Stories
Bible, missionaries & Christianity
Cross-checked stories from across church history, arranged in chronological order within each category. Tap a category to expand it, then a story to read the full version.
28 stories in total
The Council of Nicaea and the Shaping of the Creed
Emperor Constantine summoned roughly 300 bishops to Nicaea in 325 AD to settle the Arian controversy — producing the Nicene Creed and a unified statement on the divinity of Christ.
William Tyndale and the English Bible
Tyndale printed the first English New Testament from the original Greek in 1526. He was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536 — but roughly 80% of his text survives in the King James Version.
William Carey and the Birth of the Modern Missionary Movement
A Northamptonshire cobbler-turned-Baptist-pastor, William Carey reached Calcutta in 1793 and launched the modern Protestant missionary movement, translating Scripture into more than 40 Indian languages.
Samuel Ajayi Crowther and the First Yoruba Printing Press
An Albion press landed at Abeokuta in 1846. Samuel Ajayi Crowther set the first Yoruba type — work that powered both Africa's first vernacular newspaper and his translation of the Bible.
Hudson Taylor and the China Inland Mission
Hudson Taylor founded the China Inland Mission in 1865, adopting Chinese dress and pushing missionary work for the first time into China's vast interior provinces.
The Ifole of 1867: Expulsion of the Missionaries
On October 13, 1867, Egba authorities expelled the European missionaries at Abeokuta and destroyed the mission press — a political response to British encroachment from Lagos.
Mary Slessor and the End of Twin-Killing in Calabar
A Dundee mill-worker who arrived in Calabar in 1876, Mary Slessor lived in the bush as 'Ma' to local Efik and Ibibio communities and helped end the custom of killing twin infants.
Sundar Singh, the Sadhu of the Himalayas
A Sikh boy who hated Christians, Sundar Singh saw a vision of Christ at 15, took the saffron robe of a sadhu, and walked the foothills of the Himalayas preaching the gospel until he disappeared into Tibet in 1929.
S.G. "Pa" Elton and the Nigerian Pentecostal Generation
A British missionary from Bradford, Sydney Granville Elton arrived in Nigeria in 1937 and stayed fifty years — mentoring Benson Idahosa, William Kumuyi and a generation of African Pentecostal leaders.
Mother Teresa and the Missionaries of Charity
An Albanian-born nun who arrived in India in 1929, Mother Teresa founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950 to serve 'the poorest of the poor' — work that earned the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979.
Jim Elliot and the Auca Mission
In January 1956 five young American missionaries were speared to death by Waorani warriors in eastern Ecuador — a story whose aftermath became one of the most cited mission accounts of the 20th century.
Festo Kivengere and the East African Revival
A Ugandan bishop who fled Idi Amin's death squads in 1977, Festo Kivengere returned and published I Love Idi Amin — a small book that became a manifesto of African Christian forgiveness.
The Catholic Education Legacy and Loyola Jesuit College
Catholic missionary institutions like Loyola Jesuit College, founded in 1996, became elite private standards as Nigeria's public-school system declined.
Augustine of Hippo and the Confessions
A Numidian rhetorician who lived a famously dissolute youth, Augustine's conversion in a Milan garden in 386 produced the Confessions and the City of God — books that shaped Western Christianity for 1,500 years.
Martin Luther and the 95 Theses
On October 31, 1517 the Augustinian friar Martin Luther sent 95 propositions against the sale of indulgences to the Archbishop of Mainz — and the Reformation began.
The Itsekiri Kingdom and the Catholic Prince of Warri
Portuguese missions reached the Itsekiri kingdom of Warri in the 1500s, producing Olu Atuwatse I — a Catholic prince educated in Coimbra and Lisbon.
John Wesley and the Aldersgate Awakening
On May 24, 1738 John Wesley felt his heart 'strangely warmed' at a Moravian society meeting on Aldersgate Street — the spark of the Methodist movement.
The Azusa Street Revival
From a converted livery stable on Azusa Street in Los Angeles, William J. Seymour led a multiracial revival that birthed the global Pentecostal movement.
Smith Wigglesworth, the Apostle of Faith
An illiterate Yorkshire plumber who learned to read from the Bible, Smith Wigglesworth became one of the most prominent healing evangelists of the early Pentecostal movement.
Watchman Nee and the House Churches of China
Ni Tuosheng — Watchman Nee — planted hundreds of indigenous "Little Flock" assemblies across China, then spent the last twenty years of his life in a Communist labour camp without recanting.
Aimee Semple McPherson and the Foursquare Gospel
A Canadian-born evangelist who pioneered Christian radio and built Angelus Temple in Los Angeles, Aimee Semple McPherson founded the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel in 1923.
Joseph Ayo Babalola and the 1930 Oke-Ooye Revival
A Yoruba steamroller driver who heard an audible voice in 1928, Joseph Ayo Babalola sparked the Great Revival of 1930 at Oke-Ooye, Ilesa — the founding moment of what became the Christ Apostolic Church.
Oral Roberts and the Healing-Television Era
Oral Roberts brought Pentecostal healing services to network television in the 1950s and founded Oral Roberts University in Tulsa in 1965.
Kathryn Kuhlman and the Pittsburgh Healing Services
Kathryn Kuhlman led packed healing services across Pittsburgh and Los Angeles for nearly three decades and hosted the long-running television programme 'I Believe in Miracles'.
Billy Graham and the Stadium Crusades
From the canvas-tent meetings of 1949 Los Angeles to global televised crusades, Billy Graham preached the gospel in person to more than 215 million people across 185 countries.
Bilquis Sheikh — I Dared to Call Him Father
An aristocratic Pakistani Muslim woman, Bilquis Sheikh read the Qur'an and the Bible side by side, found herself addressing God as Father, and paid for her conversion with social exile — and a book read by millions.
The Pentecostal Explosion: From Idahosa to Adeboye
From the 1970s on, Nigeria shifted from a landscape dominated by mission churches to a global hub of Pentecostalism led by Benson Idahosa, Enoch Adeboye and others.
Pope John Paul II's 1982 Apostolic Journey to Nigeria
In February 1982, John Paul II spent six days in Nigeria — celebrating Mass for over a million people in Onitsha and meeting both national leaders and the Sultan of Sokoto.
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