This unit introduces you to the birth and expansion of the church according to the Acts of the Apostles against the cultural, religious and political background of first-century Greco-Roman world, and to the letters of the New Testament and the Apocalypse, their characteristics and major themes. Special attention is given to the life and preaching of the Jerusalem church, and the mission of St Paul.

This unit also examines the spread of the gospel as recorded in the Book of Acts and highlights the teachings of the early church and the issues they faced. It’s all too easy to take snippets from the New Testament and apply them to our lives without any appreciation of how the text was understood by its original recipients. Without this appreciation, it is all too easy to misinterpret the New Testament and accordingly misapply it.