Don’t apologise for apologetics

In his 2013 book The End of Apologetics, Myron Penner provocatively asserts that ‘apologetics itself might be the single biggest threat to genuine Christian faith that we face today’.

Amongst other criticisms, Penner renounces Christianity’s intellectual defence (in Greek, ‘apologia’) as threatening to value reason over revelation and failing to communicate how the gospel’s truth attaches to a wider way of living. Significantly, this position is not confined to abstract academic debate, but articulates the wider conviction of many Christians today – inevitably shaping how the church converses with the wider culture.

Yet any theological position which so limits the range of tools Christians may use to bring non-believers to faith deserves intensive scrutiny. Apologetics, in particular, seems too important a tool for evangelicals to lose in our age of scientism and intellectualism. Under these cultural conditions, reasoned arguments for Christ’s ever-present reality have proved powerful in trespassing deeply entrenched language barriers between believers and non-believers. Such dialogues have been able to reach into the intellectualism of countless unbelievers – convinced that rational thinking and scientific reasoning must rule out Christian claims – and expose them to the shallowness of their assumed positions on God. In this way, on the stages of viral debates between figures such as William Lane Craig and Richard Dawkins, and through the on-the-ground ministry of those churches engaged in this intellectual offensive, the language of God has the chance to be translated to a wider population, now largely ignorant of His words.

Penner’s school of thought presumably believes this language barrier is simply necessary for Christians in secular societies to maintain the gospel as their life’s distinctive locus. But the bottom line is this. If preserving this barrier does not in fact have as its foundation strong Biblical warrant, these cultural opportunities for apologetics imply it should be knocked down in service of another, contrastingly strong Biblical command: our commission as Christians to spread the Good News to as many non-believers as possible (Matthew 28: 19). So, to what extent does Penner’s critique actually hold ground?

Perhaps it is best to start off with what that school of thought gets right. It is certainly correct to identify the dangers of intellectualising Christianity as merely a valuable source of worldly philosophy. Both the Old and New Testament are clear about the limitations of human wisdom and its subordination to a humble and childlike faith in God (Prov.9:10; Mark 10:15; 1 Cor.3:19). Christians receive God through personal relationship with Him, from the power of His grace, and no reliance on our own rational faculties will substitute for that. Just as Jesus repudiated His followers’ desires for further signs to ground their faith, neither should we therefore establish our own faith on intellectual proofs (Matt. 16:4).

Nor can we forget it is ultimately hardened hearts, not mere intellectual disagreement, which causes rejection of God. As Paul sets out, this fact is essential to best understand God’s perfect judgment and discernment for the righteous and unrighteous: ‘For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they [the unrighteous] are without excuse’ (Rom.1:20-21). To give up this position and say atheism can be explained simply as intellectual disagreement in good faith, would thus be to give an excuse to non-believers.

So, Christians should neither understand their own relationship with God through rational terms, nor interpret non-believers’ lack of faith as a purely intellectual disagreement. But while these theological positions clearly forbid reducing Christianity to some rational exercise, they are silent on the value of defending Christianity through persuasive rational exercise. Yet this is exactly the basis of good apologetics.

In fact, such techniques have been utilised by the earliest forefathers of the church. In Acts we find an admirable description of Apollos, for example, who in Corinth ‘powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus’ (Acts 18:28 ). Peter similarly encouraged believers to be ‘prepared to make a defence to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you’ (1 Peter 3:15). And Paul, arguably the most successful evangelist of all time, affirms how Christians are to ‘destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God’ (2 Corinthians 10:5) and he himself confounded his opponents by proving that Jesus was indeed the Messiah (Acts 9:22). A New Testament tradition of utilising reasoned arguments in tackling widespread rejection of Christ can therefore be identified in the evangelistic approach of Jesus’ first followers. Indeed, this may be no coincidence, as the gospels themselves present Jesus publicly engaging with sceptics and onlookers who would try to ‘trap’ him into false positions (Matt. 22:15), only to be ‘silenced’ by his persuasive and deliberated responses (Matt. 22:34, 46).

This Biblical tradition of apologetics may seem to pose a paradox. For how can a Christian mandate to avoid intellectualising our relationship with God coexist with a strong Biblical record of apologetics? The contradiction is solved by a simple fact, easily forgotten: that just because we gather evidence for our faith does not imply that our faith is a consequence of it. Evidence is simply the inevitable consequence of our faith actually being true, not the basis for faith itself.

In this way, apologists from the Biblical tradition should not be understood as relying on intellectual proofs to reach an understanding of God. Good apologists in fact work backwards. From knowledge of God’s existence and divine nature as revealed in Scripture, they gather and deploy evidence which inevitably flows from that existence. Because God created the universe we live in, for example, we should not be surprised when the cosmological argument reflects that truth. Indeed, the reality of that fact ensures no intellectual argument could prove otherwise. Thus, that we may identify intellectual arguments for our faith is not somehow to miss the point of the Christian life, but is simply to point out its truth.

This should give great confidence to the Christian apologist. Reminded of the truth of our faith, it means, properly prepared, we need not fear engaging in intellectual debate with non-believers. For no matter which directions contemporary evidences happen to point, we can be encouraged that the underlying truth remains on our side. Apologetics properly conceived also reminds us of what we are actually arguing for. This is not to attempt to debate non-believers into personal revelation, but simply to break down intellectual barriers often thrown up by hardened hearts. Actually changing these hearts is not something in our hands, but can only happen through the work of the Holy Spirit.

This form of apologetics seems a far cry from Penner’s concern for a detachment from lived-out faith and reason being prioritised over revelation. In fact, good apologetics speaks in sceptics’ language precisely in order to change it. It begins with intellectual arguments to show the limitations of intellectualism and the real, spiritual heart of people’s rejection of God. This power holds immense potential in today’s culture, where so many people simply assume that faith is intellectual baseless before even considering it. Sadly, this assumption has, concerningly, come to infect many Christians, who presume their faith is somehow incompatible with, or even in spite of, their rational faculties.

Finally, it is important that Christian intellectual engagement is not viewed as some necessary evil for the greater good of evangelism. Just as C.S. Lewis called music a medium for meeting God, so too can the best apologetic arguments reveal and elucidate the greatness of God through a combination of timeless elegance and profound insight. Of course, apologetics as a form of worship will not be for everyone. But for those passionate about it, this evangelical tool is not only distinctly useful in spreading the word of God; it can also be personally edifying and celebratory.