2000 Years of Amazing Grace: The Story and Meaning of the Christian Faith

by Paul F.M. Zahl

2000 Years of Amazing Grace is an accessible and easy-reading history of Christianity that focuses on the essentials of the Christian message, centrally, salvation by grace. It presents a luminous and enthusiastic digest of vital Christian beliefs and an account of how Christianity evolved from Jesus to the present. It also features biographical sketches of key figures, extensive citation from founding documents, and discusses Christianity's relationship to other world religions today.

What distinguishes this book from other overviews of Christianity is Paul Zahl's lively and accessible style of writing and his vigorous advocacy of orthodox Christian faith. His own personal commitment to Christianity is a guiding force in the book. He also readily acknowledges the ways in which Christians and Christian institutions have failed to live up to the founder's teachings and have distorted his message. This book is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand Christianity's long history, and how that history has led to a thriving faith today.

480 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2006

About the author

The Very Rev. Dr. Paul Francis Matthew Zahl is a retired Episcopal priest. He formerly was rector of All Saints Episcopal Church in Chevy Chase, MD, and dean and president of Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry, Ambridge, PA.

He studied at Chapel Hill, Harvard, St. John's College (Nottingham), the University of Nottingham, Trinity College (Bristol), Wycliffe Hall (Oxford) and the University of Tubingen, where he received his doctorate in systematic theology in 1994. He has also served as rector of Episcopal churches in Scarborough, NY and Charleston, SC; was Curate of Grace Church in New York City; and was Dean of the Cathedral Church of the Advent (Episcopal) in Birmingham, AL. He and his wife, Mary, are the parents of three sons, John, David and Simeon.

Reviews

[Cody Pritchett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Paul Zahl will take a swing at anybody (including himself or his own) and he will likewise lift up anybody (even his enemies or the traditional enemies of Christianity). In this book, he repeatedly calls a thing what it is—regardless of the cost—and yet accepts a thing for what it is and not what it ought to be. In these ways, I find Zahl prophetically and priestly—Christ-Like! And…refreshing!

In this book surveying 2000 years of church history he makes the complex, understandable and the grim, humorous! I laughed a lot reading this book on church history! Of course I would have liked to hear more on a few topics, or thought: “but yeah, what about the negative side of that topic or person in church history?!” In other words, I lively engaged with his lively engagement of Church History.

I can not recommend it more—maybe mostly for people who know their church history—and either didn’t have fun learning it or had someone teaching it that villainized/heroicized each character in church history. It was a little messier than that, as Zahl shows us! An enjoyable book that takes us to the heart of Christianity through the glorious mess of church history.

[Jeffrey Romine · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is worth reading for the appendix alone, providing a glossary of events, definition of religious terms, doctrines, and brief biographical sketches on notable persons, including dates. Beyond this the history is written in a fluent readable style so that the pages easily turn. The only matter that prevents a 5-star rating for me is its 'less than objective' affirmation of Calvinism. Otherwise, there is much to appreciate, gathering perspectives on Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Protestantism, Judaism, Islam, and a few more.