Cloud of Witnesses

Martin Luther – A Ground-Breaking Translator While living in incognito in the Wartburg Castle (after the Diet of Worms), Martin Luther spent his time translating the New Testament from Greek and Latin into German. It was not the first German translation, but Luther found the others inadequate. Both...

Johann Von Staupitz – Luther’s “First Father” in the Doctrine of Predestination When Johann Von Staupitz first met Martin Luther, probably in 1506, he saw a young man who was both inquisitive and talented, with a strong potential to teach at the newly founded University of Wittenberg where the...

Helmuth James Graf von Moltke – Learning to Number His Days “One thing Christianity and we National Socialists have in common, and only one: we demand the whole man.” These words, pronounced by Roland Freisler, State Secretary of the Reich, at the time of the trial of Helmuth von Moltke, were...

Jennie Faulding Taylor and Her Team of Brave Women In 1875, a serious drought in the north of China gave way to a dreadful four-year famine, with millions of deaths and a huge migration of people. Most casualties were in the province of Shanxi (an estimated 5.5 million deaths in four years)...

Perpetua and Felicitas – Two Martyred Mothers In A.D. 202, Emperor Septimius Severus tightened his measures against Christians who refused to pay homage to the imperial genius, the spirit of the emperor. Compliance required a minimal effort: a simple sprinkling of a few grains of incense on a...

Jennie Faulding Taylor and Her Team of Brave Women In 1875, a serious drought in the north of China gave way to a dreadful four-year famine, with millions of deaths and a huge migration of people. Most casualties were in the province of Shanxi (an estimated 5.5 million deaths in four years)...

Sally Jones Charles – Pillar of the Welsh Revival at Bala Most accounts of Welsh church history recognize the impressive contributions of Thomas Charles [1] , the pastor of a Calvinistic Methodist church in Bala, Wales, in the Welsh Revival of his century, in the establishment of a great number of...

Thomas Charles, Mary Jones, and the Birth of the Bible Society Many of us have heard the story of the sixteen-year-old girl who walked 25 miles to buy a Bible with the money she had saved while doing chores. That girl was Mary Jones, and her destination was a church at Bala, Wales, where a shipment...

Hannah More and Her Lasting Influence on Education and Christian Service She has been described as the most influential woman in the British abolitionist movement – in fact, one of the most important women in 18 th -century Britain. After her death in 1833, the Christian Observer dared to say: “...

Hadrian of Nisida and Theodore of Tarsus – Seventh-Century Star Teachers Sharing a passion for learning and teaching, Hadrian of Nisida and Theodore of Tarsus partnered together to create a school that brought new resources, methods, and inspiration to England. For those who think a scholar’s life...