Series: The Spiritual Biography of a Nation

Part: #10

 

Spanish and French missionaries both made a sizable impact on the North American territory in the 15th and 16th centuries, but England remained quiet on the New World landscape until the 17th century. And when they finally decided to put their proverbial foot in the water, they experienced total disaster in Roanoke. In the year 1607, England postured themselves as if they were coming to this New World with the intent of sharing the Gospel of Christ with the natives. But their “Gentleman” Christianity was anything but a light shining in a dark world. The Jamestown settlement is a study in self-centered, self-coddling Christianity and its ramifications on the world around it. The Modern American Church in its manner and in its thinking runs a strange parallel with the gentleman settlers of Jamestown in 1607. Hopefully history can be our tutor and steer us toward a Pilgrim landing in this hostile season of American history instead of Jamestown landing.