A Call to Consider the Strange Fire Conference

Last week in Sun Valley, California Grace Community Church hosted the Strange Fire conference, the latest iteration of the Truth Matters conference, which is kind of a Shepherds’ Conference light, aimed at lay men and women rather than at pastors and elders.  And in case you missed it and the ensuing kerfuffle, the focus of this conference was the dangers posed by and the errors pervasive in the charismatic movement.  (In the interest of full disclosure, I am a confirmed cessationist, you can read why here.)

Now whether you are a confirmed cessationist, or even more so if you are a confirmed continuationist (or even a full on tongue speaking Pentecostal) I firmly believe that you should take the time to listen to the conference audio and consider the teaching and evaluate it in the light of Scripture.  Let me give you a few reasons why.

1.    Although it seems to be very unpopular to say so, even in the evangelical world, someone is wrong about the gifts and being wrong has consequences.  Either cessationists are wrong, and their denial of the miraculous gifts is seriously hindering their Christian lives, or charismatics/continuationists are wrong and they are introducing (and fostering) dangerous errors into the church.  This is an either/or issue not a both/and.  One group is right and one group is wrong.  Period.  And believers should want to be right, there is nothing godly in not caring about truth.  (There is a very helpful post from the Gospel Coalition here.)

2.    Unity is not the supreme Christian virtue.  Jesus never said the He came to bring unity,in fact He said He would be divisive.  Having a conference to take issue with what a church and many faithful scholars and pastors see as a threat to the people of God and the gospel is not inherently wrong or unloving as many have complained.  What if Peter, in the name of unity above truth, stopped preaching Christ when so ordered by the Sanhedrin?  What if Luther burned his 95 Theses instead of nailing it to the church door at Wittenberg?  What if he recanted instead of declaring “here I stand”?

3.    It was not just John MacArthur, and the staff of Grace Community Church speaking at the conference.  It has become popular in many corners of the reformed world to criticize John MacArthur, and even to begin referring to him as a Fundamentalist (which he is not, in the capital F sense, although he certainly and unapologetically affirms the fundamentals of the faith).  But it wasn’t just him speaking, he was joined by Joni Eareckson Tada, R.C. Sproul (via video, despite his failing health), Steve Lawson, Conrad M’bewe and others.  Although he is the lightning rod, John MacArthur is not alone among the giants of the faith in feeling that this conference was necessary. 

4.    The theological fringe is the mainstream of the charismatic movement.  Although the criticism has been leveled that the abuses that were the focus of much of the conference represent the fringe extreme of the movement they really don’t.  Try this little experiment, go to your local mass market Christian bookstore, don’t ask for help and begin wandering around.  Do you see more Joyce Meyer or Wayne Grudem Books?  C.J. Mahaney or T.D. Jakes?  D.A. Carson or Joel Osteen?  Flip through the channels on T.V., who do you see first, Pat Robertson or John Piper?  Benny Hinn or Mark Driscoll (there is a must read take on Driscoll’s impromptu appearance at the conference here)?  

For these reasons and more, the issues raised at the Strange Fire conference bear serious consideration, no matter where you personally are regarding the sign gifts.  I urge you to take these issue seriously, they are not minor, and be willing to submit yourself to the authority of Scripture and consider that you might be wrong.

Apologetics Q&A Pt 4: Classical Apologetics

Q: What is the "classical" approach to apologetics and what are its strengths and weaknesses?  How does this approach stack up against the presuppositional approach?

Classical apologetics is a two step approach to arguing for the Christian world view.  First it argues for a god, and after offering what it views as satisfactory arguments, it then progresses to arguing for the Christian triune God.  

There are some positive aspects of classical apologetics.  It seeks to show that faith and reason are consistent, which is a noble aim and has been of service to countless believers, buttressing their faith.  Also the classical approach historically has been at the forefront of the apologetic efforts of the church as the preferred method of many staunch defenders of orthodoxy like Augustine, Hugo Grotius and B.B. Warfield.  That said, while I love and respect many who hold to the classical apologetic method, I don’t think that it is the best approach to defending the Christian faith.  

Classical apologist William Lane Craig describes the classical apologetic method as “first to present arguments for theism which aim to show that God’s existence is at least more probable than not and then to present evidences, probabilistically construed for God’s revelation in Christ.”  

 While there are a number of methodological problems with this approach, this statement reveals the chief (and fatal) flaw with the classical approach to apologetics.  Apologetics is, at its root, an evangelistic enterprise, and souls are at stake.  In that context “more probable than not” is simply not good enough.  When engaged in this kind of encounter we must show with certainty that Christian faith is the only right world view.

Another key problem with this two step approach to apologetics is it leads the door open for an unbeliever to accept a theistic world view yet reject Christianity.  A person may acknowledge a god yet still deny the existence of God and thus be as lost as any atheist.  This in fact happened to noted atheist Antony Flew who at the age 81 announced that the teleological argument for God convinced him that there must be a super-intelligent creator.  However he did not become a Christian, but rather a deist, and thus still died in his sins.  

This is not surprising.  One of the most popular arguments for theism used by classical apologists is the Kalam cosmological argument (which essentially states that everything observable has a cause, there cannot be an infinite chain of causes thus there must have been an uncaused cause and that the uncaused cause must be God).  This argument however was not formulated by Christians, but by Islamic philosophers, so clearly classical apologetics leaves the door wide open for deviant theism which does not save but condemns.  Moreover if the God of the Bible is not presupposed there is no justification for holding to the universality of the laws of causation.  Apart for His created order there should be no expectation of any universal truths.

Craig’s approach also reveals a faulty and dangerous prosuppositional basis for his method; he writes “A good deductive argument will be one…whose premises are both true and more plausible than its contradictories.”  And after describing his preferred argument concludes “that to deny this proposition is therefore for a normal adult irrational.”  The revealed presupposition is that man’s reason determines what is true, however such an approach fails to take into account the noetic effects of sin and the fall and ignores clear teaching of scripture such as Jeremiah 17:9 which states “the heart (the seat of reason, not merely emotion in biblical thinking) is deceitful above all things.”  Although most classical apologists would deny it, their approach functionally elevates human reason far too high, to a magisterial level.

And flowing out of this elevation of human reason is a dangerous tendency to accommodate scripture to the findings of science.  The great problem with doing this is that while scripture is infallible science is fallible, and while scripture is unchanging scientific theories are constantly being overthrown.  Science has time and again proven itself to be unreliable while Scripture is unchanging and always reliable. 

A practical outworking of this tendency is that many notable classical apologists such as Craig and Norman Geisler advocate an “old earth” theory of the age of the earth.  This is a clear example of the elevation of the reasoning of man above the revealed truth of Scripture and must be condemned. (It must be noted that some classic apologists, such as R.C. Sproul hold to a young earth and a literal six day creation.)

There also seems to be a misunderstanding of the work of the Holy Spirit on the part of some classical apologists.  They readily recognize the value of the internal testimony of the Spirit to believers and root their “knowing” of the truth of Christianity in His testimony, however when it comes to “showing” the truth of Christianity they dismiss the power of the work of the Spirit though the inspiration of the Bible.  Leading classical apologist William Lane Craig takes misunderstanding the role of the Spirit a step further, stating that the Holy Spirit will convict the unbeliever of the weight of the evidence for Christianity.  There is simply no biblical warrant for this assertion however.  The role of the Spirit in the unbelieving world is to convict of sin and the coming judgment (John 16:8) not to help unbelievers weigh evidential arguments and reach conclusions based on their own reasoning.  While Craig’s position may not be universally held, it is illustrative of the kinds of errors that can arise when arguments are not rooted firmly in scripture.

And aside from a too high view of man’s reason classical apologetics has too low a view of scripture.  By conceding “neutral” ground to the unbeliever and recognizing a need to argue for the existence of a God and then the Christian God, it not only operates according to the presuppositions of the unbeliever, but also disregards the clear teaching of Scripture that all men have a knowledge of God (Romans 1:18-21).

For these reasons I believe that classical apologetics should be avoided and that a presuppositional approach is best.  We must always be cognizant that the Word of God is not only infallible and inerrant, but also living and active.  When giving an answer for the hope that is in you the revealed truth of scripture is all sufficient, and there is no need to argue for the probability of a God before sharing the truth of Christ.

Apologetics Q&A pt 3: Presuppositional Apologetics

What is presuppositional apologetics and how does it compare to other apologetic approaches?

            The goal of presuppositional apologetics, like all other apologetic methods is to provide a rational basis for Christian faith.  It does so by defending Christianity against the counter claims of non-religious world views such as atheism or secular humanism and against the claims of other religions.  It also is used to attack (intellectually, we must always be winsome in an apologetic encounter) the claims of other world views and to show not only that Christian faith is reasonable, but that it is sure and that all other world views and religions are absolutely false (it is much more suited to this latter task than other apologetic methods).

            Presuppositional apologetics takes its name from the recognition that all arguments (apologetic or otherwise) are rooted in presuppositions, or things that are already believed.  Presuppositional apologetics recognizes that God’s inspired Word is the only reliable and trustworthy standard of truth, and this is the presupposition that gives this school of thought its name.  

For the presuppositional apologist all of his arguments will be firmly rooted in Scriptural truth, and he will not grant “neutral” ground to his partner in the apologetic encounter, because there really is no such thing for as neutral intellectual territory.  The presupppositionalist recognizes that to grant “neutral ground” and then argue for the existence of God is to argue based on his partner in the apologetic encounter’s false  presupposition, namely that human (specifically his/her own) reason is the arbiter of what is true and false.  Rather the presuppositional apologist roots his/her arguments in the only sure source of truth, the revealed Word of God.

Another key distinctive of presuppositional apologetics is that it argues for the certainty of the Christian world view, and for the impossibility of all other world views and religious systems.  Other apologetic methods seek to show that Christianity is reasonable and probable (they would say so probable that other views are unreasonable), but there is a serious flaw in this methodology.  Even if it is shown that Christianity is reasonable and highly probable that leaves room for other world views to be reasonable and true (however improbable) and for Christianity to be unreasonable and untrue. 

 

The arguments that the presuppositional apologist makes are, in simple terms, one step arguments.  Presuppositional apologetics argues for the certainty of the existence of the God of the Bible, the Christian God.  In contrast classic apologetics seeks to show that the existence of a god is highly probable and that of all of the theistic views Christianity is the most likely.  Other schools of apologetics such as evidentialism and the cumulative case theory approach would claim that they too use a one step approach, but functionally their arguments, although not as strictly ordered as the classic approach, do divide into arguments primarily for the existence for a god and arguments for the Christian God.

Not only is presuppositionalism unique in its single step approach, but the nature of the arguments that it offers is also unique.  While virtually all other approaches to apologetics focus on evidential arguments of one form or another, presuppositional apologetics focuses on transcendental arguments.  A transcendental argument is not made up of a chain of evidence, but rather makes a holistic case that all meaning and thought presupposes, or relies on the God of the bible, by showing the that unbelievers are unable to think, argue, acquire knowledge or even live apart from the God of the Bible.  A transcendental argument may take several different forms, it may be to show that only the God of the bible can account for the laws of logic, and make debate possible, that only the God of the bible can explain the innate sense of right and wrong every person has, or the natural appreciation of beauty that is native to all people, but at its base, a transcendental argument shows that only the Christian worldview provides a livable framework for human existence.  (This does not mean that there is no role for the use of evidence in presuppositional apologetics, this is a common misconception.) This in many ways is the key distinctive of the presuppositional approach.

            I believe that presuppositional apologetics is not only the most effective approach to the apologetic task, but also the most God honoring.  I believe this for a number of reasons.

            First, although the other approaches are not called presuppositional, they are all governed by presuppositional thinking.  By granting “neutral” ground to the unbeliever and then arguing for the existence of God or of the God of the bible, they have effectively allowed the presuppositions of the unbeliever to lay the foundation of the apologetic encounter.  And the presupposition that they will stipulate (often without realizing it) is invariably man centered and usually boils down to some form of the enlightenment belief that that their own reasoning is the sole arbiter of truth.  This is what is called the magisterial use of reasoning and is an affront to God.  One of the things we can know with certainty is that the unbeliever is a fool, since the fool in his heart says there is no God (Psalm 14:1/53:1), so why should we allow an unbeliever to set the terms of the apologetic encounter. 

            And what is worse, to approach the unbeliever as if he has no knowledge of God and needs convinced, is to deny the clear teaching of scripture on the matter.  Roman’s 1 clearly teaches that unbelievers have a knowledge of God (although not enough knowledge to save), and that they willfully suppress this truth in unrighteousness (Rom 1:18-19).  Creation communicates to them (some of) the attributes and existence of God.  To approach apologetics as if the unbeliever has no knowledge of God is to functionally deny the inerrancy and authority of scripture.

A second key consideration for me is that presuppositionalism is the only approach to apologetics that rests squarely on sure truth.  Only the revealed word of God is 100% trustworthy and sure.  The noetic effects of the Fall (the total corruption of our thought process) render both our reasoning ability and our ability to interpret evidence untrustworthy.  And because presuppositional apologetics rests solely on the Word of God as its foundation, it can do what other apologetic methods cannot, show that the Christian world view is correct and all other world views are false with certainty.  Certainty is a precise term which in this case doesn’t just mean overwhelmingly likely, but that the contrary is impossible, and it is simply not good enough to show that Christianity is very likely, and pretty reasonable, it must be shown to be the only way to explain creation and human experience.

Another key strength of presuppositional apologetics is how effective it is not just at proving the Christian world view, but by proving contrary world views are demonstrably false.  Other apologetic approaches show the reasonableness of Christianity, but rarely show the folly of other world views.  By employing transcendental arguments, presuppositional apologetics is able to show that all other world views are unable to account for creation and the human condition and thus fail the “test of livability”.  This is particularly important because the apologist’s ultimate goal is not merely to win debates, but to win souls.  The ultimate goal in any apologetic encounter is to bring the unbeliever to saving faith (although it very rarely happens) and approaches that do not show the un-livability of non-Christian world views are ill suited for that task.

            Not only do I believe that presuppositional apologetics is the best apologetic approach, I believe that the two most commonly leveled criticisms of it are baseless and without merit.

The first of these is that presuppositional arguments are invalid because they are circular.  People who make this criticism tend to characterize the arguments of presuppositional apologetics as “since God thus God”, but this is so simplistic that it borders on being slanderous.  Perhaps the biggest problem with this claim is that all apologetic approaches are dependent on the apologists’ controlling presuppositions.  Just as the presuppositionalist presupposes that the Bible is the arbiter of truth, the evidentialist bases his arguments on the belief that evidence (empiricism) determines truth and the apologist who appeals to reason presupposes that human reason is the standard of truth.  The only difference is that the presuppositionalist recognizes and discloses his controlling beliefs.  Thus if the arguments of presuppositional apologetics are circular, the arguments of all approaches are also circular.  Moreover, the reasoning of a presuppositional apologist is not circular, it is linear in a way that the other approaches are not.  For the presuppositionalist God’s reasoning (found in scripture) is the basis for faith, which is the basis for human reasoning, and out of this reasoning flows presuppositional arguments for the Christian world view.  Most importantly, surrendering Christian presuppositions (based solely on the Bible), to argue for the truth of Christianity is to surrender the very thing that is being argued for, the Lordship of Christ (and the authority of Scripture).

The second common criticism of presuppositional apologetics is that because it assumes the Bible and a Christian world view and does not start from a “neutral” position, there is not any common ground on which to engage the unbeliever.  This is patently false.  There are two key points of commonality between unbelievers and believers.  The first is their exposure to creation, Psalm 19 states that “the heavens declare the Glory of God and the expanse displays the work of His hands” while Romans 1 makes clear that because what can be known about God is displayed through nature and that unbeliever suppress this knowledge in unrighteousness.  Everyone, even the most hard-bitten atheist knows the God of the Bible exists, and this allows for interaction on common ground.  As does the fact that bothbeliever and unbeliever alike are made in the image of God .  The image of God is the basis for human uniqueness and worth and provides ample common ground from which to launch an apologetic encounter.

While there are apologists of other methods who I respect and whom I love as brothers in Christ, and I want to stress that apologetic approach is certainly not an issue to divide over, non-presuppositional approaches are not merely second best, they are wrong headed.  Only an apologetic grounded in the sure truth of the scripture is up to the task of proving with certainty that only the God of the bible can account for creation and human existence.

 

Apologetics Q&A pt 2: A Biblical Perspective

So what does the Bible say about Apologetics anyway?

There are several important passages in scripture that shed considerable light on just what apologetics is and how it should be done.  The first thing that you should understand from Scripture is that apologetics is a biblical word.  It comes from the Greek word apologia which doesn’t mean an apology, but rather a defense (a verbal defense, in the legal sense) of something.  The word is used this way in several passages in the New Testament including Acts 22:1, 25:16 and 2 Tim 4:16 where Paul uses it to describe a legal defense in a judicial setting (or at least in the face of a mob bent on “justice”).  It is also used in the more general sense of defending the Gospel or defending the validity of Christian hope in 1 Corinthians 9:3, Philippians 1:7, and of course 1 Peter 3:15 that says we are always to be ready to make a defense for the hope that is in us.

            Now that you understand what the word means, there are several passages that are instructive for the practice of apologetics.  The first lesson that scripture teaches us is that those who deny God are not reasonable or rational, they are foolish.  Psalm 14:1 states “the fool has said in his heart there is no God.”  This does not mean that unbelievers are necessarily unintelligent or incapable of thinking correct thoughts, but essentially an unbeliever is a fool, completely devoid of true wisdom (which begins with the fear of the Lord).  Proverbs 26:4-5 teaches, how we should relate to unbelievers in an apologetic encounter; Never meet them on neutral ground of their choosing, stating “never answer a fool according to his folly…answer a fool as his folly deserves, that he not be wise in his own eyes.”  We must never allow an unbeliever’s presuppositions set the framework for an apologetic encounter, rather root all of your arguments (in the logical sense, never be angry in these encounters) in the truth of Scripture.

            And there is no reason to have to meet an unbeliever on supposedly neutral ground, scripture is clear that all men have a knowledge of God.  Romans 1:19 speaking of unbelievers states “that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.”   Likewise Psalm 19 teaches that “the heavens declare the glory of God and the expanse displays the work of His hands.”  There is no need to “prove” the existence of God because the unbeliever already knows, he merely suppresses the truth (Romans 1:18).  This suppression is never total, it is rather like trying to hold a beach ball under water, it is nearly impossible and despite their best efforts the beach ball of the knowledge of God will occasionally pop to the surface, so we should proceed confident that although they deny it, the unbeliever is keenly aware of the creator God.

            And an appeal to God as creator and sustainer of the world is often a prominent feature in apologetic encounters recorded in scripture.  In Acts 14:4-18 Paul addresses the crowd who is seeking to worship him as Hermes and Barnabas as Zeus, that they should turn to the living God “who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them (15), and that He left a witness to all people by providing sustaining rains from heaven and regular harvests that sustain men.   Creation is a key touch point in any apologetic encounter.

            Perhaps the most widely discussed passage in reference to apologetics is Paul’s Aeropagus  speech recorded in Acts chapter 17, and it is very instructive.  The first thing to note is that Paul addresses their culture (and by extension their world view).  He begins his speech by noting that the city is filled with the objects of pagan worship, and he uses an altar to an “unknown god” as a starting point for his discourse.  He does not contextualize his message though; he expressly claims to have knowledge that the Athenians do not, stating “that which you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.”  And as we have seen previously, he next proclaims the God of the bible as the creator God (26).  He emphasizes both the nearness and transcendence of God (27-29).  He also declares the coming judgment of God and calls on his hearers to repent (30), which is very instructive for apologetics.  We must never forget that our aim in an apologetic encounter is not to be right, but to bring the unbeliever to faith so that they do not face the wrath of God on judgment day, and to this end he proclaims the resurrection of Jesus and Jesus as eschatological judge (31-32), and looks to the resurrection of Christ as the authentication of his message.  And it is worth noting that he doesn’t argue for the resurrection, he simply proclaims it as fact.

            Another clear teaching of scripture is that apologetics must be decisive and comprehensive.   2Corinthians 10:5-6 states “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”.  Every means every, there is no attack on the truth of the gospel that is beyond the scope of apologetics, and Christians are always to have an apologetic at the ready as 1 Peter 3:15 states; “, always being ready to make a defense [apologia] to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you.”  Yet we must always be gentle and winsome sharing this message “with gentleness and reverence.”

            There is more to apologetics than merely addressing the objections of unbelievers.  Luke 1:1-4, the preamble of the letter, sheds some light on an often overlooked function of apologetics, to strengthen the faith of the believer.  Luke wrote Acts so that Theophilus might know the exact truth about the things he had been taught.  Apologetics is not just to counter the arguments of unbelievers, but also to strengthen the faith of Christians. 

            While this is not an exhaustive discussion of all that the Bible has to say about apologetics, these passages are an excellent foundation to help you begin to build a truly biblical apologetic approach.