| Year | World and Church events | Michael’s life |
| 1929 | The Great Depression, a decade-long global economic crisis, begins. | |
| 1930 | Born in Shenington, near Banbury, Oxfordshire | |
| 1931 | Oxford University tutor CS Lewis converts to Christianity. | |
| 1936 | The year of three kings: George V dies, Edward VIII abdicates, and Prince Albert becomes George VI. | |
| 1937 | To Montpelier School, Paignton, Devon | |
| 1939 | Nazi Germany invades Poland and Britain declares war in response. | |
| 1940 | The Blitz begins, seeing many British cities subject to intense bombing raids. | |
| 1942 | Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple publishes ‘Christianity and the Social Order’, an attempt to marry Christianity and socialism. | |
| 1944 | Scholarship to Clifton College, Bristol | |
| 1945 | Second World War ends | First visit to Iwerne houseparty (Iwerne Minster, Dorset) |
| Churchill’s Conservative Party loses the General Election to Clement Atlee’s Labour Party. | ||
| 1947 | The International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES) is founded at Harvard University by student movements from ten different countries. | |
| 1948 | Agnes Headlam-Morley becomes the first woman to hold a full professorship at Oxford University. | |
| 1949 | The USSR tests its first atomic bomb, accelerating the already-burgeoning Cold War. | Scholarship to Exeter College, Oxford to study ‘Greats’ (Classics); Became a leader at the Iwerne camps |
| 1951 | Winston Churchill begins his second and final term as Prime Minister. | |
| 1952 | President of Oxford Inter-Collegiate Christian Union (OICCU) | |
| 1953 | Queen Elizabeth II crowned. | Engaged to Rosemary Storr |
| First class honours in Greats; Start of two years National Service | ||
| 1954 | Food rationing ends in the United Kingdom, after fourteen years. | Commissioned in the Royal Artillery: Became Assistant Adjutant of 64 Regiment, R A |
| Billy Graham’s Greater London Crusade in the Harringay Arena sees two million attend over the course of three months. | ||
| 1955 | Fenced for Army and Combined Services; Entered Queens’ College, Cambridge and Ridley Hall Theological College | |
| 1956 | Fenced for Cambridge v Oxford | |
| 1957 | Married Rosemary Storr | |
| First class honours in Theology Tripos pt 3 (New Testament), and awarded University Carus Prize (New Testament); Holy Trinity, Eastbourne curacy | ||
| 1958 | Beginnings of the house church movement, which would eventually birth church groupings such Newfrontiers, Pioneer and Ichthus. | |
| 1960 | Military conscription ends in the United Kingdom. | Birth of Tim, followed by Sarah (1962); Jenny (1964); Jonathan (1966) |
| Dennis Bennett, priest at St. Marks Episcopal Church in Van Nuys, California, introduces the Charismatic Movement into the English-speaking Anglican Church for the first time. | New Testament tutor at London College of Divinity | |
| 1962 | Coventry Cathedral, built beside the ruins of the previous structure, destroyed in the Blitz, is consecrated. | |
| Vatican II, a three-year Council of the Roman Catholic Church, begins, leading to an array of changes and reforms within the Church. | ||
| 1963 | “Honest to God”, by Church of England Bishop John A.T. Robinson, is published, questioning basic Christian beliefs about God. | |
| 1964 | Thirteen years of Conservative Government ends with Harold Wilson’s Labour Party winning the General Election. | |
| 1966 | Time Magazine uses it’s front cover to ask “Is God Dead?” | Awarded Cambridge BD |
| 1967 | Homosexual acts and abortion are both legalised in Britain. | Member of the Doctrine Commission of the Church of England |
| First National Evangelical Anglican Congress sets a vision for future evangelical involvement in the Church of England. | ||
| 1968 | Regent College in Vancouver is founded. | Consultant at the Lambeth Conference |
| 1969 | Principal of London College of Divinity, overseeing the move to St John’s College, Nottingham in 1970. | |
| 1970 | The Church of England Synod is established, substantially the increasing the church’s powers of self-government. | Became Canon Theologian at Coventry |
| 1972 | First CU mission: Cambridge University | |
| 1973 | The New International Version (NIV) of the Bible is first published. | |
| Britain joins the European Communities (EC). | ||
| 1974 | Donald Coggan becomes the first evangelical Archbishop of Canterbury of the century. | |
| Fifth UK General Election in less than a decade sees Harold Wilson win for the fourth time. | ||
| 1975 | Inspector Morse solves his first fictional Oxford murder. | Rector of St Aldate’s, Oxford |
| 1977 | Myth of God Incarnate is published, | |
| 1978 | Karol Wojtyla elected Pope, takes the title ‘John Paul II’. | Made Canon Theologian Emeritus at Coventry |
| 1979 | James Callaghan’s Labour government falls to Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative one, following the strike-ridden Winter of Discontent. | |
| 1981 | John Wimber, founder of the Vineyard association of churches, makes his first visit to the UK. | |
| 1982 | Pope John Paul II becomes the first reigning Bishop of Rome ever to visit Britain. | |
| 1985 | The Church of England’s “Faith in the City” report eviscerates the Thatcher government. | |
| 1987 | Professor of Evangelism and New Testament at Regent College, Vancouver. | |
| 1989 | The first New Wine summer conference takes place. | |
| 1990 | The Alpha Course begins to be developed into an outreach tool for the wider church. | |
| 1991 | George Carey becomes the second evangelical Archbishop of Canterbury of the twentieth century. | |
| 1992 | DD (honorary) University of Toronto; Return to UK as Archbishop’s Advisor on Evangelism with the Springboard project. | |
| 1994 | Women are ordained into the Church of England for the first time. | |
| 1995 | The Toronto Blessing, a charismatic renewal movement, sweeps through many British churches. | |
| 1996 | DD (earned) Lambeth; Senior Research Fellow at Wycliffe Hall. | |
| 1997 | Eighteen years of Conservative government ends with the election of Tony Blair’s ‘New Labour’ government. | With Alister McGrath began apologetics and evangelism courses at Wycliffe Hall; early discussions with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries. |
| 2003 | Tony Blair’s press secretary says “we don’t do God”. | |
| 2005 | John Sentamu becomes the Church of England’s first black Archbishop. | Appointed Co-Rector of Holy Trinity, Raleigh, North Carolina. |
| 2006 | The God Delusion, by Oxford University professor Richard Dawkins, is published. | |
| 2007 | Returns to Oxford. | |
| 2008 | The Anglican Church in North America is initiated. | Appointed Chaplain and Missioner at Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics (OCCA); First FEUER conference (Schloss Mittersill). |
| 2008-2019 Ministry in OCCA, FEUER, UCCF, and publication of a further nine books. | ||
| 2010 | A coalition, between David Cameron’s Conservative Party and Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrat’s, brings thirteen years of Labour government to an end. | |
| 2014 | Marriage between same-sex partners becomes legal in the UK | |
| 2016 | Britain votes to leave the European Union. | |
| Seventy percent of Church of England ordinands are evangelical. | ||
| 2017 | Diamond wedding celebration. | |
| 2018 | Atheism in Britain falls by over two percent for the second straight year. | |
| 2019 | Died in Oxford. |
introducing his life and work