When you hear the word “history,” what do you think? Maybe, “Ugh, all those names and dates.” Maybe history seems irrelevant or boring. But reading history isn’t only about memorizing facts. It’s about thinking and living biblically.
The Christian worldview applies to all of life—present, future, and past. God is the Lord over history and the One who teaches us how to understand it. Consistently applying a biblical worldview helps us read history confidently, learn wisdom from the past, and develop our character as a result. These six tools can help us get started.
1. Keep the Biblical Story in Mind
The way we read and interpret history is informed by what we believe about the big questions of life: Who is God? What does it mean to be human? What’s the nature of the universe? What’s wrong with the world? What’s the solution?
The Bible’s overarching story of reality gives us a framework for understanding human nature, and by extension, for understanding the actions of our predecessors. The biblical themes of creation, the fall, redemption, and restoration tell us that all human beings have inherent worth because they are made in God’s image, have natures corrupted by sin, experience brokenness, and can be redeemed through faith in Jesus. The biblical story also gives us hope that Jesus will return to fully restore his people and his creation.
So, when we study the history of people who committed a confusing mixture of good and bad deeds, read about an unspeakably evil act, or find hope in our heroes’ stories, we can process those things through the lens of a biblical worldview. For example, how do we wrestle with the legacy of American founding father Thomas Jefferson? He owned slaves throughout his life and rejected parts of the Bible, yet wrote the following:
God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that His justice cannot sleep forever. Commerce between master and slave is despotism. Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free.
How do we process this? From a biblical perspective, we know that human beings are made in God’s image yet deeply flawed. Though Jefferson had enough biblical worldview to know slavery was wrong and to set the legal foundations for its eventual abolition, his heart was seemingly unchanged by the gospel. This reminds us that faith is intended to result in right action (James 4:17) and that even those of us who accomplish great things are fallen and in need of Christ to transform our hearts totally.
2. Avoid Chronological Snobbery
The temptation to look down our noses at people simply because they lived in the past is a strong one. It’s easy to assume people in the past were less intelligent or less moral than we are today. C.S. Lewis called this attitude “chronological snobbery.” But this “snobbery” is the product of a Darwinist view of humanity, not a Christian one.
The Bible teaches us that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The reality that people in the past were ignorant about some matters does not mean they weren’t wiser than us in other ways.
Instead of giving into the temptations of chronological snobbery, Christians are called to be humble, willing to learn from the wisdom and foolishness of those who lived before. We can receive both correction and encouragement from looking to the past in a healthy way (See Psalm 77:11–12, Romans 15:4).
3. Keep Worldviews in Mind
Remember that worldviews shape history. Just as several worldviews are shaping our culture today, past philosophies and worldviews shaped the people of their day. In some cases, their influence continues today. For example, enlightenment thinking resulted in rationalism, teaching people to find morality and truth through their own reason. Romanticism taught people to trust their feelings for moral guidance and to aim for being in their most “natural” state. Buddhism taught people to avoid all desires; Confucianism taught honor and loyalty to relational hierarchies.
Just as several worldviews are shaping our culture today, past philosophies and worldviews shaped the people of their day
Rather than simply reading about events and people, consider including some history of thought in your studies. Then, compare these historical ideas with a biblical worldview. Consider asking, “How did common ideas at the time influence this person’s actions?” and “How might this event have turned out differently if the people involved had understood and consistently applied a biblical worldview?”
4. Examine Original Sources
Reading modern books about history may be easier than reading a document written hundreds or thousands of years ago. But if we read what people wrote at the time, we’re more likely to understand the beliefs of the time or of individual historical figures.
Just as we are better off reading the Bible than books offering opinions about the Bible, we’re better off reading historical documents—or translations of them—than books offering opinions about history. That’s not to say history books have no value. If written by an author who researched thoroughly and wrote fairly, history books can provide helpful background information, maps and illustrations, information from hard-to-access sources, and keen insights. But they can’t give direct insight into the minds of people from a different era.
Reading original sources is a great way to fact-check claims that authors, influencers, or public figures make about history. This can make us wiser and more difficult to manipulate. It can also bring us unexpected enjoyment as we engage with older writing styles, and immerse ourselves in another era. If we can’t locate original sources, it can be helpful to read several perspectives by different historians to avoid being swayed by biases.
5. Study the Historical Context
By studying the social and cultural context of an event, we can avoid imposing our modern assumptions on past groups of people. Actions or beliefs that seem morally obvious today—for example, “Slavery is immoral.”—were unheard of at many points in the past. While that doesn’t excuse wrong behavior or support moral relativism, it does help us understand the humanity of historical figures and treat their stories fairly.
Let’s look at an example of studying history without proper context. A 2024 documentary series about Abraham Lincoln suggests that the sixteenth president had secret male lovers, based on historical records that he had a friend who sometimes stayed the night. In our current, hypersexualized culture, this seems pretty damning.
But instead of jumping to conclusions from our own cultural standpoint, it’s imperative to examine the full evidence. Our over-sexed culture today is strangely prudish, insisting that many forms of friendly contact between members of the same-sex—from hugs to holding hands—should be assumed to be romantic or sexual. But historically this wasn’t so.
For much of Western history, sharing a bed with strangers of the same sex at an inn was normal. Sharing a bed with friends, colleagues, or family members of the same sex didn’t raise an eyebrow. It wasn’t until the early 1860s—several years before Lincoln’s death—that a few well-known doctors began popularizing the notion that sharing a bed was unsanitary and possibly immoral.1
C.S. Lewis critiqued our cultural assumptions that close same-sex friendships are really homosexual in his book The Four Loves, saying,
The fact that no positive evidence of homosexuality can be discovered in the behavior of two friends does not disconcert the wiseacres at all: ‘That,’ they say gravely, ‘is just what we should expect.’ The very lack of evidence is thus treated as evidence; the absence of smoke proves that the fire is very carefully hidden. Yes—if it exists at all. But we must first prove its existence . . . . Those who cannot conceive Friendship as a substantive love but only as a disguise or elaboration of Eros betray the fact that they have never had a Friend.
Despite there being no real evidence that President Lincoln had secret gay relationships, historians and entertainers have decided it would be a good idea to “queer” Abraham Lincoln’s life by reading same-sex erotic passions into a cultural difference in the historical record.
As Christians, we need to do our due diligence and examine the social context surrounding a historical event or figure. What was the cultural context in which the event took place? What was going on in the rest of the world? Were people behaving within the norms of their time or outside of them?
We don’t excuse evil because it was acceptable at the time, yet we also don’t assume a negative or hidden motive for behaviors that had different cultural connotations then than they do today.
6. Use Biblical Judgment
People throughout history have made both good and bad choices. But we can only meaningfully describe these things as “good” or “bad” if an objective standard of good and evil exists. That standard must come from a transcendent moral Lawgiver—in other words, from God. Christianity tells us that moral standard is knowable through the pages of the Bible.
As followers of Christ, we have a fair standing from which to judge history because it’s not our own. The God of history is the judge over history. Reading Scripture enables us to identify good and evil in history by contrasting it against God’s righteous character and law. As Christians, we apply the Bible’s story of reality and clear moral teachings to judge right from wrong both today and in the past.
Because of this, we can see both the beauty and the flaws in our historical heroes. We can recognize and condemn evil without devaluing people. We can be rightly repulsed by the character and actions of Adolf Hitler or Mao Tse-Tung while also grieving that they never repented. We can rejoice in the heroism of Harriet Tubman or Thomas Jefferson while acknowledging their flaws. Christianity helps us face history truly and fully.
The way to become a good reader of history is to become a good reader of Scripture. As we read God’s Word and align our hearts with God’s desires, we develop discernment to understand the past and reflect on deeper questions about reality. Most importantly, reading history Christianly allows us to examine our choices and live out a biblical worldview. And that makes all the difference.
By Julie Smyth