Primary Audience – My post-evangelical friends who have abandoned apologetics.
Secondary Audience – Those who have no idea what I mean by post-evangelical and perhaps place too high of an emphasis on apologetics.
Like many Christians, I went through an apologetic phase. I got excited about people like Lee Strobel, handed out Case for Christ, the sequel Case for Faith, and the lesser known but probably his best work Case for the Yankees to everyone I knew. I also had a life-size poster of Ravi Zacharias wearing a No. 23 jersey dunking over Nietzsche. It was pretty cool.
What I liked about apologetics is that it allowed a place for philosophy and the sciences. For me, it encouraged thinking, logic and dialogue. Further I found the proclamations and defenses helpful in understanding and sharing my Christian faith.
But over the years, my appreciation for apologetics lessened because I found that at times, it was actually a counter-productive way of sharing the Christian faith. Further, it often led to unhelpful arguments, and frankly many times, most people didn’t really care about it. I hated the endless debating, the “us versus them”, the posturing, etc. I remember hearing things like, “When an atheist says this, counter with this …” Later I found it to be objectifying of people and it dehumanized those Jesus called me to love.
Over the years, I have met many different types of atheists/agnostics/skeptics. Most of them are hurting people and I believe many of them, despite what they say, are searching. I often wonder if sometimes our arguments actually have an adverse effect and push them further away from God. Now certainly, I don’t think skeptics are going to be nearer to God if we answer questions with blank stares and shrugged shoulders and this among the reasons why I have not given up on the discipline of apologetics.
I sometimes feel surrounded by people (physically and online) who perhaps over-emphasize the importance of apologetics and those who have dismissed it entirely. To the former it seems we may have to reconsider the importance, the practice and the ethic that it should be complimented by. To the latter, I wonder if it’s because we have been beat over the head so many times with it that we are simply too turned off to appreciate it’s helpfulness.
It’s important to remember that there is a lot of goodness in discussions that place a Christ-like value on the person you are discussing such matters with. Conversation is essential and the “us dialoging with others” and others with us, and the positioning of being in a time/place where we can share our hearts.
I think it’s important that believers have an understanding of what we believe and be able to articulate why we believe. It’s something that we try to do in our student ministry. We say regularly, “Don’t inherit your parents’ faith, it will fail you. Faith must be owned by you …”. Apologetics, theology, social justice practices, corporate worship, spiritual formation are all necessary in the nurturing of young disciples.
From where I sit, there is a another population in the Church that could really benefit from refuting things like the “Swoon Theory” and “The Legend Theory” or understanding the critiques and responses to the new atheists like Hitchens, Dawkins and Harris. Throughout the centuries, there has always been an intentional undermining of the resurrection of Jesus, and while we cannot ever prove that Jesus rose from the dead, I think in this postmodern era, it is beneficial to present a case that says at the very least, “It could have happened and in faith I choose to believe it did.”
Everything has a context and I think apologetics has a place too. No one can prove “faith”. That’s exactly what faith is. In fact, “proving faith” is an oxymoron. The moment you prove faith you contradict Hebrews 11:1 – one of the most quoted passages of Scripture.
I think some of my fellow seminary-trained, well-read, post-evangelicals get frustrated with apologetics because too much stock has been placed on it. I submit that we are tired of it because we have gotten so much of it. Could it be that we are suffering from an apologetics hangover? I think it’s time we consider its benefits and perhaps invest energies in reframing this discipline of study in our postmodern culture.
As always feel free to disagree/pushback/etc. What do you think – is there a place for apologetics today?
As helpful as I find ministry conferences, seminars, events, and meet-ups are, there have also been countless times where I have walked away from such an event feeling a mixture of inadequacy and excitement. I have heard similar from countless others. Sometimes you leave motivated and inspired, sometimes enthused and envious. Sometimes you’ll be with a bunch of attendees and talk about someone’s “successful ministry” and eventually someone will say, “Yeah, we could do that too if we had his money or his looks, or lived in the South or had an English accent or (fill in the blank here). Some of it is potentially true but some of it’s mediocrity disguised as a disillusioned self-pity. That said, Todd Rhodes has an 
But I was wrong. We did sit in round tables and there was time after each presenter to ask a question or respond to what was said and there was a guy there that reminded me of Meatloaf but it wasn’t what I thought it would be and that was a good thing. I didn’t see a big clergy-style pity party, I didn’t hear desperation, and it wasn’t a pathetic display of overly-emotional speakers outdoing each other’s nightmares and offering a bumper sticker sermon at the end – “But I still trust God!”. And fortunately, no country music was played.
I was interested in reading The King’s Cross for a couple reasons. One, it’s on the book of Mark and we just finished teaching that in Sr. High Sunday School class (yep, as I was reading I had plenty of thoughts of, “Oohh I wish I would have used that illustration.” There were a also a couple of thoughts of “Hmm, I’m not sure he’s right about that one but hey, who am I? ;)
I know some of my Twitter friends are CS Lewis-ed Out. I get that, he gets quoted quite a bit but he has so much good stuff, I still find that he’s really worth reading. I like that Lewis is not an evangelical but appreciated by so many. I have always liked how he was able to bring his pre-conversion thoughts and address them post-conversion. I liked how he struggled to find faith and how he honestly wrote about doubt and hope. Further, I like natural law, I admire his mind and I love knowing that he would be completely disappointed with how his Narnia world has been adapted to film today.
Perhaps my favorite part was the Terry telling of the story of Abraham and Sarah. He asked is there any greater comedy than humor about and between men and women? Both created in the image of God but among other things, so much humor is found too. He recreated the encounter well with Abraham and Sarah and highlighted the part where Sarah laughs. Indeed the thought of their geriatric love-making and conceiving at this age is funny (but don’t think about it. Really. I’m just trying to help. Ok, fine think about it). Instead of rebuking Sarah for laughing, God blesses them and tells them to call their son “Isaac” which we all know means “laughter”. God understands humor, He’s the creator of it, and among the blessings that He bestows on those He loves is children and laughter. As a young dad, there is a world of pleasure and goodness in that thought.
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