The 3 best sources to trace this history are (1) the 4 Gospel Records, the best historical biographies in existence, confirmed by the blood of martyred eyewitnesses, and by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ Himself, who maintained that He was the Son of God even to His own Holy Sacrificial Death, as the Apostles would later maintain it to their own. (2) the Book of Acts, which is sometimes called "The Fifth Gospel", or "The Gospel of the Holy Spirit", or "The Gospel of (the first part of) Church History", because it is the record of the Acts of some of Christ's Apostles, mostly St. Paul's, for most of their lives until nearly their deaths. This will be covered and elaborated upon in this series. And for further and later events, we will consult the (3) Ecclesiastical History of St. Eusebius, who brings us down to the time of the Emperor Constantine, and for reason of which St. Eusebius is rightly called "the Father of Church History".
=== The first third of the first century : (from 2 BC - 33 AD ) ===
In retelling this history, it is absolutely key to fix dates that can be known with certainty. A great example of why this is so is the Gospel of Saint Luke. In chapter 3, the Evangelist tells us: "John the Baptist Prepares the Way: 3 Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, 2 while Annas and Caiaphas were high priests, the word of God came to John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness." Just at a glance, we are amazed at how many historical markers that Luke the Evangelist - nay, Luke the Historian (as Sir William Ramsay credited him as being: "Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy. …[He] should be placed along with the very greatest of historians."<ref>Ramsay, Sir William Mitchell (1915). The Bearing of Recent Discovery on the Trustworthiness of the New Testament. Hodder and Stoughton.</ref> - provides us to date these events.