A group of 20-somethings (younger evangelicals!) got to know each other from blog networks, and come together to share and discuss social and theology issues as a community...
Sounds like Agora? Frustrated that all the fun stuffs are happening in Malaysia, these Singaporean young guns took matter into their own hands...
and do something in their local context...
I'm so proud of them!!
In the most recent instalment, Joshua did a fantastic job discussing the LIMITS, TEMPTATIONS and different APPROACH to the art of answering honest objections that are hindering people from following Christ.
A good friend wrote to me about his frustrations in trying to reach out to a thinking person who does not believe in God. He has tried all the apologetic tricks he knew from C.S. Lewis to Van Til to McLaren, yet hitting a "brick wall"...
Seems like his friend is a hard nut to crack! I'd agree that mission has SO, SO, SO MUCH MORE than just apologetics... or propositions... but i think this is ONE area sorely lacking in our Asian context, and it needs to be strengthened rather than weakened...
Sometimes, telling someone how unliveable the logical conclusions of his views may not be the best thing to do also. He's already living it! hehehe...
Normally I try to deploy the same knowledge but in a different fashion... ie help HIM to figure out those conclusions by himself, rather than telling him about it... usually we can do this by asking the right questions.
Whether it wud work particularly for that friend is anybody's guess....
I dun think any content, tactic, even 'love' or a 'plausibility structure' (social network, school, girlfriend etc) could guarantee success... (total depravity, mar... hehehe)
But what i hope to do is not hit a home run every time by having him kneel and say sinner's prayer right there and then...
I just wanna put a stone in his shoes, that everytime he appeals to moral laws, he knows tat consistently by his own admission tat this law is non-existent, it's merely what his genes have programmed into him etc...
It doesn't save him, of course, but it doesn't mean it's cheap... None of us can tell what God may do with that piece of pebble prodding every moral step he makes...
So I'm not too disappointed by 'meagre results', ar...
yea, it's not a home run, but then again, faith is a long journey rather than a once-off event rite? Here, we must be content with our own limits and rest in the sovereignty of God lar... It's not our job to convince, its Holy Spirit's job to convict... (irresistible grace!)
It seems we have two extremes to avoid - absolute certainty and absolute fideism.
Reason is like the runway... faith is like the aeroplane which picks up speed and momentum as it moves along reason... until a point where it takes flight...
u can't take off without runway, but the runway won't take us to London either! :-)
Sounds like Agora? Frustrated that all the fun stuffs are happening in Malaysia, these Singaporean young guns took matter into their own hands...
and do something in their local context...
I'm so proud of them!!
In the most recent instalment, Joshua did a fantastic job discussing the LIMITS, TEMPTATIONS and different APPROACH to the art of answering honest objections that are hindering people from following Christ.
One of the limits in Apologetic is that it cannot force belief. As noted of its importance and weakness, author Tan Soo-Inn states,” I don't think apologetics can compel belief. Its task is to show the reasonableness of our faith to believers and unbelievers alike...”
For example: Apologetics can demonstrate the historical reliability of the gospels but it cannot forces the unbelievers to accept the fact even though it has been demonstrated of it rationality. Thus, it is in this gap the work of the Holy Spirit fits in. This gap also known as the ‘noetic effects of sin’ by theologians. It is an idea that the Fall had negatively affected the ability and the willingness of unbelievers to accept the presented arguments even though those arguments were good.
A good friend wrote to me about his frustrations in trying to reach out to a thinking person who does not believe in God. He has tried all the apologetic tricks he knew from C.S. Lewis to Van Til to McLaren, yet hitting a "brick wall"...
It's a bit like the Bahnsen transcendental argument, where axioms of logic requires belief in an intelligent first-cause that sustains these laws universally - so the atheist is reasoning on borrowed ground. I've used that one also but... Again, I hit the same brick wall.
There's still a choice one can make that involves a leap of faith.
It's really really hard to convince someone to leap one way and not the other (since EVERY position is a leap of faith).
So I empathise with all the recent articles on the "failure" of apologetics.
So thats why stuff like Newbigin's church as hermeneutic of the gospel is very attractive right now. I guess this also comes with the realisation that the gospel is so much more (richer, bigger, deeper, fertile) than (not less than or something other than!) a propositional truth statement.
Seems like his friend is a hard nut to crack! I'd agree that mission has SO, SO, SO MUCH MORE than just apologetics... or propositions... but i think this is ONE area sorely lacking in our Asian context, and it needs to be strengthened rather than weakened...
Sometimes, telling someone how unliveable the logical conclusions of his views may not be the best thing to do also. He's already living it! hehehe...
Normally I try to deploy the same knowledge but in a different fashion... ie help HIM to figure out those conclusions by himself, rather than telling him about it... usually we can do this by asking the right questions.
Whether it wud work particularly for that friend is anybody's guess....
I dun think any content, tactic, even 'love' or a 'plausibility structure' (social network, school, girlfriend etc) could guarantee success... (total depravity, mar... hehehe)
But what i hope to do is not hit a home run every time by having him kneel and say sinner's prayer right there and then...
I just wanna put a stone in his shoes, that everytime he appeals to moral laws, he knows tat consistently by his own admission tat this law is non-existent, it's merely what his genes have programmed into him etc...
It doesn't save him, of course, but it doesn't mean it's cheap... None of us can tell what God may do with that piece of pebble prodding every moral step he makes...
So I'm not too disappointed by 'meagre results', ar...
yea, it's not a home run, but then again, faith is a long journey rather than a once-off event rite? Here, we must be content with our own limits and rest in the sovereignty of God lar... It's not our job to convince, its Holy Spirit's job to convict... (irresistible grace!)
It seems we have two extremes to avoid - absolute certainty and absolute fideism.
Reason is like the runway... faith is like the aeroplane which picks up speed and momentum as it moves along reason... until a point where it takes flight...
u can't take off without runway, but the runway won't take us to London either! :-)
Comments
I see apologetics as both answering objections and setting forth the reasons why the Christian faith is true.
And in the end, it is the Holy Spirit who brings people to Christ, not the Transcendental Argument!
next round of milo ice is on me.
hehehe
Censorship, eh? Hehehe...
I heard that CS Lewis believe 'dirty jokes' (based on "natural" processes of reproduction and excretion) is an example of the qualitative difference of humankind as compared to animal!!
That's Apologetic Approach No.5...
Granted, the larger part of Malaysian society is somewhat anti-intellectual, so it is inevitable that apologetics has come to be seen as the least effective way (in general) to witness in this country. Nevertheless, there are still pockets of people who really need to be ministered to in this way and they should not be ignored.
You see, there are two kinds of pagans: unhappy pagans and happy pagans.
The unhappy pagans are those who have physical needs, i.e. food, shelter, money etc. This group we reach through social programs.
The happy pagans are those who are doing well in life (in the material sense) and have no physical needs. They don't need handouts or food hampers. They don't have that kind of need. Instead, their needs are existential in nature.
You cannot reach this latter group the same way you do the former. This is where apologetics comes in. We know that the answer is Christ, so the role of the apologist is to break down the barriers so that the happy pagan may arrive at that answer.
Who are the happy pagans? The single biggest group of happy pagans are university students. Many are at a stage where they are looking for meaning and often they approach it from the framework of reason. They are not satisfied with pat and glib answers. If you cannot engage them in a way that helps them probe for deeper answers, then you will lose their respect and attention. If you adopt sheer prescriptivism in your answers, you will end up with a generation that are only engaged on the emotional level, but cannot give a reason for their faith. They will be the flotsams and jetsams in the sea of postmodernism.
I'd be the first to admit that most of my 'apologetic' attempts on the Net have yielded least results for 'outsiders' and more effective for 'insiders' :)
But I've also learnt that the task of 'giving answers' in the context of a face-to-face relationship via ALPHA course has been more effective than I've ever imagined!