Why Apologetics?

Apologetics is defense.  The word may be used more generally, but it also carries the specific connotation of defending the faith.   There is such a thing as Christian apologetics.

Why does Christian apologetics exist?  The text most often cited to defend the defense of the faith is 1 Peter 3:15.  But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect...

This particular text written by Peter came into existence, not in the midst of deep and tiring academic debates, but rather in the context of an emerging Christianity that was quite bloody.  Just as Jesus was crucified, so his early followers often suffered, especially under the Roman emperor Nero.  Peter was eventually crucified for following Jesus; it is believed that he asked to be crucified upside down because he considered himself unworthy to be crucified the same way as his Lord.  Christians were being called on to give an account, by both Jews and gentiles, for the hope that they had, and often their very lives were at stake. 

It is an entirely reasonable question to ask someone, "Why do you believe what you believe?"  That is also an entirely reasonable question to ask yourself.  For the Christian, I believe that 1 Peter 3:15 means that our answer should not simply be, "just cause I do."  Or, "cause my parents did."  If someone asks you why you have hope, don't give them just a blank stare.  For the occasional person who is truly seeking and wondering if there is anything to this faith beyond some nice metaphors and a social club, we owe it to them to have a better answer.  When the difficulties of life would bring us doubts, we owe it to ourselves to really examine things, instead of ignoring the difficult questions by drowning them out with chatter and noise.

To have doubts without dealing with them, acknowledging them, looking them in the face is like having a relative die, ignoring it, and stuffing her in the closet.  Without a proper burial (or without a resurrection), grandma is going to start smelling, and febreeze ain't gonna cut it.  To ignore the stench is denial, but for many people it is just business as usual.  "Don't make me think too hard or bother with whether this stuff is actually true.  Just give me some good singing on Sunday and I'm happy." 

There is a danger for the Christian when his faith becomes completely divorced from knowledge.  Let me take a detour to explain what I mean... 

I dare you to believe in unicorns. 

You can't do it.  You can't just manufacture a belief for which you perceive no good reasons to adopt that belief.  It is impossible. 

Every new possible belief must come and find its place in the world of your prior beliefs.  If the new candidate is at odds with a lot of deeply held prior beliefs, it is going to have a harder time finding a spot.  Therefore, the burden of proof is going to be understandably higher.  Allowing it a spot may require some struggle and the unseating of older cherished beliefs. 

For many new beliefs, we have substantially no problem letting them in.  For instance, if in conversation I were to tell you, "It was a beautiful sunny day in Fayetteville today," you would probably accept that.  You have no good reason, I suppose, for thinking that I would want to lie about that.  You probably have no prior beliefs there to challenge this.

Kids are generally more accepting than adults.  (If they are inquisitive, they will believe you but ask "why" a lot.)  They do not yet have an extensive set of prior beliefs.  That is why they more often than not simply accept what their parents or teachers tell them.  In a sense they are sort of like blank slates.  (This is a humbling responsibility for parents and educators.)

If you tell a two-year-old that unicorns are real, they are far more likely to accept that than you have been.  But if they accept that, have they just manufactured a belief out of thin air?  Have they accepted something that they have no good reason to believe?  Their reason lies in the fact that they trust you, just like you presumably would trust me about the weather.  They do not yet have good reason to believe that unicorns aren't real, and unless you have just stolen their lollipop, they will probably trust you when you tell them something. 

 But you are not a kid, and we are bound to move this analogy into deeper waters...  If you are old enough and patient enough to read and follow all this, you are old enough to have some deeply held prior beliefs, whatever they may be, and it is through those beliefs that you will filter all that I am saying.

Some beliefs come in meekly and take their place quietly in a corner.  Other beliefs, by their very nature, come in like a bull in a china shop.  They leave no stone unturned.  These sorts of beliefs are the ones that turn our lives and our way of thinking upside down because they touch nearly everything else.  We are not settled until the bull either leaves or finds its place. 

Some of the following types of questions seem to invite responses that look rather bull-like:

Who am I?  Where do I come from?  Where am I going?  Why am I here?
What is the good life?  How do I go about living it?  What really matters in life?
Is there such a thing is truth?  How do I find it? 
What is wrong with the world?  Why is there suffering?  Why is there evil?
How should we go about fixing the world?
How should I go about understanding my world?  Who can I really trust?  Is it possible for me to reliably know anything?
What happens when I die?  Anything?
How should I relate to my fellow man?  Do I have any obligation to my fellow man?
Has this world always existed?  Did it come into existence?  Why does the world exist?
Could things have been different?  Do I have freedom, or is my freedom an illusion?
Is right and wrong a real thing, or did we just make it up?
Is God real?  What is he like?  Can he be known?  Should I try to know him? 

It is certain that any given person will have more or less detailed answers to these questions.  Their answers to these questions may sometimes be contradictory.  Different people will have given variable amounts of time to thinking through these things, and different people will have differing levels of justification for their answers. Some people will even think these questions are not even important or that the answers are unknowable... which are also ways of answering them.

I would contend that truly gaining or truly losing faith will be like one of those bull-in-a-china-shop experiences for someone who is earnest and has their eyes open, for someone who is self-aware and searching.  (And the bull may cause its fuss in an instant or over the course of years.)  For the child, gaining faith - or not - generally happens more easily with less fuss and struggle.  These questions, for them, receive relatively uncontested answers.  But the older you get, a reversal on any one of these major questions is going to have ramifications for the things you already believe and the things that you will come to believe in the future. 

This is what it means to have a worldview.  Everyone has one.  It is simply a lens through which you see the world and filter new experiences.  One way of saying this is that all new information or knowledge is interpreted; there is no such thing as raw knowledge.  No one is truly neutral.  (I would add that, while this humbles us and causes us to examine ourselves, it does not logically follow that no one can know truth.  All knowledge is interpreted knowledge, but this does not mean that there is not true knowledge.  Tongue-twister!  Or at least mind-twister.)

I stated that the experience of losing faith can be like the bull-in-a-china-shop experience if the person is earnest and self-aware and generally awake to what they really believe.  But losing faith is not like that for everyone.  For some it is a slow fade, and instead of a bull, doubts can come in like a silent assassin and begin poisoning and quietly taking out unsuspecting prior beliefs.  This is what I meant by the dead-granny-in-the-closet-slowly-decomposing analogy.  You wake up one day and realize that you no longer believe.  This happens to a lot of church kids who wake up one day in college and realize that they don't really believe it all anymore.  It is now a nice childhood memory like Santa Claus. Why?

And the answer brings me to close the lengthy loop that I opened up a while back.  I stated that there is a danger for the Christian when his faith becomes completely divorced from knowledge.  And I think that's what happens to too many people.  There are many people who profess Christianity and have made a commitment to it who do not really believe it... or who no longer believe it.

The former-Christian-now-something-else originally picked up answers to all the worldview questions quickly (and sometimes without giving it much thought), and perhaps they really believed and had reasons for believing their answers.  But life sends suffering their way that is not easily explained, or it sends friends who don't fit neatly into their pre-existing categories, or it sends professors who give new intellectual challenges.  And this person - the one who doesn't have the bull-in-a-china-shop experience - just sort of ignores the cognitive dissonance and the battle that needs to happen.  But the foundations for those prior beliefs are now shaky and maybe gone. 

Perhaps this person does eventually become openly atheistic or agnostic.  I know some who have.  But maybe they don't.  Perhaps for purposes of social conformity or peace of mind or whatever, staying committed to the faith remains an attractive option.  The problem is, this person is now operating like he is trying to believe unicorns are true when he really doesn't believe it.  He is trying to manufacture something out of thin air against what he really now believes.  He is pulling the wool over his own eyes.  Faith has become divorced from knowledge, and when he tries to obey, it is now his will-power that is the driving force, not any sort of knowledge. 

"No problem," says most of the world. "Isn't faith basically belief without evidence?  If I have evidence for something, then I don't need faith."  By this definition, the person who does not see any reason to believe in God but chooses to believe anyway exercises greater faith than the one who is strongly convinced on the basis of reasons.  And some would praise the former, and that praise would tend to demotivate that person from finding or having a reason for the hope that is in him.  So much for Peter's original exhortation. 

Outside of Peter's call to be ready to give a defense, what view do the other biblical writers take of faith?   Paul writes the following in 1 Corinthians 15:17 - And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.  Paul is saying that it really does matter whether what they believe is true.  What is useless faith?  Faith based on a lie.  In other words, there is no good reason to practice Christianity if it isn't true.  And Paul goes on to say that if Christianity only gives us hope for this life, Christians are most to be pitied.  Paul doesn't say, "Just believe."  Just prior in the same chapter, he gives a list of resurrection appearances of Jesus.  And he says that most of these eyewitnesses are still alive, though some have fallen asleep.  In other words, "I am not just making this up.  Don't just take my word for it.  There are still eyewitness of this walking around.  Go find some of them and ask them."  For the skeptic who would doubt Jesus' resurrection, Paul gives reasons.  When Thomas doubted, Jesus did not banish him, but he acquiesced and invited Thomas to examine his wounds to see that it was really him.  I mention these things to show that if you attempt to look at Christianity in the way that it actually presents itself, we do not see a Christianity that wants us to turn our minds off in order to swallow dogma, even if the Church sometimes acts like it.

Consider the apostles.  It is sometimes suggested that Christianity is a hoax made up by the apostles, that they hid Jesus' body to perpetuate the hoax.  Suppose that's the case.  They could have made up some nice-sounding sayings and good moral teachings.  They could have built up some stories surrounding Jesus.  They could say he rose again to give some authority to what they were saying.  But in the end they would have known it wasn't true.  Eleven out the twelve apostles went to martyr's deaths, and all it would have taken for them to live would have been to admit the falsity of their claims.  No one dies knowingly for a lie, much less eleven out of twelve.  The only way you die for something is if you really believe it is true (even if you are mistaken).  Did the apostles die martyr's deaths because Christianity held some nice moral teachings?  No.  They died because they refused to renounce the Lord that they truly believed was risen.  And they believed because they had seen him.  Knowledge was crucial to their faith.

Why apologetics? 

1.  Others may ask why you believe.  They may be sincere in asking.  Peter tells us we should be ready to tell them why.

2.  We are supposed to tell others of Christ.  It is understandable that the world would be opposed to Jesus' last command - it goes against our world's current understanding of tolerance - but Jesus gives his people the Great Commission to make disciples of the nations, to teach them all that he commanded, to baptize them.  If this Commission is to sound like anything other than, "believe in unicorns," to its hearers, we should be willing to address the questions and help to provide an intellectual environment in which the Christian claims are at least intellectually plausible.  Conversion to Christ is one of those bull-in-a-china-shop things, and how Christ connects to everything else, all those prior beliefs, is something we should be sensitive to, even as we realize we will never have all the answers. 

3.  Apologetics exists to strengthen believers.  Apologetics exists so that believers don't have to close their eyes, grit their teeth, and just obey, even when Christianity doesn't appear plausible.  Apologetics does not exist to explain every difficult bit, but there are certainly places where it helps. 

I want to address two more things before I finish this post.  First, what about those who become Christians and it isn't like the bull-in-the-china-shop?  Second, are there other factors that apologists have to keep in mind?


To address the first question, I think there are some people who come to Christianity, but when the Christian idea enters, it comes in like the meek little guy, doesn't say a word or ruffle any feathers, and it settles for a quiet corner in the person's mind and heart.  It doesn't bother to unseat any prior beliefs.  What is going on here? 

I think this person has separated faith from knowledge.  I think this person is not bothering with whether Christianity is true and is instead worrying about some other concern.  For example, is it fashionable?  Does it match with the pants I'm wearing?  Or does it clash?  This is what I would call Christianity without teeth.  You commit to it in some sense, but you don't really believe it, and so there is no inconsistency between holding it and plenty of other beliefs that would seem to contradict it.  The world is very comfortable with Christians of this sort, but then again, this is the sort of Christian who would never bother to tell them that they are wrong about anything.  I think that the churches of the world are flooded with Christians like this.  Low-maintenance, inoffensive, comfortable Christianity.

I don't believe there is such a thing as dabbling in Christianity.  Jesus is clear that we must repent and believe the gospel.  This means believing that he died and rose and is who he says he is.  We must die to ourselves.  I don't think there is a casual half-hearted way to do this.  We don't try on Jesus like we try on a pair of jeans.  Thought experiment: suppose God is real.  How belittling is it to him for us to hold him up and nonchalantly critique him like some pretty rock we picked up on the side of the road.  If he is real, we will look back and think it tragically ironic how often we put him in the dock to grill and judge him when our very sense of justice was given to us by him as a gift - a stream trying to rise above its source... I digress.

This leads me into my final considerations.  I believe, looking back on what I have written, that this makes Christianity seem like a very intellectual, mechanical sort of exercise.  But I would be remiss if I did not say something about the relationship of the head and the heart.  Ultimately, I believe that God is after our hearts.  I believe the mind is meant to work with the heart, and it is a fool who thinks the two can be easily separated or who believes himself above the workings of the human heart.  The heart and the mind influence each other.

The Bible teaches, history confirms, and my own experience shows that the human race is fallen, and my heart is dark.  I do not even live up to the standards that I hold other people to, and my conscience condemns me.  I know that I have a darkened heart that needs healing help of some sort.  Honesty will compel any reader, I am sure, to admit that he is in a similar situation. 

Coming to Christ will likely involve intellectual challenge, but it also is more deeply about a heart change, where the will and emotions are also converted.  The apologist and the evangelist must be sensitive to this.  Peter tells us to give our defense with gentleness and respect.  There is more going on underneath the surface in any encounter with these worldview-type questions than we realize at first. 

I do believe in God, and ultimately I do not think he is looking for a bunch of people to merely acknowledge his existence.  He wants at least that, but he wants more.  He wants people to fall in love with him and worship him.

It has been my goal with this post, not exactly to argue that Christianity is true, but to argue that such an argument is worth having.  Worship provides the most compelling picture for me of why apologetics is worth doing.  Let me explain:  Everyone worships.  Worship is simply the act of ascribing worth to something.  Worship is praising something that we delight in, like, love, or enjoy.  Worship happens all the time at sporting events.  For me worship happens at good steakhouses.  Fogo de Chao!  Check it out.  When I find something I love, it is entirely natural for me to say so.  And I don't want merely to tell others about it - I want them to experience it themselves.  My enjoyment of a thing is increased as I am able to bring others into that enjoyment.  I don't merely want to say, "That was good."  I want to be able to say, "That was good, wasn't it?!"  My faith in Christ is like that.  I believe I have found the most valuable, delightful, wholly good thing in the universe, and I want to share that with others.  And when I share with them the Good News, I want it to be able to hit them with greater force than, "Believe in unicorns.  Maybe we can get a t-shirt made about it!" 

Is it prideful or arrogant to share your beliefs with someone?  Is it prideful or arrogant to believe that you are right and others are wrong?  No.  Everyone does this.  Certainly some people need to check their attitudes, but it seems to me that when you are presented with a potential belief your first question should be, "Is this true?" It should not be, "Is the person presenting this arrogant?"  That is such a distracting consideration, although an understandable one.  I think that every single person, no matter how they fall on whatever spectrum, should not allow prior beliefs to stop them from listening and talking with others.  Really listening.  If you do not know why you believe what you believe, find out.  Worry about the truth before you worry about how believing that truth will make you look in this world.  It was a wise man - and I would say the wisest - who said that the truth will set us free. 

In the end, if God means to have a person, he will get them.  The Holy Spirit blows where he will.  I am thankful that God overcomes objections and dead hearts.  I am thankful for my relationship with him.  Though I have not seen him, I know him.  I pray you will, too.  May this post serve as a dire warning of my long-winded-ness, yet I hope that if you are questioning or thinking that you would see me as a worthy conversation partner.  I promise I can listen as well as talk.