Combining the accuracy and readability of the first edition of this highly acclaimed text, Dowley has enhanced the second edition with new contributions from Pheme Perkins on The Thought-World of Early Christianity and Richard Burridge on Jesus and the Gospels as well as updated and revised contributions from Ward Gasque, Richard Pierard, John H. Y. Briggs, and more. With many new photographs, illustrations, maps, charts, and timelines, the inviting new full-color format tells the dramatic, intriguing, and often surprising story of Christians in their 2000-year journey to the present day.