Why Care about Apologetics? —Daniel Yoder — Ep. 203

What is Christian apologetics, and, uh, what role should it play, um, for for believers, um, or for people who are, um, not yet believers or maybe, um, on the fence?

So we continue our series, um, uh, related to doubt and faith, uh, with Daniel Yoder. And this episode, um, Daniel will give us, um, a brief introduction to Christian apologetics, um, what it is, and, uh, yeah, some context for that. Um, so if we could start, well, how would you answer that question? Uh, what is apologetics, and specifically, um, Christian apologetics? The English word apologetics is derived from the Greek word apologia, which means defense or the act of making a defense. So it is essentially a courtroom word, and that term is used in 1 Peter 3:15. That's one of the classic texts about apologetics. That's a verse that teaches us to be gentle and respectful in the process of giving an answer, of making a defense to those who ask us about the hope that we have as believers.

So we learn in that verse about the readiness that believers should possess to make a rational case for the Christian faith, and we also learn about the attitude that should be demonstrated by believers in that process. So the goal of Christian apologetics is to offer a logical defense of the Christian faith.

So Christian apologetics has been defined as an activity of the Christian mind which attempts to show that the gospel message is true in what it affirms. So an apologist then is someone who is prepared to defend the Christian message against criticism and against distortion, and to give evidence of the credibility of Christianity as well. And I hear you do emphasizing the rational, the courtroom setting.

Um, think of the famous works that were called apologies. Um, before Christianity, Socrates' Apology, when he defended himself, um, in court to the public, and then early Christian writers issuing the various apologies. Um, not as in apologizing, but the rational case.

Um, so yeah, um, what topics, um, go with the realm of apologetics? And maybe, uh, especially for you, what would you consider the most important or some of the most important topics? Well, as I think about the task of apologetics, I think there are really two components of Christian apologetics. One is putting forth evidence that supports the truthfulness of Christianity. I think that could be called positive apologetics. And then a second component is putting forth evidence that displays the bankruptcy of non-Christian systems. And maybe that could be called negative apologetics.

So an examination of the philosophical or scientific evidence for God's existence would be one way of doing positive apologetics. And in contrast then to that, pointing out the absurdities found in the atheistic worldview is an example of negative apologetics, demonstrating the intellectual bankruptcy that's displayed in that particular non-Christian worldview. Now, in terms of the topics that you can address in the introductory Christian apologetics course that I teach at Elnora Bible Institute, I cover a wide range of topics, including arguments for the existence of God, evidence for the truthfulness of the Bible, evidence for the deity of Jesus.

We think about why Jesus is the only way to God. We think about the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus.

We think about the biblical teaching about hell as a place of everlasting punishment for those who reject God. We think about how we should reconcile the existence of a good God with the presence of evil in the world.

So that's a little bit of a taste of some of the topics that would fall under the category of Christian apologetics. And it can be hard to pick one of those that is the most important. The problem of evil is an important topic to address because of how emotionally charged that issue is and how many people can struggle with that, can struggle with that topic. So that's a very practical one to address. And I would also add that the resurrection of Jesus is certainly significant because of how that event provides confirmation for the claims that Jesus made about himself. And certainly, the resurrection is foundational to the Christian understanding of salvation. So those are two that certainly should be given a lot of attention in any discussion of Christian apologetics.

Thinking about the place of apologetics, and especially maybe in relation to faith, um, is this a means of convincing somebody who doesn't believe and being like, "Hey, look, we can show you these arguments for these, you know, to believe this about God"? Or does it have more to do with reassuring believers who are, again, dealing with doubt, maybe some of the kinds of doubt we talked about in previous episodes in this series? I know that you asked an or question, but I think that the answer is yes.

I think the answer is yes to both components of the question. Apologetics can certainly play a role in strengthening believers. Apologetics can benefit believers in numerous ways. So, for example, knowing why you believe in Christianity can make you more confident as you have the opportunity to share the faith with others. So knowing about apologetics can help you become a more bold witness for Christ. And apologetics can strengthen believers by helping them keep the faith in times of doubt and struggle.

If a person is a Christian just because they've had an emotional experience, that's only going to carry them so far when they run into difficulty. And then at some point, they're going to need something more substantial. So if a person's going through hard times and perhaps they feel like God is distant during that time, apologetics can help them remember that their faith is not based on emotions, but it's based on truth, and therefore can help them hold on to that faith. So apologetics, yeah, can be beneficial to believers in a number of ways, as I mentioned. And apologetics can also have a role to play in bringing unbelievers to faith. Now, we need to recognize the limitations of logical arguments and the presentation of evidence.

We're not going to be able to argue people into the kingdom of God purely on the basis of evidence and logic. But apologetic arguments, presenting evidence for Christianity, delivering a rational presentation of the gospel, those types of things can be used to help to break down wrong thinking in the mind of an unbeliever and also plant gospel seeds in their hearts.

Now, ultimately, the Holy Spirit needs to work in a person's life if they are to come to faith in Jesus. And we don't want to lose sight of that fact as we engage in the task of apologetics. Apologetics does care about the evidence, does seek to provide logical arguments for Christianity, but ultimately, the Holy Spirit needs to work if a person is going to accept the evidence. And even if no one is led to faith through the work of apologetics, we should still engage in the task because God has commanded us to, and it has a role to play in strengthening our faith. But I think we can be encouraged by the fact that God has used apologetic evidences to lead people to faith in Jesus.

There are numerous examples of skeptics who have come to faith in Jesus, in part because of their investigation of the evidence. But even if no one is converted, apologetics can still demonstrate to the world that the Christian faith is rational. Apologetics can involve, for example, demonstrating that every counterargument to Jesus' resurrection or every alternative theory to Jesus' resurrection does not stand up to logical scrutiny. So apologetics can play an important role in helping to remove the excuses that people have for not believing in Christianity. And to use the terms you mentioned earlier, it's both the positive apologetics and the, you know, maybe a form of negative apologetics to say these arguments against Christianity don't prove what they purport to prove.

Um, good. Yeah. So the next, um, two questions here, uh, follow up a little bit on that. Um, so first, um, you said the Bible commands us to do apologetics. Um, and I know you mentioned in the introduction that passage from 1 Peter, um, but yeah, you fleshed that out a little bit when you say, what does apologetics have to do with the Bible and being a command? Um, and, you know, apologetics as we know them today, is that, uh, directly biblically based? There are some Christians who think it's unbiblical to do apologetics, but I think that thought overlooks the fact that Jesus and the apostles used apologetics. So I would appeal to the example of Jesus and his apostles in responding to that question.

Jesus, for example, appealed to how he fulfilled prophecy. He also appealed to his miracles as evidence that he is the Messiah. So, for example, in Luke 24, verses 25 through 27, as Jesus is speaking to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, he referred to what the prophets spoke. He asked those men walking beside him, "Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?"

And then we read there that beginning with Moses and all of the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. So Jesus was explaining to them how our Old Testament looked forward to his coming.

And we could also mention John 14, verse 11, where Jesus says, "Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves." And those works would certainly include Jesus' miracles and probably his other actions and teachings as well. So Jesus is appealing there to fulfill prophecy into his miracles as evidence that he is who he claimed to be. And in the book of Acts, the resurrection of Jesus is a miracle that the apostles emphasized in their preaching. So in Acts chapter 2, for example, during his sermon on the day of Pentecost, Peter appealed to Jesus' fulfillment of prophecy and to Jesus' miracles and to Jesus' resurrection as evidence that Jesus is the Messiah.

So he was addressing an audience there of Jews and demonstrating that Jesus is the Messiah, that Christianity is true. We also see in the book of Acts, though, Paul addressing non-Jews, like in Acts 14, verses 15 through 17. And in that case, Paul sought to show the existence of God or demonstrate the existence of God through God's handiwork in nature. So he laid the groundwork of God as the Creator, the living God, the one who made the heavens and the earth, the sea and everything in them.

And Paul explains there how God has revealed himself to those people who didn't have access to Scripture. Paul explains that God has revealed himself through the created order. And he makes an important comment there that God did not leave himself without witness, but he did good to those people by giving them rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying their hearts with food and gladness. But God did not leave himself without witness.

Knowledge of God is accessible through creation. God does desire to provide evidence of his existence. And that's consistent with Romans 1, verse 20, which says that from nature alone, all men can know that God exists.

We could also mention 1 Corinthians 15, verses 3 through 8, where Paul appealed to eyewitness testimony of Jesus' resurrection. So I think the example of Jesus and the apostles is significant, important to appeal to, and I think we can follow their example in providing evidence for Christianity.

So I hope that that provides enough justification for my view that apologetics is biblical. It's commanded in the Bible, and we have accounts in the Bible that provide examples of apologetics in practice. Yeah, good. And I find it interesting that maps onto the talked about factual doubt and philosophical doubt, and those apologetics map onto both the historical, factual, and the philosophical side of apologetics.

I guess this is kind of objection, or maybe it's just a practical question. I don't know.

Um, you know, modern culture, Western culture, we have all this, all these questions about facts and reason and, you know, what we used to still do talk about as postmodernism. Um, is there a sense that apologetics of the same sort doesn't have the same kind of effect or potency as it might have for, um, previous generations? And then, you know, if so, what's the place of apologetics in 2023 in the secular Western world? So there are certainly people in the culture around us who would deny truth, even deny any notion of truth or any concept of truth. I think to a certain extent, we could just ask, so what?

Just because they're abandoning truth doesn't mean that we have to. And one of my apologetics professors emphasized that we should stand up for the truth, even if no one else cares about it. So yes, the concept of truth is under attack by many in our culture today. That might make it tempting for us to abandon our commitment to truth and to reason and to facts.

But if we abandon those things, then I think we're also abandoning any possibility we would ever have to lead people to Jesus because you can't reach a solid conclusion if you have a defective starting point. So I think one component of my answer is we don't have to abandon the concept of truth just because other people are doing it.

Now, with that in mind, we do need to be aware of the culture in which we live, the ideas that are circulating, the different philosophies that are influencing people today. And our starting point in apologetics should always be determined by our audience. So I referred earlier to the example of Peter, who used apologetics in Acts chapter 2.

In Acts 17, verses 22 through 31, Paul took a very different approach than Peter did in Acts 2. In Acts 17, Paul was presenting the gospel to an audience that was influenced by Greek philosophy. And one notable difference between those two passages, Acts 2 and Acts 17, is that Paul did not use Scripture. Now, Peter, by contrast, appealed to how Jesus fulfilled Old Testament prophecies.

And so, even though we don't have time here to analyze Paul's approach in that chapter, I think a basic question is, why did Paul take that approach? Why did Paul not appeal to Scripture? Why did Paul begin his gospel presentation where he did, which was with the doctrine of God?

I think the simple answer is that he did so because he knew his audience. And so we also need to know our audience. Paul had a very different starting point than Peter did. So we need to know our audience, and we need to have some spirit-directed creativity to help us adapt our gospel presentations to our audience. Now, we don't adapt the message, but we should be willing to adapt our presentation of the message. So those are just a few thoughts about a really significant question. So I feel like I'm throwing a lot of objections at you, but they're also helping to flesh out what apologetics is. So that's good.

So the final one is, again, the observation that Anabaptists and, you know, some of our churches traditionally like to say, well, look at our lives more than our words. And we might say that because we're really conscious that words can be empty or hypocritical. But, you know, that can mean that, as Anabaptists, we tend to be more quiet or we don't work as hard at developing well-reasoned arguments and, you know, compelling rhetoric or presentation, um, as you gave it. So how does apologetics fit with Anabaptist tradition? Well, that small question might take us into the far reaches of my understanding, but the early Anabaptists certainly did not regard themselves as professional apologists or professional theologians or philosophers.

And in fact, they tended to be very suspicious of eloquent theologians whose lives did not match the message that they proclaimed. But I do think that the early Anabaptists should be given more credit, though, for the commitment to defending the faith that they did demonstrate.

The early Anabaptists did need to offer defenses of their faith. For example, in response to accusations of heresy directed at them by both Roman Catholics and the Protestant Reformers, the Anabaptists defined themselves as Bible-believing Christians. And there were some military impulses within the early Anabaptist movement as well. And in response to those impulses, the early Anabaptists defined themselves as being peaceful and law-abiding. So they were willing to clarify misconceptions and offer responses. And again, they didn't regard themselves as professional apologists, but they were willing to confront people with the fact of Jesus' Lordship, and they were willing to help people think about the implications of that Lordship. So their gospel presentations perhaps tended to be more simple, but they were evangelists, and they did offer a defense of the Christian faith.

They did confront people with the claims of Christ. And the early Anabaptists recognized, and rightly, I think, that apart from regeneration by the Holy Spirit, apart from the new birth, no one can rightly understand and interpret the Scriptures. So they did take people to Jesus himself. And the gospel is about more than information. It is about transformation.

And the early Anabaptists emphasized that those who are obedient to Jesus and follow him in life will be led into all truth. So there's no substitute for surrendering to Jesus' Lordship. And yes, this is far from a complete answer, but offering a simple defense of the faith and pointing people to new life in Jesus is something to which the early Anabaptists were committed.

And I think we can follow their example in that regard. And I think a strength of the Anabaptist movement was their commitment to living lives that matched their message. So I would say that we should strive to be as eloquent as possible in both our message and in our modeling of that message.

Yeah, thank you. And it also struck me, you mentioned apologetics originally has the, um, you know, it's a word that comes from the courtroom setting. If you're talking 16th-century Anabaptists, why'd they had to do that too? They had to actually give their defenses in court. Thank you for joining us for this episode. We invite you to join our monthly partner program. Monthly partners are key to the financial sustainability of Anabaptist Perspectives. Partners also gain access to bonus content, including our exclusive podcast where we respond to audience questions and comments. Sign up at anabaptistperspectives.org.