Apologetics Part 3

Worldviews Listen Here

What is a Worldview?
A worldview is outlook or perspective of what the world is. The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world. The qualification for having a worldview is having a mind.

Christian Worldview is: the Triune Sovereign God of scripture created the world and is now saving His people from this present fallen world through the prefect savior Jesus Christ.

Non-Christian Worldview is: (a) man is an autonomous and free creature who must (b) merit life or his destiny. The unbeliever has his presuppositions also. i.e. Atheism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam (may not hold to (a)) etc.

There is no neutrality
All the treasure of wisdom and knowledge are in Christ (Col 2:3)
We are have sole alliance to Christ in everything we do (Col 3:17), including our reasoning (John 17:17) whoever is not for Christ is against Christ (Matt 12:30)

Christian worldview alone gives the necessary preconditions for intelligibility:

"Thus the Christian apologist may boldly assert that without an absolute personal being as the foundation of all things, there is no possibility of ethics. Without the ontological Trinity as the fount of all being, there is no possibility of unifying the particulars of human experience. Without the combined doctrines of the Trinity and man being God's image bearer there is no possibility of predication and thus language. Without the doctrine of God's sovereignty and providence there is not ground for inductive logic and science. Without a good and all-powerful God that creates both man and the natural realm there is not reason to believe that our senses are reliable. From these considerations it is clear why TAG is often described as an argument that proves the impossibility of the contrary. There is, at bottom, one non-Christian worldview and this worldview is easily reduced to absurdity." Taken from www.butler-harris.org/tag

Show the absurdity of the non-Christian worldview:
1.Show that all people have a worldview i.e. we all have value systems and judgments about the world.
2. Show the unbeliever that he/she can’t account for reality as he/she knows it
3. Show that unbeliever worldview is internally inconsistent, that their worldview has contradictions.
4. Prove that everyone has a metaphysic i.e. even a materialist secretly believes in metaphysical realities i.e. laws of logic, laws of morality.
5. In case of world religions show that may claim to have morality, logic etc, but they don’t have concrete worldview that can unify all these particulars.

Apologetics Part 2

Schools of epistemology listen here

What is epistemology?
the branch of philosophy that is directed toward theories of the sources, nature, and limits of knowledge.

Schools of epistemology

*Rationalism (Continental rationalism)
in philosophy, a theory that holds that reason alone, unaided by experience, can arrive at basic truth regarding the world. Associated with rationalism is the doctrine of innate ideas and the method of logically deducing truths about the world from "self-evident" premises. Rationalism is opposed to empiricism on the question of the source of knowledge and the techniques for verification of knowledge.
Baruch Spinoza monist
René Descartes dualist
G. W. von Leibniz pluralist

*Empiricism (British Empiricism)
philosophical doctrine that all knowledge is derived from experience. For most empiricists, experience includes inner experience—reflection upon the mind and its operations—as well as sense perception. This position is opposed to rationalism in that it denies the existence of innate ideas. According to the empiricist, all ideas are derived from experience. Only particular exist.
David Hume (Scottish) (no sensation of causation and substance) only habit of the mind.
John Locke (English) The mind is a tabula rasa a blank slate
George Berkeley (Irish) subjective idealism (Only sense perceptions are true, God is the all perceiver)

*Pragmatism
method of philosophy in which the truth of a proposition is measured by its correspondence with experimental results and by its practical outcome. Thought is considered as simply an instrument for supporting the life aims of the human organism and has no real metaphysical significance. Pragmatism stands opposed to doctrines that hold that truth can be reached through deductive reasoning from a priori grounds and insists on the need for inductive investigation and constant empirical verification of hypotheses.

*Skepticism
philosophic position holding that the possibility of knowledge is limited either because of the limitations of the mind or because of the inaccessibility of its object. It is more loosely used to denote any questioning attitude. Extreme skepticism holds that no knowledge is possible, but this is logically untenable since the statement contradicts itself.

What is a transcendental argument? (Critical philosophy)

*Kantianism
In modern philosophy, Kant gave transcendental a new, third meaning in his theory of knowledge, concerned with the conditions of possibility of knowledge itself. For him it meant knowledge about our cognitive faculty with regard to how objects are possible a priori. "I call all knowledge transcendental if it is occupied, not with objects, but with the way that we can possibly know objects even before we experience them." (Critique of Pure Reason, A12) IOW An argument that seeks to find the necessary preconditions for the intelligibility of man’s experience.

Vantilianism
Cornelius Vantil said in defense of Christian epistemology “that we are to think God’s thoughts after Him” The infinite God is the eternal knower and we as His finite creatures can come to know facts that God already knows by way of general and special revelation.
Vantil utilized the transcendental argument of Kantian philosophy for proving the existence of the Christian God; stating that the Christian worldview is the only transcendental that can give an account for meaningfulness of man’s experience. Therefore Christian is necessarily true because of the impossibility of the contrary.

*excerpts from dictionary.com

Apologetics part 1

Methods of Apologetics listen here

Classic Apologetics: Natural Theology and Christian evidence
Proponents: RC Sproul, Norman Geisler.
Strengths: Strengthens faith of believers
Weaknesses: Presupposes the rationality of reasoning; makes man the ultimate standard of truth; undermines the authority of God Word.

Evidentialism: Christian evidence i.e. archeological, historical
Proponents: Josh McDowell, Hank Hanegraaff.
Strengths: proves the historicity of events, places, and people of the Scriptures
Weaknesses: presupposes the reliability of empirical studies, makes man the ultimate standard of truth; undermines the authority of God Word.

Presuppostionalism: Christian worldview is presupposed to be true.
Proponents: Cornelius Vantil, Greg Bahnsen (transcendental presuppostionalism), Gordon Clark (rationalistic presuppostionalism, scriptualism) Francis Schaeffer (practical presuppostionalism)
Strengths: Presents God and His Word as the ultimate authority; denies man his so called autonomy. Brings people immediately to the Triune God of Scripture.
Weakens: rational presuppostionalism; is axiomatic and presupposes the authority of logic and reasoning. Experiential presuppostionalism is axiomatic in that it presupposes the reliability of our senses and experience. Transcendental presuppostionalism can be difficult to explain to people who are not used thinking transcendentally.

Reformed epistemology: Basic belief in God is justified until proven otherwise.
Proponents: Alvin Plantinga, Michael Sudduth.
Strengths: can save time and effort in both evangelism and apologetics.
Weaknesses: Only gives negative apologetics; is dogmatic; does not answer the skeptic; is too vague and puts itself in the same category as other mono-theistic religions i.e. Islam; can comes across as fideism

Covenant Theology Part 8 misc.

The Lord's day – Eschatological sign of the covenant listen here

What is the Lord’s day?
The day when believers gather to commemorate Christ’s resurrection, which occurred on the first day of the week (Acts 2:42). Every day to the believer is one of Sabbath rest, since we have ceased from our spiritual labor and are resting in the salvation of the Lord (Hebrews 4:9-11).

Reasons for the observance of the Lord’s day:

1. The Sabbath is fulfilled and abrogated through by the finished work of Christ (The covenant works fulfilled, including the Decalogue) ( Col 2:16, Rom 10:4)
2. Christ rises from the dead on the first day of the week (Matt 28:1)
3. The disciples were together on the first day of the week (John 20:26)
4. The New Testament church was born on the first day of the week (Act 2:1-4)
5. The church in Acts came together on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7)
6. The church in Corinthians came together on the first day of the week (1 Cor 16:1-2)
7. The John was in the Spirit on the Lords day, the first day of the week(Rev 1:8)

We therefore follow this approved example/pattern of coming together as the church on the first day of the week as the new creation in Christ (2 Cor 5:17). This is eschatological sign of the covenant, in that it reminds us of our guaranteed future sabbath rest in Glory/Heaven (Heb 4:9-11)

DIAG. XV — CHRISTOPHANIES BETWEEN EASTER AND SUNDAYS IN 30 A.D.
Sundays After Passover

1st 1 (= Easter Sunday) To 10 disciples John 20:19f

2nd 8 (= 7 + 1st) To 11 disciples John 20:26
3rd? 15 (7 X 2 + 1st) To 7 disciples John 21:1-14

4th? 22 (7 X 2 + 1st) To 500 disciplesI Cor. 15:6

5th? 29 (7 X 4 + 1st) To all the apostles I Cor. 15:7
6th? 36 (7 X 5 + 1st) To the 11 disciples Matt. 28:16 40Ascension Acts 1:2-9
7th 43 (7 X 6 + 1st) None. Yet Sunday worship! Acts 1:14-15
8th 50 (7 X 7 + 1st) Pneumatophany Acts 2:1f
(Taken from "The Covenantal Sabbath" - Dr. Francis Nigel Lee [Book])

Theonomy Pros and Cons listen here

What is Theonomy?
The school of thought that believes scriptures teaches that the Law of God is two fold; moral/ceremonial, and that all moral aspects of the law are binding upon all societies today; including the judicial laws of the Old Testament with their penal sanctions.

Pros of Theonomy
Promotes the doctrine of Christ’s Ascension.
Seeks to see Christ’s Lordship over every sphere and activity of life.
Seek to have all human institutions governed by special revelation.
Has an optimistic view of the future.

Cons of Theonomy:
Fails to see the unity of the Law (holy theocracy) (Heb 8:13-9:6).
Fails to see Christ as the end of the Law of righteousness, including sanctification (Rom 10:4, Gal 3:24-25, Rom 7:1-6).
Fails to see the typological nature of the Old Testament Kingdom, i.e. judicial law of Israel are theocratic in nature and foreshadows judgment day. (Heb 2:1-3, Heb 10:26-29).
Fails to see the dissolving of the Old Covenant in AD70 through the finished work of Christ (Heb 8:13).
Fails to distinguish between crimes and sins. All crime is sin but not all sin is crime.

Solutions:
Society is still obligated to govern itself according to special revelation (2 Tim 3:16). But that special revelation concerning ethical conduct is a confirmation of the works of law already written already on the hearts men (Rom 2:14) Therefore the state must have laws that punish crimes. (Rom 13:1-5) Crimes are law-breaking deeds against society. Punishment must therefore be commensurate to the crime. (Exodus 21:22-27)

Examples of punishment for crimes:
Murder is a capital offence because it’s the unlawful taking of someone’s life; therefore your debt to society is your own life. (Gen 9:6)
Rape is to be treated as murder and is therefore a capital offense.(Deut 22:26)
Theft is taken someone’s property or goods by force or without permission; therefore you pay back the sum total of what was stolen before re-entry into society (Matt 5:26)

Examples of sins that are not crimes:
Teaching false doctrine is a sin but not a crime, therefore direct punishment is delayed until judgment day. (Jude 10-13)
Private or consenting sexual sins of adults are sins but not direct crimes against society and therefore direct punishment is delayed until judgment day. (Rom 1:32)
Worship of idols is grievous sin but not a direct crime against society and therefore direct punishment is delayed until judgment day. (Rom 2:4-5)