Apologetics

My Brother gave me one of the best gifts I've received in a long time.

It was one of Ravi Zacharias' lectures on CD.
Previously to this present I had not heard that name. I did not know who Ravi was or how to pronounce his name. No nationality was apparent in his name, but my family told me he was Indian (as the CD would confirm through his heavily apparent accent, which I might add, "makes him seem 'Xtra Learned'").

Of course he is "Xtra Learned" he has to be, because he's an Apologetic. One of the things that the faith needs most at this time.

Below is a link to Ravi's Website:
http://www.rvim.org


Here is a link within the website that talks more in depth about apologetics and why the church needs it:
http://www.rzim.org/JustThinkingFV/tabid/602/ArticleID/10475/CBModuleId/881/Default.aspx

Before you do a ton of reading on the website or decide you don't want to do a ton of reading on the website I want to share a few nutshell ideas that I stole from Ravi. Consequently, I will offer my testimony to vouch for them.

Ravi Zacharias states the main reason for apologetics in the church is and has been the opening of the mind to the thought that God might exist. He states that duplicity in the mind cannot work. Meaning someone cannot believe in atheism and God at the same time. Like-wise people cannot accept God if their mind believes in certain philosophical and or scientific theories that contradict belief in God. Their mind cannot begin to be open to any part of God if they hold these theories dear.

Apologetics takes a learned, intellectual stand to prove there is room for completely intelligent people to believe in God.
Without the information that refutes doubt in their mind they will not be able to believe, and would not want to believe (as I did not want to believe at first).

The Christian faith promotes intellectual thought. It in fact wishes for all people to search out knowledge. One of the many verses that the Bible has that advocates learning and not burying our heads in the sand is 2nd Timothy 2:15
"Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." KJV

This particular scripture has an obvious connotation to understanding the Bible in its entirety, as it would have been understood when it was written. However the new testament was not compiled yet, and God was not moving in ways he had moved before.

At this time in the Christian faith there is no firm doctrine or experience driven truth, because everything they are operating in is new. Because of this Paul wanted Timothy to enlighten himself that he may be able to tell why heresy is heresy.

If he wanted he could have made a check list of all the things to allow and not to allow, but that would have been like the old law which Jesus fulfilled. Instead he tells him to study. Embrace learning, embrace an open mind to ideas, and put them through the fire to see if they hold up to the standard of truth.

Because truth is exclusive. There cannot be two truths that exist if they contradict one another. In this Paul's telling Timothy there cannot be Relativism. There is a reason the world goes round, and there is a truth behind it. Find the truth in the world and it will support what is true with God. All we have to do is get rid of the lies, because we don't fight truth. We don't make a business fighting truth, because truth is God.

I am the way the truth and the life no many comes to the father but by me.
-Jesus Christ- John 14:16

This quote isn't arrogant, because it makes sense. Jesus claimed to be the son of God that would save the world from their sins. Meaning after he died and was raised people would have a way through him to be reunited with God. There would be no other way.

It's not arrogant at all. It's true. When you think about apologetics like that it's more discerning what is true than "defending the faith" as some have put it.

Many believers have seen no reason for apologetics, which is funny because I became a Christian mainly because of an apologetic. More funny is the fact that for a time I believed that apologetics was unnecessary, because I believed God would somehow supernaturally make himself known to the people or that simply being nice would be enough. While God sometimes does save people supernaturally or through our kindness he also saves people through logic.

C.S. Lewis had been raised a Christian similarly to I, but rejected Christianity pretty early on in his life. Traveling through Highschool and College he remained a devout atheist. His conversion I count as remarkable, because without anyone leading him along he began to believe. His account is of himself alone in his room working, while he reasons to himself that there must be a God. This step for him isn't easy. Read a biography on him or his autobiography, "Surprised by joy". You'll learn his personality. He never wanted to believe in God until he started. In his own words he was the, "The most dejected, reluctant convert in all England."

and at that point he hadn't even become a Christian merely a theist. whether he was to become a polytheist or monotheist or Christian was still up for debate at this time.

Paving the way for me to become a Christian was C.S. Lewis, the great Christian apologetic. Without him I wouldn't have given Christianity a chance (funny isn't it, it's my life now). I viewed worship as hype, prayer as calming yourself down (similar to meditation), and that knowing that God existed provided a sense of security to us as humans.

I couldn't bring myself to agree with these views completely, because my mind couldn't very well dismiss some intelligent people I had met in my own life who were Christians.
Other facts chafed at my atheism, such as the fact that most of the world claims a religion or a god of some sort. Yet I knew that to agree to something soley, because a lot of other people did was stupid (Strait/Straight up in every sense of the word).

The Screwtape Letters was the first book I read by C.S. Lewis, and it was especially vital to my faith.

Doubts that I had thought to be exclusive before were revealed to be inclusive to most all people. Above all it made me see that I was not alone, and that other people who experienced a Christian background had doubted.

I had asked Christians about doubt etc. and they claimed that they always knew God and perhaps couldn't answer everything that I was asking, but remained faithful no matter what doubt I could throw at them.
It was strange talking to them. I likened them to desperate orphans swearing that some day their parents would return for them. Then I, as the mean orphan, enters demanding proof of their parents return. All the time keeping in mind that they claimed their parents would rescue me too.

It seemed almost as if they were brain-washed, yet now I can see where they are/were coming from. God had reached them, but only because they were young enough to accept the teaching without question and search for him. God reacted to the whole-hearted devotion they showed, because they truly believed.

As a young believer I did not fully understand the commitment that went along with becoming a follower of Jesus like they did. I was all for not burning in hell, but I never quite followed the Jesus as Lord of my life. Prolifically after my conversion I told people that I had never understood that God was supposed to be in control of everything in my life. Somehow growing up in the church I had missed that part. Because I did not search for God and submit my life to his. As a result he never responded to me as a child, and as my mind developed it rejected God for secular theories and ideas. Experience had told me that I had not encountered God, because if I had encountered him certain things would happen in my life that had not happened. While I had touched God at certain points and claimed religious moments; the summation of my childhood-teenage experiences with God only piqued my interest. Overall, I was a skeptic of most everything, as such I liked philosophy a great deal. :)

Apologetics stepped in and opened up my mind to God again.

No matter how many people told me about their personal testimonies I couldn't relate, because we were speaking different languages. They said, "I feel him," I said, "You feel emotion and psychology working on you in the hype of the atmosphere created in the church building environment."

Along with the reading of the philosophes (and light reading on sciences that mainly dealt with evolution) I indulged in apologetics. soon apologetics would show me uniting truths that explained God, and made much more sense than some of the philosophies I was reading. In a nutshell: apologetics had paved a way for my mind to accept Christ.

Looking back at my conversion it was an astonishing thing. Forces were at work that I was not aware of, and I'm sure that I'm still not aware of all of them.

Apologetics may not be placed as the most important piece that led me to Christ, but it was the gate-way to allow my mind accept a belief in God.

Many other things ensued afterward in the oncoming months, and the end product was my being saved.

Apologetics I believe is a neglected category of the faith that is equally important as something such as worship.

Read what Ravi has to say in that second link. He's able to explain it much better than I.

Assembly of God Blogs

Powered By Ringsurf