Introduction to Presuppositional Apologetics

We haven't met today. I want to kind of your mind with my close friends. And he's he loves presupposition apologetics. He kind of got me encouraged to go do some reading on it. And I read on Bonson's book and always be ready.

I think that's all. And I think I also read his book on Van Til pre-supposition on method. And so today may him kind of talk about know what is presupposition apologetics. And so I guess I kind of we can start with, you know, what are the four main kind of methods used today?

The Main Approaches to Apologetics

We got classical presupposition. What is mother methods?

Do you know people come to use? Yeah, another one's called evidential apologetics. And I actually have a book. I'll talk and try to find it in time, but there's kind of the fuse of apologetics. And so here it is.

The five views on apologetics and this I recommend everybody to go read this. It's awesome because it has William Lane Craig as an author Gary Habermas John frame Kelly James Clark and then Paul Feinberg and they all have different apologetic views.

They do is they spend a chat positive presentation of their own method and then the rest of the chapter is all the other guys critiquing it and then they all take turns giving a positive presentation and the other ones take turns critiquing it.

So the five views of apologetic here, like you said, you got you have the William Lane Craig represents the classical apologetics Gary Habermas per he promotes the you know, some of these are escaping me.

Let's see. So you got classical apologetics evidential apologetics the cumulative case of apologetics the presuppositional apologetics and then number five you have the reformed epistemology apologetics.

A lot of those are confusing and I tell people is you really have two approaches like there's nuance. But you either have the presuppositional method that's a top-down view starting with God reasoning down to man and then you have the bottom up view which just just there's nuance here, but that's really more of the evidential apologetics.

Yeah, there is nuance between the classical model and the evidential model, but for all intents and purposes, they're reasoning the same way. So you can either start with God and reason down or you can start with man and reason up to God.

Definitely. I forgot the name of the YouTube channel that you always I think it's called real apologetics. Eli revealed revealed.

Why Air and Logic Illustrate the Need for God

Apologetics and I highly recommend that because Eli Ayala he's been three years now and I started following him at the very beginning. So I've seen him learn and grow a lot and he's been pulling it. He doesn't know this and I you know, I've contacted from time to time, but he's been pulling me along the way.

I've just been eating it up.

Love it so much. Definitely. I think you told me the phone illustration that you use and I'm kind of just kind of jumpboard us into the you know, the discussion but he said, you know, how much common sense would it make for somebody kind of have a debate whether not air exists or the logic exists.

And the reason I think that's so important is like, you know, if someone were debating, you know, this air exists they have to take in the precondition of air to debate that topic and it's the same vice versa the laws of logic.

If someone were to you you know to argue against a lot of logic they have to use the laws of logic to even have a debate. When the same way me and Jeremiah kind of talk about a couple minutes how in the same way, you know, I see what it is to argue against air and laws of logic and God he is our precondition.

So it to argue against him you need God to even, you know, kind of have a debate.

Yes, so I love those two examples because air is so fundamental to our experience so much so that to deny it you have to borrow it in order to try to make your case against it. Logic works the same way and then as we're going to develop this more and more KJ it's the Christian worldview that represents reality so much so that if you try to deny it, you're actually going to borrow principles from the Christian order to make your case against and I'm with you that is incredible.

And if you can demonstrate that and show that then it's no surprise that it's the apologetic method in my mind because not only do I think we get principles in scripture, but it represents the truth. It's really hard to condense to contend against the truth when you're just trying to suppress it.

You know what I mean?

Definitely not a kind of this is kind of like an intro episode me and Jamar probably doing an episode kind of go more in depth, but just in a limited amount of time. We have. Let's talk about worldviews.

Can you define what a worldview is?

Worldviews, Presuppositions, and the Image of God

Yes. Yes, and I'll do another word with it because we're talking about presuppositional apologetics and when we're talking about presuppositional, but basically this method is saying everybody has presuppositions that they approach with everything some their most basic convictions of how they understand who they are, how to interpret facts, all of these things are seen through someone's most basic presuppositional lenses.

Now we would say those basic lenses that everyone has is actually their worldview, how they view and understand the world and understand how they ought to live in that world and how they ought to treat other people.

These are their ultimate standards of how they view reality. So a worldview I think can be summed up in three bullet points. It's made up of ontology, which is the study of existence or being a worldview is made up of ontology and epistemology.

This is the study of knowledge how we know what we know very and I can't express people how intrigued I am in the realm of epistemology, but you have ontology, epistemology and number three, you have value theory or morality or ethics.

They're all talking about the same thing. Now, this is what's interesting KJ, a worldview and those three points, those three pillars, they all lean and depend on one another. Someone that has a theory of epistemology of how they know facts.

You can't divorce that from their assumptions of what they think existence is to whether they say, I don't know what my ontology is or I don't know. That's fine. You're still some context of existence as you're trying to explain things and everyone has an ethic or a morality of how they are to interact with other people and the standards of how they ought to live.

Whether that you know, and like we're going to be getting it. Everyone's made in the image of God. This is a Christian principle because it's true and everybody will whether they realize it or not, they will step into the Christian worldview when they can't account for something get these principles and these truths stuff them into their pockets, borrow capital and then walk back over to their unbelieving worldview.

And we're trying to say, hey, that belongs over here. It doesn't belong in your worldview. And that's that's the rub in those apologetic encounters when you're trying to reason with atheists or people even in Islam.

Definitely. I want to read a couple of verses. The first one at 17, I believe is verse 28. It says for in him. We live and move and exist. I like that because kind of you said we're all made in image of God.

It's in him. We find our being the KJV says and so you think about that? I think it's also Colossians chapter 2, maybe 3 verse 3 talks about how in Christ is hidden all truth and that's awesome. So I'm going to similar to John 14 Jesus says on the way the life of the truth.

And so since we know that statement is true that all truth is found in Christ Jeremiah says that in each worldview that some knowledge epistemology, you know, what can be known? And so Christ tells us that what can be known is all about him all true comes from God.

And so the question then becomes this if that's true, how can we engage these other worldviews? And so I like how Jeremiah said we're all made in image of God. And so there's like I'm in Boston's book.

I wasn't ready talks about how there's no neutral ground between believers and unbelievers, which basically means that we shouldn't be neutral in our thinking as far as epistemology. I we can't leave the Christian worldview to engage in somebody in their worldview and try to make sense in their worldview and point that to God, but where we should be able to stand on truth not neutral.

And I think if we're standing on truth, which is Christ and I like you say you start with God and go down whereas starting down and go upwards.

Well, you keyed in on another big thing is there's no neutrality. We don't going to engage with the unbelievable. Can't we just set aside our religious convictions and which is this kind of just share this neutral platforms as human beings just trying to look at the evidence and just let the evidence lead us to their natural conclusion.

That is so tempting for everyone to do but no one is neutral. They are not leaving their most basic presuppositions and commitments and neither should the Christian and that basic commitment is God is true.

He's revealed himself through his son Jesus to me and saved me and he has spoken to me clearly in his word. Those are Christians most basic commitments and we don't leave those because the unbelievers not going to leave their God hating denial presuppositions, right?

So we don't want to be neutral in those things and we know because God has told us that they hate God. They are suppressing the truth of that God in their love for sin. We know that so we're not going to set those truth aside.

Now, we might have a point of contact and talk about that you and you know, me and unbeliever can reason we can utilize logic and we can find things in common, but you and I know it's because we're made in the image of God, right?

And so I wanted to throw another verse out. There's actually kind of two more that are important. I'm going to try to just quote this from memory, but I think it's Proverbs 1 verse 7, which says the fear of God the fear of Yahweh is the beginning of knowledge.

And I think it's Proverbs 9 that kind of says the same thing and says also is the beginning of wisdom and it's knowledge of the Holy One the one who is to come Jesus and that kind of sounds like Paul and Colossians 2 there and we're learning that this this God that we must revere in our hearts and give worship to is the triune God and that has other implications later when you were talking about a worldview a world that is particularly diverse and unified in ways that just blows our minds and how it's all connected and unified in some miraculous fashion there God has to transcend this this unified and diverse world that's also one in many, right?

So that's what those are more clues that point to the Trinity accounting for those facts, but I love what Jesus said at the end the Sermon on the Mount is who then hears the words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock and when the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on the house.

It did not fall because it was founded on the rock and everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them is like a foolish man who built his house on the sand and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house and it fell and great was its fall.

Now, I think a lot of applications can be made here. Jesus is God in the flesh. So we must build our understanding of knowledge and truth our entire world on the rock of Christ. We do that. We're going to be equipped to contend for the faith.

Right, but if we build our worldview if we build our theory of truth and knowledge on human reasoning pagan philosophy worldly philosophy, it's going to crumble and try to small eyes loved kind of that application.

It was Greg Boston that really how a lot of that.

Definitely definitely. I think it's two illustrations. I'll let you use the Vantilla creation, but another one Bonson's illustration. He talks about what does it mean? How people suppress the truth for a lie?

Romans one talks about how there's a mother. She has two boys, you know, these boys are in gangs and they raise up bad environment and shoot people. They rob people and they break into stores break in the cars and a whole bunch of terrible things, right?

But when she's around friends, she always tells her friends that hey, my boys are good and boys are good. But when her boys come home to visit her she has her most valuable possessions. Now that the question is does the mother in that moment truly believe her boys are good and we will all say no.

Somebody said why because her actions say that she doesn't believe that those boys are good because she's hiding things from them on the same way and suddenly agree Romans one talks about really Roman the whole book of Romans talk about how we're all dead and sin.

We know because we're dead and sin and points back to original sin, but since we're all made in the image of God we come in this world. We're born under sin. And so people they suppress the truth. We're all made image of God.

So we know God is real because we can use laws of logic and reason and other Bob talks about how God has made us some known to us. I think Cleopas II talks about that too. How God is put. I forgot how the verse goes.

But basically he's put like existence in our hearts and know that he's real so in the lines of that and so we all can reason and know that there is a God right? But the question is what not the question the statement part of that is that he can suppress that truth for a lot.

And so I think to a vent to Jeremiah knows how the illustration goes, but I think it's like the child slapping the parent in the face.

Yeah. So there's a couple of illustrations that I really really like that been tilled and perhaps Monson and others have used but I think when the famous ones that Van Til used is like the unbeliever the someone who's made in the image of God reflects many of his attributes can reason can understand logic and truth being absolute and kind of having that the golden rule impressed on our heart that we should treat others how we want to be treated that unbeliever spits at God hates him even though that his every existence and every step that he takes is dependent on God's eternal existence.

It's like a rebellious child sitting in their father's lap slapping him in the face and the only reason that child is being able to be held up is because the father is holding them in his lap, but the idea is the rebellion is happening, but the rebellion can only happen because the father is sustaining that action you read probably the best verse to illustrate this and out 17 birth in God for in him we live and move and have our being our being is contingent on God's eternal everlasting existence and and being and I there's a verse in Proverbs KJ that says we see light in his life and that's kind of getting at that.

We know things temporarily because God knows it eternally and so another illustration when we're talking presupposition only with somebody another good illustration says we're all in this living room of a house.

We're all walking. We all share this platform and we're all walking around and we're saying we know that this floor has to be held up by beams underneath the floor. We can't see the beams, but we know that they exist because the very fact that we're standing on this floor presupposes a greater support and so we're talking about world views.

We're saying what can justify and give a reason why we live and interact with other people that we can think how we can know truth. Why is reality the way that it is and I'll just say pagan philosophy cannot tell you why without just giving you mere opinion and saying maybe it's this maybe it's that in the day.

I don't know and this is the folly of the I don't know statement. They know that they don't know and that's a self-contradiction their epistemology. Their not knowing is collapsing in on itself and that proves their epistemology doesn't work even though that they're convinced of so many things that they experience you ask the stinger of a question.

Well, how do you know you're experiencing X Y or Z? Well, I just am it's so convinced. That's that's not a reasonable justification. This is where Christianity wins every single time in these conversations.

Why am I here? How can I know things because God has eternally existed and revealed himself and created me in such a way to have reasonable cognition and ability to see things and reason in this inductive manner probabilistically, but the foundation that probability rests in the absolute creator that made me in his image.

Those are non-negotiables. That's the only proper foundation to reason and to continue to look at nature and say man. These laws seem pretty consistent, but why how could I know that without just being begging the question to say?

Well, it's always been like that. So it must continue to be like that in the future. Well, you don't know what tomorrow holds. You don't know right? And how do you know that your senses aren't deceiving you the Christian could say well God's made me in an intelligible way to reflect themselves.

We can always go back to scripture and say that's why so that there's a lot there kicking.

The Transcendental Argument and Preconditions of Intelligibility

Definitely definitely. Now two of the most common arguments that presupposition of people that's the host of this view uses the transcendental argument and a precondition of intelligibility. Now just briefly, how would you define the transcendental argument?

I like how you nicely tell me just briefly because you know my temptation to go really long-winded. So my understanding because you mentioned two things there the transcendental argument and necessary preconditions, right?

My understanding is transcendentals are necessary preconditions. So you got you got transcendental arguments plural and then you have the transcendental argument. So small t transcendentals are what must exist in order for me to be an uncle.

Well, I must have other siblings that must be a precondition and they must have children those things must be true in order for me to be an uncle, right? So those are preconditions when we say when we look at it.

This is another illustration. I think banks are used. So maybe we're jumping on a diving board at a pool, right? That's that's our immediate sense experience. We're on the diving board. But what is a necessary precondition for the diving board to be there?

Well, it must have an anchor. It must be attached to the concrete around it that must be there first so that the diving board can be there. So we're talking about transcendentals. We're saying what are necessary preconditions?

What must be true in order for something else to be true. Does that make sense? So the transcendental argument is God must be true in order for our human experience to be true.

So do you want to chime in on that? Yeah, I heard people say to that like apart from the Christian worldview everything else is falling. So kind of exactly what you just said like, you know, this this is God must be true wherever the world view kind of collapses in on itself.

Now quick demonstration of that. Let's say the the atheist he said we just use kind of what was that you mentioned earlier ethics and what else is it.

Called ontology epistemology and then value theory value theory. Yep.

So but it basically means morality, right? So the eight is in their worldview. They say that morality there is a morality. We're all just evolved from monkeys or apes and whatnot. And then the you know, animal kingdom if an animal kills another animal, you know, is that wrong?

It's no because it's just about it is right when a similar way like they would teach that, you know, there is no there's no purpose in life. There is no there is no morality all these things, right? So in a purpose is Universe where there is no morality.

There's no getting bad for a this to say to the Christian. I don't believe in God because in the Old Testament your God is evil. How can a this ever even how can I even come out his mouth if they teach the opposite of that very statement?

It's kind of like what your mind said they have to borrow from our view. But again, the existence of God kind of disproves their worldview. Anyway, how would you can chime in an attitude to kind of tag along?

Answering the Fool According to His Folly

So yeah, everything we've been saying is worldview worldview worldview. And so we don't want to give them the benefit of getting away with saying, oh, well God of the Old Testament is just evil. Well, they have made so many presuppositions in that statement.

They are claiming to have a standard of morality that's superior to the God of the Old Testament. And so thinking presuppositionally I was going to read perhaps two verses real quick. This is you know, I learned this from Greg Bonson in Romans or in Proverbs 26 verse 4 and 5 says answer not a fool according to his folly lest you be like him answer a fool to his folly lest he be wise in his own eyes.

So when someone says well the God of the Old Testament is evil. We should be thinking of this twofold method. Now, I'm not just going to say well, let's just not talk about the God of the Bible and let's try to meet on this common ground and just look at these isolated evidences and see where they lead.

No, we're actually stepping onto his turf. We're actually starting to reason like the fool and we are going to be like him answer not a fool according to his own folly lest you be like him yourself, but rather we answer a fool to his own folly lest he be wise in his own eyes.

So what Bonson point out? There's a principle here. Let's for the sake of argument. Let's say okay. You have a standard of morality. Let's hypothetically grant the atheistic worldview for a moment. Okay, where do you get your morality from?

I mean, that's the question. We're over here. We're granting your worldview for the moment and then you get questions like well, you just do what feels right. Oh, well now Stalin and all these mass murder serial killers.

They did what they felt was right. So what makes you right in them wrong? Well, okay. Well, it's not just you but you have to look to society. You have to make a vote. Oh, well then I guess Hitler was right and everything that they did right.

So you let them die according to their own standard. You pointed out that when you leave God as the the precipium the starting point then any standard you make for anything your ontology epistemology or value theory, it's going to collapse in on it.

It's going to be self-refuting not self-vindicating like we're saying. Hey, the truth is awesome. Like we eventually want to we want to destroy. I mean and when I say destroy it's a strong word, but that's what the Apostle Paul said in 2nd Corinthians chapter 10.

We destroy arguments that rival the knowledge of God. So for the sake of argument, we step in this unbelieving worldview and we show how it refutes itself on its own terms. Now KJ, this is important and we got to do this with love and with charity and compassion with gentleness and patience.

This is where those fiery apologists, you know, beat people upside the head with theological hammer like they're doing any good. You got to love on them, right? Show them the folly of their worldview and then invite them to say hey for the sake of art come back over here to Christianity.

Let me show you that everything is derived from its creator. How do I know something is good or evil? Well, it reflects God's nature and he's revealed himself to us in his word. We have this consistent standard that can account for itself and you know, I would just continue down that route.

Definitely and just again the word to appetite really quickly on the precondition of intelligibility. So we would say for example, I like how you say truth is dependent upon knowledge and knowledge is dependent upon truth.

And so I'll talk about a little bit but again, I love it. It's easier for me to kind of deal with atheists and you can also use the presumption of method all the world views as well such as other religions, but it's so easy to don't hate this because they have to borrow so much in the Christian worldview.

So far as if I hate this where they kind of bring up any kind of truth claim, we would say, well, how do you know that statement is true? Because again, the Bible says that all truth is hidden in Christ.

And so anytime I ate this makes a truth claim again in that universe. They don't but they're borrowing from the Christian worldview. I can't let your mind talk of this.

Well, you're exactly right. Whenever they make a truth claim. We want to be asking them. How do you know that? How do you know that that is a statement of fact and this is this to me is the gotcha moment that I'm waiting for with them not to be mean or try to just win an argument but to lovingly show them the futility of their own worldview.

The moment they say, well, it just seems to be that I'm standing here talking to you. How could I not be? I'm having this experience. I'm going to say no. I want you to tell me why I want you to give me a justification because the moment you just say it just is well, then that's a double standard when I just say well God just is and you don't like that and you want you're not going to let me say that God just exists and it just is the case.

You're not you're going to say, oh, you're begging the question. You're going to get mad at me and it's like let's be fair here, right? Let's use a logic. Now the reason I bring that up is you can't just arbitrarily randomly say that something just is you can't appeal to majority rule because majority could be wrong and but I will say they do have some most basic presuppositions that just seem so real to them that they can't deny like their own existence and that's great.

I'm saying for you to deny your own existence, you would have to first exist. But why do you exist? And how do you know that there's a greater accounting that has to take place and a lot of atheists will try to stop the buck.

I think therefore I am once again KJ even though that's a type of Transcendental when you actually observe that I think therefore I am was said by Socrates the cargo air go soon. There's so many assumptions that go into the eye.

How do you know that that you are the eye? How do you know that you are the one experiencing this and so you can see how you can ask the epistemological questions at every point in turn and when we get asked, but how do you know God exists?

We'd say because he's revealed himself to us in creation in our hearts and in his word. Well, how do you know? Well, we could say for the sake of argument if we were to assume the opposite it would fail therefore vindicating itself just like logic.

How do you know logic doesn't work in all points of time? Well, try to argue against logic. It's opposite. Well, you have to keep borrowing principles from it. So try to argue against the Christian worldview to try and God who has revealed himself and you're going to act like an image bearer of God having a standard of right and wrong a standard of truth and I'm like, these are all principles that are found in the Christian worldview.

And like you said, there's a way to still use the presuppositional method of the triune God against Islam and other religions. But just for the sake of this conversation atheism has already tied both arms behind their back because they cannot account for their own worldview and they know it and they think it's something by just pointing out inconsistencies and other worldviews.

The problem is they've not even grounded logic on their own worldview. So why should that even be a good method on their own terms? Now, we're over here saying it is a good method and we have justification for logic.

Yeah, those are some more good things to point out.

I know me you have also had conversations in the past that we as Christians, we're the only people that can have a justifiable standard when it comes to truth. And we also can have a false justifiable standard.

Like I say, for example, if we have a belief or something that's happens to be false. We still have a standard for what's true and what's false because the Christian worldview. Whereas the atheist they have no justification for that system.

So like for example, I hate this. They can know two plus two is four and that's truth, but they in their worldview to have no standard to know what's true and what's wrong, but we would say Christians that because they're made image of God, they can account and use laws of logic to determine what truth is, but they have no standard for that.

But the standard is Christ.

How are you going to deal with that too? There's two important definitions KJ and this is why the apologetic dog finds itself in first Timothy 6 verse 20. You care if I read that real quick? Go ahead.

Oh Timothy guard the deposit the deposit entrusted to you avoid irreverent babble or pagan philosophy worldly philosophy and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. Two key definitions in these worldview conversations is the definition of truth and the definition of knowledge.

You already kind of brought this out earlier. They're both depend. Well, we'll give it away. They're both dependent on one another remember one of the most profound questions and it was even asked insincerely to Jesus himself.

I punched pilots. What is truth? I teach at the college and I teach on apologetics and Bible study and I try to tell Christians look if you are a Christian because this is what your parents brought you up in that's not a good reason to be a Christian you ought to be a Christian because you are committed to the truth and you believe Jesus when he says I am the way the truth the life the truth.

No one comes to the father except through me and you believe that that is true and everything else that claims to either provide salvation or whatever you is false. I mean that I tell him that is why you ought to be a Christian.

That's what Jesus himself said. So what is truth? I think the scripture equips us enough to be able to like, oh, well truth is is the ultimate standard of everything, right? It's God. I think it's Isaiah 65 where God says I am the God of truth, right?

Jesus is your word is truth. Jesus is the the word the truth that has made himself known and dwelt among us. So the best definition for truth as you begin to kind of tease this out is truth is that which corresponds to reality think about this truth is that which is real now the Christians we shouldn't be only satisfied with that we didn't say well then who gets to determine what is real.

So truth is that which corresponds to reality as perceived by God. That's the true definition of truth and you see we're not talking about truth. It assumes itself in this conversation. So that's the correspondence theory of truth and then you got to have the right definition for knowledge.

Remember this is under the umbrella of epistemology knowledge is three points justified true belief and like you said the best atheists can do because because one objection to pre-submissionalism is you say oh, well atheists can't know anything.

I know things all the time like two plus two. We're saying well in a very general sense. Oh, of course, you know things but not in virtue of your own worldview, but because Christianity is true. But on your own worldview, you could only have unjustified perhaps true belief but in spite of your own worldview, it's because Christianity is true and then like you say we flip it Christians.

We don't have all knowledge. We just know the one who does have all knowledge. That's why we get our justification. But when we have a proper foundation to reason and then kind of use probabilities and try to guess what tomorrow is going to hold but we don't know that God does then yeah, we can have a justified false belief we could be wrong about things but we still have a justification for how we reason and we concluded wrongly but our overall justification for everything is still intact and nobody escapes belief people try to pit faith and reason against each other.

I'm like you are having faith in your own reasoning faculties, but without God that is a fallacious reasoning because you're you're already assuming that your faculties are reasonable before you even arrived to your conclusion or reasonable conclusion and we're saying that's just circular reasoning and begging the question Christians can say that we have reasonable faculties.

We can use logic and we can use deduction and laws of induction because God has created us in his image. God is the God of truth. He cannot lie. No lie is of the truth and we all know this because of his.

Work. Wonderful. Wonderful. Now quick summary man. I definitely the next episode we do to kind of show this these things practically. So a lot of people that probably get it practically a lot of people can kind of just get the knowledge aspect of it.

But when you show the practical, I think they both kind of intertwine but a quick summary. Everybody has presuppositions about how the world is and he's different ways in terms of the world with you put these going to call world views, right?

And in every world view you have metaphysics ontology morality or ethics and epistemology and I think Jeremiah talks about ontology. You started a being metaphysics after being epistemology is what can be known or you know, truth and stuff like that.

And then morality or ethics is again was good and was wrong. And so everybody presupposes something they bought, you know, they use those things and tell me what the world is and pre-deposition apologetics method would say, hey on the Christian world.

You can account for all four of these things. They read the world view. They may say they can come forward but it all fails down at some point. And so I like that's why I like the illustration of Jeremiah.

He told me in the past that like how silly is it to kind of have a discussion or debate about air because you have to you know, take in air to even you know argue against it and how silly is it to kind of argue against laws of logic?