Easter Camp Apologetics upfront

KNOW the reasons

God exists!

1. Why is there something rather than nothing?

(The question of existence)

Clue: the universe exists and had a beginning

2. Why is the universe amenable to life?

(The question of fitness for life)

Clue: Arguments from the fine-tuning of the universe

3. Why is the universe amenable to rational enquiry? (The question of meaning/rationality)

Clue: that the universe is intelligible and rational – implies rationality, a mind behind the universe

4. Why does life exist?

(The question of life itself)

Clue: non-living does not give rise to living

5. Where does biological information arise from? (The question of information)

Clue: information only arises from intelligent agents

6. How does consciousness arise from

non-consciousness?

(the question of mind)

7. Why are human beings capable of love?

(The question of relationships)

8. Whence comes ‘ought’?

(The question of universal moral law)

Clue: See Romans 1

9. What is the purpose of our existence?

(The question of purpose or meaning)

10. What happens to us after we die?

(The question of destiny)

11. Did Jesus rise from the dead?

Acts 2:22-32

historical evidence

(including New Testament evidence)

God is real! God can be experienced / encountered

scriptural and experiential evidence

From the Greek 'apologia' - a legal or public defense

APOLOGETICS

KNOWING and GIVING

a reasoned DEFENSE of the Christian faith

"The most dangerous idea in human history remains the belief that Jesus Christ was the son of God and that he rose from the dead."

""It alters the whole of human behaviour and all our responsibilities. It changes the universe from a meaningless chaos into a designed place in which there is justice and there is hope, and therefore we all have a duty to discover the nature of that justice and work towards that hope. It alters us all. If we reject it, it alters us all as well. It's incredibly dangerous and that's why so many people turn against it."

GIVE the reasons

Clues of God's existence in the natural world

Luke 1:1-5

1 Peter 3:15-16

Romans 1:19-20

Acts 17:16-34

Psalm 19

Scientific and philosophical evidence

Answered prayer

Experience of the presence of God

Experience of conviction and forgiveness

Those who ASK you...

People coming to faith in Christ

Miracles

Personal apologetic

with gentleness and respect...

Resurrection-based apologetic

Jesus rose from the dead!

Acts 8:26-40

no coercion!

There are really five possibilities:

1. Christianity is true

Jesus died

Jesus rose

2. Hallucination

Jesus didn't rise

The apostles were deceived

The apostles were

myth-makers

3. Myth

4. Conspiracy

The apostles

were deceivers

Jesus didn't die

5. Swoon theory

What are some of the questions people may be asking?

• Christians (including you!)
• non-Christians who are interested
• Atheists
• disenfranchised Christians

'someone convinced against their will

is of the same opinion still'

Key questions:

-What do you mean by that?

-How did you come to that conclusion?

-If I could explain the answer to this question to your satisfaction, would it make any difference in your life?

Context will decide your approach to apologetics!

From the Greek 'euangellion' ' which means ' good news'

EVANGELISM

KNOWING and SHARING

the GOOD NEWS

of God's grace for us through Jesus

Bibliography

Bibliography

The Reason for God

Tim Keller

A brilliantly clear and concise engagement with the major objections to Christianity followed by a powerful statement of the truth of Christianity from various perspectives.

Life of Jesus: Who he is and why he matters

John Dixon

A historian’s guide to the evidence for the truth of the Gospels and the New Testament based on archaeology, historical and manuscript evidence.

Pocket Handbook of Christian Apologetics

Peter Kreeft

Summarised, condensed dot-point statements of the truth of Christianity. A good place to start for those who want to begin thinking in this way or know the reasons for their faith with a view to learning more.

The Case for Christ/The Case for Faith/The Case for a Creator

Lee Strobel

Popular level writing by an ex-atheist. Strobel investigates some of the toughest questions sceptics raise about Christianity by posing the same questions he had as an atheist and interviewing some of the world’s leading experts in their fields.

God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God?

John Lennox

A more technical, scientifically rigorous creation-based apologetic. Lennox is a professor of science and mathematics at Oxford University (where Richard Dawkins also teaches)

The Irrational Atheist

Vox Day

A controversial and polemical deconstruction of the irrational arguments used by leading atheists such as Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, Dennett and Onfray. Vox Day researches the ‘facts’ often quoted by atheists and debunks them.

Miracles

CS Lewis

A classic in the field of philosophical apologetics by one of the greatest Christian apologists of the twentieth century. Lewis begins by positing that rationality itself is an inbreaking of the ‘supernatural’ (ie nonmaterial) into the material world. Very well worth a read.

The Mind of God

Paul Davies

Davies is not a Christian but presents intriguing arguments that there is more to this universe than materialism, and that God is definitely a possibility. A technical, scientific book by a world-class physicist.

The Dawkins Letters: Challenging Atheist Myths

David Robertson

Robertson is a Scottish pastor who wrote a letter responding to Dawkins’ The God Delusion on the dawkinsnet website. This book collects a series of letters in which Robertson responds to each of the chapters of The God Delusion. Worth reading just for the letter at the end called ‘Salvation came through Richard Dawkins’ written by an atheist who came to faith through Robertson’s letters.

The Language of God: a Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief

Francis S Collins

Collins is the head of the Human Genome Project, one of the world’s leading geneticists, who presents compelling arguments for the existence of God from the world of science – cosmology, biology and physics in particular. An excellent creation-based apologetic.

The God Delusion

Richard Dawkins

The famous bestseller. Read it yourself, with a critical eye, asking, ‘How strong are the arguments Dawkins raises here?’ If you need to, do this in conjunction with a pastor or Christian friend. I include this in the list of apologetics works because I read it and came away thinking, ‘Is that the best set of arguments that atheists can present for the non-existence of God? How pathetic.’

Philosophically weak, but highly polemical. Know your enemy.

There IS a God: How the World’s Most Notorious Philosophical Atheist Changed His Mind

Antony Flew with Roy Abraham Varghese

Antony Flew wrote what has become THE textbook on philosophical atheism and the presumption of atheism. In recent years he ‘followed the evidence wherever it might lead’ and declared that with recent scientific evidence especially in the realms of cosmology, origins of life and consciousness studies, that he now did believe in God and considered himself a theist rather than an atheist. A very interesting memoir of a sharp-minded thinker.