After two weeks on why church history matters, Charlie and Abigail start laying out the map. This week they cover the first three of eight eras they’ll walk through in the series: the church of the apostles, the early church under persecution, and the moment Christianity went from illegal to mainstream under Constantine. Along the way they talk about what “the church” actually means, why one verse about Peter shapes so much of church history, how the destruction of the temple in 70 AD scattered believers, and why so many early heresies were about one question: who is Jesus? They also touch on what changed when following Jesus no longer cost you anything. And yes, Abigail makes the case for naming a kid Irenaeus. It’s a big-picture look at the centuries most of us know the least about, even though they’ve shaped our faith the most.

It’s easy to look at the way things are and assume that’s the way they’ll stay. The powerful stay powerful. The ones who’ve been knocked down stay down. The situation that looks impossible probably is.

Hannah didn’t believe that. And in week two of the Samuel series, Mark walks through her prayer in 1 Samuel 2 — one of the most overlooked passages in the Old Testament — and unpacks what it actually says about who God is and how he operates. He’s not the God of the expected outcome. He’s the God who raises the poor from the dust, breaks the bows of warriors, and seats the forgotten at the table with princes.

The question isn’t whether God can flip the script. He’s been doing it the whole time. The question is whether you believe he’s doing it for you.

Most of what we believe about God didn't start with us. We inherited it from centuries of Christians who studied, debated, and prayed their way through the hardest questions of the faith. This week, Charlie and Abigail finish making the case for church history by talking about humility and how Christian doctrine developed over time. They get into why the Trinity is harder to arrive at on your own than it seems, how Constantine shaped the church in the 300s, and what changed when the printing press let ordinary people read the Bible for themselves. There are a few detours along the way, including where the term "Mad Hatter" comes from and a kindergarten math problem that didn't go well. Through it all, they explore how remembering what we've been handed can help us come to Scripture with more confidence and a lot more humility.