The Warring Christian

The state of affairs in which we find ourselves as Christians is one of perpetual opposition. I have found that it is always healthier if one honestly and accurately sets expectations up front. This way, at least we know what we are getting ourselves into. I don’t know about you, but I am tired. I am tired of the moral degradation of the culture in which I live. I am tired of the irrational arguments opposing Christian belief. I am tired of the sheer volume of people flirting with evangelical Christianity who have no interest in a genuine covenant relationship with Christ. I am tired of the liberal scholars who, at every turn, are coming up with theories aimed at weakening the integrity of the Christian story. And I am tired of the conservative scholars who tolerate them in the name of Christian scholarship. I am tired of the unbiblical virtual campus model and the veiled arrogance behind it and the pastors who are too political to speak out against it. I am tired of the empty emotive rock concert atmosphere called Christian worship in many evangelical churches today. I am tired of Christian leaders who are giving every appearance of accepting outright false teachers all in the name of unity. I am tired of generic Christianity. I am tired of timid pastors who are more interested in building empires, kingdoms, and reputations than they are in applying the truth of God’s Word to the lives of their respective communities with love and grace in holiness and the fear of God. In summary, I am tired.

I have to ask myself, “why am I tired?” A little reflection indicates that I am tired for all the wrong reasons. I am tired because my aim is misguided. I am tired because my motivations and my targets are misdirected. I am tired because what brings me pleasure is not what is supposed to bring me pleasure. I am tired because what is bringing me frustration and pain is the thing that ought to bring me great pleasure. I am tired because my expectations are faulty. They are out of touch with reality. In short, I am tired because my expectations are out of touch with the reality that is clearly presented in divine revelation and I need to do better. There is nothing new about this state of affairs in which I find myself except, that is, for me. I am the variable. The only thing different about this sinful world in which I find myself is me. I wasn’t here and now I am. It’s time for an adjustment to my thinking.  

The Bible Depicts the Christian life as a War

For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. (2 Cor. 10:4) Paul describes the Christian life as one that is a warfare, complete with weapons and all. And in this case, he clearly thinks of these weapons as being designed to destroy an enemy. This charge I entrust to you, Timothy, my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you, that by them you may wage the good warfare. (1 Tim. 1:18) In this case, Paul charges Timothy to he must wage a good warfare! In fact, Paul charges Timothy to wage a good warfare by the prophecies previous made about him. Again, Paul writes to Timothy, Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. (2 Tim. 2:3-4) Paul repeatedly uses military language to describe the Christian life. To the Ephesians, Paul writes, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 6:12) Notice the language again; struggle, powers, world forces, spiritual forces. The Christian way is not for those who want a life of comfort, of luxury, and of ease. The minute the Holy Spirit regenerates your person, you are placed in the most intense battle you will ever know. The New Testament writings could not be clearer. In light of this, the Christian must prepare himself or herself for what is to come. And this “what is to come” will come until you draw your last breath. The Christian life is by definition a life of struggle. When you are born again, both the spiritual forces of darkness and your own spiritual nature immediately respond: THIS MEANS WAR!

Old Testament History as a Depiction of War

Our first parents could not even get to the third generation without violence of the worse kind; murder. Cain murdered his own brother under the most ridiculous circumstances. Sin produces violence, animosity, war! The good that is, exists eternally. It is only to be expected that if evil comes to be in a reality that has eternally existed as good, immediate tension would arise. And so it does. It is for this very reason that tension will not cease until good finally puts an end to evil: perfect good cannot rest until even the slightest evil is destroyed once and for all. We trace this violence to the generation of Noah where it is described in this way: Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (Gen. 6:5) As one traces the accounts recorded in the Old Testament narratives, it is impossible to miss to continuous struggle between good and evil and the constant warring faction between the two! The violence and war are everywhere we read. Consider the prophets and the number of them who lost their lives because they took up the sword of truth against the tyranny of wicked behavior and false teaching! From the fall all the way through the pages of the Old Testament we read of murder and war and violence and exile. It is impossible to miss. What is God telling us? What are we to learn from this? Can we say that both the Old and the New Testaments are setting expectations for us? I think we can. The servant of God is a warrior, continually at war, never at rest. Peace comes in the morning, but so long as we breath, and so long as Christ tarries, it is day. And as long as it is day, there will be war.

Church History and the on-going spiritual battle

To begin with, the evil system of the world took the most perfectly good human who was also divine and subjected him to the most violent death available at the time. God came into the world and the world killed Him. Jesus told us as Christians to expect to be false accused and slandered for His name’s sake: “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matt. 5:11-12) Paul told Timothy, Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. (2 Tim. 3:12-13) One might be tempted to say that this is pretty morbid. And by natural standards, it is. But Christians do not operate by natural standards. Our standards are higher. We remain engaged in this battle, in this war, in the discomfort not for our own morbid interest in fighting and discomfort, but because it is to this that we are called! Good opposes evil. Truth opposes error. Righteousness opposes unrighteousness. It could not be any other way!

Jarsolav Pelikan wrote, “for when the church confessed what it believed and taught, it did so in answer to attacks from within and from without the Christian movement.”[1] From the beginning of the Church, there was opposition from without and from within. This opposition is the result of what happened in the Garden some 6,000+ years ago. The introduction of evil into the reality of good created a tension that has manifested itself ever since. Human beings are either loyal to God or they are loyal to something else. Only God is good said Jesus. If you are loyal to something other than God, and only God is good, and everything that is not good is evil, then you must be loyal to evil. For this reason, early Christians were destroyed by the Romans on several occasions. To refuse to burn incense before the emperor’s image was a sign of treason or at the very least of disloyalty.[2]

The war between the Church of God and the sons of unrighteousness continued throughout church history. Even though he was not excommunicated while living, after his death, John Wycliffe was condemned by the Council of Constance, his remains were removed from the sacred burial place, burned, and his ashes were thrown into the river Swift.[3] William Tyndale, on the other hand, never made it to a natural death. He was arrested for heresy in the Low Countries, he was tried, condemned, degraded from the priesthood, and strangled, and his body was burned (1536).[4]

If you are reading this post and you are in this war, and like all of us from time to time, you feel like quitting, don’t! Don’t ever quit. We need another to be sources of encourage to stay in the fight, to hold up God’s truth, to point the culture to God’s righteous standards, to glorify God in all things. Your church needs you to hold the battlefield line, no retreat, no surrender, not even an inch of ground. The battle is here to stay; are you? It is easy to walk away. It is easy to park it in front of the television and disengage. It is easy to adopt modern methods of consumerism, to go along and to get along. Jesus never called us to “easy.” Jesus called us to division, to tension, to war! In closing, I remind myself and you, of the words of Paul to young Timothy: No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. (2 Tim. 2:4)

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[1] Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971-1989), 11.

[2] Justo L. González, The Story of Christianity, 2nd ed. (New York: HarperOne, ©2010), 22.

[3] Ibid., 411.

[4] Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity, rev. ed. (Peabody, Mass.: Prince Press, 1999, ©1975), 799.

Response to William Lane Craig: Are Christians Utterly Unprepared to Defend Their Faith?

According to a recent article in the Christian Post (CP), Dr. William Lane Craig “believes there is an urgent need for the church to equip its members to give good responses to tough questions about their faith, especially in light of a cultural climate that has made it easier for atheists to be more outspoken, sometimes aggressively so, in their attacks on religious beliefs.”

Craig blames this bleak state of affairs in the Church on movements like the New Atheism. Seemingly, outspoken proponents of atheism have, over time, made good progress removing the stigma that is associated with atheism hence freeing more atheists to come out of their skeptical closets. According to Craig, “Christians should be concerned — and prepared to sway the irreligious.” CP captures Craig’s proposal succinctly: "I think that we need to present a sound case for why we believe that God exists and why as Christians that we believe that He has revealed Himself decisively in Jesus of Nazareth," said Craig. "I believe that if we can do that, we will win over many of these people who are now self-identifying as agnostic or atheist."

Craig goes on to say, "I think that many Christians are intimidated because atheists are often very aggressive," said Craig. "They will attack you personally, and they will do so in the name of reason and intellectual arguments. And many Christians feel utterly unprepared to give a defense of what they believe, and feel unprepared to answer the tough questions that their unbelieving friends will put to them."

I am in complete agreement with Craig’s view that there is an urgent need for Christian leaders to equip their members with the necessary tools to be able to submit to Scripture’s demand in 1 Peter 3:15, “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.” After all, there is a biblical mandate for Christians to defend the truth, to refute those who contradict the gospel, and to provide a reply to anyone that asks for an account of the hope that is in them. Additionally, I think that answer should be in the form of persuasive rhetoric. I do mean rhetoric in a good sense of course. Nowadays rhetoric has a superfluous and erroneous deleterious association. We must work diligently to change that sad truth. The Christian is not interested in winning arguments and proving they, or their worldview are superior to the unbeliever in any way. The Christian that obeys 1 Peter 3:15 does so for two reasons: first, they seek to obey Christ above all else. Second, they hope to persuade unbelievers to forsake their unbelief! However, there is far more to the latter than this post can cover.

I think you might benefit from a glimpse of 1 Peter 3 before I summarize my remarks. Locating our text we cannot help but notice that verse 15 employs the post-positive conjunction δὲ, which the NAS translates, but. This clause actually begins up at v. 13, which reads, “Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good?” According to Runge, “δὲ is a coordinating conjunction like καὶ but it includes the added constraint of signaling a new development. The use of δὲ represents the writer’s choice to explicitly signal that what follows is a new, distinct development in the story or argument, based on how the writer conceived of it.” [Runge, Discourse Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 31] The use of this small conjunction does not only mark contrast (although it can), as many mistakenly believe. What the writer is doing with the use of this particle is breaking the discourse into smaller chunks. This makes it easier for the audience to follow the line of thought or the story, whatever the case may be. Since δὲ functions in this way, sound exegesis dictates that we recognize the marker, and interact with it. The exegete should follow the development the author is creating by the choices he makes.

The process is to go back to the next marker in order to analyze the development the writer is creating. When we do that, we read, “And do not be troubled,” and then we move back again, to the next marker, which reads, “and do not fear their intimidation,” and then we come to what is known in discourse analysis as a point-counterpoint marker. The beginning of v. 14 says, “But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed.” ἀλλά, according to Lunge, “provides a corrective to whatever it stands in contrast with in the preceding context, even if it is positive rather than negative. [Ibid, 56]

Bear with me just a little longer and hopefully the haze will lift. The fact that verse 14 begins with a point is reason for the exegete to identify the counterpoint. In this case it is easy. The counterpoint is v. 13, “Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good?” What English readers do not realize is that v. 13 also has a marker at the beginning, Καὶ. This particle joins v 13 with vv. 8-9. Here we have two paragraphs (8-12 & 13-22) essentially dealing with the issue of Christian apologetics.

Peter sums up his instructions in this section, beginning at v. 8 with the phrase, Τὸ δὲ τέλος̣. Literally it translates, “now the end.” It is the summary of what Peter wants to his audience to hear so far. The use of the phrase is a choice on the part of Peter to grab the attention of the audience. The phrase stands out! The longer discourse unit runs through the end of Chapter 4. The one with which we are concerned takes us to the end of chapter 3. Peter glides effortlessly from his exhortation around Christian virtue, to his desired responses from Christians to external ridicule, to his prompting to good works and not worrying about being harmed if they are doing good works. After quoting a portion of Ps. 34, he advances his discourse to a counterpoint, which takes the form of an interrogative. “Who is there to harm you?” The “point” he is getting at with his point/counter-point discourse is this: “But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed.” The counterpoint is, “One part of a paired set of statements that is usually replaced by a more-important point.” [Runge] The more important point being that the one that suffers for righteousness sake is blessed! The point, counter-point set is used to explicitly link two things together and to draw attention to the “point” in the set. Added to the “point,” Peter uses another marker as he continues to development his argument.

Peter is most surely concerned with threatening behavior from outside the community. Craig uses the same word “intimidate” that Peter uses. τὸν δὲ φόβον αὐτῶν μὴ φοβηθῆτε is the phrase and it literally means do not fear their fear. Do not be frightened by their fear, if you will. The subjunctive with the negative forms a prohibition. As we move to v. 15, we see that Peter employs the use of the particle δὲ once again as he continues to development his argument. Concerning the use of the word apologia, here, Elliot comments, “Occasionally, in the NY the noun apologia (reply) us used in reference to a personal “defense” before juridical officials (Acts 22:1; 25:16; 2 Tim. 2:4). Elsewhere, however, it denotes a reply to accusations of a general rather than legal nature (1 Cor. 9:3; 2 Cor. 7:11; Phil. 1:7, 16). The term apologia is used here in this latter sense, as the context demonstrates. [Elliot, 1 Peter, 627] Consequently, it is not in keeping with sound exegesis to force the meaning of a legal defense on apologia in this context. Such a notion does not come into view given Peter’s context. The proposal that apologia has a formal or legal defense always attached to it is the fallacy of semantic obsolescence. This fallacy presupposes, in this case, that the way Plato used the word in 400 BC has not changed at all. [McManis, Biblical Apologetics] Clearly, the exegetical evidence does not support this conclusion. Words change their meaning over time.

The Christian is to continuously be prepared to provide a reply (apologia) to anyone and everyone that asks. That begs the question, asks for what? The Christian must always be ready to provide a reply to everyone that asks for an account of the Christian hope that resides within. The Greek word “λόγον” is often understood to be related to reason, as in rational justification. This is a bias attached to apologia by the philosopher. Peter uses this word just a few verses later (4.5) where we know such a use could not have been his intention. “But they will give account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” It is an exegetical howler to conclude that Peter was thinking about rational justification as if he were speaking to a class of philosophy majors.

Christians are commanded to be ready to reply with an answer to anyone that asks them to give an account for the reason of the hope that is within them. Notice that the object isn’t even Christian truth. Christian truth comes into play, but only as the ground of the hope that Peter mentions. How does the context of 1 Peter 3 relate to the concerns of William Lane Craig?

First, Craig is correct that Christians must give some thought to being fully prepared at all times to reply to unbelievers when they ask us to give an account of the hope that is within. I could not agree more. I think that such preparation involves sound critical thinking skills. In other words, we must exercise our skills at discerning and testing the spirits. Intellectual indolence does not honor God or anyone else as far as that goes. It is the pastime of purely hedonistic fools to allow the mind to become dull. America has become a nation of dim-witted hedonists. Surely, in time, unless something changes, she will be dominated by another whose people have busied themselves with equipping the mind while dispensing with morality. Sin has the odd tendency to work that way. Not only do more Christians than ever before refuse to think critically, thanks for foolish leaders and rock-star pastors, many of them believe that critical thinking is immoral. This has to change. From that perspective, I agree with Craig’s basic assessment: we must improve apologetic awareness and skill in our communities.

Craig and I disagree in several areas. I want to focus on two fronts. First, Craig thinks that if we present a sound case for why we believe in God, we can stem the rising tide of atheism. The inference is that if we learn just how to reason in a way that the unbeliever agrees with and understands, we can persuade them of the truth of Christian theism. In other words, the reason so many people are self-identifying as atheists and agnostics is because Christians have really bad arguments. However, according to Scripture, that is not the reason for atheism. In fact, there are no true atheists if Scripture is true. According to Scripture the unbeliever holds the truth about God in utter contempt (Rom. 1). The Christian message, that God came in the flesh in order to redeem sinners from eternal damnation is just plain foolish to the unbeliever (1 Cor. 1). Finally, Paul did not follow Craig’s prescription either. “And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.” (1 Cor. 2:4-5)

What Craig and many classical apologists fail to recognize is that Christians are not called to be philosophers and logicians. Moreover, the Christian’s ability to construct compelling arguments is not what changes hearts and minds. Indeed, it is not even what opens hearts and minds. The atheist and agnostic criteria for justification of beliefs, though they vary greatly, will always clash head-on with the Christian’s ultimate authority of justification, namely, Scripture. Only the power of God, which is revealed through the gospel of Jesus Christ by the word of the Holy Spirit on the human heart, can change that!

TAG: Dealing with Conceptual Necessity and Ontological Necessity

One of the questions I heard from the audience at the SES debate between Jason Lisle, Richard Howe, and Scott Oliphint had to do with the idea of conceptual necessity and ontological necessity in TAG. The question was directed at Richard Howe. Unfortunately, Howe did not address the question. So I hope to give it a little more treatment here. I only ask that you recognize this is a theologian speaking and not a philosopher. You may want to note that point when you recognize the obvious absence of philosophical jargon in my post.

TAG is a presuppositional apologetic tactic that stands for the Transcendental Argument for God. In my last post I defended TAG over against the classical method and tried to be as brief and as simple as I know how. I am sure I left a lot to be desired from those who are more adept in Christian apologetics. I humbly request that the reader keep in mind that my goal is to reach a broader audience. I want to stimulate and challenge those who are familiar with this field as well as encourage others to become more familiar with this field. Sometimes that task exceeds the skills and limitations of this blogger’s abilities. But I am working on it every week, bit by bit.

One of the most challenging objections to TAG is the fact that conceptual necessity does not require ontological necessity. Michael Butler frames the problem for us: “The challenge is, this, to bridge the gap between having to believe the Christian worldview because it provides the necessary preconditions of experience and showing that the Christian worldview is true.” Perhaps I should explain what I mean by “conceptual scheme.” A conceptual scheme, in this context, is a way or method of organizing our thoughts and experiences in order to make sense of the world. The underlying premise is that good conceptual schemes are subject to rational justification. Therefore, a conceptual scheme that is irrational should be abandoned. While it is true that Christianity, if viewed as a conceptual scheme, is superior, it does not follow that it is necessarily true. It only means that Christianity provides the necessary preconditions for experience. It simply means that Christianity has succeeded in constructing a way to organize our thoughts and experiences that is impervious to the objections and challenges of its competitors. Hence, conceptual necessity says nothing about truthfulness. In other words, conceptual necessity does not necessarily lead to ontological necessity.

The problem with this objection to TAG is that it is a mistake to view Christianity as merely a conceptual scheme. The Christian apologist is not merely interested in providing the unbeliever with the best or even the only conceptual scheme that makes experience intelligible. He is interested in much more than that. He is interested in proclaiming and defending the truth. He is, after all, not a philosopher as much as he is a Christian theologian, and a follower of Christ. He does not seek to wax philosophical, but rather to confront unbelief with the power of the gospel. He knows that only the power of the gospel can effect what he desperately seeks: radical and supernatural change. It is not an argument he seeks to win, but a heart. He does not enter the intellectual parade that so many others do when they have these discussions. Rather, he seeks to persuade men that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. That no man finds God, or the truth, except through Him!

TAG is a powerful argument because it is constructed upon man’s ultimate epistemological authority, God’s Word. It is an argument that is built upon the fact of God and His creation. What many young apologists seek is something that should be of grave concern to the Church. They seek an approach that is, for the most part, philosophy through and through. In fact, William Lane Craig promotes this sort of pursuit. Richard Howe himself did not pursue a theological education. He is educated in philosophy. For many young apologists, this is the preferred way. Martin Luther wrote, “What are the universities, as at present…schools of Greek fashion and heathenish manners, full of dissolute living, where very little is taught of the Holy Scriptures and of the Christian faith, and the blind heathen teacher, Aristotle, rules even further than Christ. Now my advice would be that the books of Aristotle, the ‘Physics,’ the ‘Metaphysics,’ ‘Of the Soul,’ and ‘Ethics,’ which have hitherto been considered the best, be altogether abolished, with all others that profess to treat of nature, though nothing can be learned from them, either of natural or spiritual things. Besides, no one has been able to understand his meaning, and much time has been wasted, and many vexed with much useless labor, study, and expense.” [Luther, Three Treatises, 4, 92-93, via, McManis see below]

“Instead of writing in clear, perspicuous, practical, accessible language, they {Christian apologists} opt for specialized oft incomprehensible metaphysical terminology that the average Christian does not understand.” [McManis, Biblical Apologetics, 362-3] Clearly, something has gone wrong in Christian apologetics and we must work hard to correct it. The transcendental argument for God is an appeal to the authority of Scripture. Positively, it contends that we have to take God at His word. Negatively, it subjects all non-Christian worldviews to a vicious, but fair internal critique. It demands that they be able to justify their system without contradictions and inconsistencies.

TAG argues for God from the impossibility of the contrary. “A truly transcendental argument takes any fact of experience which it wishes to investigate, and tries to determine what the presuppositions of such a fact must be, in order to make it what it is.” [Van Til, A Survey of Christian Epistemology, 10] For the Christian, no fact can be what it is, apart from God. Every fact is what it is because God has made it to be what it is. However for the unbeliever, it is a remarkably different story. When we turn the guns of reason on the non-Christian worldview, something very interesting happens. The non-Christian worldview, in all its different versions, is shown to be arbitrary, inconsistent with itself, or entirely lacking the preconditions necessary for the intelligibility of knowledge. {Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetic, 513]

I agree wholeheartedly with Clifford McManis when he argues that philosophy has hi-jacked Christian apologetics. This seems profoundly obvious to me. The apologetic mandate of Scripture is given to every single believer. It is within the power of each and every Christian to engage in this practice. It is not reserved for some manufactured office of “apologist,” fabricated by lovers of philosophy. There is no such gift or office, alluded to in Scripture. What is declared in Scripture is that all believers must give a reason for the hope that is in them with gentleness and respect. This begins with the authority of God’s truth, the preaching of the gospel of Christ, and the demolition of every mouth that seeks to subvert God’s truth. That is precisely what TAG seeks to accomplish without compromise.