Desire as Argument for God

March 20, 2012 By scotmcknight 8 Comments

By Paul Copan:

If humans are multi-dimensional, faith and apologetics must be too.

This final point gets important reinforcement in philosopher Clifford Williams’ excellent and accessible book Existential Reasons for Belief in God: A Defense of Desires and Emotions for Faith.[6] I highly recommend it. Williams argues that we are right to emphasize existential human longings and needs, not simply “reason” or “evidence,” as traditionally understood. Indeed, it is easy for Christian apologists to overstress “reason” and underemphasize “need.”  Yet both are important and are part of a holistic gospel message; both are factors in unbelievers coming to faith.  According to Williams, need is a “triggering condition.”  So no wonder the Jesus’ words reach the very depths of our being when he calls himself the bread of life (Jn. 6:35); when he promises to give “water of life” so that we will never thirst again (Jn. 4:10; 7:38); when he tells those who are weary and burdened that, if they come to him, he will give them rest for their souls (Mt. 11:28-30); when he claims he has come to give the fullest life possible (Jn. 10:10). [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics 8 Comments

Changing Apologetics

February 10, 2012 By scotmcknight 16 Comments

In some ways defense of the Christian faith is the same; in other ways it has changed — for some quite dramatically. Example: C.S. Lewis argued that without God morality is disestablished as a universal. For some this argument is compelling; for many today this argument confirms what one already believes but does not compel faith. Apologetics, then, shifts to meet new counterarguments and new challenges. Good apologists shift because they listen.

I have a question of two for you: What is the most compelling argument for you when it comes to the Christian faith?

In reading this new book by McClymond and McDermott on Jonathan Edwards (The Theology of Jonathan Edwards) I was struck how versatile Edwards was in his apologetics, and in some ways anticipates apologetics in postmodernity. (And in some ways offends the same.) The authors of this sketch Edwards’ apologetics, a topic he never addressed in a book but the man left behind notebook after notebook with detailed discussions of most issues in apologetics.

The context for Edwards’ apologetics is deism, and they observe that much of deism is Christianity diluted. Former Christians became deists, or deists were expressing their beliefs out of a Christian culture so that the reasonable religion and reasonable ethics were de-Christianized or de-supernaturalized remains. Edwards’ own apologetics emerge from William Paley’s evidentialism and Schleiermacher’s religious sense.

They break Edwards’ apologetics into three kinds of arguments: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Church History 16 Comments

Bonhoeffer’s Birthday

February 5, 2012 By scotmcknight 1 Comment

From Fred Sanders, at The Scriptorium Daily, posted yesterday on Bonhoeffer’s birthday.

If you were only going to say one thing about theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), you would tell the story that led up to his death in a Nazi prison on April 9, 1945, at age 39. But today is the anniversary of his birth, so here is a reflection Bonhoeffer’s way of living a Christian life: It was polyphonic. It means hearing at least two melodies simultaneously.

Writing from prison to his friend Eberhard Bethge on May 20, 1944, Bonhoeffer tried to give counsel about how to hold all the scattered pieces of life together during the stresses, the actual bombings, of war. Bonhoeffer, engaged but behind bars, strengthened his friend who was married, had a new baby, and feared the threat of possible wartime separation. He shared with his friend the following powerful meditation on human love and divine love:

There’s always a danger in all strong, erotic love that one may lose what I might call the polyphony of life. What I mean is that God wants us to love him eternally with our whole hearts –not in such a way as to injure or weaken our earthly love, but to provide a kind of cantus firmus to which the other melodies of life provide the counterpoint. One of these contrapuntal themes (which have their own complete independence but are yet related to the cantus firmus) is earthly affection. Even in the Bible we have the Song of Songs; and really one can imagine no more ardent, passionate, sensual love than is portrayed there (see 7:6). It’s a good thing that the book is in the Bible, in face of all those who believe that the restraint of passion is Christian (where is there such restraint in the Old Testament?). Where the cantus firmus is clear and plain, the counterpoint can be developed to its limits. The two are “undivided and yet distinct,” in the words of the Chalcedonian Definition, like Christ in his divine and human natures. May not the attraction and importance of polyphony in music consist in its being a musical reflection of this Christological fact and therefore of our vita christiana? This thought didn’t occur to me till after your visit yesterday. Do you see what I’m driving at? I wanted to tell you to have a good, clear cantus firmus; that is the only way to a full and perfect sound, when the counterpoint has a firm support and can’t come adrift or get out of tune, while remaining a distinct whole in its own right. Only a polyphony of this kind can give life a wholeness and at the same time assure us that nothing calamitous can happen as long as the cantus firmus is kept going. Perhaps a good deal will be easier to bear in these days together, and possibly also in the days ahead when you’re separated. Please, Eberhard, do not fear and hate the separation, if it should come again with all its dangers, but rely on thecantus firmus. –I don’t know whether I’ve made myself clear now, but one so seldom speaks of such things… (from p. 303 of my old edition of the Letters and Papers from Prison)

 

Filed Under: Apologetics, Bonhoeffer 1 Comment

Want to Defend the Faith? Read this

January 26, 2012 By scotmcknight 32 Comments

Some people specialize in apologetics (like Lee Strobel); some apologists love to debate (like William Lane Craig); others approach the issues from subtle angles (like John Polkinghorne). Some are convinced by apologetics and become believers, while the standard observation is that Christians read the apologists and to to hear them and that apologetics then becomes in-house confidence-building. There seems to be a rise of interest today in apologetics and I’d like to commend one scholar, Alister McGrath, who has been at the apologetics task for decades.

What is your favorite apologetics book? What book do you think is the most convincing in our world today?

His newest book, Mere Apologetics: How to Help Seekers and Skeptics Find Faith (Baker Academic), is more or less taking a class on apologetics from McGrath. And the book’s chps are a sketch of major topics, except this book doesn’t read like a textbook and it is tailored more for a new generation (ahem, postmodernity, but it is not kitschy or clever about postmodernity). I highly recommend it for college classes and for adult groups. Apologetics is not for everyone, but those who are so inclined — this is a great place to start.

Any form of apologetics, other than a strict embodiment theory (apologetics is not argument but seen in the Christian community), will have to engage in how the rhetoric will work best, and McGrath sketches it this way: address the specific audience, identify the authorities that carry weight with that audience [I wish more did this], use lines of argument that carry weight with that audience. If you are arguing with a Dawkins type, don’t quote Michael Behe; quote Polkinghorne or some well-known scientist that audience will respond to and not one they will react against. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics 32 Comments

Testing Scripture 2 (RJS)

January 5, 2012 By RJS 43 Comments

Scripture plays a foundational role in the Christian faith on both an individual level and a corporate level. In fact, the centrality of scripture to the Christian faith is hard to argue. It is a self-revelation of God, so Christians believe. The Rev. Dr. John Polkinghorne has written a short book to describe his general approach to scripture:   Testing Scripture: A Scientist Explores the Bible. The first two chapters of this book look at Scripture, that is the nature of scripture, and Development, the way the story and doctrines develop from Genesis through Revelation.

Dr. Polkinghorne is not an evangelical – and he certainly does not subscribe to the US evangelical view of biblical inerrancy. Neither, however, is he a (whisper it) liberal, denying incarnation and resurrection and rationalizing away the miracles. His views on scripture are outlined in the first chapter:

At the heart of the Christian faith lies the mysterious and exciting idea that the infinite and invisible God, beyond finite human powers to conceive adequately, has acted to make the divine nature known in the most fitting and accessible manner possible through the life of a first-century Jew in whom humanity and divinity were both truly present … The Word of God uttered to humanity is not a written text but a life lived, a painful and shameful death accepted, and divine faithfulness vindicated through the great act of Christ’s resurrection. Scripture contains the witness to the incarnate Word, but it is not the Word himself. Its testimony is that “The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only Son, full of grace and truth’ (John 1:14) (p. 2-3)

As a witness to Christ, scripture contains multiple layers – and a central task for the interpreter is to separate the lasting witness of God’s work in the world  from the incidental features of each passing age from Abraham or earlier, through Moses, David, Isaiah, Paul and John to select just a few. As Dr. Polkinghorne points out, and as Scot wrote a book exploring (The Blue Parakeet), no one can eliminate this task of interpretation and separation. The multi-layered view of scripture has been a common one in the New Testament era and through the early centuries of the church. The insistence of a single appropriate interpretation of any specific passage runs counter to history. The New Testament writers made use of the OT scriptures in ways that oppose the notion of a universal unique interpretation. The early church fathers looked at literal, moral, symbolic, and spiritual levels of scripture.

Is Dr.Polkinghorne right to emphasize the Word of God as Jesus?

Is scripture the Word of God or the witness to the Word of God?

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Bible, Science and Faith Tagged With: 43 Comments

Science and Theology 5 – Motivated Belief (RJS)

January 3, 2012 By RJS 66 Comments

Is religious belief merely a faith claim – a personal preference like that for peanut butter?

Last Friday I put up a short post pointing to a column in the Huffington Post by Paul Pardi based on an interview with Professor Peter Boghossian of Portland State University. Dr. Boghossian takes the position that faith claims have no place in the classroom or in the public square. To an extent I agree with him. Students, and all Christians, should be challenged to understand and motivate their beliefs. “Mere” faith claims have no place and do not contribute productively to the classroom or the public square. But religious belief is not merely a faith claim. The Christian faith is a motivated belief that can be explained and defended. I doubt the motivation and defense will satisfy Professor Boghossian. Whether the defense satisfies most or not, it is reasonable for him, or anyone else, to expect a motivated defense of anything that appears to be a faith claim. It is equally reasonable to expect a reasoned defense motivating the faith claim that scientific materialism is more rational than any form of theism.

This brings us to the subject of the last post on the Rev. Dr. John Polkinghorne’s book, Theology in the Context of Science. Science trades in motivated belief, there are reasons for the positions taken and the theories accepted. Theology also trades in motivated belief. In chapter six Dr. Polkinghorne presents a short summary of his motivation for Christian belief. But he begins with a short discussion of why such a motivation is important.

One of the difficulties that face a scientist wanting to speak to his colleagues about the Christian faith is to get across the fact that theology also trades in motivated belief. Many scientists are both wistful and wary in their attitude towards religion. … Their wariness arises from the mistaken idea that religious faith demands that those who embrace it should be willing to believe simply on the basis of submission to some unquestionable authority …  (p. 124)

Dr. Polkinghorne goes on to acknowledge that he too would have trouble with faith if it required uncritical fideism.

What I am always trying to do in conversation with my not-yet-believing friends is to show them that I have motivations for my religious beliefs, just as I have motivations for my scientific beliefs. … This task is one of great importance, since the difficulty of getting a hearing for Christian faith in contemporary society often seems to stem from the fact that many people have never given adequate adult consideration to the possibility of its being true, thinking that they ‘know’ already that there can be no truth in claims so apparently at odds with notions of everyday secular expectation. (p. 124-125).

What is the motivation for your belief?

How could you explain it to your friends or colleagues?

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Science and Faith Tagged With: 66 Comments

Seven Days that Divide the World 1

September 5, 2011 By scotmcknight 80 Comments

John Lennox, professor in Mathematics at Oxford, in his new and wonderfully written book, Seven Days That Divide the World: The Beginning According to Genesis and Science, examines the age-old, ever divisive — and yet wintergreen in piquing our interest — issues in the science and faith/Bible debates. My sentence, the one I just wrote, is hopelessly complex. Lennox has learned to write, and that Zondervan bundled up this little book into an attractive format, makes this a delightful book both to hold and to read.

I really like this statement he makes:

The take-home message from Augustine is, rather, that, if my views on something not fundamental to the gospel, on which equally convinced Christians disagree, attract ridicule and therefore disincline my hearers to listen to anything I have to say about the Christian message, then I should be prepared to entertain the possibility that it might be my interpretation that is at fault (32).

Now I said Lennox could write, and that sentence is very complex, but it’s unlike any other I’ve seen in this book.  But he’s right, and it’s important to listen to what he’s saying. And it leads me directly to a comment or two. Ah, it’s that “fundamental to the gospel” that gets us all tripped up. What one person thinks is fundamental to the gospel, another person thinks is totally unimportant. No matter that I disagree sharply with Al Mohler on the age of the earth and the intent of Genesis 1 (and 2), I give Mohler “props” for sticking to his guns in thinking that gospel matters matter greatly. He thinks surrendering Adam and Eve to the land of myth or fiction, true myth or true fiction notwithstanding, surrenders too much. As I say, I give him props for that. But Dennis Venema thinks, well, Mohler is just wrong. And Venema thinks otherwise on the Adam and Eve issues of our day.

Questions: Are ancient cosmological statements metaphors, intentional ones, or are they cosmological perceptions of that day? What does this mean for how we view the Bible?

So let me say it simply, in layperson terms: If our views are ludicrous for the scientists, maybe we are wrong. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Bible, Science and Faith 80 Comments

Jeff Cook’s Response: A Confession of a Seeker

June 1, 2011 By scotmcknight 75 Comments

From Jeff Cook.

We Need Better Answers. A Response to Mark Galli.

I love and admire Francis Chan and Mark Galli, and am very grateful for the fruit of their lives, and even for their upcoming work on hell. I want to continue to dialogue about present issues in the church with class and respect and in that spirit, I want to offer a disclaimer. I am going to bring my argument strong and candidly with no antagonism toward anyone in particular, just a deep unrest at the present state of Christian thought.

During the recent rapture hoopla I heard a commentator say, “Making fun of born again Christians is like hunting dairy cows with a high powered rifle and scope.” I assume it’s because he thinks ridiculing Christians is not very challenging, and after a while it’s not very fun. But this insult contains a nugget of truth.

Christians hold in their hands the most profound sets of insights into the human condition ever constructed and yet despite their numbers and resources they consistently produce the most lack luster art, literature and academic thought available in popular circles. For example, I find the “Christian living” section of the local bookstore—with a few exceptions—a disheartening place because apparently this set of texts is the best our culture can do when displaying Jesus Christ and his plan for the world. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Hell 75 Comments

God Behaving Badly 3

May 25, 2011 By scotmcknight 20 Comments

When it comes to women in the Bible, or when it comes to potential indications of sexism in the Bible, some people want a clean slate in the Bible. What they want is a Bible that fully affirms women and that has no traces of sexism. That Bible doesn’t exist because that kind of world doesn’t exist, and the Bible isn’t into describing idyllic conditions. Apart from Genesis 1-2, all you get is the human condition warts and all.

It is that kind of Bible that David Lamb, in his excellent book, God Behaving Badly: Is the God of the Old Testament Angry, Sexist and Racist?, examines with this question: “Sexist or affirming?”

He begins at the beginning, as we ought to do — and a striking feature of his study of Genesis 1-2 is that he sees women as Godlike. Made in the image of God, that means women are Godlike. From that idea the Christian cannot budge. (Men are too, but as David says, men already knew that.) Women, David says, are the “second draft” and the second draft is better than the first draft. He backs down from saying women are superior, but he makes it emphatically clear that women are not depicted as inferior.

How can we talk about what the Bible says about women and both admit some ancient sexism, know its impact on women in history and in the church, and yet also call out the positive and affirming texts? What are you doing? Do you encourage women to do in your church what they did in the Bible?

The sin of Genesis 3 makes the woman look bad, but the man probably looks look worse — standing there doing nothing, naked and all. The man looks bad, too.

On the “curse” of Genesis 3 David and I don’t completely agree. He sees submission but not oppression; he doesn’t see a general human condition but a specific Adam-Eve thing, but he does permit generalization, which lands us back with not just a specific thing. The man’s curse is more severe; Eve receives an important promise (not one for Adam).

But here’s where we completely agree: the condition of Genesis 3 is not what God wants. I have pushed harder on this one than David, but what he says I totally agree with. We are called to diminish the fall’s implications (epidurals and harvesters) and not indwell it. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Women and Ministry 20 Comments

God Behaving Badly 2

May 23, 2011 By scotmcknight 77 Comments

Sometimes I’m a bit surprised by what people say about God. I know of no humans who don’t get irked or who don’t get angry in a good sense, though I’ve seen some who get too angry too easily while others don’t get irked easily enough. But for some reason God’s getting angry, or expressing wrath, is bad behavior. I do wonder if our anger doesn’t correspond in some ways with something inherent to God and that means anger can’t simply be assigned to a fallen world.

In a chp called “Angry or Loving?,” David Lamb, God Behaving Badly: Is the God of the Old Testament Angry, Sexist and Racist?, asks this very question about the Old Testament. He can’t map all the OT texts but he gives a good map to the whole by sampling passages.

The biggest and most common mistake is to say the God of the OT is angry but the God of the NT is loving. The only people who say such things don’t read the Bible.

How do you explain the “anger” of God?

David examines Uzzah’s being struck dead by God for touching/steadying the altar when it was being moved. Seems a tad overdone, no? David says “Not if you look at the text in its context.” (I’ve got the text after the jump.)

He explains: first, YHWH’s anger results from how the Israelites were to carry the ark. Read Numbers 4:15 if you can. Clear disobedience. Second, they treated the ark of the covenant as cargo by pulling it on a cart when they were told to carry with sticks through the rings on the shoulders of priests. The ark represented God, and God is royalty, and they asked God to ride — as it were — in the trunk or the bed of the truck. Third, they had been so negligent of their relationship with YHWH they had lost the ark to the Philistines. Finally, they learned their lesson; never did this again; God never “broke out” like this again with them over the ark.

But there’s more:

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Apologetics, Theology Tagged With: 77 Comments
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