

Dr. Nathan Busenitz of The Master's Seminary teaches the church's story from the Reformation to the modern age: Luther and Calvin, the Puritans, the Great Awakenings, the rise of liberalism, world missions, and the roots of the church you know today.

This course carries the story of the church from the Reformation to the middle of the twentieth century: the pre-reformers and Luther, Zwingli and the Anabaptists, Calvin and the English Reformation, the Puritans, the Great Awakenings on both sides of the Atlantic, the rise of liberalism and the modern missions movement, the American cults, Pentecostalism, and the battle between fundamentalists and modernists that shaped the church we know.

Each lecture below is a full seminary class session, and each has its own page with the video, a study sheet that walks the lecture section by section, links to every Scripture passage discussed, key terms, a comprehension check, discussion questions, and a printable PDF.

Lectures by Dr. Nathan Busenitz, embedded from The Master's Seminary's public channel.

Enrollment is free and optional, and takes a minute: let the church know you are studying.

Optional textbook: The Story of Christian Theology by Roger Olson, the course reading Dr. Busenitz points to throughout the lectures.

All 27 lectures are ready.

  1. 01Five Questions to Set the Table: What the Reformation Really Was67 min
  2. 02Reformers Before the Reformation: The Waldensians, Wycliffe, Hus, and Savonarola73 min
  3. 03The Humanists, Erasmus, and the Making of Martin Luther69 min
  4. 04From the Ninety-five Theses to Worms: Here I Stand66 min
  5. 05Luther's Last Years and the Rise of Zwingli69 min
  6. 06Zurich Reformed: The Sixty-seven Articles, the Swiss Brethren, and the Sword at Kappel72 min
  7. 07The Radical Reformers: Munster, Menno Simons, and the Anabaptist Spectrum65 min
  8. 08John Calvin: Noyon to Geneva, the Libertines, and the Servetus Affair67 min
  9. 09Calvin's Legacy: The Five Points, the Institutes, and William Tyndale65 min
  10. 10The English Reformation and John Knox: Convenience and Conviction73 min
  11. 11Review: From the Pre-Reformers to the English Reformation64 min
  12. 12The Puritans: Disappointment, Disillusionment, and Despair48 min
  13. 13Civil War, Westminster, and the Puritans in Two Englands67 min
  14. 14Five Puritans to Know, Pietism, and the Dawn of the Enlightenment50 min
  15. 15The Enlightenment, Arminianism, and the Road to Revival69 min
  16. 16The Evangelical Revival: Whitefield and the Wesleys69 min
  17. 17Perfectionism, Two Marriages, and Two Legacies61 min
  18. 18Jonathan Edwards and the Great Awakening63 min
  19. 19Edwards: Lordship, Brainerd, Dismissal, and the Freedom of the Will58 min
  20. 20The Second Great Awakening: Revival and Revivalism57 min
  21. 21Finney's Theology, and Review: Puritans to the Second Awakening75 min
  22. 22The Birth of Liberalism: Schleiermacher, the Higher Critics, and Their Heirs57 min
  23. 23The Modern Missions Movement: Carey, Judson, and Hudson Taylor60 min
  24. 24The Ugly: Restorationism and the American Cults43 min
  25. 25Cultural Christianity, the Social Gospel, and the Three Waves58 min
  26. 26Spurgeon, Moody, and the Rise of Fundamentalism72 min
  27. 27Fundamentalists and Evangelicals: The Split That Shaped a Century71 min

Start with Lecture 1

Five questions to set the table: when the Reformation began, what it was about, and why it still matters. About an hour with your Bible open.