This is my reply to an article by J. Warner Wallace entitled
Only a Christian apologist would try to put a damper on a child's joy in the Lord.Not long ago, Brett Kunkle, Sean McDowell and I spent several days training students for a Berkeley Missions trip. These trips are fun but challenging. Brett still leads these trips regularly, helping Christian high school students engage young men and women on the UC Berkeley campus. Once there, the students discuss issues related to theism, culture and worldview. These young Christians also interact with thoughtful atheist authors, speakers and student leaders during the trip. The resulting discussions are robust, pointed, and sometimes hostile. In spite of the challenging nature of the excursion, students usually begin this training with a naïve sense of confidence and (I hate to say it) apathy.
And if the kids are apathetic toward the goal of the trip, that might tell you they don't have enough of the Holy Spirit to justify trying to "empower" them for the mission field, especially the type of mission field that is most likely to put them in contact with information likely to persuade them to do what many other Christians have done, and give up the faith.
Like many other Christians I meet across the country, our students need to understand the importance of case making before they will ever take a step toward becoming case makers.That's funny, I thought that the basis for the motive to become a productive Christian was the Holy Spirit. It's nice to know you are a cessationist, and therefore, you have about as much of a 'relationship' with Jesus as you have with Abraham Lincoln.
As we begin to train each group, we must overcome their apathy and naïve confidence.
Some Christians would argue that the more effort you put into trying to motivate Christians to become more interested in goals you think are spiritual, the less convicting power of the Holy Spirit you actually believe in. In today's apologetics, the Holy Spirit is nothing but a gratuitous afterthought. Fuck what the bible says, your spiritual growth will be stunted if you don't learn how to answer atheism. How can you seriously believe God has any part to play here, if your actions make it seem as if God just sits up there looking down and expecting everybody else to do all the work? Like I said, "gratuitous afterthought".
Wow, the general apathy of today's Christians toward apologetics is so pervasive, even an apologist can complain about it.If you’ve tried to energize your own church, family or community about “apologetics” (Christian Case Making), you’ve probably experienced something similar.
That solution is nowhere expressed or implied in the bible. But prayer is:In fact, many of you have written to me, expressing this frustration: “How can I encourage my church to understand the need for Christian Case Making?” If you’ve ever found yourself asking a question like this, I have a potential solution: consider role-playing.
24 "Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted you. (Mk. 11:24 NAU)If Christians pray, yet don't convince their church to start giving a fuck about "case-making", you might consider that God, in his sovereignty, has decided that this is one of the things he doesn't want the Christians in this church or that church to engage in. But no, you keep on truckin' as if what you have to say applies across the board to everybody all the time.
You also might try a little common sense: If the church is not interested in apologetics, you have no reason to think they are spiritually mature enough to handle getting that close to the devil, in which case it makes more sense to either walk away, or build them up in the faith before trying to turn them into spiritual lights.
In 1st Corinthians 12 Paul insisted that not everybody has the same spiritual gifts:
27 Now you are Christ's body, and individually members of it.Paul admitted elsewhere that while he has the ideological goal of others being like him in their actions and life-choices, he also knows that this is unrealistic because not everybody has the same gifts. Notice what he says about the goodness of men remaining single, but the stupidity of expecting this of every man:
28 And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues.
29 All are not apostles, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All are not workers of miracles, are they?
30 All do not have gifts of healings, do they? All do not speak with tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they?
31 But earnestly desire the greater gifts. And I show you a still more excellent way.
(1 Cor. 12:27-31 NAU)
5 Stop depriving one another, except by agreement for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer, and come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.Yet Wallace is so stuck on his "case-making" bells and whistles, he leaves no room for the obvious biblical truth that not everybody has the gift of teaching, and certainly not "youths" (!?)...and of course "teaching" is precisely what Wallace is having these kids doing when they try to 'answer' atheists and bible skeptics.
6 But this I say by way of concession, not of command.
7 Yet I wish that all men were even as I myself am. However, each man has his own gift from God, one in this manner, and another in that. (1 Cor. 7:5-7 NAU)
Wallace is so focused on his goal of selling Jesus in Wallace-style that he has completely forgotten that there are probably millions of Christians he is speaking who are not and never will be fit to hold the office of a teacher.
And that's to say nothing of the fact that he is asking youngsters to be "teachers", when in fact not only is there no biblical precedent for this, but the biblical precedent warns even adults that most of them should not consider becoming teachers:
Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment. (Jas. 3:1 NAU)Other biblical criteria for teachers necessarily imply the teacher is not a youth but well-seasoned by experience to handle the crap that normally comes with being a teacher:
23 But refuse foolish and ignorant speculations, knowing that they produce quarrels.First, given Wallace's insanely obstinate stance that Christianity is true and atheism false, we might very well force Wallace to take the position that he believes atheism and all of its challenges to theism constitute "foolish and ignorant speculations" which Paul said to avoid (v. 23). And indeed, other parts of the bible force Wallace to view atheism as not merely wrong, but foolish (Psalm 14:1) and thus, the New Testament, in telling Wallace to stay away from foolish and ignorant speculations, is telling him to stay away from atheism.
24 The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged,
25 with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth,
26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will. (2 Tim. 2:23-26 NAU)
Second, the teacher cannot be "quarrelsome" (v. 24), yet I would imagine that any school-aged child who really liked apologetics, would likely harbor such desire because it gives them a way to vent their sinful lust to argue, a lust they wish to indulge merely because they get off on being contentious with others.
Many kids and teens are attention-whores, and Wallace runs the risk that many of the youth in his audiences will look upon their bible and faith as an excuse to draw attention to themselves, as indeed happens to most apologists, including Wallace himself, when in fact the alleged goal is to transfer focus off of oneself and onto Jesus. Wallace's trying to turn kids into spiritual lights is like trying to promote a teenager to the position of overseer. He is about as pathetic as the 18 year old Mormon missionaries who call themselves "Elder" so-and-so. Elder? Really?
Paul also presumes folly in the young when he says young widows are not to be placed on the church's charity list until they are old, because, Paul presumes, they will more than likely give in to their animal instincts and end up wanting to get married again, or gossiping again:
11 But refuse to put younger widows on the list, for when they feel sensual desires in disregard of Christ, they want to get married,
12 thus incurring condemnation, because they have set aside their previous pledge.
13 At the same time they also learn to be idle, as they go around from house to house; and not merely idle, but also gossips and busybodies, talking about things not proper to mention.
14 Therefore, I want younger widows to get married, bear children, keep house, and give the enemy no occasion for reproach;
15 for some have already turned aside to follow Satan. (1 Tim. 5:11-15 NAU)
It is clear that Wallace doesn't give two shits about this biblical precedent; if you wanted your 3 year old to learn apologetics, Wallace would probably write a book on it and then tour the U.S. giving lectures on how important it is to buy his books and turn toddlers into spiritual warriors. Doesn't matter if it doesn't make sense, most of the crap Wallace teaches also doesn't make sense (as can be presumed from his carefully efforts to avoid debating me and avoid responding to my challenges and indeed to any challenges from other informed bible critics), but that doesn't slow him down in the least from being utterly obsessed with selling, selling, selling. He is nothing but a 1950's Jehovah Witness with a bullhorn on his car. If you wish to make money selling Jesus, advertise, advertise, advertise.
Which is the reason you and Christian "heretics" are so difficult to dissuade, you purposefully create a happy social bubble that makes it nearly impossible for truths you don't agree with, to significantly impact your life (to be fair, Wallace is into apologetics so he is less inclined to say inside his happy Christian bubble than most Christians). I suppose that if I surrounded myself only with other atheist bible critics, I would create a happy bubble around myself, but I can afford to be more objective than Christians can.As Christ followers, we typically surround ourselves with other like-minded believers.
That can only be a good thing in the bible, since it is precisely the outsider's challenging and making you uncomfortable that leads straight to your apostasy or heresy. Wallace doesn't consider that some Christians are likely so fragile in the faith that they aren't ready to join god's "army".In the comfortable worlds we inhabit and create for ourselves, we seldom encounter people who challenge us or make us uncomfortable.
That might give you a clue, Wallace: the only reason you have an apathetic Christian demographic to market your materials to in the first place, is because those people either lack salvation, or are otherwise not intended by God to be spiritual soldiers.Many of us don’t even understand the extent to which our Christian beliefs are being challenged by the increasingly antagonistic culture. We’ve insolated (sic) ourselves to the point of apathy.
Blame it on the Holy Spirit, since he is allegedly capable of making even unbelievers do what he wants (Ezra 1:1), so he has no excuse for not exerting the same magically coercive telepathy on his own followers.Because we’re never challenged, we fail to see the need to study.
Telling you that most of your readers have more in common with elementary school kids than they have with city planners. School kids? Not the kind of people that should be teaching atheists...the devil's most clever disciples.Most of us don’t start thinking about dinner until we get hungry.
Ditto.We don’t start shopping for a car until our current car isn’t working.
Similarly, most Christians don’t recognize the need for Case Making until they’ve been challenged to make a case.
But you haven't shown biblical justification for saying ALL Christians need to be case-makers. Apologetics puts you in contact with some very smart people who have a track record of successfully deconverting Christians. You are rather stupid if you think you aren't putting kids in spiritual danger by blindly assuming its always good for them to do the work that not even most adult teachers are prepared to do.
They'd be better prepared for real-world encounters if you have them try to handle a real atheist or bible critic. If you are going to ignore biblical restrictions, then go for gold.That’s why role-playing is so effective. Last night, as in most of our prior training sessions, we began with some acting. We spent an hour challenging the students as though we were non-believers. We did our best to portray the opposition with clarity and fairness, but we pressed our students as much as possible. We presented the arguments we typically encounter when talking with atheists (or held ourselves when we were non-believers).
At first, it didn’t take much effort to stump the group or frustrate them with our atheistic objections. Within minutes, the students realized they were unable to defend what they believed as Christians. After an hour, their frustration was palpable. They were irritated with their inability to defend what they believed, and while this incompetence made them uncomfortable, it served our purposes perfectly. Suddenly, Christian Case Making became important to these students; they understood their inability and the magnitude of the challenge.
Probably because they were youthful, and youths have more tendency to want to win an argument for reasons other than long-term spiritual good. Impressing one's cohorts with flashes of intellectual brilliance are also among the reasons many Christian youths would wish to become involves in apologetics.
Once again, the bible says atheism is foolish (Psalm 14:1), and the Christian teacher is to avoid foolish subjects (2nd Timothy 2:23 ff, supra). I find it disturbing, to say the least, that Wallace can forge ahead with his new marketing scheme, while being so blissfully ignorant of (or apathetic toward) the New Testament restrictions on just who is supposed to be a teacher.
Hard to believe that the Holy Spirit, whom you credit as the reason you have joy in the Lord, would approve of you misleading others about what you really believe. YOU might play games, but the Holy Spirit likely doesn't.When I am asked to do longer, multi-session training with a group, I sometimes begin without revealing my Christian identity at all. I’ll introduce myself as the old atheist I used to be. Without revealing who I am today, I’ll spend an hour demonstrating the defensive shortcomings of the group.
If you want to turn them into spiritual giants, have them meet with me or some other bible critic who specializes in answering apologists. I'll start them off on why it makes no sense to say that causing men to rape women can possibly be "loving". Isaiah 13, Hosea 13. Either the god of the bible has a history of actions utterly inconsistent with "love", or the definition of "love" becomes intolerably and uselessly malleable.When I finally reveal I’m a Christian, the group is typically relieved to find out I am on their side. If my time with a group is much shorter, I’ll still find a way to “role-play” the position of those who oppose the Christian view. If nothing else, I’ll simply provide a series of quotes (or even a short video) demonstrating the strength of the opposition.
If we are supposed to believe that God "loves" the women that he causes other men to rape, that is a horrifically ignorant and desperate view that that nobody finds the least bit compelling...except Christian apologists whose solitary goal in life is to transform ancient tribal barbarian philosophy from the OT prophets, into something more acceptable to modern western notions of justice and common sense.
In other words, like a salesman, you create a problem for which your materials, on sale now, provide a solution. Standard operating procedure for any car salesman.In other words, I begin by creating a hunger for the meal we are about to eat.
I try to demonstrate the urgency of the questions so the answers will be embraced more eagerly.
Very sad that an alleged "bible-believer" like you causes youth to eagerly involve themselves in answering atheism, when your own NT directly forbids any Christian from becoming involved in such "foolish speculations". You need to check yourself, Wallace, you are missing the forest for the trees.
But whatever you do, don't trust in the power of the Holy Spirit nor in the power of prayer. No, you are hopelessly stuck in mire unless and until you purchase Wallace's materials. Maybe he can explain how the bible alone can be sufficient for faith and practice, yet also be insufficient until it is supplemented by commentaries written by sinful men far less inspired than the biblical authors.If you’re a “One Dollar Apologist” and you’re struggling to introduce Christian Case Making to your Christian brothers and sisters, consider the importance of role playing. If nothing else, present the opposing case prior to making the case for Christianity. When you demonstrate the strength of the challenge, people are far more willing to strengthen their ability to respond.
