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Apologetics, Apologetics for kids

A Guide for Talking with Your Kids about God

June 8, 2018

I have been frequently asked, over the years, about apologetics resources for kids. Parents and children’s ministers are sometimes desperate to find resources that take these important concepts that are often extremely complex and translate them in a way they can be presented and taught to kids. For a long time, there honestly wasn’t much that did this. We are thankfully beginning to see this situation change. One of the best writing in this area is Natasha Crain (her blog is christianmomthoughts.com) . I recently read her Talking with Your Kids about God: 30 Conversations Every Christian Parent Must Have and thought it was terrific.

Talking with Your Kids

To be clear, Crain’s is not a book for your kids to read. It is a book for parents (or grandparents or anyone who interacts with kids) to help their kids better understand God. There’s of course a place for books that are written for kids to read. However, those books should never take the place of a parent taking the time to be intentional in leading, guiding and preparing their children for the challenges they will face. The aim of Crain’s book is to provide content and strategies that will equip parents to have meaningful conversations specifically about God (30, in total) with their kids.

Each chapter is devoted to setting up a substantive conversation between a parent and child on a variety of topics about God. The chapters are relatively brief (around 8 pages). They first lay out the case for a Christian perspective on a particular topic. This serves as the meat and potatoes of what will be discussed. The parent gets good and hard-hitting content that he or she will need to confidently discuss the particular issue on his or her child’s level. After this case is developed, the details are helpfully summarized under a heading of “Key Points” for easy reference. Each chapter concludes with a “Conversation Guide.” The conversation guide has suggestions to start the conversation, suggestions to advance the conversation, and suggestions to apply the conversation.

So imagine you would like to help your kids think about and have reasons for believing in the existence of God. Crain provides 6 chapters for having 6 different conversations on this topic! What, for example, can we learn about God and his existence from nature? In this particular chapter, Crain gives a biblical basis for how God has revealed himself in nature and then offers a very substantive run through of what we see in nature that points us to God (which is further elaborated in subsequent chapters). The chapter concludes with suggestions for your conversation with your kid and this is of course what it is all about. A parent is given a framework and very helpful suggestions to have a meaningful conversation about seeing God in the world around us.

Highlights

Some highlights for me in reading the book were the fact that the content of the book is not simply to have apologetics-style conversations with your child, but also theological ones. You can’t talk about God without doing some theology, or so it seems to me. One of the five major sections focuses on the nature of God and even takes on such issues as the doctrine of the Trinity. Each of my kids have, at a relatively young age, wondered about how to understand this difficult concept. I quickly realized that having this conversation haphazardly had the tendency to create frustration. But it is, of course, an absolutely crucial conversation to have. Crain’s helpful suggestion in having this conversation is to walk your child through the provided passages of the Bible that describe the oneness of God, the distinctness of each of the persons of the Trinity, and that each person of the Trinity is fully God. What’s nice about this is that before jumping into the concepts such as essence and personal identity (as some of us may be a bit apt to do), a kid can see the Trinity on display in the pages of Scripture. There’s going to be some mystery here and that’s okay, but a child is building a foundation for doing good systematic theology (probably) without even knowing it.

Beyond covering the fundamental issues such as the existence and nature of God, Crain also focuses on relevant issues as well. This is helpful since if you are not up on the current topics you may not know how a flying spaghetti monster serves as an objection to the belief in God. But there’s a good chance your kid will eventually run into this sort of objection. Crain has a whole chapter devoted to it. Or for many of us, we haven’t exactly stayed current on trends in science as it relates to Christian faith. This is a real problem since, especially on college campuses, science reigns supreme. Crain spends 6 chapters covering issues related to God and science with very interesting and insightful suggestions for discussing these issues with your kids.

Hard-hitting Accessibility

I think Crain strikes a really good balance between having hard hitting content and making it accessible throughout the book. This is one of the most difficult challenges in writing on these sorts of topics for a general audience. On my view, not everything can be made perfectly accessible without sacrificing some accuracy. Some concepts, I think, are irreducibly complex. Crain’s target is a very general one: parents. So her task was to take these very difficult concepts and translate them in understandable ways without sacrificing accuracy. The result is a good blend of challenging material with helpful and relatable illustrations. But the reader should be forewarned. Some of this will strike as difficult material and Crain’s chapters are intentionally brief. She does a terrific job of making it as accessible as it can be, but I suspect many will want and need to look to other resources for some further help understanding all of what is going on.

This leads me to the only real criticism I have with the book. What would have been helpful is to have listed resources for further study right there when a parent needs more. This is of course a rather minor criticism since it is not difficult to find resources these days. But for a person who is very new to these topics and may not be familiar with the authors who do good work in these areas, it can be difficult to go further without a guide.

3000 Conversations!

The reality is that there are 3000 conversations (and probably lots more!) that you need to have with your child about God, but Crain gives a terrific guide to get into some of the most fundamental and relevant. There are countless number of insights, anecdotes, and analogies that I plan to use with my own children as I talk with them about God.

 

 

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Apologetics, Christian Faith

Apologetics is Unassuming

March 26, 2018

There’s considerable debate on just what apologetics is or at least what it’s supposed to be. A typical definition is something along the lines of this:

Apologetics is the defense of Christian beliefs.

But the problem with this definition is this doesn’t uniquely pick out the discipline. After all, the systematic theologian seems to be defending Christian beliefs when he or she defends a particular doctrine. A Sunday morning sermon even seems to be a defense of Christian beliefs. The pastor provides reasons for how to understand a passage and how it should be applied in our lives. So this definition isn’t going to work.

An Unassuming Defense

I want to suggest that what uniquely picks out apologetics is that, in doing apologetics, one defends Christian beliefs in an unassuming way. That is, we think about and formulate reasons for believing that do not, in making the case, assume the truth of Christianity already. This doesn’t mean that one doesn’t believe Christianity is true, in making this unassuming case, and it doesn’t mean that we aren’t obviously arguing for the truth of Christianity, in making the case. It is simply that we don’t only cite a passage or some belief from Christian theology and call it a day.

Proving Christianity with Christianity

Think about how easy it would be to give a case for the existence of God if all we had to do was cite a passage. Genesis 1:1 says “In the beginning God…”…and we’re done here! We’ve proven God’s existence.

Citing Scripture as a way to justify our Christian beliefs is of course a very fine practice. In fact, I think this is precisely how it should be when we are having discussions about Christian theology amongst Christians and how your pastor should do it when he is preaching to the church on a Sunday morning. The pastor certainly cannot be burdened with proving the general reliability of Scripture before he ever begins to give an exposition.

The problem, of course, is that, outside of Christian circles, people do not believe Genesis 1:1 is true. Or someone may be doubting the existence of God and they already know what Genesis 1:1 says. Or (and this is important) we might just wonder whether there are other reasons outside of Scripture that point to the existence of God. According to the Psalmist, the world declares, pours forth speech, and provides knowledge about God (Ps. 19:1-2). Paul says, in Romans 1:S19-20, that God’s attributes (including presumably his existence) can be clearly seen and understood in what has been made. If this is right, it is thoroughly biblical for Christians to reflect on and consider (what I’m calling) the unassuming reasons for the existence of God. This extends also to our other Christian beliefs as well.

What are unassuming reasons?

What I mean by unassuming reasons is just that these reasons are not controversial. There are, for example, facts about the universe that no one really denies. Unless you are insane you believe the universe exists. There’s a wee bit of consensus on this fact! But how do we explain the existence of the universe? The Christian answer says the universe points to the existence of God as creator. Or take the so-called fine tuning of the universe. There may be quibbles about calling this “fine tuning,” but no one really denies that there exist certain contingent conditions of the universe that have to be just so for life to exist in the universe. Again, this seems to point to the existence of God. The point is the consensus gives us an unassuming reason to believe that God exists. Said differently, a person does not need to already be a theist (Christian or otherwise) to affirm these reasons. In short, they are unassuming.

Now, one can argue that the existence or the fine tuning of the universe do not point to God, but one cannot simply dismiss these as Christian propaganda. One must grapple with these reasons and what they provide reason for believing. This shows the great value of apologetics both for the believer and the unbeliever. For the believer, it helps us to address our doubts and to lean in to a deeper and fuller knowledge of God as we love him with our minds. For the unbeliever, it shows what reasons there are for believing in Christianity and, it seems to me, he or she must contend with these reasons without simply dismissing them as beliefs without evidence.

So…

Apologetics is the unassuming defense of Christian beliefs.

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Apologetics, Philosophy

Does Evidence Take Away from the Bible’s Authority?

February 19, 2018

Authority Issues

Christians have always been extremely wary of holding anything, such as philosophy or “reason” or evidence, as an authority over Scripture. It is sometimes argued that if one appeals to something as a reason to believe Scripture, then that thing becomes one’s authority. But, for the Christian, nothing can stand in authority over Scripture. Thus, we cannot use reason and evidence as our basis for believing the claims of Scripture.

The very prominent theologian, Wayne Grudem, has said:

Since the words of Scripture are “self-attesting,” they cannot be “proved” to be God’s words by appeal to any higher authority. If we make our ultimate appeal, for example, to human logic or to scientific truth to prove that the Bible is God’s Word, then we assume the thing to which we appeal to be a higher authority than God’s words and one that is more true or more reliable. Therefore, the ultimate authority by which Scripture is shown to be God’s words must be Scripture itself.[1]

Is Scripture Self-Attesting?

Though it is a common phrase in the history of theology, it seems difficult to know exactly what is meant by saying Scripture is “self-attesting.” Grudem himself goes on to explain this as the persuasiveness of Scripture in the actual experience of the world. But if this is right, then Scripture doesn’t seem truly self-attesting. It is seems to be the experiences of the world that attest to its truth in persuading us. Grudem goes on to even more explicitly contradict his initial claim (so it seems to me) by saying we can have evidence for the authority of scripture without that evidence becoming a higher authority. He says:

This is not to say that our knowledge of the world around us serves as a higher authority than Scripture, but rather that such knowledge, if it is correct knowledge, continues to give greater and greater assurance and deeper conviction that the Bible is the only truly ultimate authority.[2]

I would agree. It looks like he is suggesting here we can make appeal to what we know about the world and see that it (the evidence) points to Scripture’s authority. This seems to concede (despite what Grudem said above) that something can play an epistemological role in believing and recognizing a thing’s authority without itself becoming the ultimate authority.

Question: “Is the Bible God’s Word?”

The real epistemological issue we face in believing that the Bible is the authoritative Word of God is what we do when the question is “is the Bible the Word of God?” This question, it seems, can’t be answered merely by looking to the claims of Scripture attesting to this fact, at least not without vicious circularity. To avoid circularity, we’ll need to use reasons and evidence to come to the belief that Scripture is authoritative. But our coming to know that Scripture is God’s revealed word doesn’t take away from its authority in our lives. Once we come to know that it is God’s word, then we recognize and submit to its authority (the authority, by the way, it possessed all along). How do we recognize it is God’s Word? I am extremely broadminded as to what counts as evidence for this claim.

Evidence Broadly Construed

Consider the following example. Suppose Al is standing before a complete library of the world’s great religious texts. The Bible is there alongside the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita, Book of Mormon, the Upanishads, etc. Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that each of these claim, in effect, to be divine revelation. Standing there before all of these options, how could Al decide which one is correct? It can’t be the mere fact that the Bible claims to be God’s word. This is because, again, they all make this claim. How is Al going to decide?

Let’s suppose someone, whom Al has reason to think is trustworthy, tells him that the Bible is God’s divine word. Al now has one (i.e., a preacher) testifying to the Word of God (Rom. 10:14). Let’s also suppose the Holy Spirit stirs in Al’s spirit confirming that the Bible is God’s divine word. In this, Al hears and recognizes the voice of God (See Jn. 10:27). Al now, it seems, has epistemological reason to think the Bible is God’s authoritative word. Though Al now has reasons to believe, he can and should improve the epistemic status of his belief. He can engage in an intentional study of the text itself and begin to see how Scripture accords with the world. He will also no doubt notice the consistency and harmony of the message throughout the biblical text. Let’s also suppose he begins to read Scripture as a guide and, as he internalizes its claims, it begins to change his heart and life. Al now possess an even stronger epistemological basis for his belief in Scripture’s authority.

Many don’t think of the preacher or the Holy Spirit as providing evidence. But it is not clear why we shouldn’t. Much of what we believe is on the basis of testimonial evidence. This is where a person, whom we have reason to trust (this is important!), reports something as a fact. It seems we thereby have some reason to believe the account. It is defeasible evidence, but it is evidential in nature. This may include testimony of our parents, our teachers, books we read, etc.  But again, a trusted person telling you something has some evidential value. Again, I am employing a notion of reason in an extremely broad sense.

No one will be surprised that I think Al should also turn to topics in apologetics related to the authenticity and authority of Scripture. One should come away with the distinct impression from this study that this is no ordinary book. None of this, as I’ve argued, should take away from the authority of Scripture. Indeed one has reason upon reason (I would argue) to yield one’s life to its authority.

(This is comes from a journal length article that will be published in the Southwestern Journal of Theology).

[1] Wayne Grudem, Bible Doctrine: Essential Teachings of the Christian Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999), 37.

[2] Ibid., 39.

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Christian Faith, Doubt

The Value of Being Dogmatic in Our Faith

January 30, 2018

For some, I’d be the last guy you’d expect to be extolling the value of dogmatism. On this blog, I typically urge the value of doubt and questioning our faith. I do always try to be careful to say that doubt is not good in itself. It has value, but the value comes when we lean into doubts and are led to truth, knowledge and a more confident faith. And faith certainly is a virtue. So I don’t want anyone to stay in a place of serious doubt. And through the doubt, I want to suggest it’s important to stay somewhat dogmatic about the (important and fundamental) beliefs we have.

Okay, so what do I mean by dogmatism? For our purposes, let’s understand dogmatism as sticking with our convictions in the face of countervailing evidence.

Inappropriate Dogmatism

Now there is no question there are forms of dogmatism that are clearly inappropriate. We should of course follow the evidence where it leads. At some point, the evidence will likely lead all of us to reject some belief we have long held. This can be very, very difficult, especially when we have organized our lives, to some degree, around this belief. This can be a belief in the integrity of some person, organization or institution, or a belief in some political theory, or a theory of science, or even something having to do with sports or a hobby, etc. It can also of course have to do with one’s Christian beliefs. When we remain absolutely stubborn in our beliefs despite unassailable evidence, this is not an intellectual virtue and it’s not what I’m suggesting here.

There is, as usual, another extreme. We can also be unstable in our deeply held beliefs where we fold, so to speak, in the face of any challenge at all. So, as usual, the virtue is somewhere in the middle. The big question is where is that line? To what degree should we be dogmatic?

Virtuous Dogmatism

Well the answer seems to clearly turn on the evidence. We should give up our beliefs when we lack any substantial reasons for believing them to be true. Also we should give up our belief if there is a fatal objection and it cannot be adequately addressed after sustained inquiry. However, this is often not where we are at when we doubt our Christian beliefs. When I was in my strongest periods of doubt, I still had plenty of reasons for maintaining my beliefs. There were just a few things with which I was deeply struggling. But, even in this, there were numerous other lines of evidence for the truth of Christianity that more than justified my Christian faith. So it seems we should be dogmatic about a belief in the face of countervailing evidence when we still have, all things considered, good reason for that belief.

To illustrate, suppose a mom finds out her son is being charged with murder. Things don’t look good for him. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time and substantial evidence points to his guilt. His mom, though, has unique perspective. She knows him well and believes for good reason that murder would be completely out of step with his character and life. She sees the countervailing evidence and feels the pull of it. At a certain (probably early) point, the mom should stay dogmatic about her son’s innocence even in the face of this evidence. Why? Because she has good reason to believe he didn’t do it. As the evidence gets sorted out, it may be that the mom’s evidence will be defeated and she should change her belief. But it could be that her unique perspective was completely right. Likewise, when it comes to our Christian faith, we should be dogmatic to a certain extent. This is a good thing while we sort out the evidence that’s before us.

Hang on!

I often encourage folks who are doubting to hang on. The reason is it can be difficult when one is in the throes of doubt to keep in view the other evidence one has for one’s Christian beliefs. Our doubts have a way of being in our face and clamoring for our attention. Again, this can be valuable because it is very likely that we should lean in and investigate those areas in which we are doubting. I’m not saying hang on and blindly trust that Christianity is true in the end. But hang on as you address the moment of doubt. After investigation, you may change your belief. But you may find as you lean in that the doubt can be adequately addressed. Either way, you will be more rational and on a surer intellectual foundation.

 

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Christian Faith, Doubt

Did Jesus Himself Have Faith?

December 14, 2017

The Bible calls us to faith. Many Christian thinkers have seen faith as a moral virtue. At the same time, the Bible pictures Jesus as our moral exemplar. He’s the example after whom we should model our lives. What’s curious is the Bible never says that Jesus had faith. It would be odd if our moral exemplar lacked this primary Christian virtue.

Did Jesus have faith?

One may be lead to think Jesus did not have faith. This, I think, could be plausibly argued for. I don’t think it follows merely from the fact that the Bible never says Jesus had faith. This would be an argument from silence and we need to be careful in basing a claim on silence. A position like this should be motivated, I think, by other considerations. Ultimately, the issue seems to turn on what we mean by faith.

One of the most influential figures in the history of Christian theology, Thomas Aquinas, saw this. He said:

Faith…implies a certain defect…and this defect was not in Christ. And hence there could be no faith in Him (ST, ch. 9: ques. 7: article 3).

I would certainly agree that if faith implied a defect, then Jesus did not have faith since, as Christians, we are committed to a sinless Christ. But it’s not clear to me that faith necessarily implies a defect. What is the defect? For Aquinas, it is the lack of directly beholding God. Faith, for Aquinas, was a way of having knowledge of religious matters without direct experience of those things. We do not directly behold God–that is, he is unseen–therefore, we must know God by faith. Faith, he thought, was the for things unseen in his reading of Heb. 11:1. Unlike us, Aquinas thought Jesus had a kind of direct vision of God throughout his earthly life such that religious matters were not unseen for him. He didn’t have this defect or this lack. So faith was unnecessary for Jesus.

What is faith?

Now if Aquinas was right that faith is a way of knowing and this way is necessitated because of a lack or defect, then surely it follows that Jesus did not have faith. I just don’t think Aquinas is right here. As I’ve argued before, even though there are a number of epistemological issues related to faith, I don’t think faith is an epistemology. That is, on my view, faith is not a way of knowing.

The gist of the view is that faith is a form of active or, what I call, ventured trust. It is where we stake our faith or trust in some object. I venture my life on the well-functioning of an airplane…but only when I get on board. This is analogous to Christian faith except that I venture my life on the person of Christ and truths of the gospel. Epistemology comes into it precisely because I need to know who (or whom) I should trust. Evidence should guide us to those things that are worthy of our ventured trust.

Jesus indeed had faith

But if faith is ventured trust, then it seems Jesus is a paragon of faith. We see, in Christ, a full and whole life ventured in trust on the reality of God. Again, even if Jesus had a direct view of God, then this in no way counts against his having faith understood as ventured trust. In fact, if Jesus had a direct view of God, then this would provide him with ideal reason to trust. Jesus could rest certain (literally) in the trustworthiness of God.

A benefit of this view is it avoids the awkwardness of saying Jesus is our moral exemplar but except for faith. It seems much more plausible to think of Jesus as our model for all the virtues.

Evidence is important

Seeing evidence as important for faith is, I think, good news because evidence matters for most areas of our lives. Why should our Christian beliefs be any different? With this understanding, if someone has doubts or questions, then they should investigate the evidence. In other words, investigating is not somehow inconsistent with having faith. It is, in my view, part of what it means to pursue the knowledge of God.

What do we find when we investigate the evidence? Do we have reason to venture our life on the reality of God? I and many others find the evidence very compelling and have given our lives to it.

[Related post: The Risk of Doubting One’s Faith]

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Apologetics, Christianity, Philosophy

Are Christian Beliefs Properly Basic?

November 29, 2017

Properly basic beliefs

If you have hung around philosophical discussions about God and Christianity, then at some point you’ve likely heard someone bring up the notion of a belief’s being “properly basic.” It can often sound like the Christian who employs this concept is simply helping him or herself to some wild claim without offering any reasons to believe it. That is, it can sound like a cop out. And, frankly, it may be a cop out. I’m guessing well-meaning Christians do use this as way to not have to give actual evidence. But if they do, they have misused the concept.

Let me explain.

Let’s first say what it is for a belief to be properly basic. In short, a basic belief is one that is based directly on a fact and not another belief. A properly basic belief is one that is based directly on a fact where the fact justifies the belief.

[If this is satisfactory, then you can skip to the next section. I explain things more fully below, but please note there are many technicalities of this discussion that will be completely left out.]

The basis of a belief

Some beliefs are based on other beliefs. Let’s say I watch the evening news and the weather man reports that tomorrow it will be 70 degrees and sunny. Call this belief B1. I believe B1 and I infer B2: that “tomorrow will be pleasant.” Since I inferred this belief, we say B2 is based on B1. B1 is my rational basis for believing B2. What we should notice is if I were to report B2 to my wife, she may appropriately ask why I think B2 is true. I would answer with B1. But here’s where it gets interesting. If she was in an uncharacteristically meddling mood, she could ask why I think B1 is true. In order for B1 to be rational, it seems I would need reasons for believing it.

Beliefs, by their very nature, are such that they are always either true or false. When we believe, we represent the world as being some such way and this is either how the world is or it is not how the world is. Again, this is simply a matter of the nature of a belief. Thus, one ALWAYS needs a reason for thinking the belief is true if one is going to assent to it. That is, if one lacked all reasons whatsoever for some belief, then it isn’t rational to hold that belief.

But not all beliefs are based on other beliefs. Some beliefs are, for example, based directly on an experience of some sort. Let’s say you stub your toe and experience a sharp pain and form the belief “I am in pain.” Remember, beliefs need reasons. So what’s your reason for this belief? Here it seems it is the very fact that you are in pain! We should notice we’ve based our belief directly on a fact and facts don’t need further reasons because they are, well, facts. Facts just exist. In other words, there are not true or false facts. There are just facts. This is a basic belief since its reason doesn’t involve any beliefs that would require further reasons. It’s based directly on a fact.

If a (nonbasic) belief is inferred from a prior belief, the prior belief must have justification for it to be rational. This is either some fact or another prior belief. The foundationalist believes that all inferential beliefs must ultimately lead, at some point, to a properly basic belief from which these beliefs were inferred. The thought is that an inferential chain cannot go on infinitely. It must ultimately terminate in a belief that is based directly on some fact or facts that generate justification without itself needing to be justified.

Consider the following:

Belief: “I should go to the doctor.”

Why think this is true?

Belief: “I am in pain.”

Why think this is true?

Experience: the pain itself

We should notice that the belief that “I should go to the doctor” is justified by the belief “I am in pain.” This is inferential. There is undoubtedly more going on with this inference than just this, but it seems we could sufficiently fill this picture out and, if we did, we’ll clearly see that it is a rational inference. But since the belief “I am in pain” is a belief, it makes sense to ask whether it is justified. If it is not justified, then the belief “I should go to the doctor” is not justified. Here the belief is basic. It is based directly on the experience of pain itself. The experience justifies the belief “I am in pain” which in turn justifies (by inference) the belief “I should go to the doctor.”

Are Christian beliefs properly basic?

There’s a legitimate discussion in Christian philosophy about which beliefs should be considered basic. To say that a belief is properly basic is not a cop out (or at least it need not be). It’s merely to assert that a belief is based not an inference from other beliefs, but on some fact or facts. So if a belief is to be properly basic (and not used as a cop out), one must come up with some justifying fact upon which it is directly based.

I’m an unabashed evidentialist in the sense that the rationality of a belief has only to do with what evidence one has.[1] It’s a big debate in epistmeology, but my own view is that a belief cannot be made rational by things of which one is unaware. But I think of evidence in a very broad sense. Though arguments can be evidence, it is not only arguments that can be evidence. Evidence includes both empirical and philosophical considerations. But we can have evidence of the direct sort. We can, for example, base a belief directly on an experience. When one is in pain, the evidence one has for believing one is in pain is the experience of pain itself. We also seem to know such things as mathematical and logical facts on the basis of intuition. I rationally believe that 2+3=5 not on the basis of an argument. I grasp this fact directly via my intuitive awareness of the relevant mathematical fact.

On what facts can we base our Christian beliefs?

What about our Christian beliefs? It seems clear we can have a direct encounter with God and thereby rationally believe that God exists on the basis of this encounter. It also seems we can know certain things about God on the basis of our intuitions similar to the way in which we know mathematical facts. Most Christian philosophers will agree that, when it comes to our Christian beliefs, we can minimally have these as properly basic beliefs.

But I think philosophers would agree that not ALL Christian beliefs are properly basic. There are very fine grained theological claims that seem to be the result of careful reflection and inferences from other claims. One cannot have direct experience of the facts of, say, eschatology, or so it seems to me. These will be inferred from prior beliefs.

So if there are some beliefs we know in the basic way and some that are clearly inferred, where is the divide? Again, there is considerable disagreement on this issue. I tend to be less permissive than others in what we can know in the basic way. For example, it is not clear to me one can know Jesus rose from the dead in a properly basic way. One can perhaps know that Jesus is real, given a direct encounter. But to know that in AD 30 (or thereabouts), Jesus of Nazareth was crucified and 3 days later rose from the dead seems clearly inferential given its historical nature. One will need to infer this from other beliefs about the Bible, history, God, etc. I’m also doubtful one can believe that Scripture is God’s revealed word in a properly basic way.[2] Again, it is difficult to know what facts on which one could base this belief for it to be basic.

We should keep in mind that just because something is not properly basic doesn’t mean it is any less rational to believe. Perhaps the structure the relevant beliefs will be a bit more complex and complexity may bring more opportunity for error. But as long as the belief is inferred in the appropriate way from a justified belief, then the belief can be rational for someone.

One last point is a person can have a properly basic belief that is also, at the same time, justified inferentially. One can have a direct encounter with God and believe that God exists on that basis. But one can also consider the dozen or more plausible arguments for God’s existence and have this belief also supported by them. This would be, for one, a well justified belief indeed.

[1] A non-evidentialist, like Alvin Plantinga, would say that a belief can be made rational by things of which one is unaware. Plantinga’s epistemological view is a version of externalism whereas evidentialism is typically construed as an internalism.

[2] Much of this turns on whether testimony is a source of properly basic beliefs.

Christian Faith, Philosophy

God Stands Behind It All

November 16, 2017

Having recently completed a discussion of Plato’s Republic with a terrific group of college students, I am once again reminded of its beauty and depth. When teaching the Republic, I am always struck by the seemingly innocent back and forth of the dialogue that inevitably entices us straight into discussing life’s deepest issues. I am convinced that the genius of Plato is that we, in a way, cannot help but become a participant in his dialogue.

The influence and importance of the Republic as a single work is hard to match. It finds its way onto every self-respecting list of the most influential books, often ranking in the top five. Alfred North Whitehead famously said,

“The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.”[1]

Many philosophical topics that are live discussions today are traceable to Plato’s Republic. In short, the Republic is really, really good and worth our time.

One of my favorite discussions to have with students in reading the Republic is Plato’s allegory of the cave. In the dialogue, the main character, Socrates, tells a story according to which people are held captive within a cave and are bound such that they are only able to see the shadows on the wall of the cave. They have been there their whole lives, and so they think the shadows are all there is. It is possible to escape, but it is exceedingly difficult and no one really wants to because they are not sure there is anything beyond the shadows. The way of escape is an arduous journey, and, if one is successful, one encounters blinding light. It is so bright it’s painful. It takes some time for one’s eyes to adjust, but once they do, one sees the true world—the world as it really is.

The allegory is intended to illustrate how philosophy can free us from a fixation on the world of sensation. We are, in a way, bound by the shifting and ever-changing material world—the shadowlands, to use C.S. Lewis’ turn of phrase. For Plato, the material world is not necessarily evil, but it is a world in a constant state of flux and change. Thus, one cannot have genuine knowledge or even say true things, because before one finishes one’s inquiry, the world has already changed. The true world—what Plato calls the world of the forms—is the world of eternal and fixed ideas. This is a world discoverable not by empirical inquiry, but by philosophy.

In the shifting material world, one experiences things that have beauty to some degree. Or one may experience things that are somewhat good. But these are, at best, the mere shadows of beauty and goodness as they really are in themselves. In the world of the forms, one experiences beauty and goodness themselves along with the rest of the forms. And by knowing beauty and goodness themselves (as well as the rest of the forms), we are able to live well—at least, better—in the material world since there will be less confusion about what is beautiful, good, etc.

At this point in our discussion of the Republic, I always try to show how profound this is. What motivation to do philosophy! You can gaze on beauty and goodness themselves in doing philosophy! But here’s the thing. As good as that is, there’s something better still. For the Christian philosopher, there’s something (or someone!) that stands behind the forms [Read more]

[1] Process and Reality, p. 39 [Free Press, 1979]

(this post originally appeared on www.theologicalmatters.com)

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Christian Faith, Doubt

God Never Requires Us to Believe without Evidence

November 14, 2017

In his An Essay on the Divine Authority of the New Testament (1804), 19th Century theologian, David Bogue once said:

God never requires us to believe without evidence: but where sufficient evidence is given, he is highly and justly displeased at men’s unbelief.[1]

Is this right? Does God ever require us to believe without evidence? I say he does not.

I’ve often asked my students whether they can come up with even one example in Scripture of someone who is asked to believe blindly—that is, to believe without evidence. It’s harder than you might think…okay, I think it’s impossible, since it is not there. But feel free to try. Every time God requires belief, there are experiences that accompany the request. Take, for example, Moses being asked to confront Pharaoh. There’s of course the burning bush as well as other confirming miracles. Or take Paul’s conversion experience on the road to Damascus. He’s literally blinded by an unexplainable light and talked to by Jesus himself. It’s not that these couldn’t have questioned these experiences and disbelieved. In fact, disbelief is always possible with experience (more on this below). The point, however, is it was very rational for them to believe. That is, these extraordinary experiences provided good evidence that rationally supported their beliefs.

Abraham and Isaac

The prime example that people often allege as a clear case of blind faith is Abraham’s being asked to sacrifice Isaac. But, as crazy as this experience must have been, when we look closely at the account (Gen. 22), we see that Abraham acted rationally. How so? We should keep in mind that just having Isaac was already a miraculous experience. God appeared to Abraham and verbally told him that Sarah, Abraham’s wife, would give birth. Abraham actually didn’t even believe this at first because Sarah was a wee bit beyond the child-bearing years at 90 years old! But her becoming pregnant and giving birth to Isaac seemed to change his mind rather quickly. This same divine voice spoke again verbally to Abraham and commanded him to go up to sacrifice the miracle child. Given this history and the verbal expression of God himself, Abraham clearly believed God on the basis of evidence.

Competing Reasons

There’s no doubt Abraham had competing reasons. Isaac was the promised child after all. All the promises that God had given to Abraham were to be given and furthered by Isaac. There’s also his obligations as a father to protect his child that had to have caused him to question whether he should do this thing. All of this, I would think, would provide Abraham with a tremendous intellectual conflict. Does this mean he therefore acted in blind faith? No! It seems to me he made the rational evidentially-based choice in believing God (even if he didn’t understand just what God was up to) and even rationalized it by expecting God to raise Isaac from the dead (according to Heb. 11:19).

Rational Trust

We often find ourselves in similar situations. We are confident we are called to something we don’t understand. We don’t have the first clue how things will play out or even how all the ends will meet. And yet we are called to believe. We are called to trust. However, this is not blind faith. I suspect we have very good evidence for the belief. It’s just that we don’t know all details and we are going to have to trust. The point is, though, trust is the rational thing to do in this case.

Or perhaps we have doubts about our Christian faith. Again, I don’t believe God expects us to believe blindly. The good news: there no shortage of evidence for the truth of Christianity. As long as there have been Christianity, Christians have explored the evidence for its truth.

For Abraham, he was ultimately rational given his knowledge of God. I suspect that it took the very voice of God very God, the creator of the universe, whom Abraham knew very well to be trustworthy to move forward. His neighbor’s voice wouldn’t have been sufficient. A priest or a prophet’s voice perhaps wouldn’t have done it. But that familiar voice, given the bigness of his theology, gave him reason to believe.

[1] You can find the context of this quote and a link for Bogue’s full work at The Library of Historical Apologetics http://historicalapologetics.org/god-never-requires-us-to-believe-without-evidence/

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Apologetics, Apologetics for kids, Christian Faith, Doubt

4 Steps to Help Kids Ask Questions Stuck in their Heads

November 2, 2017

Every survey and researcher says that students have a lot of questions about their faith. This seems to essentially define Millennials and Gen Y from older generations. Whereas older generations were content with certain presuppositions about faith, youth today are suspicious and often doubtful of these things. But here’s a funny thing. I get the privilege to speak regularly to students about faith and apologetics. At these events, there will occasionally be a Q and A time. When it is thrown open for questions, it’s very often the case that there is…awkward silence (crickets in the background). (whispering) Psst, where’s all the questions? What’s going on?

What is going on here? Well I don’t think the researchers have it wrong. I do think students have questions and they can, often times, be burdened by these. I think it is that the questions haven’t always coalesced in their minds into English language yet.

This can be a really rough place to be. One has a question that’s bothering them and creating cognitive dissonance, but they cannot even ask the question that’s there. It can be especially rough since that question may continue to nag them and even create further doubts. If they could just ask the question, it may be there’s a really good answer waiting in the wings. But it’s currently stuck and, thus, they are currently stuck.

We must get our kids asking their questions and seeing the resources of the Christian faith. An important role for youth leaders and parents to play is to help their kids articulate the questions they in fact have. To be clear, this isn’t telling your kids what to think. It is not telling them what questions they should have. It is helping them surface and articulate their questions.

Here are 4 steps to help kids ask the questions stuck in their heads.

  1. Enter into their world.

The first thing is to enter their world. This is perhaps the most difficult step, especially if you haven’t done this much to date. But we’ve got to meet them where they are at. We need to notice what they like, what bothers them, what repulses them, what do they tend to emphasize, what sorts of things change their mind on issues, etc. Every generation is different. There is said to be one of the greatest generation gaps that has ever existed today. I’m not sure if that’s right or even how that is measured, but it seems clear the world they move in is substantively different and you need to get to know it to help the ask their questions.

  1. Listen and affirm them in the questions they ask.

I want to also suggest you create a safe space for them to ask any question at all. This is perhaps the scariest part. My wife and I have always told our kids they can ask us any question in the world and we’ll do our best to answer it (always in age appropriate ways) without any condemnation. There is, for us, no question that is off limits.

Now you have to cultivate the art of listening in these situations. Listen to them. Listen to what they are saying on their terms. Listen especially to what they are not saying. It’s often that the good stuff hangs just behind what they say.

Now it’s not my view that every question is a good one. There are dumb questions. But any question, insofar as it is a genuine question, is good to ask. And again, ill-formed questions will often stand just on the outside of a great question. Thus I think we should always affirm our kids in the questions they ask. If it is interesting to my kids, it is thereby interesting to me. If you make them feel bad in asking a question, they will start going elsewhere for answers.

  1. Ask clarifying questions and push them to dig deeper.

If they’ve begun to ask some questions, great. But it may not be the question that’s bothering them. Clarify what they are saying. State their question back to them in different words to make sure you’ve got it. “I hear you asking…” and be ready to have missed their point.

If they still don’t know what to ask, give them some prompts. I find that I can typically start in talking about God or the Bible and the questions often come. By pushing them to dig deeper, they’ll find things that don’t make sense to them.

  1. Walk together in dialogue as you search for answers together.

Chances are you will get thrown for a loop. I know I do all the time with students. I often have to give my best stab at something and then apologize and promise to get back to them. But I make it a point to get back to them. And this is the good stuff. Walking together in a dialogue (rather than preaching at them in monologue form) will draw you closer together and help both of you to clarify your thoughts and believe in more rational ways.

 

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