Defending Your Faith

Have you ever heard of apologetics? This comes from the Greek word apologia, which means to give a defense. Scripture tells us plainly that we must “always [be] prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter‬ ‭3‬:‭15‬).

Do you know how to defend your faith? Have you considered that you need to be able to defend your faith? There are a plethora of books in the Christian market that show how we must defend our faith—there are plenty that do that well. But in his book Defending Your Faith: An Introduction to Apologetics, published by Crossway, RC Sproul lays the groundwork for what apologetics is, the issues at hand, and the best way to do it. He advocated for classical apologetics, which, in contrast with presuppositional apologetics, focuses on using external evidence to validate, so to speak, the existence of God.

This apologetic method uses arguments such as the moral argument or ontological argument for the existence of God, which both essentially claim that morality of truth and logic are unknowable without God. For instance, Sproul argues, “No one can be a consistent relativist for very long; even when absolute truth is denied to exist, those denying it affirm at least one absolute, namely, that no absolutes exist.”

Essentially, Sproul is explaining that, though someone can claim that morality and truth are subjective—just mere preferences—their claim falls flat because it’s self-defeating.

In the end, Sproul attempts to explain if this way, “Christianity is based on far more than naked human reason but by no means upon less. Though divine revelation carries us beyond the limits of rational speculation, it does not sink below the bar of rational intelligibility….Defending the faith to the best of our ability is not a luxury or an indulgence in intellectual vanity. It is the task given to each one of us as we bear witness to our faith before the world.”

I highly recommend this book if you want to dive deeper into apologetics!

I received this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.