Exploring Approaches to Apologetics CA513 o Apologetics t ... · of the witnesses. Since God cannot...

Exploring Approaches to Apologetics

Transcript - CA513 Exploring Approaches to Apologetics © 2019 Our Daily Bread University. All rights reserved.

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LESSON 24 of 24CA513

Reasons for Believing in the Bible

Exploring Approaches to Apologetics

The Apostle Paul in 2 Timothy 2:2 says, “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses, entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others.” As students who have persevered through these twenty-four lectures, you are reliable people who are hopefully now qualified to teach others. And I pray that as Paul passed the torch to Timothy, I may pass it to you. He goes on to say, “Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Jesus Christ.” No one serving as a soldier gets involved in civilian affairs. He wants to please his commanding officer, and as you seek to please God in your future ministry, may you give a solid reason for your hope with respect and concern for others.

Lord Jesus Christ, I thank you for each student of this course. I thank you for the potential of each of these lives and ministries, and I pray that the one who hears me now may commitment himself to a faithful, lifelong service for You through Jesus Christ. Amen.

Why I believe the Bible. These last three lectures may be entitled, “Why I Am a Christian.” I am a Christian because of the coherence and viability of Christian hypotheses about God, Christ, and the Bible. In the research reflected in the first of these three, I tested the hypothesis of a personal God distinct from the world. Of the basis philosophies in the world, theism best accounted for the phenomena of the universe, its existence, order, self-transcending persons, and nonrelative values or virtues that make meaningful human life possible.

In the second of these lectures, I considered the hypothesis that God communicated redemptive plans and purposes for unjust people in a uniquely incarnate person. The relevant observable phenomena testing this claim from the First Century and continuing to the present day conclusively supported the hypothesis that Jesus of Nazareth was as He claimed; Messiah and Lord of all, as opposed to the contradictory hypotheses.

Gordon Lewis, Ph.D. Experience: Senior Professor of

Christian and Historical Theology, Denver Seminary, Colorado.



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Join me now in considering the phenomena relevant to testing a hypothesis that God disclosed His will uniquely in the inspired truth of biblical teachings. The biblical hypothesis, like any other, is subject to the criteria of logical consistency, factual adequacy, and existential authenticity. Hypotheses alleging special divine revelation may be disproved as well as confirmed.

Latter Day Saints allege that the Book of Mormon is a special divine revelation as authoritative as the Bible, if not more so. In addition they hold to continuing revelation through the leaders of their church. A judge tests the case for or against a suspect by its internal consistency, its conformity to fact, and the authenticity of the witnesses. Since God cannot contradict Himself, knows all the facts and has uncompromised integrity, even teachings of Latter Day Saint revelations, if they are to be believed, must meet these standards. Although the Book of Mormon appears to be like the Bible in superficial ways, it differs from the Bible in very damaging ways. Mormons who accept all of their alleged revelations have the problem of assenting to at least five logical contradictions.

One, polygamy is both commanded as part of the eternal covenant and condemned after it became illegal in the United States. Two, some passages affirm only one God; others many gods. Three, all things were created; some things other than God were uncreated and eternal. Four, God has a flesh and bones body; God is Spirit, which does not have a flesh and bones body. Five, Jesus was born in Bethlehem; in another passage Jesus was born in Jerusalem. In at least these five ways Latter Day Saints affirm and deny the same thing at the same time and in the same respect.

How does the content of the LDS revelations come out when tested by fitting the facts? In relation to factual adequacy, there are numerous problems. The story says that two Jewish brothers, Nephi and Laman traveling in a homemade boat from Jerusalem about 600 BC, landed in Central America. Their descendants developed into two great competitive civilizations. From the darker-skinned Lamanites came the American Indians. Before the Nephites became extinct, their alleged revelations from God were inscribed on gold plates in Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics. In 420 AD, these records were buried in the hill Cumorah near Palmyra, New York. An angel led the teenaged Joseph Smith to their location. He dug them up, translated them as the Book of Mormon, and then an angel took the gold plates back to heaven.



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The peoples and battles described in the Book of Mormon are unsupported by archaeological evidence. The physical type and cultural characteristics of the American Indian are not confirmed by anthropology. Linguists have yet to discover any such language as Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics. The alleged witnesses to the gold plates “hefted something under a blanket,” but did not become literal witnesses to a language on gold plates. Had they seen the language, they were not qualified to assess it. Eight of the eleven continually advertised witnesses eventually defected from the church. And the story of the uneducated Smith’s dictation of the content of the gold plates while his head was in a hat to ascribe on the other side of a curtain does not fit several facts.

What is called a translation of material from no later than 420 AD includes thousands of words from the King James translation, which was not done until 1200 years later. One book signs off adieu, but the French language had not been developed. Steel swords and compasses are employed before they were invented. Other stories about the lost tribes of Israel traveling to England and then to the United States were available at the time to help Smith’s fertile imagination. Smith’s claims to be a prophet do not fit the biblical criteria. His predictions that came to pass were general and anticipated by many—the Civil War for example. But his specific prediction that the Civil War would develop into a world war did not take place. He then cannot be regarded a true prophet. If you need documentation of the sources for these contradictions and discrepancies, see my book entitled, Confronting the Cults, published by the Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company.

Because of the increasing difficulties with the claims for Smith and his alleged revelations, critical scholars brought up in Mormonism are finding it difficult to embrace the official positions. It is hard to keep on declaring and living by the Book of Mormon unhypocritically. So existentially, as well as logically and factually, it is difficult to believe the claim that the Book of Mormon is the Word of God. Neither can I accept information received by New Age channelers to be true or from God. Those who do so are insufficiently critical or just plain gullible.

But employing the same tough criteria, I can believe the Bible to be the Word of God. Why? Well, there are still some reasons I will not use, even though others who defend the Bible’s truth do. I will avoid reasoning in a circle. I will not just quote a verse of the Bible like 2 Timothy 3:16, asserting that all of the Old



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Testament Scripture is inspired and profitable because that begs the question. The question remains, why believe 2 Timothy 3:16? To merely assume its validity is fallacious. I would not accept such circular reasoning from others. Suppose you asked a Latter Day Saint, “Why should I believe the Book of Mormon?”, and you received the response of a verse quoted from it. Would that convince you of its truth? If you asked a Muslim, “Why believe the Koran,” would you be convinced of its revelatory status if she quoted a sentence from it quoting dictation by Allah? You had asked why you should believe sentence as well as the rest. The promise that God’s Word will not return void was not intended to stimulate us to quote verses like magical formulae. When truth is presented in love, it does not miss its mark. But people are not convinced automatically by the use of biblical words or by illogical reasoning.

Neither do I base my belief in the Bible on a single line of evidence or reasoning as in the alternative approaches to apologetics that we have surveyed. But it may help by way of review to apply the approaches to apologetics studied more concretely to the Bible. The approach of J. Oliver Buswell, Jr., John Gerstner, John Montgomery, and Josh McDowell as pure empiricists involves three steps: One, present the evidence that the Bible is reliable historically speaking. Two, from the historical records argue that Jesus was God incarnate. Three, conclude the case for the Bible solely on the authority of Jesus Christ. The first order in outreach is to lead a person to Christ as Savior and Lord and only then to argue for accepting their Lord’s view of the Bible. All of the empirical data is utilized in my approach, but it is strengthened when associated in stronger argument form and with other converging lines of evidence.

Stuart Hackett and Floyd Hamilton defended their belief in the Bible using the approach of rational empiricism. They did not put special stress on Christ’s authority, but amass more verging lines of evidence. All these effects require an adequate cause, and that is God. Again, the entire case depends on the validity of causality. All this data is useful in my verificational form of argument, but if one cannot successfully defend the applicability of the causal principle, the whole case is not lost.

The rationalist, Gordon Clark, thought that sin distorts the empiricists’ observations and reasoning so that they never do arrive by sheer evidence at the truth about the nature of things. Logical thinking in any field, Clark insisted, starts with axiomatic



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truths as in geometry. Only if we begin with the truth of the Bible will we defend it. So he begins by assuming that Scripture is God’s revelation. When some reason is required for beginning with this assumption rather than another, he argues on the sole criterion of logical noncontradiction. He rejects axioms of naturalists and pantheists because they lead to self-contradictions. He accepts the axiom of biblical revelation because he thinks he can develop a comprehensive worldview consistent with every phase of human experience or, at least he thinks, with fewer problems than any other.

Having dismissed all empirical data as a source of knowledge, it is hard to see how Clark thinks he can make sense of life’s experiences when others do not. If he is unwilling to reconsider his assumption, again we face circular reasoning; he is assuming the thing to be proved. If he’s open to follow evidence where it leads, he is starting not with an axiom, but a hypothesis. Again, the hypothetical element of truth is incorporated in my verificational approach.

Cornelius Van Til does not accept Scripture because of any principle or facts independent of God, for every true idea derives its meaning from God. Without presupposing the God of the Bible, Van Til cannot count on the principles of causality or noncontradiction. His final appeal is not to an adequate cause or to consistency, but to God. The truth of every fact must be learned in terms of biblical revelation. The traditional arguments for the possibility, probability, and actuality of written revelation allow for a sacred book, he argues; a superior book, but not an absolutely authoritative book. He is right in that, but not when he says, “Unless one accepts the Bible as the authoritative, interpretation of human life and experience as a whole, it will be impossible to find meaning in anything.” I can know my address without first believing in the Bible. A biblical framework may supply the only stable basis for the meaningfulness of all our experience, but we must convince our friends of this.

We should ask unbelievers from the beginning to consider the possible truth of the Christian presuppositions, but to ask them to accept the Bible without evidence is to beg the question. Van Til does not address the apologetic issue of people committed to conflicting claims concerning the Bible. When it is pointed out that his reason is circular, Van Til may then say that the witness of the Holy Spirit attests the Bible’s truth. He may also say that it is self-authenticating, therefore. And that is another tact the Latter



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Day Saints take in defense of the Book of Mormon. As you read it, they say, “You will feel a burning in the bosom,” but no such feeling can overcome a handful of contradictions and numerous discrepancies with fact. If we will not accept the claim that the Book of Mormon is self-authenticating because of the evidence, why should we expect unbelievers to accept a similar self-authenticating claim for the Bible?

Earl Barrett’s Christian mystical approach to defending the Bible says in effect, “Don’t argue with unbelievers inductively or deductively, just tell them of your self-authenticating experience.” No one can be completely objective. The decisive thing is the perspective gained from personal experience with God. Mystical experience of God produces a psychological certitude at once compelling and complete, but it does not displace the Bible as the primary base of religious knowledge. The Bible itself comes out of religious experience and biblical meditation and prayer mediates personal experience of God. The Bible says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (Psalm 34:8). The Bible is held to be true, then, because it has worked for me. Mystics from all parts of the world and many periods of history bear witness to this phenomenon, but just how solid each of their views of biblical authority has maybe been questioned. My witness to my personal experience of God is one strand of the many converging lines of objective and subjective evidence, but I do not base my entire belief in the Bible on my private experience alone. Experiences vary and our interpretations of our experiences may change, but the Word of the Lord endures forever.

I believe the Bible because assent to its divine inspiration consistently accounts for the many converging lines of evidence related to it. It passes the acid test of logical noncontradiction. In the Bible, I have found much that is not fully comprehensible. I have found complexity, multiple causes, but never logical nonsense. Allegedly contradictory assertions do not affirm and deny the same thing at the same time and in the same respect. What appear at first to be contradictions turn out to be subcontraries or paradoxes. Although one or the other of two contradictory assertions must be false, in a subcontrary relationship one of the propositions or both may be true.

Some students in my class may be Bronco fans and some may not. There is no logical problem there. Science does not report that all the phenomena of light are wavelike or that none are. Rather, it reports that some of the phenomena are wavelike and



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some particle-like. Both may be true without self-contradiction. Light is composed of particles all the time and upon occasion, and under certain conditions they act in a wavelike manner. We need make no logical difficulty with this issue if we clearly define what we are talking about. Paradoxes of apparent contradictions in my perspective serve as literary devices to attract attention. When Jesus said, “If you would find your life, you must lose it,” He did not speak nonsense. He said, “Think about it, if you put to death your old nature and ways of life, you will discover a new nature come from above by the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit and you will come to life in new ways.” Paradoxes or apparent contradictions can be worked out by those who define their terms, distinguish different times, and contrast differences of respect. Until I get over the initial shock of paradoxes, I quarantine them like the measles.

I believe the Bible not only because it is consistent and I exhibit the consistency of its great doctrines in my three volume work Integrative Theology, but I also believe the Bible because it fits the facts. I have argued this with various forms of recent biblical criticism that have come and gone through the years. With C. S. Lewis, I criticize them as literary critics. In an article entitled “Faulting the Bible Critics,” C. S. said, “I distrust them as critics. They seem to me to lack literary judgment, to be imperceptive about the very quality of the texts they are reading. The fourth gospel is hardly to be classified as a spiritual romance or a poem and not history. Bultmann just does not get it when he claims that the personality of Jesus has no importance for the Gospel message or the kerygma of Paul and John. The critics,” C. S. Lewis said, “want me to think they can read between the lines, but the evidence is their obvious inability to read the lines themselves.” He also finds incredible the critics claim that Jesus’ immediate followers came rapidly to misunderstand Him, but they twenty centuries later know better.

Third, they simply assume a closed naturalistic system and rule out miracles a priori. Fourth, none of their attempted reconstructions of the text have held up, and when applied to the writings of C. S. Lewis were totally distortive of the case. The article developing these points can be found in Christianity Today, June 9, 1967, pages 7-9.

In another article, I distinguish classical criticism from recent form criticism or whatever designation may be used. Scholars in the early church were aware of the similarities and differences in the



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four Gospels. After careful work, they did not find irreconcilable contradictions. In a lecture given at local university classroom on form criticism, I pointed out an equal number of similarities and differences in the classical and recent critical approaches. Where they differed, I tested the two hypotheses by the standard relevant data and criteria. Let me share how I approached some of those differences.

I asked which of these views of criticism best fits the facts. Is it one which assumes naturalism and excludes the possibility a priori of any miracles and jumps to a hasty conclusion about alleged contradictions? For example, form critics observed that in John, Jesus’ ministry is primarily in Jerusalem in the synoptics in Galilee. Since Jesus admittedly ministered in both areas and it was no part of their purpose to give a complete travelogue, this difference is not the kind to support invention by the church or any hypotheses of historical inaccuracy. Form critics saw difficulty in the fact that Matthew and Luke give two reasons for Jesus having been born in Bethlehem, though He was a citizen of Nazareth. Well, if the reason in Matthew is Micah’s prophesy 5:2, that in no way conflicts with Luke’s reference to the instrumental reason—the census which took Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem, the original home of David’s family. In Luke’s census at AD 6, it seemed impossible to reconcile the statement that Herod was alive at the time, since he died in 4 BC. Here is a genuine difficulty, but a monument inscription indicates that Quirinius was twice governor of Syria and that the first governorship was from 7 or 8 BC to AD 1, the preceding census was probably ordered in Rome in 7 BC, and delays in its implementation to 4 or 5 BC.

In the synoptics form, critics point out Jesus refuses to give signs, while in John the signs are listed. Signs are also given by Jesus to John the Baptist in the synoptics (Matthew 11:4). On one occasion when the Pharisees were particularly obtuse and would not have been disturbed by any facts (Mark 8:12), Jesus refused to perform any further signs other than His coming resurrection from the dead. It is simply unhistorical criticism to take a statement from such a limited context and give it a universal and necessary reference to manufacture an alleged contradiction.

Form critics find a problem in that John had a realized eschatology in which the kingdom is not coming as in the synoptics, but has arrived in the eternal Christ incarnate. However, John also has futuristic elements (5:28 and 11:25), resurrection from the dead and judgment. It is important to know that there are several uses



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of the word kingdom and there is no contradiction if a different sense is involved in these different contexts. The kingdom may refer to God’s providential rule over all to Christ’s spiritual rule in the hearts of believers now and to a future social and political kingdom in a millennium. It is quite possible that the Gospels teach all three of these respects of the kingdom without logical nonsense.

Numerous problems are raised in connection with the accounts of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Mark has the women fearful upon their discovery of the empty tomb in telling no one. Matthew has them run at once to tell the disciples. John, Matthew, and Mark disagree about how many women came to the tomb. Luke and Acts disagree about how long the appearances continued. Mark has Jesus instruct the disciples about the resurrection, yet they are surprised when the news reaches them. Let me quote John “honest to God” Robinson in an unusually good article of his on the resurrection from the Interpreters Dictionary of the Bible. “When we turn to the Gospels, their evidence on the empty tomb is in substance unanimous. There are indeed differences of detail which at times have been given an exaggerated prominence. None of these, however, is the kind of difference that impugns the authenticity of the narrative. Indeed they are all precisely what one would look for in genuine accounts of so confused and confusing a scene. The recent mythological view fails to do justice to the scriptural evidence. Many in fact,” Robinson says, “will continue to find it easier to believe that the empty tomb produced the disciples faith than that the disciples faith produced an empty tomb.” Robinson concludes, “All the appearances, in fact, depict the same phenomenon of a body identical yet changed, transcending the limitations of the flesh, yet capable of manifesting itself within the order of flesh. Again, according to all our accounts, it was the appearances not the tomb that were decisive for the disciples’ faith.”

So the fact that people charge contradictions in the Bible ought not to be taken at face value. Ask them to name one and to define what a contradiction is. Ask them to show that you do not have simply a difference of perspective of time and respect, rather than an affirmation and denial of the same thing at the same time and in the same respect.

I believe the Bible because it is consistent; I believe the Bible because it fits the facts. Let me indicate how archaeology has supported its factual reliability. Dr. A. H. Sayce—the discoverer



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of the library of the Hittites, who were at one time were thought to be a crude, uncivilized people—came to regard himself after studying the vast amount of writings preserved a representative of the Orthodox party and a defender of holy writ. Starting out an unbeliever in the reliability of Old Testament history, he came to be its defender. A similar thing happened to an English scholar, Sir William Ramsay. He followed Paul’s three missionary journeys from place to place as they are recorded in the Book of Acts in the New Testament by Luke. He concluded that Luke’s history is “unsurpassed in respect to its trustworthiness and that it could not have been written by one who had not been an eyewitness on those journeys.”

William Foxwell Albright was an American archaeologist for over twenty-five years in the Near East. He started out as a liberal questioning fact after fact in the Bible’s history, but toward the end of his career he wrote an article entitled “Return to Biblical Theology.” In it he showed that archaeology has revolutionized the critics’ historical approach to the Bible. To sum up, “We can now again treat the Bible,” he said “from beginning to end as an authentic document of religious history.” And that was published in the Christian Century, a liberal journal, on November 19, 1958.

I can believe the Bible because its history is accurate when it speaks of cultures, of cities, of battles, of rulers, and of the official names of people in government in the nations of which it speaks. I believe the Bible furthermore because its text has been remarkably preserved for us from its original writings. Sir Frederick Kenyon wrote after years of study of the many different manuscripts like the Dead Sea Scrolls and others, “The interval then between the dates of the original composition and the earliest extent evidence becomes so small as to be, in fact, negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established.” That is in his book, The Bible and Archaeology.

I believe the Bible because it’s accurate historically, because its text has been preserved with great accuracy through dedicated copyist for centuries. I also believe it because of the unity of its teaching. In the many different biblical books written by some forty different men in different circumstances over a period of some 1500 or 1600 years, there is a remarkable uniformity of teaching concerning God, concerning human need, and concerning God’s



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gracious provision in the Messiah to meet that need. The unity of biblical content has been recovered in biblical theology recently, and it is displayed in systematic theology and in the discipline of integrated theology; in these I have sought to bring together the import of historical, biblical, systematic, apologetic, and practical theological approaches.

I believe the Bible furthermore because its prophecies have repeatedly come to pass. Years before Cyrus was born and gave his decree to allow Israel to return to rebuild her temple, the name and the significance of this human being was predicted. Hundreds of years in advance, specifics were given concerning the coming of the Messiah who would be a child of Eve in the line of Abraham and of David. He would be born at Bethlehem and born of a virgin. Jesus fulfilled many prophecies in His birth, His life, His death, and His resurrection. None of these could have been written up after the events; they reflect a transcendent, supernatural knowledge of the future and of all reality.

I believe the Bible furthermore because of its amazing realism. It is neither prudish nor obscene. It refers candidly to God as the creator of sex and to sinful pride and indulgence that has affected our sexual identities as everything else. The Bible does not gloss over the weaknesses of its heroes like so many other books do. Its realism can best be accounted for because its writers were controlled as they wrote to put down what the Holy Spirit would have them write.

And then, I believe the Bible because of its perennial relevance as indicated by its external phenomena and its internal phenomena. Against the competition of all the greatest writers in history, the Bible has remained a continual best seller. It is the most translated and retranslated book in the world. It is the most written about and quoted. As one wrote, “No one can count himself educated unless he has read widely in the Bible.”

And I believe the Bible to be what it claims because of its unique power to change people’s lives. Norberg in Varieties of Christian Experiences writes, “Psychologists without exception have overlooked the absolutely decisive element of Christian conversion, the hearing of the Word of God.” And unquestionably that was the decisive element in the remarkable ministry of Billy Graham in our generation. He has spoken to people around the world in high and low places, and they have responded because he constantly quotes the Bible. The Bible says. It is the teaching of the



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Bible that is the two-edged sword, the primary instrument of the Holy Spirit to transform today’s Sauls into Pauls. Emile Cailliet was a French atheist who came out of the First World War with a sense of the meaninglessness of life. A scholar who did not find an answer elsewhere, he finally came across a Bible for the first time and found at last that there was a book which understood him.

I hope you will get a chance to read my chapter on “Inspiration” in Volume 1 of Integrative Theology. In the apologetic section of chapter four on the “Inspiration of Scripture,” I consider three hypotheses: the Bible’s complete errancy, its partial errancy, or its complete inerrancy. And I find the case for its plenary inerrancy has fewer difficulties in comparison with the momentous denials of Christ’s view of the Bible in the other options. A belief in the Bible’s inerrancy provides the most coherent account of all the lines of relevant evidence with fewer difficulties. I believe acceptance of the Bible as reliable information from God also meets the test of existential viability. Having developed that in my last lecture, I will not labor here how my belief in the Christ of the Bible has given me freedom from anxiety, purpose, and a most challenging life.

What is the existential result in the mind of one who takes a verificational approach? I’m no longer at my logical starting point. The God revealed in Christ in Scripture is no mere hypothesis. It is a confirmed conviction for which I live and die. I have a sense of reality not just with words and ideas, but the realities to which they refer. I enjoy permanent access to communion with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. I do not have and do not claim complete comprehension or intellectual certainty, but I have a probability beyond reasonable doubt; that is the best that can be done in matters of history and law. That overwhelming degree of probability leads to a psychological certitude and a moral responsibility on which to act. So I devote my vocation and life to serve the purposes of my Lord and His kingdom. My world and life view leads to a theological belief system that provides for a stable family, a growing church fellowship, and respect for others in my society and cultures around the world.

I am a Christian for countless logical, factual, and existential reasons attested by the Holy Spirit. The Spirit does not work in just one aspect of my research, oral, or written presentations, but hopefully throughout it all. The work of the Spirit did not displace my responsibility to reason soundly. Rather, the Spirit enabled me


Christ-Centered Learning — Anytime, Anywhere

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to overcome my natural bias against the truths of absolute moral standards, to admit my own sinfulness and to admit the once-for-all incarnation of Jesus Christ. And the Spirit enabled me to admit the one merciful way on the basis of which I could be accepted when I get to God and faced my most comprehensive exams and final judgment.

I have emphasized the science of apologetics. I want to conclude with some suggestions on the art of apologetic communication. In the midst of cultural wars against the faith, your church members need to be able to speak up in favor of their convictions, and church leaders need to prepare them for the challenges to moral principles faced throughout the world and instant media coverage today. One excellent approach to implementing apologetics in a local church was developed for training church members to reach unchurched people and spiritual seekers with difficult questions. I urge you to write to Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois, 60010in care of Mark Mittelberg, Director of Evangelism, who ministers with this goal: All people matter to God and therefore to us, but they are lost without Christ and must be reached with the message of the Gospel. Along with answers to their questions and objections, this must be done in a relevant way, realizing that it will generally take a period of time for them to go through the process of coming to the point of trust in Christ. To implement that objective, staff strategy sessions identified four groups of people who matter: the unchurched, the spiritual seekers, all believers, and those led to become evangelists and apologists. To reach them, Pastor Bill Hybels designs a topic each weekend and a service to show the target audience the relevancy of Christ, the Bible, and the Gospel message in their daily lives.

A general tone is set that says in effect, “It’s okay to doubt and ask questions. We take your questions seriously and we want you to take time to carefully investigate Christianity.”

Exploring Approaches to Apologetics CA513 o Apologetics t ... · of the witnesses. Since God cannot...

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