I seem to get into a catch-22 often where nonbelievers tell me I am not intellectual enough, but then I am told by those in the church I make things too complicated. Does anyone else have this problem too? It is frustrating for sure. In this post I want to deal with the church side of things. I will likely address the nonbelievers in a future post.
On September 28, 2010, I wrote a hopeful post about my experience of trying to get apologetics into the church for Apologetics315’s first “How to Get Apologetics in Your Church” series (Link here: http://tinyurl.com/bvwqkls). I thought things would be a little better by now, but they have not gotten that way. However, I am not throwing in the towel, and I will continue to slog away at this. Important things require this kind of work and struggle, even more so when eternity is at stake.
Unfortunately, I find many, if not most, in the church hold to a superficial faith. Most do not seem to take what they believe and why they believe it that seriously. I think at the very least, Christians should be as motivated for the truth as much as others are motivated by their falsehoods. For instance, look at how the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, and Muslims take their beliefs seriously. If we in the church were as half as zealous about Jesus as they are about their false beliefs, we could turn the world upside down. And this is not just about apologetics either, when many of us take our beliefs less seriously, we take Christian disciplines less seriously too. If we don’t really believe what we believe is really real, we tend to slip on praying, Bible reading, and service to the church and others. So we should treat our faith seriously and realize that God has spoken and makes a claim on all aspects of our lives.
But instead this is not the impression one gets when they try to teach a class on apologetics or bring in something apologetically related into a church group setting. Most often this material is met with blank stares, lack of engagement, and an oblivious attitude. Or you try to arrange a meeting or event outside of the traditional church meeting times and the turnout is dismal, even with lots of announcements, legwork, and trying other days of the week. And then there are the one or two people in a class that are prone to go off on unrelated rabbit trails and take over the discussion to talk about personal pet peeves or some unrelated item of crazy theology, but that is another topic altogether. Or some people may even call you out in front of the others about what you are trying to teach and your reasons for doing so.
What are some causes of this? I think a good deal of it is Western comfort, frankly. Chasing the American Dream of a big house full of stuff, career and family, and one or two nice lengthy vacations per year is taking away greatly from the needs of the church. Secondly, I still think many professing Christians tend to box in their theology and limit it to Sunday, while busying themselves with other things the rest of the week. They may not see the faith as having a serious bearing on all aspects of their life outside the church walls. Another issue is the general “trust and obey” nature of a lot of teaching and preaching of the last twenty or so years (maybe even since the Second Great Awakening) that leads to a very shallow and emotional faith with no engagement with the mind. In this scenario, the Christian faith gets reduced to sound bytes, stories, and feel-good platitudes that end up not really being about what is important. Still another issue is the sometimes warranted but usually overzealous fear of strange teaching, whether it is talking about science, evolution, philosophy, logic, or even something that may appear theologically off at first glance but turns out pretty orthodox upon further study and reflection. And finally it may have to do with people today generally reading less due to so many distractions (television and social media chief among them), including not spending adequate time in God’s Word, let alone reading theology and apologetics books. A confession on my part, I can especially be susceptible to this last issue.
Moreover, so I don’t let myself off the hook, it may also be my presentation of the material. Maybe I should use more illustrations and analogies to bring things down to a personal level. Maybe I should attach it more to Bible verses. Maybe more life application is in order to show how these things are important for everyday life. Or maybe I just need to put myself out there more.
So I offer this post to commiserate with those who are in the same boat as I am, and to garner some advice and input on my experiences. So what do you all think?
This is not a foreign to me either, I have heard my pastor say how we need it yet he allows members to have completely wrong ideas about who God is, who they are, and much more.
When I have had the opportunity to preach/teach I have always gotten a very positive reaction, so I know that the saints want sound doctrine. However getting it to them is very difficult.
Hello Dan: Well, I attempted to bring apologetics to our congregation. I was met with some good results and some poor ones. First off, I expected them to get Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology for their future reading, most of them did get it. I expected them to read the 10 page reading assignments I handed out. half of them did read most of the handouts. I expected them to participate in class discussion, most of them did so with questions. I expected each of them to write out a 10 page essay on some topic they chose and handle it apologetically showing the validity of their conclusions. about 1/3rd of them did that.
My syllabus was a general introduction to apologetics and showing them 4 major methodologies they could use and to chose one that interested them. I attempted to go over the syllogism, defeaters such as ad hom, ad populum etc.
I explained to them the necessity of having a clear understanding of theology and how it will greatly help them in addressing apologetic issues. I told them not to fear philosophy, that we are not learning worldly philosophies, but learning how to coherently and rationally defend the Christian faith.
My Pastor was all for the class, with little reservations. During the class one of my students had a fit about some issue with reformed theology and sent an email bomb to discredit me in front of all my students. As it went, his email bomb dudded and he ended up leaving the Church because I was not summarily executed for heresy, j/k but it sounded like that was an option.
In short, the apologetics class went well and the students gained from it. But as to creating any new apologists, that didn’t materialize. Several other brothers have introduced the “truth project” and are now going through those classes. In short, that class divided neatly in no time, with some going the direction of apologetics and theology, the other into a more pastoral understanding of the material with the apologetic side ‘dismissed’ as unnecessary to Christian witness.
Again, to summarize, I too ran into “there is no need to dive so deeply into apologetics and theology” from the Christians and “you Christians are too stupid to understand logic and educate yourselves on how to present an argument” from the unbelievers I know. I am attempting again to start another apologetics class and have another go at it. This time I will be a little better prepared. I am praying that God will raise up more apologists/evangelists in our congregation.
I see our congregation not as a group that doesn’t know what they believe or why they believe it, They seem to be convinced that its not necessary to know what or why simply because some unbeliever disagrees with them. Their confidence is not built upon the approval of the unbeliever…and for that I am immeasurably thankful. But, what I want them to see is that the sacrifice to know the what and the why is for creating a platform, a battle ground to engage the unbelievers right where they live so that scripture truth can be brought to bear upon their opinions. I want to put additional tools in their hands, but for some, its convincing them those additional tools are not injurious to their faith, disagreeable to scripture or destructive to being a likable person not-a-know-it-all Christian that has no friends.
I know I don’t speaks for anyone else here, but in comparison you experience with introducing apologetic to your church has been much more successful than the rest. Please don’t stop drugging forward, I don’t have to express the absolute need to equip other brothers and sisters.
God Bless
“FireSpeaks”
Thanks Bill, keep slogging away.
I know that sometimes doing Apologetics – or anything that God has given you to do – can feel like shovelling sand into a leaky bucket. It’s tough, but keep plugging away! Don’t be put off by others not following – this can take time. Jeremiah had to plug away without much love through his ministry.
As Wil says – prayer is key. And asking for feedback – however it comes – can help. Demonstrating a teachable spirit can win people over to see that you really do care, and you never know what little tips you pick up along the way!
Well done for initiating and continuing your Apologetics ministry. It’s an encouragement to hear. Keep it up!
Jonathan, thank you brother!
Sure it is frustrating, but we ourselves must be very care not to judge others too harshly. Only God knows what is in a person’s heart and we risk becoming like the person we are frustrated with. My suggestion is to start with prayer. Sure apologetics is important and yes we need to defend our faith, but it still always comes back to God and his timing and what he wants vs what we want. Just a thought.
Wil I agree. I was a afraid my post was becoming too judgmental, so I made sure I included myself in my analysis.
Alas, my story is similar. I’ve had pastors say, “I want you to come to my church and teach this.” However, follow-through is woefully absent. I don’t aggressively dog them in follow-up; I make 1-2 contacts and then leave it to the Lord. The last presentation was at a men’s breakfast, where I learned afterward that a substantial core of the audience, including the organizer, held a particular theological position very firmly (not an heresy, I hasten to add), and didn’t feel I addressed it appropriately 🙂 I continue to read, study, and prepare so that, whenever the opportunity arises, I will be ready. On a more positive note, I’m preaching the Sunday service on a regular basis at a local faith-based medical center and have had positive feedback.
I think and pray the medical moral injunction (Hippocratic oath) “first do no harm”.
Jehovah’s Witnesses promotion of their Watchtower sect has the net effect of stumbling and turning people off to the real Gospel.
Jesus said: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte; and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves” (Matt 23:15)
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Danny Haszard born 3rd generation Jehovah’s Witness
I agree, and it is important for Christians to know the differences between what the JWs believe and Christianity, and to know where in the Bible the passages are that disagree with JW theology. I’ve talked with some of our local JWs enough to where they have pretty much stopped coming by the house and calling me, so I may start visiting their kingdom halls soon instead.