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Truth and Apologetics: DTS Recap

October 9, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

Over the last 3 weeks I have spent some great time with the current DTS in Maui. I’ve a had a few sessions in which we had a quick introduction to Apologetics and Truth.

This post is really just a recap of some of that content with some links to further study. If you’re a student and have questions feel free to contact me – I’d love to hear from you.

Apologetics

Apologetics is the encompassing term that we give to the practice of ‘defending the faith’. We derive the term from the Greek word apologia. This word was a Greek legal term that meant ‘to give a defense’.

Biblical Mandate

In 2 Corinthians chapt. 10 v.5 Paul states this,

“We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”

The context of this verse is warfare, and warfare not in the flesh but in the spirit. In understanding this we come to conclude that the discipline of Apologetics is a part of Spiritual Warfare, that is combating the Lie with the Truth.

Satan is the father of lies (see John 8:44) and it is his plan to spread the Lie in as many ways as possible to aid in the destruction of Man and Creation. As Christians we lay claim to the Truth, and must defend this Truth to all who ask. Our principle from this comes from 1 Peter chpt. 3 v.15:

“but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence.”

Peter is quite clear about our charge. We should be ready to answer the honest questions put to us about why we believe what we believe.

People in the world today are starving for authenticity. We have countless “reality” TV shows that draw strong audiences. There is tremendous interest for what is perceived to be real, raw and honest. This works in our favour as Christians! We can live out our lives authentically, honestly and completely. Our Christian lives are fully liveable – through His grace – and we can do so without violating our truths (see the next section on truth).

The flip-side to this is that if we do not live authentically with the beliefs that we profess, we can end up promoting a counter-apologetic that will do more harm than good. I wonder at the number of people who have been ‘put off’ from Jesus by the ill-witness of His followers. This weighs particularly heavy on my own heart

More to come …

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Real Christianity

August 30, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

Over 200 years ago a bill was passed in the House of Commons outlawing the slave trade in all parts of the British Empire. A great injustice to humanity was ended and a practice that had been around for thousands of years ceased overnight in many parts of the world. It was largely the work of one man that brought this momentous change about. His name was William Wilberforce, and he was a Christian.

Britain at the time, though a professed Christian nation, was a nation full of uncommitted believers. Many people were more concerned with the gratification of their fleshly desires rather than playing their part in bringing to earth the Kingdom of God. The Bible to some people was relegated to a book of good ideas and morals, not actually holding any direct authority in their own lives. Yet one man, who knew his God, who held the Bible as authoritative and inspiring, changed the world.

And that is what we are all called to. Christians need to realise the power of their God and the authority of His Word. To many Christians today – and especially young Christians – the Bible is not the authority in their lives that it should be. We have relegated its power, demoted truth and celebrated emotion. Sensation is the measure of faith of our fellow believer. We fight with other denominations, even squabble amongst ourselves over how we operate. We look for instant results and keep track of successes for only that week without strategising for the future or celebrating our history.

There are many injustices in the world today. There are still people being sold into slavery. There are governments abusing their citizens and there are many people dying of starvation. The church will be able to do nothing about these things unless we get over ourselves and get out of watered-down, hyped up, good looking, microwave societal, flashy, giddy, day-care centres and realise that what we are sitting on is dynamite. The word of God has the power to change lives, societies, countries and the world. William Wilberforce knew the authority of the Scripture and acted upon it, will we?

But a word of warning to those seeking instant results. The truth of our calling is not measured by the progress we can observe in a week, a month, a year, a decade or indeed, a lifetime. We may never see the fruit of our labour in whatever area we are called to, but then again, we have no entitlement to it. When we acknowledge that all glory belongs to God, then truly we are free to labour tirelessly for those holy callings he has given us with all of the strength he has given us.

nb. This is a revised copy of a previous post.

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Oh The Glory Of It All

August 28, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

I can look back on times when men wrote hymns, when the Holy Spirit breathed life into worship, when God was worshiped for God. In my generation so often, both in church and outside, we simply sing about ourselves. Truth is replaced by emotion; conviction replaced by subdued apathy. God is often not proclaimed for who He is and what He is done.

Passion, for me, is getting things right. This latest song from David Crowder (available on the album God of This City) has gripped me. It is powerful, it is truth, it is worship.

At the start
he was there, he was there
In the end,
he’ll be there, he’ll be there

And After all our hands have wrought
He forgives

Oh the Glory of it all is:
he came here
For the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
for the glory of it all

All is lost
find him there, find him there
After night
Dawn is there, Dawn is there

After all falls apart
he repairs he repairs

Oh the Glory of it all is:
he came here
for the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all

oh he is here
for redemption from the fall
that we may live
for the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all
the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all

After night
comes the light
dawn is here
dawn is here
it’s a new day
it’s a new day
everything will change
things will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same
we will never be the same

Oh, The glory of it all is
you came here
for the rescue of us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all

Oh you are here
with redemption for us all
that we may live
for the glory of it all
for the glory of it all
oh the glory of it all.

Lyrics from cowboylyrics.

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Craig on State of Post-Modernity

July 7, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

I just came across the cover article (thanks to D. Groothuis) of the recent edition of Christianity Today. It is a 5-page essay from William L. Craig presenting, in a condensed manner, the major philosophical arguments for the existence of God. In addition to presenting the arguments, Craig also underscores the importance of using these apologetic tools today, in the process dispelling some myths about post-modernity. I’ve quoted a few paragraphs below but I highly recommend to anyone to read the whole article.

**note the nod towards the emergent church at the end of the first paragraph

However all this may be, some might think that the resurgence of natural theology in our time is merely so much labor lost. For don’t we live in a postmodern culture in which appeals to such apologetic arguments are no longer effective? Rational arguments for the truth of theism are no longer supposed to work. Some Christians therefore advise that we should simply share our narrative and invite people to participate in it.

This sort of thinking is guilty of a disastrous misdiagnosis of contemporary culture. The idea that we live in a postmodern culture is a myth. In fact, a postmodern culture is an impossibility; it would be utterly unlivable. People are not relativistic when it comes to matters of science, engineering, and technology; rather, they are relativistic and pluralistic in matters of religion and ethics. But, of course, that’s not postmodernism; that’s modernism! That’s just old-line verificationism, which held that anything you can’t prove with your five senses is a matter of personal taste. We live in a culture that remains deeply modernist.

Otherwise, how do we make sense of the popularity of the New Atheism? Dawkins and his ilk are indelibly modernist and even scientistic in their approach. On the postmodernist reading of contemporary culture, their books should have fallen like water on a stone. Instead, people lap them up eagerly, convinced that religious belief is folly.

Seen in this light, tailoring our gospel to a postmodern culture is self-defeating. By laying aside our best apologetic weapons of logic and evidence, we ensure modernism’s triumph over us. If the church adopts this course of action, the consequences in the next generation will be catastrophic. Christianity will be reduced to but another voice in a cacophony of competing voices, each sharing its own narrative and none commending itself as the objective truth about reality. Meanwhile, scientific naturalism will continue to shape our culture’s view of how the world really is.

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Is the Emergent Church Escaping from Reason?

July 5, 2008 in Theology with 1 Comment

I am reading D.A. Carson’s ‘Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church’ at present. As I read it I’m drawn back into the present reality, which in all honesty, I’ve tried to block out. I don’t like the way that much of the western church is heading, I don’t like it at all but it feels to me as if this change is quite like an avalanche already under way and I’m just trying my best to get down the hill and out of the path as quickly as possible!

With that being said this comment is more of a pre-comment (I have yet to finish Carson). A reaction to what I already know. The last section of Francis Schaeffer’s ‘Escape from Reason’ keeps sticking with me. I should have posted about it when I was reading the book but it ties in well with my thoughts now. Schaeffer says this right at the end of the book:

“There are two things we need to grasp firmly as we seek to communicate the gospel today, whether we are speaking to ourselves, to other Christians or to those totally outside.

The first is that there are certain unchangeable facts which are true. These have no relationship to the shifting tides. They make the Christian system what is is, and if they are altered, Christianity becomes something else. This must be emphasised because there are evangelical Christians today who, in all sincerity, are concerned with their lack of communication, but in order to bridge the gap they are tending to change what must remain unchangeable. If we do this we are no longer communicating Christianity, and what we have left is no different from the surrounding consensus.”

Now as profound as this quote is, it is also upsetting. My book says ’1968′ in the front flap. That’s 40 years ago. 40 years of warning. 40 years is surely plenty of time to block or re-route an avalanche, right? And so I feel a little discouraged. Dr. Schaeffer wrote plainly and simply and for what? I do not mean to be dour, although there is a certain amount of gloom about all of this.

Quite simply it seems to me as if Christianity has become “something else”; something indistinguishable from contemporary culture. I sometimes think that we might know too much of life, have too much knowledge. We should rethink our mission, which first and foremost should be centred on God and the finished work of Jesus on the cross.

Paul says in Galations 1:9,10, “As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed! For am I now seeking the favour of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bond-servant of Christ. (NASB)”

I really think that the root of so many false gospels is the misplacing of God. If God is not centre then we will not fear Him but rather man. So our stand should be that we will not fear being an outcast, not fear not ‘fitting in’. This isn’t a throwing off of all culture or withdrawal from those Spheres of Life that are so important, but a dogged resistance to submitting to man instead of God.

I think the church in the past has become confused over this and thrown the baby out with the bath-water, so to speak. Christ must be shown in all areas of life and we must not be afraid to show Him whatever that means.

And in my ears I hear one of my professors words ringing out, “If we don’t realise we’re in a war, we wont know what prayer is for.”

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A Christian Manifesto

April 20, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

A Christian Manifesto
by Dr. Francis A. Schaeffer
This address was delivered by the late Dr. Schaeffer in 1982 at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. It is based on one of his books, which bears the same title.

“Christians, in the last 80 years or so, have only been seeing things as bits and pieces which have gradually begun to trouble them and others, instead of understanding that they are the natural outcome of a change from a Christian World View to a Humanistic one; things such as overpermissiveness, pornography, the problem of the public schools, the breakdown of the family, abortion, infanticide (the killing of newborn babies), increased emphasis upon the euthanasia of the old and many, many other things.”

Click here for the full transcript.

The above is the beginning on the transcript of the late Dr. Francis Schaeffer’s address to Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in 1982. The address was filmed and is now available on DVD, known as A Christian Manifesto.

For more on A Christian Manifesto see Doug Groothuis’ recent post, or see Schaeffer’s book by the same name.

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Is Love Really All We Need?

April 17, 2008 in Theology with 2 Comments


“So it’s not surprising that the world would think that “all we need is love,” and we can do without the doctrine, since the world thinks it can do without Christ. Doctrine is where the religions most obviously part ways. Doctrine is where things get interesting-and dangerous. As the playwright Dorothy Sayers said, doctrine isn’t the dull part of Christianity, rather, “The doctrine is the drama.” Jesus was not revolutionary because he said we should love God and each other. Moses said that first. So did Buddha, Confucius, and countless other religious leaders we’ve never heard of. Madonna, Oprah, Dr. Phil, the Dali Lama, and probably a lot of Christian leaders will tell us that the point of religion is to get us to love each other. “God loves you” doesn’t stir the world’s opposition. However, start talking about God’s absolute authority, holiness, wrath, and righteousness, original sin, Christ’s substitutionary atonement, justification apart from works, the necessity of new birth, repentance, baptism, Communion, and the future judgment, and the mood in the room changes considerably. If postmodernism is simply a revival of modern romanticism (experience as sovereign), then it’s not very postmodern after all.”

Stumbled upon here, quoted originally from here.

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Not Your Father's L'Abri

April 15, 2008 in Theology with 0 Comments

This is taken from a Christianity Today article on Francis Schaeffer and L’Abri, by Molly Worthen:

The modernist philosophy that he targeted in most of his writings, the bogeyman of existentialism, is passé. “Now the question is, Is there truth at all?” said worker Thomas Rauchenstein, a soft-spoken Canadian with sandy brown hair and a close-cropped beard. “Postmodernism’s critique of truth is more of a factor in students’ thinking.”

This just shows the complete misunderstanding of Schaeffer’s teachings. He saw, felt and understood post-modernism which is the reason he pushed strongly presuppositional apologetics. Presuppositonal apologetics do not rest on modernism, but on truth – which does exist no matter what worldview you hold. Schaeffer, by pushing people to the Line of Despair, helped people realise that their presuppositions were faulty, incoherent and unliveable.

In an age of non-truth we do not play the field to the post-modern rule book. Jesus is the “way, the truth, and the life” – therefore if people do not understand truth our apologetic must first target truth, in turn to reveal Jesus.
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