Contending Against Idols: Round 1 Phil Sessa VS. Relative Truth

Ladies and gentlemen, round one, Phil Sessa. This from the

Christian satire site Babylon Bee. US sources confirmed this

Friday that American society, while typically rejecting concepts like absolute truth and objective moral standards, is suddenly showing grave concern for the rise of fabricated news stories after a reported uptick in fake news during the recent election season.

President Trump was blasted for his habit of using the term fake news to describe many mainstream media outlets who said he was to blame in the attempted assassination upon his own life.

One judge said, he brought this on himself and we will ensure justice is done. According to sources, the motion to indict

Trump was filed 30 seconds after the failed assassination attempt.

If Trump were not literally Hitler, no one would have tried to kill him in the first place. It's time the legal system goes after Hitler and not the people trying to murder

Hitler. Trump was indicted for the Secret Service shooting of the would -be assassin.

It's absolutely wrong, in my opinion, said the man who denies absolute ideals are right and wrong.

If someone reads information outside of liberal media sources, they may get deceived.

That just seems totally wicked. How can other news sources publish stuff that's blatantly not true, added the man who noted in his firm belief that everyone has the right to define their own version of truth.

Others agreed that shady news sites could get away with reporting completely inaccurate information, which is disturbing and evil, while stressing that there is no absolute moral truths that everyone must conform to.

But tech corporations such as Facebook and Google vowed to meet the trend head -on, assuring they would filter out any news that contradicts the version of truth they decided is acceptable.

So the title of this first session, Contending for the Faith in a Relative Truth World, and I have four headings for us to consider this morning.

Heading number one would be contending purposefully. Heading number two, contending with relativists.

Heading number three, contending with weapons. And heading number four, contending coaching tactics.

And so relativism is sort of like monopoly. Rather than use the standards set by the community, in this case,

Parker Brothers, which governs behavior, the players make up their own rules.

And so relativists play monopoly with right and wrong. Many in our culture are conditioned that all religions are the same, which is called religious relativism.

And that tolerance is the ultimate virtue. And there is no absolute truth.

The ideas are heard in such statements as we all worship the same God. All religions are equal.

And who are we to judge others? We cannot change America. Only God can do that.

However, we can equip Christians how to biblically respond to modern trends within the culture.

Heading number one, contending purposefully. Now as we look in Jude chapter one, because again, it only has one chapter,

Jude says in verse three, beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation,

I found it necessary to write to you, exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith, which was once delivered for all the saints.

Now, when you look at that verse, many people think, well, Jude was writing one thing and then he decided to write on a completely different topic.

Well, is celebrating the gospel different than defending the gospel, right?

Defending the gospel is simply just another aspect of the gospel. It's not a different topic.

It's the same topic. We can celebrate the gospel and we can contend for the gospel.

Now, as we look at to contend purposefully, we have to define a couple of terms.

And the first one is a worldview. And a worldview is a lens by which we view the world, sort of like putting on a pair of glasses with red lenses.

It would color everything that you look at and the way you look at such things. It's the way you orient yourself in this world, like a map of reality.

And like any map, it may fit what is actually there or it can be very misleading.

If you use a map of Spain to find your way around the United States, it just simply wouldn't work.

You couldn't navigate using a map from Spain in the US. And one might have the right, one must have the right map in this world we live in.

And we have that map here in the scriptures. This is our map. This is our lens. This is the worldview.

It's our final arbiter or judge for our Christian faith and practice.

And scripture informs us the way we're to think about everything, about the big questions in life, such as our origins, where does humanity come from?

Our identity, who am I? Our purpose, why am I here? The problem, what's wrong with this world?

The solution, how can what's wrong be fixed? And afterlife, where do

I go when I die? And the Bible has true answers for each of these, just as the world has false responses for each.

If you have a biblical worldview, you will know that God created you in his image to live in his world and to glorify him forever according to his revealed will, which is in the scriptures.

You didn't evolve by random evolutionary processes to live a life of survival of the fittest in a dog -eat -dog world.

The world says the problem is there's not enough education, medication, and government. Now, the

Christian knows the problem is man's rebellion against God. The world's answer, we need more education, more medication, and more government.

I wonder who's governing the governors then. But the Bible's answer is Christ's atonement for sinners, who gives us a new birth, causing us to repent of our sin, trust in Christ.

And at death, the world says we're just pushing up daisies. But the gospel says that saints rise to be with the

Lord and sinners receive their just reward, being punished in hell. Now, politicians, musicians, educators, artists, scientists are all giving their worldview.

Some are on track with God's word, but many more are off the rails, giving an unbiblical worldview.

And people will even vote for the candidate that aligns most with the worldview that they contain.

We must have a biblical worldview to contend for the faith. Now, contending for the faith can be thought of having an offensive and a defensive strategy, sort of like football.

There's the offensive team and the defensive team. And we're to articulate a biblical worldview in a world saturated with worldly philosophies.

And so on the offensive, we read in Jude, he said to earnestly contend for the faith that was once delivered to the saints.

But then he continues, for certain people have crept in on notice who long ago were designated for this condemnation on godly people who pervert the grace of our

God into sensuality and deny our only master and Lord, Jesus Christ. And the

Greek word for contend is apagonizomai. And it's found only here in the

New Testament. And you have to grit your teeth to make an ugly face just to say apagonizomai.

And so we get the English word agony from this word. And this verb describes a vigorous and intense athletic competition, specifically grappling, wrestling, hand -to -hand combat.

One warrior determines to defeat their opposition. This is he beats you or you beat him to the point of agony to win.

We're seeing right now in the Olympics, we're seeing people competing against each other to the point of agony.

And Jude calls us to contend for the faith for the person and the doctrines of Christianity.

The person and the doctrines because you can't have Christianity without Christ. Now defensively, 1

Peter 3 .15, it says, but in your hearts, honor Christ the

Lord as holy. Always being prepared to make a defense, apologia, where we get the word apologetics, to anyone who asks you for the reason, for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect.

Christ must first be honored as Lord in our own hearts. How are you gonna defend someone that you don't honor?

The spirit in which we are to respond to others is not an arrogance or pride, but in gentleness and respect because all people are made in the image of God.

Now, Pastor Anthony said rightfully concerning Tulip to me a few years ago, that the doctrines of grace that we hold are doctrines of grace.

They're not doctrines of arrogance. They're not doctrines of pride. So we must share them with grace and never be outgraced by those that oppose the doctrines of grace.

Saints, we can respect a person as an image bearer of God without respecting their unbiblical worldview.

The world has no category for that. The Bible does. It's called being a

Christian. I can help a very ungodly person who broke down on the side of the road to get back on the road.

Doesn't mean I agree with anything in their worldview. And we have to be prepared.

We must be prepared. And being prepared for the sake of the gospel requires planning before time and not at the time of the challenge.

One doesn't begin to build lifeboats while the ship is sinking and a soldier doesn't go out to buy ammunition in the very heat of battle.

These are things that must be done prior. And we prepare using the Bible for offense and defense, using apologetics.

And this is not a scary word. Just as every Christian is a theologian, if you've heard of R .C.

Sproul's book, Everyone is a Theologian. Everyone is a theologian, either a weak theologian or a strong theologian.

And as you grow in your faith, you become stronger. And so every Christian is an apologist. Again, either a weak apologist or a strong apologist, and you will grow in your defense of the faith.

And this is the reason why we have this conference today, to strengthen you to be better at defending and contending for the faith.

And apologetics is just simply giving a rational or a logical defense for the Christian faith.

And get this, you don't have to know everything everybody believes. You don't have to be a

PhD scientist to speak to an evolutionist. You don't have to know everything about Islam and Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses.

I spoke to a man at the Museum of Natural History who had a PhD in astrophysics. And I just, he said, well, you know, there's no absolute truth.

And I just asked him, is that absolutely true? I didn't have a PhD. You don't need a

PhD. Truth is truth. It doesn't matter if you have a PhD, right? If you live in the country, that just means you're a pothole digger.

I mean, so I'm not impressed always when someone says they have a PhD. Because if they have a

PhD and that which is wrong and sinful, what does it matter? It doesn't matter.

Nicodemus had a PhD in theology. And Jesus said, Nicodemus, you must be born again.

Jesus skipped right over his PhD. Didn't matter. So you have to know three things.

You have to know what you believe. You have to know why you believe that and be able to articulate that to others in an effective and winsome manner.

Know what you believe, why you believe it, and be able to communicate it. You can and are to address legitimate questions and objections that stand between someone and his or her trust in Christ alone for salvation.

And so you're vindicating the Christian way of life against the various non -Christian ways of life because those ways don't work.

In reality, there's only two religions in the world, the religion from man and the religion from God.

That's it. Every religion from man, you could list under there, Roman Catholicism, Mormonism, evolution.

You could just put them all down. That's just the umbrella of it. But they're all the religion of man. The religion of God, for God so loved the world, he sent his only son.

He gave us a message in the cross. Only two religions in the whole world.

Religion from man is a due religion. Hence, you must do something to earn heaven, whether it's the five pillars of Islam, the four noble truths of Buddhism, the seven sacraments of Roman Catholicism, and so on and so forth.

You have to jump through all these religious hula hoops. But Christianity is a done religion. God has done something for you that you and I could have never done for ourselves in sending his son.

He sent the man, he sent the plan, he sent the savior to save us from our sins. We could have not shaken heaven and made that happen.

I think a group of people in Babel tried to do something like that, and how did that work out for them?

And he sent Jesus to regenerate our stony, wicked hearts and replace those hearts into pliable hearts of flesh that now love him.

Well, not only are we to contend purposefully, but heading number two, we're to contend with relativists.

Now, in John chapter 18, verse 37 and 38, familiar passage, Pilate asked

Jesus, so you are a king. Jesus answered, you say that I am a king. For this purpose,

I was born, and for this purpose, I've come into the world to bear witness of the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.

Now, does Pilate get it? Here's what he says. Pilate said to him, what is truth? Now, Pilate was a relativist when he asked, what is truth?

And so relativists, they believe that all points of views, beliefs, religious systems, moral positions, and truth claims are equally valid and relative to the individual, and that there are no moral absolutes.

If one believes there's no moral absolutes and all truths equally valid, this leads to nihilism, which all ideas lose their value.

It's kind of like when you're reading a book and you take a highlighter and you highlight the important stuff.

The relativists, they highlight everything. So if everything is true, if everything is important, nothing's important, because you highlighted everything.

If the truth doesn't exist, why couldn't Pilate and Jesus just switch roles at the crucifixion?

It wouldn't matter if Jesus said, how about you go to the cross?

If there is no truth, I'll be the governor. You'll be the criminal. Imagine waking up and seeing newsflash.

All bills in the American currency system are declared to be equal.

So your $1 bill and your $100 bill, well, they're the same. Your $5 bill and your $100 bill, they're the same. Doesn't matter.

This is akin to relativism, saying we all worship the same God. We just refer to him or her by different titles.

Relativism overlooks the most glaring contradictions between religions in an effort to preserve unity and peace.

And unity and peace are things we find in the cross, in Christ, in the scriptures.

And we're gonna see how they steal from our ideas to try to create their false systems. And this would mean that Christianity, Islam, and Mormonism are not mutually exclusive, but are, in fact, all expressions of worship to the same deity.

So to the relativist, the Bible, the Quran, the Book of Mormon, they're all man -made books that contain good teachings, but none of them can exclusively claim truth.

So when I spoke to a yoga teacher who had been coming to our public school that I work in, and he said he grew up as a

Christian and a Hindu. And I said, well, that's interesting. I said, so what do you do with the words of Jesus?

He said, I'm absolutely cool with the words of Jesus. I said, really? Well, let me see how cool you are with them. Jesus said,

I'm the way, the truth, and the life. No man can come to the Father except through me. I said, what do you think?

He said, I'm cool with that. I said, you're cool with Jesus saying he was the way, the only way, and no other way? He said, he can't possibly be the only way.

I said, oh, you're not too cool with the words of Jesus. I said, you don't believe what

Jesus has said. He walked out. He saw that he said one thing, and his very words violated what he just said.

Try to be a relativist. Imagine three umpires.

The first one says, some pitches are balls, and some are strikes. I call them like I see them. That's your relativist.

The second umpire says, some are balls, and some are strikes, but they're nothing until I call them.

Another way of being a relativist. The third one says, some are balls, and some are strikes.

And I call them as they are, according to the rules. It's gotta land in that strike zone.

Can't just be, oh, it went up there. That looks like a strike to me. Can't do that.

Sadly, what they wouldn't do in sports, they do with philosophy.

They do with voting, and they do with morality. But they would never do it in baseball.

They would never do it in football. They take the tape measure out and make sure what line it's on. Relativism, though, has fatal flaws, according to Greg Cockel.

The first one is, relativists can't accuse others of doing wrong, because there's no objective moral standard.

How can you tell me I've done something wrong when there is no right and wrong? Just apples and oranges.

It's the rapist's view versus the victim's view. There can be no innocent or guilty, no accountability, without having a standard.

Secondly, relativists, they are king and queens at contradicting themselves.

They make self -refuting or contradictory statements. An example would be if I said, my mom, well, she didn't have any kids that live.

And what would you say? What are you doing here, right? Or if I said,

I can't speak a word of English. Say, well, it sounds like English to me. There is no absolute truth.

Really? Like I said to that PhD, is that absolutely true? And his head hung.

You ought not judge. Really, is that your judgment? Are you judging me for making a judgment and saying judging is wrong?

Right, Matthew 7 .1 is like the new John 3 .16. Judge not, lest you be judged.

And Jesus is not telling us not to judge. He's teaching us how to judge. You can't know anything for sure.

Really, are you sure about that? All you need to do is flip the statement on its head and it contradicts itself.

And people do it all the time. I have students that do it and I have fellow teachers that do it. Thirdly, relativists, they can't complain about the problem of evil because they can't say anything is right or wrong.

It's just like apples and oranges of preference. They can't say rape is wrong if truth is relative.

They can only say, well, you know what? It's not my way of dating people. Someone can't call a line crooked unless there's a straight line by which they can measure it by.

Fourth, relativists can't make charges of unfairness and injustice. Now, a story is told of a young college student.

He stays up all night and he writes a paper to dispel right and wrong, fair and unfair.

He hands it in the blue folder. The professor turns it back to him the next day, big red letter

F. The student said, how can I have gotten an F? And the professor said,

I don't like when people hand in papers in blue folders. You fail. And he said, that's not fair.

That's not just. He contradicted himself because understand words have meanings and words such as justice and injustice, fair and unfair, these are biblical terms that the world tries to hijack from us.

The social justice movement made famous by the BLM cult doesn't get to use and redefine our words from scripture.

We preach in the middle of a BLM rally at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, right? And one of the guys in the rally tried to steal our speaker in the name of justice.

50 police officers. I said, can an officer please help me? I'm on the microphone. They're stealing my speaker.

Not one of them moved to help me. Not one. 50 of them. Injustice is sin.

There is no social justice. Scripture speaks of categories as not as oppressed and oppressor, but as righteous and unrighteous or children of God and children of wrath.

We need to use the biblical categories, not the world's categories. Because when

God judges all lives, he's not using the categories of this world. Right?

Cause then med fans could never get in the heaven. Relativist can't hold meaningful and moral discussions.

You as a Christian have a biblical standard and others have no standard at all.

They will impose moral rules like it's wrong to push your morality on others. Well, that's exactly what they do.

One day when I was preaching open air outside of the Queen Center Mall, a Muslim came up to me and said, the Bible is corrupt.

I said, sir, by who? He said, I don't know. I said, what verse was corrupted?

So give me like the before and the corrupted version. He said, I don't have an example.

I said, sir, have you ever read the Bible? He said, no. I said, sir, the only thing that's corrupt is you and I.

And that's why we need Christ. A Jewish man hears this interaction and comes over and says, you have no right to tell this man that he's wrong.

And I said, but you have a right to tell me that I'm wrong. He cursed me up and down and went away and grunting.

He wasn't even in the conversation and he contradicted himself. Foolishness, foolishness.

Even the Muslim man was more respectful than the man who wasn't even in the conversation. Number six, relativists can't promote the obligation of tolerance.

If I said all views are equally valid, no one is better than another. The relativist would say, amen,

I agree with you. But if I said Jesus is the Messiah, the only way to God, and all those who reject him would spend an eternity in hell, they would say you're intolerant.

They would say I'm wrong and intolerant and violate their own worldview of supposed tolerance because they can't tolerate our worldview, can they?

They can't and they won't. So sometimes I'll ask them, are you a tolerant person?

They say, oh yeah. And then within two minutes, they violate that because they have to.

The relativists want Christians to tolerate ungodliness like abortion. But if I said, you should tolerate slavery, it would say no.

They would say, wait, so you want me to, so I agree slavery's wrong and abortion's wrong and being very consistent, but you tolerate one evil and reject another.

Problem. Should we as Christians tolerate the opening ceremony at the 2024

Olympics, which mocked our Lord's Supper? Should we just say, well, that's just art.

That's just different. I spoke to a pastor friend of mine who used to be a

Muslim and we both agreed if they did a cartoon of Muhammad, there would have been bombs going off at the

Olympics. They would never do that with Muhammad, would they? No. You can see the dilemma in our tolerant city.

They are inconsistent because they don't have a biblical standard by which to make a biblical judgment. Applying the words of Francis Schaeffer, one can rightly say the relativists have both feet firmly planted in midair.

Well, heading number two, contending with a weapon. There must be a mechanism of truth, a standard by which we can know what is and what is not true in scriptural.

The mechanism and the standard that we have is the Bible. It's the sword. Your Bible is the weapon that God has given us to contend.

In Ephesians 6 .17, the Bible's called the sword of the spirit which we are to use. In Hebrews 4 .12,

it says that for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two -edged sword.

And here's what it does, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and the intents of the hearts.

The Quran can't do that. The Book of Mormon can't do that. Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

The traditions of Roman Catholicism can't do that. He didn't breathe out traditions. He breathed out the word.

2 Timothy 3 .16, and the word reproves, rebukes, and exhorts with complete patience and teaching.

2 Timothy 4 .2 -3, we have a mechanism. We have a standard of truth, an unchanging standard of truth.

And just as God is unchanging, his word is unchanging because it's out of his character. Remember, you don't need to know what everyone believes.

You have to know what you believe, why you believe it, and articulate it to others. If the Muslim asks, why do you believe in three gods?

Or why do you believe Mary is the mother of God in the third part of the Trinity? I don't have to contend with that because it's a false view, also known in logic as a straw man, which is kind of like in a field,

I set up this fake image, this straw man, and then attack that image. If somebody misrepresents what you believe, you don't have to defend it because you don't believe it.

You can say, well, where'd you get that from? I don't believe that. Matter of fact, no Christian believes that.

You don't need to grapple with false views of Christianity or false preachers that claim Christianity like those of the word of faith movement.

So when somebody comes along and says, oh, yeah, you and Joel Osteen, right? He said, I don't claim Joel Osteen. He's not a

Christian. Just, he's like you.

He's unsaved. Between the words of Jude 1 .3 and 1

Peter 3 .15, I am responsible to contend for the faith that was once delivered to the saints and defend the hope that is in me, not the faith that was delivered and the hope that is in others.

Remember, behind every question, there's a questioner, and behind every objection, there's an objectioner, a person behind what they're objecting to or behind what they're asking.

Has the gospel changed over time? It has not. Therefore, the objections to the gospel have also not changed.

Even if they're nuanced, the core is still the same. The atheists from way back then, or the professing atheists, they're making the same claims against the scriptures as the ones today.

There's nothing new under the sun. They're not coming up with anything new. People are asking the same questions, raising the same objections that Pilate made.

Truth, what is truth? We have to think categorically.

I call this sailing on the high seas, using the commandments, the creeds, confessions, and catechisms.

Now, when you go shopping in the supermarket, when you first walk in, you always go into the produce aisle.

You don't walk into the cookies and the snacks. They always have you walk in there because those are perishable.

If you don't buy the salad now, it's gonna perish. The cookies have a shelf life of about 25 years, like a

Twinkie. If you went to the store and things were just all over the place, and the canned foods were right next to the frozen foods, next to the mousetrap, you wouldn't be able to find your way around.

They put things in categories so you could navigate your way through the store and find what you need.

And so we need to familiarize ourselves with basic categories of questions and the key biblical texts that address them so we can be equipped to engage in contending and defending the faith using expository apologetics, basically the power of God's word to respond to questions and objections.

And here are some categories. The category of sin, the category of the person of Christ, the category of death, the category of marriage, the category of abortion.

You just saw it at the Olympics opening ceremony. It's the category of Christ, the category of sin.

They had a wrong view of Jesus, a wrong view of the Bible. First commandments.

What Bible verse speaks directly to these topics? You memorize them, you put them into your heart so that the spirit will draw them out of your mind when that Jehovah's Witness comes to the door.

If someone says, well, God is so good, well, then why is there evil? Oh, you're talking about the doctrine of sin.

Well, let's see where evil came from. Let's go to Genesis 3. I'll open my Bible if you don't have yours.

We'll read it together. We can look at the 10 commandments. Well, God said, don't violate these things and we violated them, so what do you expect to have happen?

When you violate the law of gravity, you fall. When you violate God's commandments, you sin. It's not complicated.

I think people should be able to marry whoever they want. Oh, oh, you're talking about the doctrine of marriage. Well, let's go to the architect of marriage and let's see what he said about marriage.

Since he founded it, let's see how he described it and what the architect said, how it's designed, and we should stick to that design.

What did he say? Not only the commandments, but the creeds, the earliest apologetics.

And so the creeds are apologetic in nature. They're summaries of the gospel in poetic form, and they're easy to remember.

We have the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, which is very similar to the Apostles' Creed, but mentions the members of the

Trinity, and it was written to address a heresy popular in that day called

Arianism, where we get Jehovah's Witness theology from in Mormon theology, because Arians believed

Jesus was a created being. Jehovah's Witnesses today don't have, they have no clue that they got that heresy from way back in the third century, but yet they're running with it like, oh, this has always been.

No. The Athanasian Creed, which focuses on the person of the Trinity trying to deal with those that deny the

Trinity. And so we must know what we believe, and these creeds are essential tools for disciple -making and equipping us to contend and defend the faith.

The creeds express expressions of biblical truth. Therefore, we can know Jehovah's Witness, Mormonism, Oneness Pentecostal doctrines are heretical.

They're all false, because we have what's true. A jeweler has to be able to tell the difference between fool's gold and true gold, real gold, right?

And if you're single and you want to get married, make sure you have the right one, because your fiance will know too.

And then you'll need a defense of the faith. Not only that, but confessions of the faith.

And I believe here, 1689? All right, we use the 1689 and there are others, the

Westminster and other confessions of the faith. And it's amazing, they're organized categorically.

So you can go and say, oh, the person of Christ, let me go to the humanity of Jesus. Oh, sin, the

Trinity, I mean, it's all there. They wrote it out and what they wrote yesterday is still absolutely useful today.

The explanations and all the verses that back up the explanations. Now, first, Tim, are creeds and confessions only historical?

No, but they're biblical as well. The Bible contains confessions.

First Timothy 3 .16, here's a confession. Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness.

He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world.

There are five snapshots of the life of Jesus Christ right there, and we're to pass these truths on to faithful men who'll be able to teach others also.

Second Timothy 2 .2, Paul admonished Timothy, follow the pattern of sound words that you have heard from me in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus by the

Holy Spirit who dwells within us. Guard the good deposit entrusted to you.

The confession lays out essential in categories such as scripture, trinity, creation, the fall, sin, punishment,

Christ the mediator, salvation, assurance of salvation, all the way to the last judgment. It's all there, it's all there.

You need to be able to define what you believe about Jesus, which will contrast with a Jehovah's Witness, Mormon, Muslim, or one that's

Pentecostal. You see, they can't hold it, all religious beliefs are okay, so wait a minute.

So if I say to the Muslims, so you do believe Jesus died on the cross and rose from the grave, they're gonna say, no,

I don't believe that. They're gonna say that never happened, that was an imposter. Even the religious groups, when you press them, will all hold to an exclusive claim that what they're teaching and saying is true.

All beliefs are not relative. If you have the wrong Jesus, you know what you have? You have the wrong gospel, and you have one that can't save sinners.

I can use chapter eight, Christ the mediator, which speaks directly to the true Christ and includes all the Bible verses which this confession stems from.

Not only confessions, but catechisms. Foundational question and answer format, in category, sort of like we dialogue today.

Somebody asks a question, we respond to it. There are different levels from young children to older children and adults.

And parents, you would do well to teach your children to learn from the catechism. And on our website, we have a link in our tackle box at Soul Fishing Ministries.

You can click on it, and there are free tools there to use to teach your children the catechism.

And the parents learn this alongside with their children, because it's not just for kids, it's for mom and dad too.

People have legitimate questions, and format memorized answers to such questions.

Commandments, creeds, confessions, catechisms are a practical manner to apply the command to contend and defend the faith.

And they are effective to prepare us and tools to contend with, and are transferable to young disciples and to raise our children to prepare to live in a world that is relativism and saturated with false doctrines.

Now, some people will say this. Well, I don't believe your Bible. Now, I don't know if you've ever done this, but when

I was a young believer, I used to do this. Instead of using my Bible, I would stop using my

Bible and then try to prove the Bible to be true. So that would be like if I went to a sword fight and my opponent said,

I just don't believe in your sword. I take the sword and I put it in the sheath. And I say, well, let me try to convince you about the properties of metallurgy, how swords are engineered and the history of sword making.

Would I do that or would I just take my sword and cut him with it? Then he'll believe. I never put my

Bible away, and you don't need to put your Bible away. Why would you put your Bible away, which is your worldview, but they don't have to do the same thing with their worldview?

So the evolutionist says, you need to put your Bible away because I have science. Put your pseudoscience away.

Now, we can't even have a conversation. They're not willing to put their worldview away, but they're asking us to put our weapons down.

And if you do that, shame on you. You're being foolish. Don't do it, right? I was foolish.

I did it as a young believer. I knew about two weeks worth of the Bible because I just started reading it.

And when people said, well, how do I know that's true? I put my Bible away and started to try to defend it. Don't do that.

Never do that. This is the rule. Never put away your sword.

Use the truth. Don't sheath the truth. How do we put these things into practice?

Well, this is heading number four, contending coaching tactics. This is sort of the how -to, some coaching steps.

Also known as the expository waltz, or if you've ever read Greg Kogel's book, Columbo Tactic, dialoguing with someone that presents an unbiblical worldview in conversation with you.

And there are three steps to communicate and guide you away from their lies and toward truth.

And you wanna do that for them. You wanna guide them away from their own lies. Even if it's putting a stone in their shoe and saying, man, you know what?

They walk away from you and they say, my worldview really doesn't work. They're uncomfortable with that stone.

You ever get a pebble in your shoe or in your sandal, right? You walk in and you have to take it off and you gotta shake it out.

Well, you're kind of leaving that person in that predicament and they're like, oh man, yeah, this really doesn't make sense.

If I say all truth is relative, yeah, how can I say if my sister got raped, it's just a rapist view versus my sister's view.

It doesn't work. Their worldview is inconsistent and it's uncomfortable to walk in.

Well, here's the first coaching step. Now you're gonna, this is in your mind. You're not telling them this, but you're gonna display this.

Coaching step number one, you're wrong. All right, that's simple enough.

You're wrong. You're gonna expose their worldview inconsistencies because people don't usually make assertions unless they think that they're right.

They're gonna state their worldview and when they do so, you wanna listen carefully. Listen for understanding to gain information.

James chapter one, verse 19 and 20 says, be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to become angry for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God.

And so you wanna listen because you want to clarify their worldview, their claim, their objection or question.

And you're gonna presume that there's a hole in their logic because there will in fact be a hole in their logic.

Outside of Christianity, no one's going to stay consistent. It's impossible. The universities, uni meaning one, right?

And diversity, unity and diversity. They try to bring it all together. Do we see that on our college campuses?

I think I saw a couple of riots and friendly protests breaking windows and everything.

That looks very unified, doesn't it? Burning flags, right? We have it.

We have unity and diversity in the Trinity. Summarize generously.

Don't drop the atomic bomb. Don't guess, but clarify what they've said.

Oppose wisely and gently with gentleness and respect. Not quarrelsome, but kind to everyone.

Able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness and God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth to escape their senses.

And they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will.

Show the inconsistencies. Secondly, you're a thief. You find the source, the biblical source, not theirs, but ours.

Show their argument is perfectly upheld in the gospel, not according to their own twisted worldview.

Well, what's your standard? Well, how do you know that's true? Can you defend that view? And you will clarify the reasons for the person's idea or worldview because he or she bears the burden of proof for their own claims.

Know the high seas, the commandments, the decrees, the confessions, and the catechisms.

Because true claims are rooted in biblical truth even if the other person is ignorant of it.

We can connect their issue, racism, LGBT, evil, riots, abortion, and we can connect all those things to God's truth.

And then cite the source. Their worldview versus the biblical worldview. Scripture is the source of moral and theological truth, not me.

I'm not the end all. And so presuppositions are exposed. They might not like that. They may say, well, everybody should be able to marry whoever they want.

You shouldn't judge. Number three, I'm right. So we have, you're wrong, you're a thief, and I'm right.

Here's where we get the gospel right. Remember, it's not information that saves but the power of the gospel that saves.

And we contend and defend the reason for the hope that's in us. Why is it true?

What does it really look like? Now, both of us have presuppositions. They're stepping on a limb from a biblical worldview and trying to saw it off from God's tree of truth.

And we demonstrate the consistency, superiority, and beauty of the Christian worldview. Why is the

Christian worldview better? Because it's rooted in a timeless, perfect, external source with God as the author.

He exists, he created us, he's spoken, and I'm obligated to listen and obey.

It's of the greatest benefit to image bearers of God. Why does our worldview matter? Well, because if God is true and he is, he has an unchanging righteousness and judgment that will come to all revealed in the scriptures.

Then we don't come like a formula like the Jehovah's Witness, we just come with truth. And these are steps to navigate.

And you show them the steps, not telling them you're wrong, you're a thief and I'm right. And here's how that looks, an example.

The person says you're wrong for not respecting same -sex marriage. You disrespect people.

Number one, you're wrong. What's the basis of your standard that people should be treated with dignity and respect?

What's the right thing to do? Well, what makes it right? I have a standard for treating people with dignity and respect because all people are creating the image of God.

What is your standard? They don't have one. Secondly, you're a thief.

I should support your position even though your worldview has no basis for it. And you want me to abandon my worldview which embraces what you're trying to posit.

I have a foundation for treating people with respect and love while yours doesn't. And you want me to abandon my worldview?

My worldview is the only way to get to where you're saying that we need to get to, to treat people with dignity and respect.

You can't do that from your worldview. You're using the map of Spain to try to navigate in the United States. It doesn't work.

And not only that, you want my limb of truth while denying the scriptures and that limb is vitally attached to God's righteousness.

So you wanna get out on the limb, saw it off, and where's it gonna leave you?

You're going down. Third, I'm right.

You display to them the truth of the scripture. The God of the universe has given truth and created marriage as one man and one woman which honors him and displays the gospel of Christ and his church and is the foundation for procreation of biblical families.

Any other display tries to define what the architect has designed. You can't redefine what the architect has designed.

And it doesn't display a picture of the gospel. It doesn't produce complimentary marital roles which leads to producing biblical families.

So here's the steps. You're wrong. Your worldview is inconsistent. Two, you're a thief.

And number three, I'm right. Let me display the branch connected to the tree or the puzzle and put it in its right focus.

Some considerations. When you try to persuade, God alone opens hearts.

Be as wise as serpent and gentle as doves. You're not coming with a formula. Sometimes these conversations are marathons.

They're not sprints. And you're not selling your best life now. Let me close with this illustration from the book of Jonah.

In Jonah chapter one, we know that there's a heavy storm that's brewing, the storm of the

Lord as Jonah is running from God. And the mariners call out to their gods and they didn't know what was going on and who was responsible for the storm which

God was throwing the storm at them. They acted in what Paul Tripp calls pantheistic panic.

He said, everyone pray to your God, pray to anyone. Someone's gotta have the right wavelength to the God that's responsible for this.

So everybody get on board, everybody throw it up and someone's gonna connect with that right wavelength.

Then they try the blame game. Who's at fault? They cast lots and even God is sovereign over a coin flip.

Proverbs 16, 33, the lot is cast into the lap but every decision is from the

Lord. They tried pragmatism, the end justifies the means. They try to roll and roll and roll as hard as they can but to no avail because man's efforts cannot bring about salvation.

Finally, they listen to Jonah, they throw him overboard and the mariners are just like those in our neighborhoods.

They're just trying everything that they know. They're grabbing, they're throwing things overboard, they're trying to get rid of things in their life and they're trying to roll their way to salvation by their good deeds and good works.

They're just like our family and friends, aren't they? They're panicking and they're trying to grasp onto anything that they can to try to save themselves.

Jonah had the truth but he ran with the truth and he tried to sleep on it.

When people needed it, we cannot be asleep. When people need the truth, we need to contend and defend the faith.