Tag: faith

How Tom Wright Changed My Life

Yesterday (7 February 2020), St. Mary’s College of Divinity at St. Andrews had an event to honor and remember Tom Wright (a.k.a., N.T. Wright) for his tenure at the university. Professor Wright held a distinguished chair in New Testament for nearly a decade (a chair previously held by Richard Bauckham). As Professor Alan Torrance mentioned yesterday evening, he was responsible for millions of pounds being poured into St. Mary’s via student enrollment and grants. He was also instrumental in Logos (the program I study in) starting and being developed at St. Andrews. But I want to point out a few other ways that I have benefitted from his lifetime of scholarship.

When I was a high school student, I first heard the name N.T. Wright when my pastor and worship pastor wanted to take a group from the church to Oklahoma Christian University where he was speaking. The trip ended up being cancelled, and I didn’t get to go. (I would then meet him New Orleans some years later where he signed every book I had by him at the time, and then I would have classes with him some years after that.) Instead, I wouldn’t interact with Wright’s work for another couple years until I picked up the book Simply Christian and then Simply Jesus after that. Again, I wouldn’t interact with his work in any meaningful way until my undergraduate years.

The two primary things I learned from N.T. Wright which I should have known, but never did, were: the Jewishness of Jesus and the New Testament, and the Christian hope of future resurrection. I grew up in Christian communities that never spent much time thinking about how deeply Jewish Jesus was or the four gospel accounts which talk about him or Paul’s letters or any of it. Jesus is Jewish—not formerly or temporarily Jewish. Jesus continues to be Jewish, as does the New Testament. How are we to read the gospel accounts, Acts, Paul’s writings, the letter to the Hebrews, or the letters from Peter or John or Jude if not as profoundly Jewish texts? Yes, they often write to a wider audience—especially Paul’s letters, but they do so from a religious background and history of thought which is profoundly Jewish.

Finally, Tom Wright taught me the Christian hope. I always imagined death to be the end. I don’t mean that I thought we would just die and that there would be nothing. But I did imagine that we would die and go to heaven—some would go to hell—and that everything would just be disembodied and ethereal. However, in reading Wright’s works, I realized that the New Testament teaches something profoundly different. It teaches that God will raise us bodily from the dead in the end and bring heaven to earth. It teaches that if God doesn’t raise us like Jesus, then we ought to be the most pitied because we are wasting our lives. I can’t even recount the experience of reading The Resurrection of the Son of God for the first time. If I could get everyone to wade through its hundreds of pages, I would want every Christian to read it.

In summary, Tom Wright changed my life. His teaching impacted how my professors read the New Testament. In reading his work, I realized how profoundly he impacted my own professors. In reading his work, I realized essential truths of the Christian faith for the first time. In reading his work, I realized the Christian hope, and in reading his work, I realized that the story of Jesus is the climax of the story of Israel. I, like many, am forever indebted to the life and scholarship of N.T. Wright. May God bless him abundantly in his retirement (even if, it’s just “in name only”)!

Christian Worldview with Tawa Anderson

In this article, I interview Dr. Tawa Anderson about Christian worldview. Anderson is an Associate Professor of Philosophy and Assistant Director of the Honors Program at Oklahoma Baptist University. He co-authored An Introduction to Christian Worldview: Pursuing God’s Perspective in a Pluralistic World which released in 2017. Anderson frequently speaks on issues concerning Christian apologetics, worldview, and philosophy for churches, seminaries, universities, and schools.

See my previous interview with Dr. Anderson on Christian Apologetics here: Christian Apologetics.

Thank you to Dr. Anderson for taking the time out of his schedule to answer these questions for us. My questions and comments appear in bold font, and his responses follow them.

Two years ago, you and your co-authors published An Introduction to a Christian Worldview: Pursuing God’s Perspective in a Pluralistic World. Could you explain what “worldview” is? What a “Christian worldview” is? And why you chose that subtitle?

We define worldview as “the conceptual lens through we see and interpret the world and our place within it.” Worldview is like a set of glasses that we wear, through which we view and interact with reality. If we wear pink-colored glasses, the world looks pink (even if it’s not); if we wear the wrong-prescription lenses, the world will look very distorted. So having the right set of glasses is important—it helps us to see the world the way it really is.

The subtitle of our book was chosen as an indication that a Christian worldview is, ultimately, a pursuit of God’s perspective on reality. Christians recognize that God alone has a true and accurate understanding of life, the universe, and everything—our goal is to chase after God in relationship, but also in understanding. If God sees reality truly, then we want to see the world the way that God sees the world, so that we also might understand reality truly.

A Christian worldview, broadly put, is one which embraces the biblical contours of Creation – Fall – Redemption – Glorification, places the Triune God at the center of reality, and embraces Scripture as the inspired and authoritative self-revelation of God to His people.

If our worldviews are really so pervasive in how we interpret things, then how can we ever reach consensus? How could we ever get people to see things “our” way?

We talk about worldview impacting people in four ways: confirmation bias, experiential accommodation, the pool of live options, and life motivation. Confirmation bias describes our tendency to look for and accept information or arguments that agree with or support what we already believe. Experiential accommodation is the process of interpreting new data or experiences in a way that fits with our existing worldview. The pool of live options is the set of possible explanations that our worldview will permit. Life motivation describes the way that our worldview encourages us to behave and react.

With respect to those first three worldview influences, we can see how people with different worldviews will generally fail to reach consensus, and why it seems nearly impossible to get people to ‘see things our way’. Our very fundamental worldview means that we see the same data, but interpret that data in very different (perhaps even contradictory) ways. Within my Christian worldview, for example, the sudden remission of Aunt Martha’s cancer will readily be interpreted as an answer to concerted desperate prayer; but within my sister’s non-Christian worldview, such a miraculous interpretation of events is outside the pool of live options—there will have to be some other explanation.

With a plurality of competing worldviews, and the strong influence that worldview has upon us, how can we pursue consensus?

The first step, I think, is promoting worldview awareness—we need to be aware of the impact our worldview has upon us when interacting with other people. When are my worldview presuppositions causing me to dismiss someone’s position or arguments? Do I reject this piece of data for good reason, or simply because it doesn’t fit with my pre-existing understanding?

But, of course, it doesn’t help much if we are aware of our worldview influences but other people are not. Hence, it is important to try to educate people broadly about the existence and influence of worldview presuppositions—not in a way that challenges people to re-think their fundamental commitments, but rather asks them to become consciously aware of their worldview.

Why should Christians think through their own worldview and those of others?

We confess that Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life,” (John 14:6), that Christ has come to “testify to the truth,” (John 18:37) and that “the truth will set you free” (John 8:32). So, it seems, truth has a central role in a Christian worldview. Hence, a Christian should be in constant pursuit of truth in his or her own worldview. Obtaining an increasingly true worldview will bring us closer to a full knowledge of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The only way to obtain an increasingly true worldview is to subject our worldview to rigorous, conscious, and logical self-examination. We talk in our book about three “worldview truth-tests” that can help us adjudicate the accuracy of our worldview (and those of others): internal consistency (logical coherence), external consistency (evidential correspondence), and existential consistency (pragmatic satisfaction). Applying these tests to worldview components can help us apprehend truth more accurately.

How has studying Christian worldview changed your relationship to Jesus?

Probably the most fundamental impact has been my increasing awareness that I do not possess the full truth. I have always known this in some sense, but I have generally been overly confident (and dogmatic) about particular stances or beliefs that I hold. There are two sides to this.

First, many of those beliefs end up being secondary within a Christian worldview—not unimportant, but not central to the faith. In our textbook, we differentiate between “Core,” “Secondary,” and “Peripheral” worldview beliefs, and note that what identifies overarching worldviews (like Christianity, atheism, Islam, Buddhism) are Core beliefs. Worldview study has helped me to more clearly (I think) identify the core tenets of the Christian faith—those beliefs, attitudes, loves, and behaviors which are central, and without which there is not an authentic Christianity. Gary Habermas likes to crystallize core Christianity around the deity, atoning death, and bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. I think that’s helpful, but prefer to think of the ancient creeds (Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed) as fuller articulations of essential Christian doctrine. I have had a tendency to make secondary things ‘hills to die on,’ and I feel that as I grow in worldview awareness (and hopefully Christian maturity), I am less likely to make mountains out of molehills. For example, there was a time in my Christian life when I would have held that someone who embraces theistic evolution has left behind orthodox Christianity. Today, while I still reject the modern Darwinian synthesis (random mutation and natural selection as a sufficient explanation for the diversity of biological life), I recognize that someone can be an authentic orthodox Christian and embrace divinely-ordained evolution as the means of God’s creative activity. The issue of how and when God created are secondary; the doctrine that God created is primary (core).

Second, my growth in worldview awareness has helped me better identify the perspectival nature of human knowledge. Other people who are just as intelligent and well-meaning as I am come to radically different worldview conclusions. They, like me, are triply f’ed-up: we are all finite, fallen, and fallible. Hence, I cannot claim to have a monopoly on truth, and neither can they.

How has studying Christian worldview changed your relationship to those around you?

Four things to say here.

First, with respect to non-Christians who hold different worldviews, I think I have become more gracious. I am able to enter into their worldview, and understand why they might see the world the way that they do. This does not make me any more likely to believe that their fundamental worldview is true, but it does help me to understand who they are and why they stand where they do. In turn, this helps to build bridges between my worldview and theirs, such that I can (Lord willing) help them consider the winsomeness and truthfulness of the Christian worldview.

Second, with respect to non-Christians who claim that their worldview is obviously true and Christianity is obviously false, I think I have become more stringent. It pains me to see people who are so blinded to the possibility that they could be mistaken, and who seem to mock those who would embrace the ‘ridiculous superstitions’ of traditional religion.

Third, with respect to fellow Christians who think differently than I on secondary or peripheral issues, I have (again) become more gracious. I have a long ways to go here, and I know that in the past I have hurt fellow believers by arguing too vehemently about secondary issues. The biblical appeal for unity within the body of Christ requires that we accurately identify the core of Christianity, such that we fight for that, and never fight over the secondary issues. I’m getting there, but clearly am not there yet.

Fourth, with respect to people who profess Christianity but reject the historical core of the Christian worldview, I have become less patient. I would join the late Ronald Nash in appealing for ‘honesty in advertising’. If one is going to reject the objective existence of the Triune God, reject the inspiration and authority of God’s self-revelation in Scripture, reject the objective divinity of Jesus of Nazareth, reject the historical resurrection of Jesus on the third day, reject the notion of Christ’s death on the cross atoning for sin, and reject belief in life after death—then that person has no more right to call themselves a Christian than I have to call myself a black woman.

Thank you again to Dr. Anderson! Look for more interviews with Tawa Anderson and others in the near future! If you missed his interview on Christian Apologetics, you can view it here: Christian Apologetics.

Mary, the Mother of God with Timothy and Faith Pawl

In this article, I interview Drs. Timothy and Faith Pawl on Mary. Tim Pawl is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of St. Thomas. He has published two books In Defense of Conciliar Christology and In Defense of Extended Conciliar Christology, and he will soon release a book in the Cambridge Elements series on the philosophy of the incarnation. Faith is an adjunct instructor in philosophy at the University of St. Thomas. She is the author of numerous academic papers, and along with her husband Tim, she earned her PhD in philosophy from Saint Louis University.

Thank you to Drs. Timothy and Faith Pawl for taking the time out of their schedules to answer these questions for us. My questions and comments appear in bold font, and their responses follow them.

Why should we call Mary the “mother of God” instead of just the “mother of Jesus”?

In the history of the church, there have been some claims that have been theological lightning rods. They took on great importance as tools for demarcating the limits of orthodoxy. For instance, at the first ecumenical council of Nicaea in 325, the promulgated creed included a final anathema which cursed those who, among other things, thought that “there once was [a time] when he [the Son] was not” (Tanner 1990, 5). This sentence, contrary to the full divinity of the Son, was affirmed by the Arian party; the orthodox bishops made use of it to counter Arianism.

So likewise, Nestorius, Archbishop of Constantinople, claimed that while Mary bore the Christ in her womb, she didn’t bear God in her womb – that is, she was not the theotokos – i.e., the Godbearer. At the ecumenical council of Ephesus in 431, the promulgated documents include the claim that Mary is the theotokos. This claim, affirming the singularity of person in the incarnation, was denied by the Nestorian party; the orthodox bishops made use of it to counter Nestorianism.

Why is this affirmation of the singularity of person important? Well, it safeguards the claim that it was really someone divine who became incarnate, really someone divine who entered creation for our redemption, really someone divine who suffered the ignobility of the cross.

Finally, the claim that Mary bore God follows straightforwardly from the orthodox understanding of the incarnation. Not only is it affirmed in the ecumenical councils, as I noted above. One can see how the claim must be included, given the traditional understanding of the incarnation. Whatever happened to the man, Jesus Christ, happened to God, on the traditional view. For that man, Jesus Christ, was no other than the God-man, the Word, the Second Person of the Trinity. And so, given that the man gestated in the womb of Mary, and given that the man is no other person than the Second Person of the Trinity, it must follow that a divine person gestated in the womb of Mary. But a divine person is rightly called “God” on traditional Christian teaching. So, God gestated in the womb of Mary. (For Aquinas on this question, see here.)

If we call Mary the “mother of God”, do we not make her greater than God or at least at the same level as God?

Mary is not greater than God or on the same level as God in any theologically pernicious way, even if we do call her the Mother of God. We must remember that when thinking of Christ, we can consider him with respect to his divinity, but we can also consider him with respect to his humanity. With respect to his divinity, no created thing is greater than him or at the same level as him. None could be.

With respect to his humanity, Mary and Jesus were at the same level in some senses. They were both truly human in a full and complete sense. In some ways, too, she was greater than him – again, with respect to his humanity. As a human son (but not a merely human son) of a human mother, he owed her obedience according to the Law. (For Aquinas’s take on Christ’s submission to the Law, see here.) This should not surprise us, as scripture itself notes Christ’s submission to his parents in Luke 2:51.

We might say that, as her son, she was above him in authority; as her God, he was above her in authority. If we measure greatness all things considered, the whole and entire Christ measured against the whole and entire Mary, we get the answer we expect: Christ is God, and God is greater than Mary in every respect. We should expect that there would be something difficult to wrap our heads around in Jesus’ relationship to Mary. After all, how could a creature be the mother of the Creator? As the 11th century Marian hymn, Alma Redemptoris Mater puts it, “to the wonderment of nature, she bore her creator.” But the fact that this really happened is no more shocking or awe-inspiring than the fact that God became man, that God entered into the ordinary human way of being in the world.

Can we learn anything about God because the Son of God was born of a woman?

Numerous things, no doubt! We see God’s faithfulness to his covenant. This might not be us learning a new thing, but it counts as yet another reason to affirm something we already knew about God. We learn God’s willingness to enter into the quagmire we’ve created for ourselves in being born to a woman, like all of us, and being born to a woman of low standing. (For Aquinas’s take on the value of being born to an espoused virgin, see here; for his take on being born into poverty, see here.) Were he to have simply appeared somewhere, full-formed, one might question his true humanity. Such a birth safeguards his lineage.

Could God have been born a woman?

Yes. Undoubtedly. The medieval disputes about the incarnation were often about whether rationality was required for assumption (“Assumption” is the technical term for what the divine person does to the created nature when that nature is united to the person in a hypostatic union; “hypostatic union” is the technical term for the relation that holds between the divine nature and the assumed nature in a case of incarnation.) This question was disputed. (For Aquinas on what’s required for incarnation, see here.) Whatever the answer to that question, the assumability of a created, rational nature was universally affirmed by Christian thinkers. And so, a female human nature’s being assumed is no more impossible than a male human nature’s being assumed, as both are rational natures.

How is Mary an example for Christian life?

In this time of Advent, we can learn from Mary about saying yes with joy to what God asks of us, and about waiting patiently to see how God will work out His redemptive purposes in our lives and in the world around us. It’s of critical importance that when the angel Gabriel came to Mary, Mary gave God her permission, her fiat, to cooperate with God’s plan for salvation. She used her freedom to offer all she had to be part of God’s work of bringing Christ into the world. There’s a venerable tradition of considering Mary the New Eve, acknowledging the unique way she is able to participate in God’s plan to unravel the harm brought about in the Garden. We see in that tradition both the affirmation of Mary’s freedom and dignity, and her exemplarity in giving her all to God. Twentieth century British author, Caryll Houselander, writes beautifully of Jesus and Mary while Mary was waiting to give birth, “By his own will, Christ was dependent on Mary during Advent: he was absolutely helpless; he could go nowhere but where she chose to take him; he could not speak; her breathing was his breath; his heart beat in the beating of her heart…. In the seasons of our Advent – waking, working, eating, sleeping, being – each breath is a breathing of Christ into the world.” (Houselander, Reed of God) We, like Mary, are called to bring Christ into the corners of the world we inhabit, and to do so with joy and patience.

Thank you again to Drs. Timothy and Faith Pawl! Look for more interviews with the Pawls and others in the near future! If you haven’t read it yet, you can read my interview on Christian Apologetics with Dr. Tawa Anderson here.

Reflecting on the Tower of Babel

The Tower of Babel wasn’t so bad…

Have you ever heard of the Tower of Babel? The story comes from Genesis 11. Genesis is the first book of the Jewish Torah and the Christian Bible. This book relays the story of the world’s creation by God and God’s calling a people to himself starting with Abraham. However, before Abraham is introduced, the book has this story about a tower. The story goes something like this:

A long time ago, the whole earth had one language. After finding a place to settle, the people invented bricks. They used the bricks to build a tower which reached the “heavens” (i.e., sky). They did this with the intention of making a name for themselves (a task later shown to be God’s alone). Therefore, God confused the language of the people and spread them across the earth. This is why it’s called the Tower of Babel—Babel sounds like the Hebrew word for confused.

There’s a lot that could be said about this story. So I want to note a few things I’m not doing. I’m not addressing whether this event happened as a real event in history. Historians, biblical scholars, and theologians disagree within their own fields about this issue. I prefer to focus on what this story means. But I’m also not focusing on many common interpretations. I think some of them are right. For example, Acts 2 seems to obviously draw on this story as a reversal of it. This seems right, but it looks at things differently than I want to here. However, this is not the most common translation in my circles. The common interpretation goes something like this:

The people were evil and wanted to be like God. They couldn’t actually reach heaven, and they couldn’t actually become like God or take over his realm. But they tried, and that’s why God came and confused their language and spread them across the earth. Now we have such a hard time communicating with each other that we will never unite and attempt to take over the world from God. If we could have just avoided screwing up, people would be more similar, and this would be better.

This interpretation has some truth to it, but it also has some problems. I suggest that God’s action here is a good thing. Is it a punishment? Yes. But is it wholly retributive? No. Is it or its results wholly bad? No. Maybe the Tower of Babel is a story of God’s ability to take bad human actions and make them good. As another character in Genesis says, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good…” (Genesis 50:20, ESV).

Why might I argue something like this? Well I take it that God makes us diverse for a reason. I assume God’s actions are done intentionally, for various reasons. I also know that he plays an intimate role in the creation of every human (e.g., Psalm 139:13). Because of his actions in showing generosity to people of all nations in the Old Testament and his desire for non-Jews to join the family of God as explained in the New Testament, I know God likes ethnic diversity. God doesn’t prefer anyone on account of their ethnic background. God doesn’t consider the whole world condemned for speaking different languages despite the common interpretation of the Tower of Babel presented above. Therefore, if God likes ethnic diversity and diversity of other kinds, then perhaps it’s not a stretch to say that God uses humanity’s evil actions (like the Tower of Babel) to bring about good things (like ethnic, geographic, and linguistic diversity).

I could be wrong about interpreting the story this way. I also am aware that even if I’m right, there’s more going on in this story than just that. It’s also true that ethnic diversity brings with it many issues and opportunities for human sinfulness. I just want to suggest a possible interpretation where God actually brings about something good from the sinful actions of humanity. I do not pretend this is a correct response, but I would love to talk more about it with you. Please leave a comment or send me a message with your thoughts.

Christian Apologetics with Tawa Anderson

In this article, I interview Dr. Tawa Anderson about Christian apologetics. Anderson is an Associate Professor of Philosophy and Assistant Director of the Honors Program at Oklahoma Baptist University. He co-authored An Introduction to Christian Worldview: Pursuing God’s Perspective in a Pluralistic World which released in 2017. Anderson frequently speaks on issues concerning Christian apologetics, worldview, and philosophy for churches, seminaries, universities, and schools.

Thank you to Dr. Anderson for taking the time out of his schedule to answer these questions for us. My questions and comments appear in bold font, and his responses follow them.

Could you please define and briefly explain “apologetics”? What are its purposes and goals? How does it relate to Christianity?

Apologetics, in general, is the reasoned defense of a particular position, belief, or worldview. An apologist provides evidence and arguments for their stance. Christian apologetics, then, is the explanation and defense of the Christian faith, in fulfillment of the Apologetic Mandate in 1 Peter 3:15 (Always be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have).

There are, I think, four primary purposes/goals of Christian apologetics, which can be related to the thrust and audience of apologetics. There are two thrusts of apologetics: positive and negative (or offensive and defensive). Positive apologetics sets forth reasons to believe that Christianity is true, while negative apologetics responds to objections (or doubts or questions) that others have with respect to Christianity. There are also two audiences for apologetics: evangelistic and devotional. Evangelistic apologetics focuses on those outside the Church and seeks to provide reasons for them to consider the claims of Christ. Devotional apologetics focuses on those within the Church and seeks to strengthen them in the faith.

1. Positive evangelistic apologetics seeks to give non-Christians reasons to believe that Christianity is true: this is the evangelistic function of apologetics.

2. Negative evangelistic apologetics seeks to respond to the doubts and objections that skeptics bring against the faith, providing them with reasons to not disbelieve in Christianity: this is the pre-evangelistic function of apologetics.

3. Positive devotional apologetics seeks to give Christians reasons to continue believing that Christianity is true, providing them with more confidence and boldness in holding and sharing their faith: this is the discipling function of apologetics.

4. Negative devotional apologetics responds to the natural questions and doubts that arise in the minds of believers, providing reasons to not start disbelieving in Christianity: this is the preservative function of apologetics.

So, in summary, I think apologetics serves as pre-evangelism, evangelism, discipleship, and preservation.

As Western civilization becomes increasingly post-Christian, there will be an increasing need and call for strong apologetic ministries of all four types. Christians find their beliefs under intellectual and social attack at every turn, and need to be able to see strong rational and evidential defenses for the core tenets of orthodox Christianity.

What led you to study apologetics?

I had the privilege of serving for seven years as the English Pastor at Edmonton Chinese Baptist Church. Our congregation was nearly all younger than me (and I was young at the time!): junior high, high school, and university students. These were predominantly sharp and thoughtful young men and women, who had lots of questions and doubts about Christianity. They would also bring friends to the church who were not Christians, and these friends would also have lots of good questions about the faith. I also served as part-time chaplain at the University of Alberta, where I would meet and talk regularly with dozens of college students with, again, lots of good and deep questions about life, the universe, and everything.

In the context of ministry, I was basically ‘forced’ into apologetics. The Holy Spirit made it clear to me that it was my responsibility as their pastor to walk alongside people amid their questions and doubts, and seek to help them find reasonable answers to the questions and resolutions to their doubts. So as they would ask questions, I would read and study in order to help them answer those questions. I found the process, frankly, both exhilarating and exhausting. I loved mentoring and shepherding young adults with serious questions and doubts—the answers I found were not always satisfactory to them (or to me), but the process of questioning and seeking was very rewarding.

So while serving as pastor and chaplain, I fell in love with apologetics, and became convinced of the necessity of apologetics in contemporary ministry.

Eventually, that love led to a calling back to school, to pursue a doctorate in philosophy and apologetics.

You are currently writing a book on apologetics. What material do you hope to cover? And what has been your approach to the topic?

The book I’m currently writing is intended to be an accessible lay-level introduction to apologetics. I am primarily focused on positive apologetics—that is, presenting reasons to believe that Christianity is true—which will hopefully resonate with Christians and normal people (those who are not Christians) alike.

My approach to positive apologetics is known as the ‘classical’ or ‘two-step’ approach. The first step is providing evidence and arguments for the existence of God (the classical God of western monotheism—omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent). The second step is providing evidence and arguments for the deity, atoning death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth—the central historical and doctrinal claims of Christianity specifically.

I should mention that I do not believe the evidence and arguments for God or for Christianity to be what philosophers would call demonstrative (or conclusive). That is, the reasons I present do not arrive with 100% certainty at the truthfulness of the conclusion. I don’t think that any apologetic arguments can do that—for Christianity or for any other position or worldview!

What role do you think apologetics plays in belief formation?

In general, I think apologetics plays a relatively minor role in bringing people to Christian faith. William Lane Craig draws a helpful distinction between knowing and showing that our faith is true.

Craig argues that most of us know our faith is true primarily via ‘the self-authenticating witness of the Holy Spirit.’ That is, we come to faith in Christ through experiencing the redemptive power of Christ in our lives. Oftentimes, however, apologetics lurks in the background of that personal experience. For example, in my own life, my conversion to Christianity was very immediate and experiential—God reached down and grabbed a hold of me, convincing me directly of my need for a Savior. But in the two years prior to my conversion, I had four Christian friends who were answering questions I had, and providing reasons that I ought to consider Christianity. In terms of conscious awareness, their apologetic and evangelistic efforts did not play a part in my coming to faith; but behind the scenes I have no doubt that they were instrumental in paving the way for me to come to the cross of Christ.

Thus, again, in terms of coming to faith, or (in Craig’s words) knowing that our faith is true, apologetics plays a more minor role.

But when it comes to showing that our faith is true, apologetics is front and center. If we are going to share our Christian faith with those outside the walls of the church, we need to be able to identify good reasons and evidence that supports the truthfulness of Christianity—and this is increasingly important as society continues to move in a post-Christian direction.

Furthermore, while apologetics may have relatively little to do with becoming a Christian in the first place, I think apologetics is essential in remaining a Christian, particularly in a hostile post-Christian culture.

In what ways do you think local churches ought to promote apologetics?

In every way possible. First, church leaders must always be cognizant that there are non-Christians in their midst, who will not just take their word for things. Skeptics need to be given reasons to consider the faith, arguments that support the contention that Christianity is true. Second, church leaders (pastors, preachers, teachers, etc.) must also recognize that the most difficult questions and doubts may exist in the hearts and minds of the most faithful Christ-followers in their midst. So, taking these first two pieces together, we must always preach and teach with the awareness that there are people with doubts, questions, and objections who are listening.

Third, because of that, we can and should cultivate a church culture of openness, where it is safe to share one’s doubts and questions and thoughts. We as church leaders should never feel threatened or attacked when people in the congregation (Christian or not) ask difficult questions—the questions are out there anyway, and it is far better if they can be asked and answered in a healthy, faith-nurturing fashion by church leaders.

Fourth, we need to live a life of constant growth and study, seeking answers to people’s questions and resolutions to people’s doubts. That will mean reading works by snarky skeptics, honest doubters, wavering disciples, and confident apologists. If people in our congregation are reading Richard Dawkins, we should read Dawkins to be familiar with his thoughts and arguments, and we should read Alister McGrath (or others) who respond forcefully to Dawkins.

Fifth, there are tremendous apologetics resources available, in print, online, via video, etc.—we can and should make these resources available to folks as readily as possible, so that they have the means of seeking answers to their own questions and resolutions to their own doubts. The long-term goal should be discipling a congregation of confident apologist-evangelists, who are solid in their faith, who grasp the rational and evidential foundations for orthodox Christianity, and who are passionate about defending and sharing that faith in the public marketplace.

What advice would you give someone interested in apologetics who’s unsure of where to start?

I’ll mention a few very helpful resources that can get someone started in apologetic equipping.

First, in print, the series of books authored by Lee Strobel are accessible, and provide very helpful introductions to major questions while also pointing readers in the right direction if they want to dive more deeply into particular subjects. The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, and The Case for Easter are particularly helpful.

Second, for online apologetics ministry, the cream of the crop is http://www.apologetics315.com – an apologetic clearing-house which has helpful articles as well as links to apologetic ministries around the world. You can find literally everything there!

Here are a few more helpful suggestions:

C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity – excellent communicator with some persuasive arguments.

Timothy Keller, The Reason for God and Making Sense of God

William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith, 3rd edition – also his website, http://www.reasonablefaith.org

Thank you again to Dr. Anderson! Look for more interviews with Tawa Anderson and others in the near future! If you liked the content, please like this post and leave a comment. To receive updates when more interviews are released, subscribe to the blog with your email.