Chronological History

Sometimes we speak of world history as though it belongs to people. It doesn't—it belongs to God, and though people play prominently within the historical narrative, it always remains under God's auspices and control. The problem with losing the right perspective isn't that we'll get the facts wrong, it's that we'll fail to understand what they mean, what the purpose of past events is, and what we can look forward to.

Human history began all at once in the same place: the Garden of Eden, where God made Adam and Eve as the crown of all Creation. He told them to fill the earth and take dominion of it, and He also told them not to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. They ate the fruit anyway, and mankind was removed from paradise and introduced to tension, pain, and resistance.

The story of the world is in many ways simply the story of adversity. For the enemies of God, it's adversity in the form of the failure and futility of purely human endeavor; for God's people, it's the story of fighting for the truth against secular philosophies, fighting for holiness despite the pervasiveness of sin, and fighting for the Gospel in the face of persecution and death.

Jesus Christ is our only hope. He is the Prince of Peace, the defeater of Death, and the King of the Universe, the saver of souls and the punisher of wickedness. His kingdom is the restoration and glorious fulfillment of the paradise from which Adam and Eve were removed, and we work, wait, hope and pray for the quick fulfillment of His will in all things.

This is our framework for history. While it's important to study things like the Renaissance, the Industrial Revolution, and the ancient Near East, it's only important when investigated through the lens of God's ultimate sovereignty and plan. The story of mankind is the story of redemption, and only when we analyze battles, kings, treaties, and catastrophes from God's perspective can we truly make sense of them.

Otherwise, it's all fairly irrelevant and useless. Sure, there's Napoleon's dictum that those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it, but a quick survey of the past will show that each successive generation does repeat the sins of their fathers, and that without Christ's real physical life on Earth as a centering point, there's no real cause for optimism or hope of any kind.

Christ's love not only makes the trajectory of history cause for hope; it reveals the truly great moments of the past, events that to the secular eye seem insignificant or even pernicious. We're speaking of the progress of the true Church, of course, and of each soul that God calls and makes His own through the agency of His Holy Spirit. These are the milestones we look for and celebrate.

We carry a lot of world history products. Because it's the story of God's work in the world and our human responses, we believe it's important to know and understand. Not everything we carry is Christian; there are plenty of secular resources here. We encourage you to use whichever ones work best for your situation, but that you do so with a view to understanding the will and work of the One who made history in the first place.

Review by C. Hollis Crossman
C. Hollis Crossman used to be a child. Now he is a husband and father, teaches adult Sunday school in his Presbyterian congregation, and likes weird stuff. He might be a mythical creature, but he's definitely not a centaur. Read more of his reviews here.

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1421: The Year China Discovered America
by Gavin Menzies
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Adam and His Kin
by Ruth Beechick
from Mott Media
Historical Fiction for 7th-10th grade
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Age of Fighting Sail
by C. S. Forester
1st edition from Doubleday & Company
American Naval History for 8th-Adult
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America is Born
A History for Peter #1
by Gerald W. Johnson (iilustrations by Leonard Everett Fisher)
from William Morrow & Company
for 4th-7th grade
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American History: Globalization 1977-2008
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American History: The Civil Rights Movement & Vietnam 1960-1976
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An Island Story
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Art for Children: Renaissance
Art for Children
by Lillo Canto
from Chelsea House Publishing
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Book of Discovery
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Boys' and Girls' Herodotus
by John S. White
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$12.00 (1 in stock)
Colonial Experience
A Basic History of the United States Volume 1
by Clarence B. Carson
from American Textbook Committee
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$17.00 $10.00 (1 in stock)
Cultural History of Women in America: Finding an Identity
A Cultural History of Women in America: Volume 1
by Alex Woolf
from Chelsea House Publishing
Women's History for 3rd-8th grade
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Dateline: Troy
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Early Family Home
Early Settler Life Series
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Exploration and Conquest
The American Story Series
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Exploration and Conquest
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Exploration and Conquest
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Explorers
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Explorers Who Got Lost
by Diane Dreher
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Explorers, Missionaries, and Trappers
by Kieran Doherty
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Famous Men of the Middle Ages
by John Haaren & A. B. Poland
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Ferdinand Magellan
by Milton Meltzer
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Forever Free
by Eric Foner, illustrations edited with commentary by Joshua Brown
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Great Explorers
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Great Fire
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Greek Way
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The History of Human Society
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History of the Ancient World - Study & Teaching Guide
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History of US Book 1
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3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 10
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3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 10
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4th edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 2
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History of US Book 3
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3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 4
by Joy Hakim
3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 5
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3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 5
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History of US Book 6
by Joy Hakim
3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 6
History of US Book 6
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3rd edition from Oxford University
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History of US Book 7
History of US Book 7
by Joy Hakim
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American History Reference for 5th-9th grade
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History of US Book 7
History of US Book 7
by Joy Hakim
3rd edition from Oxford University
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in Joy Hakim's A History of US (Location: HISA-HAKIM)
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History of US Book 8
History of US Book 8
by Joy Hakim
3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
American History Reference for 5th-9th grade
in Joy Hakim's A History of US (Location: HISA-HAKIM)
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History of US Book 9
History of US Book 9
by Joy Hakim
3rd Revised Edition from Oxford University
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In the Name of the Father
by Francois Furstenberg
from Penguin Books
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Incans, Aztecs, Mayans
by John Holzmann
from Sonlight Curriculum, Ltd.
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Incans, Aztecs, Mayans
by John Holzmann
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Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark
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from Scholastic Inc.
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Jerusalem, Jerusalem
by James Carroll
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Land of Hope
by Wilfred M. McClay
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Landing of the Pilgrims
Landmark Series
by James Daugherty
from Random House
Historical Non-Fiction for 5th-8th grade
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Life & Times of Louis XIV
by Alfredo Panicucci
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Life & Times of Peter the Great
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Long Road to Gettysburg
by Jim Murphy
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Magellan
by Michael Burgan
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Magna Charta
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Many Thousand Gone
by Virginia Hamilton
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Miracle at Philadelphia
by Catherine Drinker Bowen
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More Perfect Union
The American Story Series
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from HarperCollins
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Mountain Men and Fur Traders of the Far West
by LeRoy R. Hafen & Harvey L. Carter
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Mummy
by Ernest A. Wallis Budge
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Nation Torn
by Delia Ray
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On the Edge
by David D. Lee, David Horowitz, Peter N. Carroll
1st edition
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On the Shores of the Great Sea
Story of the World Series #1
by M. B. Synge
from Yesterday's Classics
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Orphan Train Rider
by Andrea Warren
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Panama Canal
by Elizabeth Mann
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People of the Century
by Various
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Portraits of African-American Heroes
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Prairie Visions
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1992 NCTE Orbis Pictus Honor Book
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Punic Wars 264-146 B.C.
by Nigel Bagnall
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Science in Ancient Rome
by Jacqueline Harris
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Seneca Falls Women's Rights Convention
Events That Shaped America
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Sir Walter Ralegh and the Quest for El Dorado
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2001 Robert F. Sibert Medal winner
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Sounding Forth the Trumpet for Young Readers
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Story of Flight
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Story of Liberty
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Historical Reference for 10th-Adult
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Story of Modern France
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Story of Polar Conquest
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Story of the Declaration of Independence
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Sweet Land of Liberty
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Tall Tales
Tales of the Wild West Volume 13
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Time: The Century Collection
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Timeline of Congress
Timelines of American History
by Lisa Modifica
1st edition from Rosen Central
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Usborne World of Shakespeare
by Anna Claybourne, Rebecca Treays
illustrated edition from Usborne
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V is for Victory
by Sylvia Whitman
from Lerner Publishing Group
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Vasco de Gama and the Portuguese Explorers
by Jim Gallagher
from Chelsea House Publishing
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Vietnam War: How the United States Became Involved
by Dr. Mitch Yamasaki, ed.
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Vikings
Landmark Series
by Elizabeth Janeway
from Beautiful Feet Books
Non-fiction for 5th-8th grade
in Middle Ages (Location: HISW-MID)
$9.95 $7.00 (2 in stock)
War Between the States
by John J. Dwyer and editors
1st edition from American Vision Press
American History Reference for 9th-Adult
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$32.00 (1 in stock)
War of 1812
Perspectives on History Series
by Mary Alice Burke Robinson, editor
from History Compass
Historical Non-fiction for 6th-9th grade
in War of 1812 (Location: HISA-19WET)
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What Really Happened In Colonial Times
by Terri Johnson, editor
from Knowledge Quest
Biographies for 4th-8th grade
in Colonial America (1690-1765) (Location: HISA-17COL)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
What Really Happened In Colonial Times
by Terri Johnson, editor
Revised from Knowledge Quest
Biographies for 4th-8th grade
in Colonial America (1690-1765) (Location: HISA-17COL)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
What Really Happened in Medieval Times
by Terri Johnson, editor
2017 Revision from Knowledge Quest
Biographies for 4th-8th grade
in Middle Ages (Location: HISW-MID)
$11.00 (1 in stock)
What's the Deal?
by Rhoda Blumberg
from National Geographic
for 5th-9th grade
in Lewis & Clark Expedition (1801-1803) (Location: HISA-19L&C)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Women of the West
Tales of the Wild West Volume 5
by Rick Steber
from Bonanza Publishing
for 4th-7th grade
in Pioneer & Frontier Life (Location: HISA-19PIO)
$2.50 (2 in stock)
World of Columbus and Sons
by Genevieve Foster, edited by Rea Berg
Edited from Beautiful Feet Books
History Reference for 7th-10th grade
Cathy Duffy's 100 Top Picks
in Age of Exploration (1450-1700) (Location: HISA-16EXP)
$18.95 $15.00 (3 in stock)
12