Paul James-Griffiths of Christian Heritage Edinburgh writes, “This is the penultimate article in this series, which began over four years ago. In this article I’ve summed up the whole series in about 600 words! What an extraordinary Christian heritage Scotland has!”
A few years ago, we began this series of short articles and are nearing the completion. What a journey it has been! Beginning from the earliest times of Christianity in Scotland among the Britons in about AD 200, we have progressed chronologically almost up to this century. As I close this particular series for the 20th century, we can look back over the centuries and try to briefly pull it all together.
We followed the early British Christians – Ninian, Patrick, Gildas and Kentigern, and moved through the period of the Scottish Christians – Columba, Moluag, Aidan and others, and then walked with Cuthbert and the Anglo-Saxons. We discovered how the gospel became rooted in this nation, often through horrendous periods of suffering. First the Britons received the faith, then they were persecuted by the Romans; in their turn the pagan Picts and Scots were converted to Christ, after massacring the British Christians; the Scots and Picts were then brutally treated by the Anglo-Saxons, who in turn became Christians and were massacred by the Vikings, who later also fell before the cross.
As we journeyed through the Middle Ages, we discovered some key Christians, such as Adomnan, Queen Margaret and King David. We were dismayed at the corruption of the church, and saw the growing reforming movement, firstly through John Wycliffe’s Lollards, some of whom were burnt at the stake in Scotland in the 14th and 15th centuries, and then through Patrick Hamilton, George Wishart, John Knox, and many others. We followed the Covenanters in their terrible ordeal in the dark 17th century, and into the light of their freedom. We explored the Christian characters during the Enlightenment, both locals like Alexander Webster, John Erskine, John Witherspoon and Sir Walter Scott, and visiting preachers, like George Whitefield and John Wesley.
Following this, we entered the world of Christian revivals in the nineteenth century, when Scotland was called the Land of the Book. Great luminaries shot up, such as Thomas Guthrie and Thomas Chalmers, and Christians transformed our nation through a Christian worldview in law, democracy, human rights, social reforms, abolition of slavery, science, medical advances, nursing, healthcare, the arts and other things. Out of this, the missionary movement erupted, as Christians impacted and shaped many nations, taking their worldview with them. A wave of missionaries passed before us: David Livingstone, Robert Moffat, Mary Slessor, George MacKay, John Paton, and a host of others. We finally arrived close to our own times and struggled through the war years, and into the time of the Hebrides revival, Billy Graham’s crusades, and Eric Liddell.
It has been a long journey of 209 weeks, but our hope and desire are that many of you will have been inspired and challenged since we began over four years ago. We really do have a very special Christian heritage in Scotland, and our story needs to be told again, and again, and to become widely known. It is our joy to tell this story through these short articles, and through our Christian Heritage Centre, which runs during the summer months in St Columba’s Free Church, where we have welcomed over 180,000 visitors since we began. You are welcome to visit our website at christianheritageedinburgh.org.uk and see our videos, and read the short articles (and other, longer ones). We aim to have all of the short articles up by the autumn. There are also over 1,000 Christian heritage-related photos, which you can freely use (as long as you attribute them to Christian Heritage Edinburgh as the source).
“Then they said to one another, ‘We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, and we remain silent’” (2 Kings 7:9, NKJV).