An Introduction to Presuppositional Apologetics 1 (Introduction)

An Introduction to Presuppositional Apologetics, Part 1, brought to you by RoarNoMore .com.

I really like apologetics, I think, because ever since I was very young, I was always attracted to very controversial things, and a lot of people who know me kind of know that. Religion and politics are like the two things I love discussing more than anything else, and so that got me in trouble quite a few times at various jobs, and when I started going to college, it was YC bringing up controversy all the time, and I think I've hopefully toned down a bit.

I don't bring that stuff up all the time, but when it does come up, you know, I really like talking about it, and so that sort of naturally fits in with apologetics. It was reasoning, it was about worldviews that were in conflict, and I really liked just talking to people about what they believed, what I believed, and going back and forth with point, counterpoint, and so forth.

Facts Alone Do Not Win Debates

First, I want to go over something I noticed when I was, I guess this would probably be when I was like 16. First class I took at college was a speech class, and basically the teacher wanted us to do controversial subjects on everything.

We had to debate the legalization of marijuana, we had to debate evolution, all sorts of things, and of course she tended to be on the liberal side of all those issues. I tended to be on the other side, and most of the class was on her side, and I actually enjoyed it, so it was a good deal.

But I remember thinking that if I just have all the facts, if I can get a pile of evidence and bring it into class for whatever topic it was, say it was evolution, I could bring all my creation facts in, and they can bring all their evolution facts in, and if my pile was higher than theirs, if I had more compelling reasons to believe in my position, then somehow I figured, well that's the end of the debate.

And so I reasoned that way, I think, for a couple years. I would just try to memorize facts, whatever topic it was, bring them into class, and then just kind of pigeonhole whoever it was, which is not a very humble way of doing things, but it was like boom, boom, boom, this study says this, this study says that, we know this, and then the other person wouldn't have much to appeal to because maybe they hadn't studied the issue.

That was all great until I ran across people that had more facts than I did, and then I was the one being pigeonholed, and I realized that that probably wasn't the best way to do things, but that's the way that I think most of us are wired.

We think that somehow if we have enough facts, enough arguments, that we can somehow convince someone that our position is true. And through this whole course, through this whole summer Sunday school, hopefully we'll see at the end that that's not the case, that there is a better way, a higher way, actually a more compelling way to reason that is irrefutable, that is a way of reasoning that is consistent with the biblical God.

Worldviews, Escape Mechanisms, and Presuppositions

Let me give you an example here. One of the things evolutionists believe is that there is this Oort cloud. I don't know if any of you, some of you might have heard of this. One of the creationist arguments is that, well, evolution can't be true, the Earth can't be that old, because if it was, comets would have burned out a long time ago.

And the evolutionists' answer to that is, well, there's an Oort cloud, there's a cloud up there, we can't see it, we've never detected it, but it just keeps producing comets, and therefore, our world view is still intact.

Now you see what they've done there is they've created what's called an escape mechanism. We poked a hole in their world view, and they'll come back with, well, you can't disprove this though, it's a possibility that there could be just this imaginary, this Oort cloud out there.

No, I don't have any proof for it, but if it were true, then my world view is still intact. We see this all the time. Harold Camping. Is everyone familiar with what's happening with Harold Camping? Yeah, the world came to an end.

Now his followers, do they accept that he is wrong? No. Most of them don't. They're still listening to family radio, you know, they still have their bumper stickers and all that. Now, from our perspective, it's like, the guy was proved wrong, right?

He said the world was going to end, the world didn't end, how come they're still following this guy? Well, it's not about facts for them anymore. It's about their presuppositions, it's about their assumptions.

They assume at the outset whatever Harold Camping says is correct, that's why it's a cult. He's their final authority. And so, everything that happens, if Harold Camping gives an explanation, they automatically go with it.

That's what their world view is based on, it's based on one man and what he says. So no matter what happens, it cannot be disproven based on facts alone. And I want you to see that every world view is like that.

Facts are not the issue, the issue is the underlying reasons for believing those facts. And I came to realize this, I think, probably towards the end of my college experience when I started noticing that, from my perspective, I was making awesome points witnessing with people.

I'll give you two examples of this. I remember for one of my classes, one of the students had talked about believing in no absolutes, you're probably all familiar with the postmodern idea. And they said, you know, I don't think there's any real truth out there, there's no such thing as an absolute.

And I asked, well, are you absolutely sure? Yes, I'm absolutely sure. Well, that's an absolute. And so, therefore, you do believe in absolutes, well, no, I don't. And I couldn't break through that. And I'm like, I'm making an awesome point here, how does he not see this?

And I remember there was a bunch of students there that all agreed with him, and they didn't see it either. I was kind of like, this is really unusual, you know, why can't he see what I'm saying? And that's when I, I think, started to realize that the things of God are spiritually discerned, that Satan has blinded the minds of unbelievers, and our responsibility is not to necessarily prove them wrong, though hopefully that happens, but it's more just to bear fruit, to take what God has said, and then expose them to it, and let the Holy Spirit do the work of convincing.

Because we, on our own power, cannot do that. You know, we should strive hard, we should try our best to be reasonable, and to show the unbeliever that he's being non-reasonable, but it's ultimately the Holy Spirit that does the convincing work.

Another example, real quick, I was in a philosophy of religion class, I think it was my second to last semester, and I remember my professor saying that, he asked, what do you think of the modern ecumenical theologians who basically say that, they're kind of post-modern too, but they don't say there are no absolutes, they say, well there could be absolutes, we just don't know if there are or not, we don't really know anything for sure.

And I remembered in class, I said, and they know that, and the whole class kind of smirked, giggled a little bit, and the professor just didn't see it. This was an obvious contradiction, you know, how can you know that you don't know anything?

And so we're going to get into some of that stuff a little later, that's just sort of a preview of some of the unbelieving worldviews and how they contradict themselves. But I guess the point would be, it's not really about evidence, it's not about getting your pile of facts, it's more about reasoning from the fear of the Lord, fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, that's what we start with.

We start with, we don't throw the Bible out in the discussion, we keep the Bible, we stand on that authority, and then we try to show the unbeliever that he's being inconsistent, and the only way he can be consistent is by standing on the foundation we're standing on, which is God's Word.

God in the Judgment Seat, Not the Defense Seat

So this is sort of, I think, a way to break this down, to make it, I think to say what I'm trying to say in a very simple analogy, if we go to a courtroom, and let's say we're doing apologetics in a courtroom, you know, is Christianity true, is it not true?

And with two sides going at each other. The typical way apologetics is done today is God is sitting in a defense seat, and your responsibility as the apologist is to defend him, is to, we don't want God prosecuted, you know, the atheist or whoever else, the other worldview is trying to say, your God is evil, your God can't exist, this and that, and we're trying to defend him.

Well where does that, what kind of a God has to sit in a defense seat and take this from a non-believer? But that's the way almost all apologetics is done, and I'm not really afraid of naming names, so I will in case maybe some of you have heard of these apologists, but William Lane Craig, one of the biggest apologists today in the Christian community, that's exactly what he does.

He is what we call an evidential apologist, and he basically takes all the atheist arguments against God existing, and he tries to get God off the hook, saying, well, my pile of evidence is bigger, therefore my position is true, and God is, therefore, he's justified in allowing evil things to happen, and this is not the right way to do, biblically, apologetics.

The biblical way to do apologetics is to put God where he should be, which is in the judgment seat, right? He doesn't belong in the defense, he belongs in the judgment seat, and when you're arguing with an unbeliever, giving your defense for the faith, and he's giving his defense for his worldview, you have to let him know that he is the one that stands in judgment, not your God, he does, and his only defense is Jesus Christ.

His only way of, of course, coping with the world as it is, is by accepting the gospel and standing on your foundation, so just at the outset, that's where I'm coming from. I want to make sure that God is in the judgment seat whenever we argue or have a discourse with an unbeliever.

We don't want to be in a position where we're trying to defend God, and saying, well, God's really not that bad, or, you know, God, God really does, does exist, if you just look at it this way, we don't want to do that.

God does exist, that's all there is to it, and we proclaim judgment to the unbeliever. Now, that doesn't mean that all reasoning is thrown out, we're still, we'll see as time progresses that there's still a way to reason, there's still a way to argue, but we, we put God in his rightful position, and that's, that's why the apologetic that I'm going to be trying to impart to all of you is a, what's called a presuppositional apologetic, or a reformed apologetic.

It's a, an apologetic that first starts with the idea that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, and that we ought to sanctify Christ as Lord in our hearts before giving a defense. If you, if you don't do that, if you, if you try to be neutral with the unbeliever, there is no such thing as neutrality, by the way, you can't serve two masters, then you are losing at the outset, because you're saying that he is autonomous, he can reason, he's, he's man, and he's, he's able to look at facts and reason himself in a right way, and that's just not true.

We know that there's a sin nature, we know that man cannot look at facts neutrally. So if all that was a little bit confusing for some of you, that's okay, we're going to really get into more detail about this, I'm just sort of giving you a brief introduction of kind of what I intend to go over over the summer.

Augustine, Apologetics, and the Meaning of Defense

So, I guess this would have been about three or four years ago, I was introduced, I don't even remember who introduced me to this now, but there was a gentleman by the name of Dr. Greg Bonson, who has since passed on, and he had a whole series on YouTube, a lecture series on apologetics, and somehow, I don't remember if I stumbled on it or someone showed me it, but I found it, and, and I was blown away, he, he gave this presuppositional way of approaching apologetics, and I was taken aback, I had never really heard anything like that, you know, I had always sort of, I think, been presuppositional, I had always wanted to argue in such a way that God was still on the throne, that I wasn't in a, in a position of defending him, but I had never seen this done, and since then, that just sort of opened a whole, whole can of worms, I, I, you know, went, I read all I could on it, I'm still reading things about it, I've since discovered other great apologists who are consistent with that, and I think the whole structure of this method can be summed up with what Augustine said, which was, I have faith, or I believe, in order to understand.

He didn't start out with reason, he started out with faith, and that's what every worldview starts with, we always start out with faith, we never leave that behind, alright? So, so let's, let's define what apologetics is, before we keep going here, does anyone know what apologetics is?

I've been using the term a lot, so I've sort of assumed that people have a basic understanding. I'm going to read to you the Oxford Dictionary, they say it's, reasoned arguments or writings in justification of something, typically a theory or religious belief.

In the classical Greek legal system, two key technical terms were employed, the prosecution delivered what's called the categoria, and the defendant replied with an apologia, and to deliver an apologia, it meant making a formal speech, giving an explanation to rebut charges.

So we're talking courtroom here, continuing on with that courtroom example. This classical Greek term appears in the Koine Greek of the New Testament, New Testament, there's different kinds of Greeks, New Testament was written in Koine Greek or Common Greek, and the Apostle Paul employs this a number of times, he says, when he's before Festus and Agrippa, he says I make a defense, that word defense, apologia.

And then we see in Philippians, he is defending the gospel, again the same word used for defending there. And then of course, the main verse that we're going to be talking about this morning, believers must be ready to give an answer for their faith, in Timothy, right?

That answer, that's the same word there. And we have it in the negative in Romans 1. Romans 1 of course talks about the unbeliever, they actually know God in their heart of hearts, that's the key to this whole thing, they actually know God, they're suppressing it.

But they are without a apologia for their worldview. And so we find in scripture that we have a defense, the unbeliever does not have a defense for what he believes, but we do. So that should give us all encouragement right now.

The ground that we're standing on is very solid, the ground that the unbeliever is standing on is very shaky, in fact it is not ground at all really, they're standing in space. And in order to reason about anything, they have to jump to our ship, they have to use our ground to reason.

They have no defense they can make for their faith. I might mention just came into my head, all wisdom, I think it's in Colossians, all things pertaining to wisdom and knowledge are deposited in Christ.

So in order to disprove the Christian worldview, you have to first assume it. You have to assume that Christ is Lord. So that's what apologetics is, defending your faith, giving reasons. I want to read that verse, actually I'd like someone else to read that verse.

1 Peter 3:13-16 and the Prerequisite of Sanctifying Christ as Lord

1 Peter 3, if someone could just turn there, and we're going to look at verses 13 through 16. 1 Peter 3, 13 through 16. And whoever gets there first can just go ahead and read that. Okay, the context of the book of 1 Peter is the church is under persecution under Nero.

Rome was burned, he blamed it on the Christians, and this is some of the worst persecution the church has ever seen. I think Fox's book of martyrs starts with that, as I recall. And it's in the midst of this that Peter encourages the Christians in Rome to not be intimidated, to not be, to not fear.

And then he makes this profound statement, sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, verse 15, always being ready to make a defense 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 behavior in Christ may be put to shame. A lot of the times when I hear this verse quoted by different apologists or ministries that are into apologetics, they like to talk about reasoning as what this verse is talking about.

And that's partially true. They like to say, go out there, show the unbeliever he's wrong, we have a reasonable faith, and so forth. And what I feel like often gets missed is the beginning of verse 15, which says, but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts.

That's the prerequisite. You can't do apologetics, you can't even have a discussion with an unbeliever, or you shouldn't, if you don't first sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. If you're willing to, if the unbeliever comes to you and says, you know what, why don't you just be neutral with me for a moment, assume that your worldview isn't true, assume that Christ isn't Lord, and I'll just, I'll assume neutrality too, and let's just look at the facts, let's be unbiased.

If you accept that, and go along with him and say, well, let's just look at the facts, what you've done is you haven't been sanctifying Christ as Lord, because he's no longer Lord anymore. You've just conceded that, well, let's, maybe Christ isn't Lord, and let's reason to him being Lord.

That's your starting point, is that Christ is Lord, according to this verse, right? And there's something, I think, even bigger here. If Christ is Lord in your hearts, you're going to act in a certain way, right?

The best apologetic that you have is not the reasons that you give, necessarily for your belief, it is the lifestyle that you live. And I know I've heard it many times, I don't know exactly who had this quote initially, preach the gospel, if necessary, use words, I think is what it is.

Some of you have maybe heard that, and sometimes that annoys me a little bit, because I'm like, well, you always need to use words to preach the gospel, you know. But there is a point there that, in a sense, the authenticity of the gospel is made evident by your life, right?

If you say one thing and then live another way, then you've just basically embarrassed the message that you're proclaiming, and Christ, you know, ought to be ashamed, that you ought to keep your mouth shut if you're going to say that I'm a Christian and then go out and go to the bar and get drunk and go, you know, do all sorts of things that the non-believers do.

And so that is, I think, another crucial part here of sanctifying Christ as Lord in your hearts. You don't start a conversation with an unbeliever when you've been acting like the unbeliever. If you're at work and you've been joining in filthy conversation all day, laughing at dirty jokes, cursing, whatever it may be that is consistent with the non-believer worldview, then why would you start proclaiming that, yeah, I'm a Christian, and I can show you why Christianity is the right way, why your way is wrong and why my way is right, why the Bible is true, and all those things.

Don't do that. I remember Kent Hovind had said something, he's an apologist, used to be popular regarding creation and evolution, and he had said something about children in school, or actually high school, he said if you're out partying with your friends and doing things that Christ would be embarrassed of, just don't even open your mouth.

Don't tell them you're a Christian, you know, because that does more damage than anything else. And so I would say those two things, first, to sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, sanctify means set apart, to set apart Christ, first you must not concede that he is not the Lord, you must say, I believe this, and I'm not willing to go on new control ground with you.

And secondly, you must live a life that is, I'm not saying perfect, but consistent with a Christian, that they can see there's a difference there, that you're not like them. And then, as those two things are set in place, now you have an opportunity and a chance Christ can use you to do apologetics, to give a reason for the hope that is in you.

If we come down to the end of the verse 15, it says, with gentleness and reverence. This is another thing that is not often highlighted when this verse is quoted. They just focus on make a defense, make a defense, get the reason.

But there's a way in which we ought to make that defense, and that's with gentleness, first of all, that's gentleness towards the non-believer, towards the person we're communicating with, right? I looked in some other translations, this is also translated as humility, weakness, or meekness.

It's kind of an art, telling someone that they're wrong with humility. How do you do that? You know, Jesus made some very strong statements against the Pharisees during his time on earth. You know, we find that Paul was what we would consider sometimes harsh, and so there was nothing actually wrong with being firm with people.

In our culture today, what's that translated as? You're intolerant, you're mean, you're judgmental, all those things. So, telling someone they're wrong with humility, with gentleness, doesn't mean that you are not firm at times.

You have to be firm at times. Here's what it means. This is at least what I think it means. Of course, the fool has said in his heart, there is no God, right? So, we can say that to someone. We can say, you're being a fool right now.

We can still be gentle and say that, yet we tell them this in a humble way, and a humble way means, at least I think, you don't talk above the person, first of all. I've seen this so many times, and it's the worst when I see it in myself, because I know I've done it a number of times, but when you're in an argument with someone and you just start thinking, you know what, I'm going to cut this off real quick.

I'm just going to start using words that they don't understand. That will end the debate really quick. You know, I've done that before. People have done it to me, and what is our tendency when someone does that to us?

We don't admit that we don't know what they're talking about. We just keep going with it, and we try to use our big words and go back and forth. I've had people before that have been arguing the non-Christian position.

I'll be like, well, you know, your problem is you don't believe in the preconditions of intelligibility, and you need to epistemologically repent. And they'll just look at me and kind of like, well, yeah, but I think, you know, they obviously don't know what I'm talking about, and it's selfish of me to even do that, because I know they don't know what I'm talking about, and that's why I brought it up.

What we ought to do, and this is the strongest apologetic and the most humble, I think, gentle way that we can approach this, is when someone says something that you don't understand, ask them. Just say, you know, I'd really love to keep up with this conversation, but I'm afraid I don't understand some of the terminology you're using.

Could you maybe define that term for me or explain that? And we should not intentionally do that. If we see a look of confusion on someone's face, we should say, I'm sorry, you know, do you understand what I'm talking about?

You know, I realize that might have been a big word, and, you know, and not try to demean them, but instead, in a humble fashion, try to actually have real communication going on. And I find this is so effective, just asking questions.

I mean, that's like 90 of apologetics. When I'm on the college campus and someone says something like, well, I don't believe in Christianity, because they're all so cruel and judgmental. Really? Well, you know, what do you mean by cruel and judgmental?

What does that mean? Well, you know, they believe that women shouldn't have the right to privacy, that they shouldn't have an abortion when it's their body. Oh, well, you know, that's cruel. And then you can start talking about, well, is it cruel to the baby?

And you find that their definition of cruel is not a definition you necessarily subscribe to. So people can throw out statements. What you want to do is define their terms and make sure that they understand the terms you're defining.

That's doing apologetics in a humble way, in a gentle way, in a way, I think, that is consistent with what Peter's talking about here. I guess one more thing about that, another thing with the gentleness and humility, that also means that you are, again, putting God in his rightful place, you're humble before him, you're submissive to him, even in the midst of apologetics.

So you should be praying, you should be seeking your motivation to be in keeping with evangelism, not just disproving the person. That's humble. Anyways, let's go to the next one. Gentleness and reverence.

Reverence is the second word used here. Most translations translate this fear. I am not 100 sure exactly what the difference is there between reverence and fear. I know a lot of people try to take verses, especially in the Proverbs and Psalms, that talk about fearing the Lord and say, well, it's just a respect.

I don't necessarily buy that. I think it actually is an actual fear we're supposed to have, which also demands a respect, but a creator who is ultimately holy, who demands perfection from his creation and who will judge us, that's something to be very afraid of.

That is not a being that I want to say, well, I'm just going to be respectful of him. I'll bow my head when I pray. I think it's more than that. So when he's saying here, let your apologetic be with gentleness and reverence, reverence meaning fear as well, we even as Christians ought to have a healthy fear for God when we're doing this.

You're probably all familiar with Proverbs, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. I find it ironic here, or interesting, that it doesn't say the belief in God is the beginning of knowledge.

I've never heard anyone else talk about this. It's just something I've noticed. A lot of the times presuppositionists will say, well, you see the starting point is God, you've got to believe in God, but it's actually not what it says here.

It says the fear of the Lord. So yes, you do have to start with God, but there's also an understanding of what God that is. If it's just this sort of latte in the sky that gives you comfort, that's not the God that we start out with.

We don't start out with blank theism. We don't say that the unbeliever, he's suppressing the truth, but he does believe in this vague notion of God. No, he knows that there's a judgment coming. He knows that he's responsible before God.

He knows the God of Christianity, the God of the Bible. That's why it says the fear of the Lord there. And that's ultimately why he suppresses the truth, right? So there should be a fear for you of, am I really sanctifying Christ and my Lord here?

Am I like, I think it's in Philippians where Paul says they're preaching Christ out of a wrong motivation just to get back at me. It's possible to do apologetics to preach the gospel in a way that is not right, in a way that has a motivation of pride and of putting yourself in a judgment seat.

We want to make sure that God's there. Fear and respect, they're both required if we're going to do apologetics and sanctifying Christ and our Lord. These are all things that we must have before we can even really start thinking about, okay, what are our arguments?

What's the defense going to be? I think that's like really, really, really important and it's often missed, unfortunately. And that's why there are a lot of Christians out there, unfortunately, in the apologetic world who are just arrogant.

They view the unbelievers as their enemies. We know that they are not our enemies, they just work for our enemy because the battle's ultimately not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual beings.

Goals for the Summer Course on Presuppositional Apologetics

So putting God in his place. Briefly, I'd just like to go over some of the goals because I realize the material that I've been going over is kind of scattered all over the place. There's not a lot of consistency yet.

I'm just giving you sort of a preview of what we're going to be going over. We're going to make this understandable, hopefully go into a lot more depth. We're going to go into specific examples and I'd love to hear from you, share examples and maybe conversations you've had.

I'll certainly share mine and make this a really applicable thing. So first of all, I guess my first goal would be for everyone, including myself, to be better equipped, obviously, to defend their faith.

The second goal, and this is kind of exciting, is to know an irrefutable argument for defending the faith that can be used no matter what the circumstance or situation. There is a way to reason with anyone that is not a Christian to show them that their worldview is flawed and that yours is right.

Now that doesn't mean that they'll necessarily accept that argument. That's only the Holy Spirit that can make them do that. But it does mean that you can be completely confident whether you're talking to a six-year-old or Richard Dawkins.

I don't know if I want to give him that much. Someone smarter than Richard Dawkins. The smartest person you know who's not a Christian. You can talk to them and feel very confident as well. And that's the beauty of the argument that we're going to be learning.

Also, to practically analyze situations in our own lives. We already talked about that. We want this to be interactive. And I guess a fourth one would just be to be bolder in our proclamation of the Gospel.

I know that before I really learned this approach, I would still witness and evangelize, but I did not have the confidence that I have now in doing that. I'm completely confident that no matter who I talk to, they're not going to be able to humiliate the Christian point of view.

They're not going to be able to shake my faith that it could be someone who is an expert on evolution from Harvard University and I'd be fine with it. And most people that have really learned this approach are the same way.

They're completely comfortable in that situation and I hope everyone in here is comfortable by the time we're done this summer. We will also have notes. I'm going to just print out a sheet with some fill in the blanks and stuff every week.

Hopefully there shouldn't be a problem. I want to have a PowerPoint presentation too because some of the concepts we're going over will be a lot easier to understand if they're visual. And so those are my goals for the summer.

I hope you're excited about it. I certainly like it and of course it's kind of what I like talking about.