The Illumination of History is a Festschrift in honor of Glen L. Thompson, professor emeritus at Wisconsin Lutheran College (Milwaukee, Wisconsin) and Asia Lutheran Seminary (Hong Kong). Among Thompson's works in various areas of church history are The Correspondence of Julius I (2015), In This Way We Came to Rome: With Paul on the Appian Way (2023 with Mark Wilson), and Jingjiao: The Earliest Christian Church in China (2024). This Festschrift celebrates Thompson's broad contributions in church history with twenty-two essays on New Testament history, patristic history, patristic historiography, papal history, Chinese Christian history, and historical languages. All of these essays serve as examples of how the study of history can provide illumination for the church.