And I believe based on these foundations that the biblical apologetic that is consistent is Covenantal Apologetics (or presuppositionalism); The simple reason is because without God nothing makes any sense.. there is meaning or purpose because God design everything to ultimately reflect his glory. And when we all come to the table with "evidences," the issue is not evidence but the underline presupposition that we force upon the evidence. So we must argue not based on evidence but the presuppositions and show that only Christian presuppositions make any sense of the evidence. The Unbelieving one do not at all.
Now with this said, I can consider some biblical testimony to this biblical truth. And remember I do not need to prove God exists; He exists regardless of our beliefs in him. And do not need prove the authenticity of the scriptures; for they self authenticity. And without God and his word.. Science would not be what it is for it was established on biblical truth.
Key passages on this apologetic
A passage at this point to help us to correctly view the Lord as a central point of the Apologetic is found in 1 Peter 3:
but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defence to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behaviour in Christ will be put to shame.This is really the key issue in all our apologetical debates and discussions to be living examples of Christ; how do we do this, simply by considering the elements of this passage... (1) sanctify Christ in your hearts, ... in other words, to honour, revere and set apart Christ by our conduct, through our arguments, and in a more respectable candour. Our lives are to be Christ like. (2) Always be ready to give a defense ... in this, we're to give a reasoned, biblical presentation for our faith and hope.
Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.This is such an important section, it gives us a reason for defending the faith 'for ungodly people, who pervert the grace of of God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord Jesus Christ'. So the curge is that such people are (1) continually teaching perverted thing as if they are the truth. (2) and fundamentally denying Christ either through the teaching or out rightly. And this is why the true born of the Spirit Christian must contend for the faith "once for all delivered to the saints."
The negative application: an internal critique
The scriptures does not give an exact approach in the way this is to be carried out and I think this is the reason why there are a few different ways this has been approached. But they are all applicable and praiseworthy of adoption. But for the purpose of this, I wish to consider some words of Greg Bahnsen on this issue first. He states,
Here we see the ultimate standard for the Christian must always be the self-attesting word of God. This standard is accepted because of what it truly claims to be (the word of God) and not on the basis of independent human buttresses. This self-attesting revelation of God is objectively true and authoritative, even though subjective persuasion about it comes only by the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit.In other words, the bible is the only objective and self attesting truth about God, about man, and about the universe; it is from this source that we can get the real picture of all things; that of course, is not to say that there is no usefulness in other methods.. it is just to be clear that other methods fail to capture the full reality because it is interpreted based on human presupposition and assumptions. And it is on this basis that it more often than not is contradicted.
The bible lays out some guidelines into how we are to come to this subject with a biblical understanding;
For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete. (2 Corinthians 10:4-6)It is important to note that our warfare is not of "the flesh" but of "divine power" that is our arguments are grounded in the divine truth of God. All our arguments have to grounded upon scriptural truths; to argue away from this foundation is to not argue for Christianity at all. Our aim here is to "take every thought" that is raised against the faith "captive to obey Christ."
And how does one go about this task... well in a simple fashion: by identifying the very fact, that no matter the argument one must first presuppose God in order for the argument to even make sense. And then it reveals that they are in fact arguing from an objective stand point in that they cannot escape from.
And also we have this text,
and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments .... See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. (Colossians 2: 2-4,8-10).As Christian our Sole infallible and final authority is the divine writ; it is the highest court of of appeal on all matters pertaining to God; in terms of all he has done in this world on creation and redemption matter and many others. What we believe on any number of issues has to been informed and conformed by the Word of God.
And therefore, all our beliefs must be put to it's infallible test of truth; and on that basis, if it passes it should be believed. If it fails, then it should be rejected. And never to be seen as a possible idea. The thing about Molinism is that it was a Catholic counter reformation idea that now many philosophers are adopting and adapting to a protestant view point.
The positive application: the offer of the Gospel
The first text I wish to present is from Romans 1:
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. (Verses 18-20)Here we have a great section of scripture, where Paul is describing the depravity and corruption of every man; and in despite of these matters, all men still have the image of God inside of them which is an internal baring on the fact that they are all aware of God. For the matter is so clear from both with in and from outside the person; their own person and creation itself testifies to the existence of God in a clear and precise manner.
But due that corruption of nature and utter depravity that is manifest in their very lives; and the continual love of their sin... Mankind has suppressed the truth of God's existence and are in a downward spiral of turmoil and self destruction. In this scripture like that of Ephesians 2:1-3; we find an important truth about presuppositionalism. And that is of course, found in the darkness of man's natural state... they won't accept no evidence even if it is compelling.
Therefore, in this text we find the first presupposition of the Christian truth: Man.. all men that is from birth are totally depraved and are not able to come to Christ; or even accept any evidence that will contradict their own beliefs (such as the naturalistic one); and inherent in this is the complete ignorance of the fact that man is in fact a testament to God's existence for they are borrowing from Christian capital.
A second text that is important to matter is found in John 3:
Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born, can he?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (Verses 3-8)In this passage we find another crucial truth being declared, and that is the doctrine of Regeneration. It is because Man cannot save himself due to the fact of his corrupted nature and his inherent inability to come to Christ (God); therefore, God in his Sovereign rule has taken it upon himself to free the sinner from his sin through regeneration and unite him to his son through his death. It is a divine accomplishment and not a human effort.
So we must recognise that God is the one who draws the sinner unto Christ, the sinner is spiritual capacitated (dead); He has no say in the matter.. but after this action is eternally grateful to God for the newness of life.
Therefore, from this we have a second presupposition to consider: God chooses the person based upon his own kindness and then regenerates that person.. brings him to faith in Christ (or grants him divine saving faith) as a gift.
This apologetic in action
In this first example which is come from one William Lane Craig; whom is a philosophical mind and not a theologian of the faith. And is this philosophical mind-set that has led him to become an advocate of one of the most heretical thoughts of all history. And that anti biblical stance is Molinism (A anti- reformation view held by the Catholic Jesuits in the 1500's).
And here are some of the comment made by William Lane Craig in a recent broadcast on his reasonable faith website:
When I speak of 'possible worlds', Kevin. I use possible worlds as a sort heuristic device a useful tool for talking of possibility and necessity. But as you know from my work on divine aseity I don't think there are any such things as possible worlds. I don't think there are any abstract objects that can objects that can confront God; indeed, contemporary work is that abstract objects do not exist. So I take an anti-realist position on abject objects. I'm zealous to preserve God's unique Aseity and would not in any way think there are uncreated possible worlds that confront God can exist independent of him. (1)
But none of these things actually exist on an anti-realest view - they are only a heuristic device for talking about modal notions. I take it what he is trying to say is just as counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are independent of God's will; so necessary truth, for example truths of logic and mathematics are independent of God's will. It's not as though God made it up ,that 2x2 =4; this is something that is necessary and not God's will. (2)In the first statement he is positing this "possible worlds" scenario but in the second statement he says this "none of those things (other possible worlds) exist. As we can see from this statement, "When I speak of 'possible worlds', Kevin. I use possible worlds as a sort heuristic device a useful tool for talking of possibility and necessity. But as you know from my work on divine aseity I don't think there are any such things as possible worlds." This kind of illogical position is something a Christian must never enter in on as personal belief.
It is important for us to consider this from another point, he is erecting a view that he claims not "believe in" as if it were a possibility. This is really something that is commonplace with a lot of Atheists. So why in the world would WLC make such statements; is he rally dealing with this honestly or is he holding something back.. in that he really does believe in this clack trap of a system.
Here is an important point from my two part examination on this matter with William lane Craig which is named: "William Lane Craig and Molinism: vain human philosophical speculation." for a more fuller treatment on this please consider reading those articles.
Consider from his above response, "I use possible worlds as a sort heuristic device a useful tool for talking of possibility and necessity." Is it the job of a Christian to randomly dream up scenario's; whereby, they end up calling into question the nature and being of God and his one sole purpose of creating the universe in that his glory would be manifest to us.The bible gives us the full world view for any Christian to hold and believe in, there simply is no justification for leaving the one solid foundation for all Christian truth and wondering in to speculative theories such as Molinism. Other issues that have succumbed to this philosophical position of WLC are that he argues for God's existence from a mere deistic view of offering evidences of his possible existence. that he argue for the trinity and the deity of Christ as if they are likeable human imaginings like the 3 head dog of ancient Greek mythology and some fantasy film based on a blue feline
Essentially what this kind of philosophical monstrosity is to render the idea that there is in fact another more legit purpose behind creation; and in his words, "creaturely freedom," or even worse is that behind this view is that there is another source behind the determinative factor of what would be.
In this second example, we come to an example of a man who claims to have been a christian at once point in his life and then lost his faith; based on one of his university tutors who did not like his answer for a passage. His teacher put a question mark against the answer and said, "I was sure this argument would be a satisfying one for the professor but he made a remark on saying "prehaps mark was mistaken."
And this man, of course, is none of than Dr Bart D Erhman.. we have the following statements:
"What good is it to say that the autographs (i.e., the originals) were inspired? We don’t have the originals! We have only error-ridden copies, and the vast majority of these are centuries removed from the originals and different from them, evidently, in thousands of ways….There are more variations among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament." (1)
"I have nothing but respect and admiration for him , in addition even though we may have difference of opinion on important and fundamental religious questions, he is a firmly committed Christian and I am not.. we are in complete agreement on a number of important historical and contextual questions, If he and I were put in a room and were asked to hammer out a consensus statement on what we think the original text of the new testament is, there would be very few points of disagreement.... Maybe one or two dozen place of thousands." (2)In the first example we see one perspective of Bart Erhman that "you cannot know what the originals said," And yet, one the other side of his mind he can say, "we can know what the original said to a very high degree of certainty. Well, on which of these point is he hanging his hat on. or can we just consider this his agnostic beliefs that does not know what the truth is here.
I believe that based on the high trustworthiness of all the manuscripts we have in the Christian possession that there is one reality: that what we have today in the gospel alone stand undisputed everything we know from Matthew to Revelation is as it was written through the inspiration by the Spirit of God.
At this point I would like to consider an important fact which is brought out in a sharp contrast in these all important words. If interested to see a full refutation of Bart's views I point you too, "Bart D Erhman a refutation of his case against Christianity." But here is the statement,
Another important fact plays out in light of another of his works called forged; the premise is that we can discredit certain works in the bible based on the fact that he feel based on their writing styles that they were not written by the purported writer. And two that come under fire are Paul and Peter and their letters. But if we take the same premise to his own work will find similar points of contention that will lead to us to consider him as someone who forges works.And this is the same point James R White made a comment in regards to Bart Erhmans view:
"The new testament is the earliest attested document of antiquity .... (said to J .R White in debate) and the new testament is the most widely documented work of antiquity .... (said to D. B Wallace in debate) ...... he would have to say if he was honest the NEW TESTAMENT is the most accurately transmitted document of history"
Baring in mind the above two statement the one with his mentor and the ones with the scholar J R White and D B Wallace ... we begin to get the real face of Bart's beliefs as a historian and textual critic .. he believes just what has been believed for many years that we do have reliable information and manuscripts to work from and since he has said that he could get back to the originals with some area of disagreement which again is how the textual evidence is seen in every manner.
The sensationalistic face but put on about not known for sure is a deploy just make his cultic followers feel assured, even though his own contradictory remarks show that he himself is the one who can not be trusted.
Continued in Part 2.
