If, At Bottom, All People Know Deep Down That God Exists- Why Pussyfoot Around With Apologetics?

I want to address an issue that is important from the perspective of why we bother to do apologetics in the first place. The issue is the subject of moral obligation. To put it back into perspective let me try and recall the gist of a recent discussion concerning whether or not apologetics, or defending the faith is really necessary.

In the final analysis the unrepentant, unregenerate sinner has to face the the reality of their obstinate disobedience to a holy God.

Although it may not have been expressed in so many words the general thrust of the discussion was:

Why put effort into learning (and some of the mental gymnastics that may involve) to defend the faith in order to dispel intellectual objections, which, in the end are not the real core issue with people? Isn’t the real issue being plain disobedience and a stubborn will which does not want to admit God exists even though deep down they know He does. They will not admit it because of the moral obligations which will immediately be brought to bear the instant they let the idea of the existence of God get a foot in the door.

But is there not more to it than plain disobedience?

We (humanly speaking) are naturally pattern seeking people. That is- people who- by nature use evidence to confirm what we are already predisposed to believe. And consistent with our nature, we will, under those circumstances, clutch at any straws that seem to support what we want to believe and we are already committed to, while simultaneously and diligently we ignore what, to others, may be glaring evidence to the contrary. People who study the nature of human behaviour call this “Confirmation Bias”. As Joe pointed out from personal experience- the unbeliever may admit some kind of god out there, a force or what have you, but evade, and shrug off the idea of a personal God that we can have a relationship with and strongly resist anything more concrete, ultimately because of the moral connotations that will necessarily follow that admission. "If  a personal God really exists- then that would mean I might have to conform to a set of rules for life that will box me in." Therefore the safest route, is to deny any such sort of God exists and downplay any evidence that is proposed to the contrary.

The implication is clear- why pussyfoot around with time consuming arguments? Why go to a lot of needless effort in learning to disarm the intellectual objections to the faith- when all we really need to do is go straight to the heart of the problem? The strong temptation is to hit them with the Gospel, their need for repentance and face them squarely with the reality that their obstinate self-willed direction is on a trajectory to hell unless they man up, admit what they already know- that God exists- and face the reality that God has a legitimate claim on their lives.

I hope you would agree that sets out fairly the direction of the discussion.

Invisible Things Are Clearly Seen- But Foolish Heart is Darkened.

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools… (Romans 1:20-22)

The scripture clearly speaks of a self deception that goes on. Every unrepentant sinner knows deep down enough about the reality of God’s existence to render them without excuse. But, at the same time, even though this knowledge is vouchsafed for by God (who is not a man that he should lie) it is also true that this ancient knowledge is buried. Consequently this knowledge has disappeared from his consciousness, such that at the normal cognizant level of everyday existence he is able to completely and convincingly uphold the facade of unbelief. He has deceived himself. His foolish heart is darkened. He is blind. In fact the state of the natural human, is even worse than blind, the scriptures characterize this as being dead. We must not be unapreciative of this reality. The unrepentant sinner suppresses the truth with regard to the existence of God. As far as his consciousness is concerned- he doesn’t know God exists. The Bible describes this condition of being unaware, completely oblivious to the greatest reality in existence- as being dead.

"And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;" Ephesians 2:1

"And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;" Colossians 2:13

"Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:" John 11:25

"So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.  And if Christ [be] in you, the body [is] dead because of sin; but the Spirit [is] life because of righteousness." Romans 8:8-10

"For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit." 1 Peter 4:6 (My emphasis)

The Gospel is held forth as the word of life, the word that brings spiritual life to dead bodies. When the Gospel is preached- like Lazarus- the dead come forth:

"Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain." Philippians 2:16

But we must not forget, merely speaking the truth of the Gospel to dead men, is not enough. The scriptures attest to the reality that we must speak the Gospel of truth convincingly and persuasively to these dead people, as Paul so ably demonstrated:

"And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks." Acts 18:4

"Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." Acts 26:28

"For he mightily convinced the Jews, and that publickly, shewing by the scriptures that Jesus was Christ." Acts 18:28 (My emphasis)

Now if it is established that we must also be convincing in our reasoning with these "dead" people, it therefore follows that we ought to convince them of the trustworthy nature of the Gospel. If the culture at large is convinced, for example, that truth is relative, then we must unconvince them. Because if they believe that all truth is only true for those that believe it, then they are thereby prevented from taking seriously the Gospel message of the exclusive and universal claims of the Gospel as having any truth for them.  They can simply say: "Oh ok, yes I can see this religious stuff might work for you because you believe it, therefore it is true for you", at the same time they are thinking, as long as I don't believe it, it cannot be true for me! This is a stronghold they must be released from.

As far as the natural mans justification is concerned, God justly condemns his refusal to bow his knee.

The Heart Has Reasons...

It is as well to emphasize here that all of this resistance to the evidence for the existence of God is taking place within the minds and hearts of those who oppose themselves at a level which is not specifically thought through consciously- as I have tried to express it, but it is all taking place at a subconscious level. This is what I meant by referring to Blaise Pascal's-

"The heart has reasons, which reason never knows".

What he meant by that is, the act of reasoning takes place at a very conscious level within our minds. It is an effortful, deliberate and highly cognitive exercise of the mind. The reality is that deep thought requires a focused pulling together of the resources of the mind. The next time you are taking a walk with someone, as you are strolling along, ask them a difficult question. Ask them what is the product of 12 times 8,672? You may not even have to go to that extreme, maybe just ask them what they were doing at the same time yesterday. The first thing they will do is stop walking in order to think. Why? Because thinking requires effort and it requires the mustering of certain resources within the brain, and if the mind is also occupied with ordering all of the complex movement of muscles, coordination of limbs, arms, sense of balance etc, that is involved in walking, it is a distraction. Even though you are not directly aware of all that is required of your mind in order to do such an ordinary thing as walking, there is less ability, less resources available to focus on the problem.

So we stop and think.

The complicated processes that our brains are working through in the process of a simple walk are happening quite out of sight and seem to happen automatically and without a sustained conscious effort, but it is most definitely occupying our processing capabilities beneath our immediate consciousness.

It is somewhat the same deal happening with a computer when we have our Internet browser open, watching a YouTube video, while your operating system is working through automatic updates and some other programmes are beavering away in the background and all of a sudden you are aware that the computer has slowed up, the video is lagging, it stalls and the picture breaks up or whatever. Too much going on in the background, the computer needs to dump some of the stuff that's going on in order to focus on the essential task. The computer needs to reassign priorities when a problem that involves lots of resources is engaged.  

So, the mind is for thinking, but the heart is where the motives lie. The heart speaks of that deeper level of being and the Bible assures us that "...out of it flows the issues of life." (Proverbs 4:23) So thinking also takes place at this deeper level quite independently of our consciousness. We are not even aware of it. I can only offer anecdotal evidence of this, but how often have you heard of someone with an insoluble problem being told to "go and sleep on it". And then the next morning, fresh from sleep- suddenly what could not be done yesterday is in sharp focus and that insurmountable problem is suddenly do-able. I have been absolutely stumped doing a difficult Sudoku problem and have given up. I go and do something else and come back a couple of hours later and find, within minutes the solutions that I was previously desperate for. How does that work? A deeper level of the mind has been happily at work on the problem in my absence.

Working In Absentia...

I was in a conversation after church one day with Michael Taube an engineer who is deeply involved in our refinery expansion. He was telling me this true story of the guy who invented the first mechanical sewing machine. He had this problem with the needle, no matter what he did the problem seemed unable to be solved. After exhaustive efforts he was at an impasse. Worn out he went to bed and during the night had a dream. In this dream he dreamt he was in a strange land of savages who were intent on doing him in. From my recollection, they were chasing him through the jungle and he turned to face his tormentors. With their arms held high their spears were poised to thrust him through and deliver the final blow. True to form, at this point he woke up.  As you can imagine, the last moments of the nightmare were recalled in vivid detail, and he noticed a feature of their spears that he had never seen before. It was a Eureka moment- the spears all had holes in them just before the sharp point of the tip. That was the answer to his problem. And the rest, as they say is history, and sewing machines have been with us ever since.

But that wasn't the end of our conversation.

Just a few days before this conversation, I had stumbled across a story which seemed to corroborate this phenomenon. It was the story of the discovery of the benzene ring. And I thought Michael would be interested because of its connection to his profession in Chemical Engineering.

Friedrich Kekulé- From the 1850s until his death, Kekulé was one of the most prominent chemists in Europe, especially in theoretical chemistry. He was the principal founder of the theory of chemical structure.

Kekulé's most famous work was on the structure of benzene. In 1865 Kekulé published a paper...suggesting that the structure contained a six-membered ring of carbon atoms with alternating single and double bonds. The empirical formula for benzene had been long known, but its highly unsaturated structure was a challenge to determine.The new understanding of benzene, and hence of all aromatic compounds, proved to be so important for both pure and applied chemistry after 1865 that in 1890 the German Chemical Society organized an elaborate appreciation in Kekulé's honor, celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of his first benzene paper. Here Kekulé spoke of the creation of the theory. He said that he had discovered the ring shape of the benzene molecule after having a reverie or day-dream of a snake seizing its own tail (this is an ancient symbol known as the Ouroboros). This vision, he said, came to him after years of studying the nature of carbon-carbon bonds.  

Notice in this extract from Wikipedia that it was some 25 years before Kekule admitted the circumstances surrounding his discovery. He knew only too well the very human prejudice of scientists who would arbitrarily dismiss his dream.

The Enemy Within The Walls

So what can we conclude or infer from these stories? We might infer that in the deep recesses of our mind (our heart) has been very busy even while we were absent! Whether in sleep or while our consciousness has been otherwise occupied doing other things that didn't require sustained focus, our busy mind and heart has been hard at work. There seems to be strong evidence that our minds are thinking things and working through issues somewhat independently of our consciousness, and yet not entirely devoid of connection to what issues we had been grappling with.

So how does this ability of the mind to work through issues on a subconscious level- relate to an unrepentant sinner, who declares that God does not exist? Well it's like the good detective trying to solve a mystery. The crime is a sinner who denies the undeniable in order to evade his obligations.  

• Who is the prime suspect?
• Does the suspect have the opportunity?
• Does the suspect have the resources?
• And finally- does he have a motive?

In this case the suspect is the human heart, and we suspect that the human heart, the sinner's own heart, has deviously misled the sinner's consciousness into believing the lie that there is not enough evidence for the existence of God. In fact, the human heart has erected an entire system, a complete scaffolding of defences against the legitimate claims of God on their being. So the heart brings to mind arguments that set themselves up in opposition to the truth of the Gospel.  It might take the form of an argument against the existence of God on moral grounds. "There is so much evil, how could a good all powerful God exist?"  It might be on existential grounds. The Universe came into existence without any outside help, therefore God does not exist. "Because there is such a law as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing". (Famous physicist Stephen Hawkings). And so on and so forth. Certainly the opportunity exists to deny the existence of God. What about the resources? Is the sinner really able to fool herself to that extent? Can we really be so self-deceived that the left hand doesn't know what the right hand has done, that our heart has all by itself figured out that in order to preserve our absolute sovereignty over our own life we cannot afford to let God's foot in the door? Well I hope the above stories all indicate that, yes our heart does have some independence from our consciousness. So in our human hearts, we do have the resources to carry out the crime. The description that God gives is perfectly applicable to the scenario we have envisaged:

"The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? (Jeremiah 17:9)

And what about the motive? Well we already discussed that. The sinner's heart is determined to keep God out and can deceive his conscious self by declaring that there is not enough evidence, and thereby maintain this sense of his own integrity and honesty, then he can "safely" keep himself at a distance from God. That is the motive of the unregenerate human heart. We humans (since the fall) are like water- always seeking the lowest level.  And this is what we do not just out of habit, but by nature- since the Garden of Eden. It is as automatic, and occurs as effortlessly from a consciousness perspective as our heart beats within our chests or our digestive process goes on within our innards.

A Scaffold Of Deception

So what we have within the sinners defences is a scaffolding of beliefs that work like armour plating against the penetrating word of God. To get to the persons heart one must first dismantle or penetrate that armour. The trap that Christians often fall into is they immediately pull out the armour piercing bazooka, the Word of God, and attempt to hammer the reality home of the need for a saviour before the groundwork is done.

For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
(Hebrews 4”12)

Softly, Softly, Catchee Monkey

Some might say: “Why is that a trap? Doesn’t the above verse verify the power and necessity of using God’s word? Absolutely yes, God brings to light and manifests the deep and hidden depths of depravity that lie within each of us as children of the first Adam. But we are also assured of this reality:

The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, And he who is wise wins souls. (Proverbs 11:30)

Remember this is spiritual warfare. When an opposing army sees the other side amassing his biggest most powerful weapons at a particular point along the battlefront what must he do? He concentrates all of his defences at that point. He gathers up his army and its armaments and focuses them at that point. In our culture today, the quoting of Bible and verse is strongly opposed because in doing so they instinctively know that it immediately disarms most Christians. If they can successfully evade and silence the big guns, the battle is theirs. So they resist most strongly the use of the Bible. And we can see how they justify this.

“Why should I believe a bunch of words written thousands of years ago by ignorant primitive people, who had no knowledge of science, who worshipped things like rocks, and carved images?”.

We need a defence of the Bible itself, we need to offer reasons why we trust in it as an authoritative source for life. But there is also another tactic we can employ and it is entirely scriptural, though it does not involve direct use of the scripture.

“Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

In this verse Jesus uses four animals of very different character to teach us some important aspect about reaching out to people. The first two animals describe the actual nature of sinners and saints. Unrepentant sinners are portrayed as wolves, and repentant sinners are depicted as sheep. Sheep and wolves have some common characteristics. They both are communal, they cohabit in flocks and packs. Sheep are harmless vegetarians and docile and easily led. Wolves are cunning, agile and rapacious opportunists who are led by the strongest in the pack. Wool laden sheep are easily rounded up and attacked and relatively defenceless. In fact sheep appear as easy pickings and slightly dull. They get caught up in thickets- just a perfect position for a predator to take them. When put in a corner they jump over invisible obstacles. When they fall over on a slight hill with their legs facing up the incline- they often can’t get up again. When their wool is wet they are sluggish. Sheep are an easy meal. That is the reality that we are by nature. We (according to the world) believe incredible things, we are gullible, credulous creatures and easily led. That is how we appear to the wolves. Indeed that is how we are in reality, Jesus says we must be as teachable as young children.

"Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Mathew 18:3)  

Children are trusting, and easily follow those in authority.

But look now what Jesus tells us to become: be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Why Serpents?  Sheep are what we are as newborns in Christ. But what we must become are people who are as wise as the serpent, but in appearance as gentle, harmless and inviting as a dove. The dove is a symbol of peace. No one is afraid of the dove. The character of serpents and doves are diametrically opposed. You almost couldn’t get animals more different in character. Somehow we must become both.

Learn From The Enemy

In the garden of Eden, Eve was beguiled by the serpent. What was the essential nature of his attack? What tactic did he use to effect his plan of destruction? He planted an idea in Eve’s mind. It was not an all out frontal attack on her defences. The serpent avoided arousing her defences. He did not threaten or bludgeon her into submission. He just whispered into her ear. And it was a seemingly harmless insinuation:   

”Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, “Yea, hath God really said…” (Genesis 3:1)

In some versions the word “subtle” is used instead of crafty. The serpent planted doubt in her mind, and we must do the same in the minds of unbelievers, avoiding if possible the arousal of their defences.
But how do we make those doubt who are not believers? They aren’t people of faith are they? Yes they are. Even the most ardent scientifically minded, rationally focused atheist is a believer. They have faith in science, they have faith in human ability, they have faith in reason. They also have faith in their own authority, faith in their own understanding, Just as nature abhors a vacuum, all people are religious, that is people of faith, and if the faith of Christ does not fill that vacuum, then some other faith imbued system already has. And those are some of the areas in which we focus in order to get them to question the basis of their own worldview. We must ask them, and give them reason to doubt their skepticism for instance.  And we do it best when we gently and respectfully engage them. And through imparting a sense- not of antagonism, or competition or contention- but the way a dove softly “coos” into your heart. We must win their confidence. We must build a relationship, we must engage them as friends. Now this is not to be a sham, but out of a genuine love and concern for those who are lost and blind and naked- because that is the exact condition of their lives. Being self deceived, they have- in unwitting submission to Satan- achieved a monument to unbelief. We need to topple this monument, without destroying the person.

Seeing The Invisible

Now some may object: "That's an awful lot of conjecture you've got going there, we can't just go by opinions, what's your authority?" To the Christian, we turn to the authority of the scriptures. They are the ultimate authority- so what do they say?

Conjecture aside then, what does our final authority say in this regard? We do believe, don't we that our scriptures are the ultimate authority on reality? After all is it not reasonable to think that if He who created all of reality gave us a handbook- then that is fair grounds for trusting it's usefulness for understanding His creation? (If we bought a new Ferrari- who would think to consult the Lada handbook, as if it was the final authority?)

Starting from Romans 1:18 Paul makes the astounding claim that from the beginning, we humans have been able to see that which is invisible. And that we have been able to see them clearly. What invisible things? "Even his eternal power and Godhead". What is the significance of that? We have no excuse. We have no excuse for claiming, like the famous atheist Bertrand Russell- "Not enough evidence". We don't have a valid excuse for disobeying God.

The scripture says:

"Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Romans  8:7

What is the carnal mind?

In the renowned daily devotional "My Utmost for His Highest" Oswald Chambers explains carnality:

The natural man, or unbeliever, knows nothing about carnality. The desires of the flesh warring against the Spirit, and the Spirit warring against the flesh, which began at rebirth, are what produce carnality and the awareness of it. But Paul said, “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). In other words, carnality will disappear.

Here Chambers is talking of the inner struggle of the Christian against his own carnal nature that he received from the first Adam. Our natural inheritance. Though we are “born again”- now “born of God”- we still need to war against our fleshly disposition towards selfishness and self-rule. So the Christian is in a battle within his own nature. The Christian is in a battle “to mortify the deeds of the body”

But Chambers, at the beginning, states that the carnal man, the unbeliever does not know that he has a fleshly mind that is predisposed against the claims of God on his life. He or she is not even subject to the law of God. Imagine a plane that has just taken off, they have “slipped the surly bonds of earth”. Though the plane is still subject to the law of gravity the aerodynamic forces at work have in effect neutralized the downward effects of gravity. But the plane is still subject to the law of gravity. It is still affecting the action of the plane.The force of gravity is still at work. If it does not maintain speed and lift- gravity will again exact its toll and the plane must descend. That is the situation that the believer finds himself in, struggling against the law of sinful flesh, struggling the good fight against his predisposition to be a self governing, self centred being.

Not Loyal To God, Not Subject To God

But in Romans 8:7 the unregenerate human, the unbeliever is declared not even subject to the law of God- and it is impossible that it could be otherwise. Why is that so? The scripture declares the unbeliever as “dead in trespasses and sins.” That is- he is oblivious to the legitimate claims of God over his life. Imagine the driver of a hearse speeding through the city with a corpse in the back. The hearse driver is not anxious at all about getting a speeding ticket by the long arm of the law- because he is indemnified by the contract he has with the owner of the hearse. The owner of the hearse has agreed in writing to pay any fines incurred in his task of driving the vehicle- therefore the driver has no qualms about driving as he will. To top it off the body in the back is the owner of the hearse. It is impossible that the dead person be subject to the law of the land because a dead person is not subject to anything but the law that binds him to death. He cannot make himself alive again. His estate may have to pay a fine, but he himself is free from the law. Just as the dead man is not subject to a speeding ticket, the unregenerate mind is by nature opposed to God and not subject to God.

“When a strong man, like Satan, fully armed, guards his estate, his possessions are secure.” Luke 11:21 As other versions translate, “his goods are kept in peace”

Analogously we must not think of the plane as merely resisting the law of gravity, we must think of the plane as entirely beyond the reach of gravity. It would be similar to a vessel that had entirely escaped the gravitational field of Earth and can no longer be affected by it. Here there is no battle within because the “enemy keeps his goods in peace”. There is no fight at all because the person has no internal battle. He is blind to the reality that he is a chattel of the enemy of souls. He feels in himself he is free to do what he wills, and yet he is bound by the law of sin and death to follow the dictates of his own selfish nature. He does what he does freely from his humanly perspective. But from God’s perspective he is bound to the law of sin and death. He delights in his own way. He perceives himself to be free to follow his own desires. Without realizing that his desires will and have made a willing slave of himself. But unaided he is not free to change his desires in any meaningful, spiritual way. But he is not free to follow the law of God. He is not free to fight the good fight against the flesh. Unaided, without the intervention of God, without the grace of the New Birth he is not free to follow or even desire God. He is in fact at war with God. That is the enmity between them. That is his human condition, and that was our condition before being born again.

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. (Romans 5:6) Other translations have: “For while we were still helpless…”

What If We Apply The Above Principle To Ourselves?

Now you will recall that I quoted the verse from Jeremiah regarding the  deceptive wickedness of the human heart, and how we aren’t even aware of its deceit (without God’s help) or able to acknowledge the depths of depravity to which we are prone if pushed hard enough or if we are determined. That is the state entirely with the natural man. But the bad news is that we Christians are still a long way from perfection, and we still require the  continual “washing of the Word” that we may grow up into all the fullness of Christ.  Paul’s admonition is still applicable:

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:2

In light of the deceptive nature of our native human heart, and our ever present need to renew our minds we should be prepared to examine ourselves for motives and reasons that we ourselves, (that is our deceptive human heart) might be using to attempt to hide behind and thereby avoid obeying the revealed and clear will of God. The clear will of God with regard to both preparation for and  the actual defending of the faith is unquestionable.

But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: (1 Peter 3:15)

As well respected apologist Michael Ramsden has said, this letter of Peter’s was not to a specific group, it was a general open letter to the churches, and thus taking its context directly into account, we cannot avoid the fact that it was written on our behalf also- those that should afterwards come to faith. It applies to us.

Reality establishes the need, scripture establishes the obligation.

So far then we have established that a) People have talked themselves into a worldview that denies the existence of God, or they have been indoctrinated into some form of religion that denies the only true God. and that therefore it is necessary to talk them out of the corner they have backed themselves into. And b) That there really is no excuse for denying the mandate to defend the faith as is clearly laid out in 1 Peter 3:15. So there is no doubt for the need of apologetics, and equally clearly there is the express requirement in scripture to be proactive in that regard.

So why are we so unwilling or why do we find it such a tiresome business?

You may recall the statement at the beginning: Why put effort into learning (and some of the mental gymnastics that may involve) to defend the faith in order to dispel intellectual objections, which, in the end are not the real core issue with people?

In view of all that has been discussed above is there reason to suspect that our reluctance to engage with the subject and with people of other worldviews may have something to do with our heart having its own reasons? Perhaps we need to reconsider the implications of why we constantly find excuses not to engage in defending the faith? Perhaps the real issue is that we simply need to face up to and resist the very human temptation to do nothing...

Book Review- The Reason For God, Belief in an Age of Skepticism by Timothy Keller.

I was first introduced to Tim Keller through YouTube videos. His insights reveal a mature and thoughtful faith. What Is Your Reason For Living? is a post on this blog that features his take on the perpetual purposelessness of the mythical Sisyphus. In another post on this blog, Keller takes up the subject: The Truth About Christianity-  On The Love Relationship And Freedom. For somewhat of a preview of at least something out of the book the following post features another video of Keller at the Veritas Forum: Five Ways A Skeptical World Attempts To Destroy Or Neutralize Christianity-  Belief In An Age Of Skepticism.


The Reason For God is my first foray into one of his books, and I am very pleased to say, I was not disappointed.

After many years as a pastor of a church in what was deemed to be a difficult neighbourhood of New York, the Redeemer Church grew from small beginnings to a substantial mega church. Keller is  now responsible for planting other churches in New York and in other major cities of the world. What is significant is that he understands the pulse of the city in perhaps ways that have failed to be realized in other ministries. His was a difficult area- not because of impoverished, marginalized people in the poorer suburbs of a large city, but because he successfully manages to reach out to those who are notoriously difficult to reach. The affluent, the influential, the educated and the professional. In some respects, this is important to me because these are the people that very few ministries tend to focus on. Just as the 10/40 window represents- from an outreach perspective- a neglected and difficult geographical area between the latitudes of 10 degrees, and 40 degrees north where the Gospel has hardly made an impact; so too the chosen area of service for Keller represents a slice of humanity where few pastors have successfully braved the rigours of the territory.

The secret of his successes appear to be at least in some form franchisable in the sense that we can learn valuable lessons and apply them to the sort of people he manages to reach in our own cities. The book is full of the nuanced questions that these people have asked over the years followed up with his own personal anecdotes. One of the more colorful things I take from this book is the reality that for quite a number of his earlier years in Redeemer church, Keller would end his service with a dedicated hour or so of question and answer time. What a great opportunity to gauge the impact and responses to his sermons!

The focus of this book is its unapologetic apologetics. As the title suggests, giving reasons for your faith and the recognition of a powerful skepticism in the sort of people he reaches out to is an important, integral part of building a solid congregation. At the end of the book, Keller gives some clues as to his mentors in the faith. Apart from a dedication to the encouragement and support of his wife, his strong appreciation for the works of C.S. Lewis chalks up, for me at least, yet another life among many that have credited Lewis with being a major influence in their Christian worldview. It also was somewhat more of a surprise to find that Jonathan Edwards was another influential person in his view of Christianity.

This is a great book, and worthy of using as a reference for the sticky questions that arise from those who, through education and training come to the faith with a keen sense of skepticism and the skills of critical thinking.