Dave Stotts, director and host of the Drive Thru History series, careens along bumpy Old Testament roads, peering at the world through the lens of faith –- exploring Scripture, history, geography, and archaeology.
Bringing Life and Humor to History
Far from a stiff intellectual documentary, the 18-episode miniseries Drive Thru History: Acts to Revelation -– currently streaming on Prime Video –- slips easily from the road trip to the geography book, explaining the Bible with maps, animations, artifacts, and a touch of humor.
Included in Stotts' lessons are many cities and regions with which the faithful reader will be familiar: cities such as Corinth and Antioch, Thessalonica and Athens, Jerusalem, Caesarea, and Ephesus.
But Stotts, smoothly handling the desert roads in an all-terrain vehicle, also takes the viewer to small towns through which the apostles would have passed, en route from one ancient major city to another: towns like Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, Thyatira, and Sardis.
Tracing the Growth of the Church
The videography is exceptional, as Stotts leads his viewers from the early growth in the church -– beginning with Pentecost, and continuing as the Apostles preached and worked miracles in Christ's name in Jerusalem.
Episodes 3 and 4 describe the early Church's growth among the gentiles, as Peter, Paul, and Phillip travel to Samaria and on to Damascus.
The travels continue, with Stotts leading his viewers throughout the Mediterranean and on to Rome, where we tour the Pantheon and the Roman Forum, and visit the remains of old houses of prayer.
We learn that some of the most famous churches in the Mediterranean were constructed over a humble house church, where the earliest Christians gathered to worship.
Episode 17 is devoted to the seven churches of Revelation, located in Asia Minor, in what is present-day Turkey. Stotts leads his audience through the ruins of churches in Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Ethyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.
Today, nearly 2,000 years later, the ruins of each of these ancient cities remain -– strong evidence for the credibility of the New Testament Scriptures.
In the Footsteps of Martyrs
The most difficult episode to watch, it seemed to me, was Episode 15, which deals with the martyrdom of Peter and Paul.
Followers of Christ faced increasing persecution, in Rome and throughout the Mediterranean region. Stotts spends time in Rome, recounting the story of Nero's burning of the city in 64 A.D. He reports on the final days of Paul and Peter, and their ultimate deaths for the Christian faith.
He also films the site of an ancient house church where Christians gathered in secret, defying the orders of the government.
But Wait, There's More ...
Stotts is not new to the world of historical and travel documentaries. His other projects include a drive through the Gospels, a tour of the Holy Land, a look back at American history, and more.
Stotts also has his own website, and Drive Thru History Adventures, a paid-membership site that offers episode content, courses, merchandise, and more.
And, he has a YouTube channel, where, last year, he did a 50-minute live-event trek through the New Testament.
A Note on How Stott Handles Faith
Dave Stotts is not Catholic; according to his online bio, he is a member of the United Methodist church. So then, I wondered, would his Scripture lessons veer from the Catholic understanding? Actually, there is little with which a Catholic could disagree.
Stotts follows the Bible faithfully, explaining the rich heritage while standing on a dramatic mountaintop or beside a bubbling brook, and then citing the chapter and verse from which he's drawn the story.
Only once, in Episode 7 (which focuses on the Jerusalem Council and Paul's second missionary journey), did I sit up to question his understanding of the Bible. Speaking of the apostle James, Stotts said, “James … is known as the half brother of Jesus.”
But the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches understand the Scripture passages referring to “Jesus' brothers and sisters” differently. We understand that in that time, the terms “brothers” and “sisters” referred also to other relatives -– perhaps cousins of Jesus (children of Mary of Clopas, Mary's sister) or Joseph's children from a previous marriage –- and not necessarily siblings who grew up in the same family, in the same home.
Who Makes It, and Where to Watch
Drive Thru History: Acts to Revelation is produced by Colorado-based ColdWater Media.
Along with Amazon's Prime Video, episodes of Stotts' various series (especially the American-history ones) can be seen on subscription service PureFlix, and free (often with ads) on streamers Hoopla, Pluto, Fawesome and Tubi.
Drive Thru History: Acts to Revelation and Drive Thru History: To the Ends of the Earth have also aired on Christian network TBN, and are available on TBN+.
Series can also be purchased on DVD.
BTW, also available for digital rental/purchase on Prime Video is Drive Thru History: The Gospels.
Here's a peek:
Image: Drive Thru History®
Kathy Schiffer writes regularly for the National Catholic Register and Catholic World Report, and for other Catholic publications, including Evangelization and Culture, Crisis Magazine, Aleteia, Zenit, the Michigan Catholic, and Legatus Magazine. She’s worked for Catholic and other Christian ministries since 1988, as radio producer, director of special events, and media-relations coordinator.
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