If people are sharing their faith, they do not ask this question. If people are truly encountering people in a meaningful way in friendship, ministry, evangelism, sooner or later they will encounter people’s barriers or objections to faith.
Christians themselves have the same questions as they are growing in the faith, even doubts. We often suppress or try to deny those doubts because of fear or peer pressure. So apologetics is for Christians to deepen their faith.
Apologetics has a decided offensive component as well. We are clearly called to advance the kingdom of God as a fundamental task under the Lordship of Christ. We are called to be about the process of redemption - of ourselves (sanctification), others (evangelism and ministry), and of the governing ideas of culture and institutions (2 Cor. 10:3-5, Mat. 5:13-16).
Clearly, the culture is in a death spiral and the Church needs to be awakened, equipped, and about the ministry of redemptive engagement. That’s why this ministry[ARC] is here. We return to the exhortations of Christian leaders.
Carl F. H. Henry wrote, “A marked deterioration in American society, indeed in Western society generally, has risen at the very time when evangelicals have been emerging from the subculture into the culture. The implications of this fact are immensely important for Christian communication and apologetics generally and for every evangelical ministry.”
William Lane Craig wrote, “Moreover, it’s not just Christian scholars and pastors who need to be intellectually engaged with the issues. Christian laymen, too, need to become intellectually engaged. As Christians, their minds are going to waste. ONe result of this is an immature, superficial faith.... The results of being in intellectual neutral extend far beyond oneself. If Christian laymen don’t become intellectually engaged, then we are in serious danger of losing our children. In high school and college Christian teenagers are intellectually assaulted on every hand by a barrage of anti-Christian philosophies and attitudes.”
Published on the first page of the Apologetics Resource Center May/June 2002 Newsletter.
1 comment:
I agree with W. L. Craig. Adults (especially fathers) must know, teach, and apply the Scriptures in every context of life for the benefit of self, spouse, and children.
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