I would be a rich man if I had a dollar for every time I heard or read an emerging leader say something like: “Apologetics don’t matter anymore in our postmodern world,” “Young people no longer need evidence; it’s about relationships.” Are these claims true? Have we moved into a new era in which apologetics are no longer needed? From my perspective, nothing could be further from the truth.

This past weekend I spoke at the Big Dig youth apologetics conference by Focus on the Family to over 2,200 youth. Speakers included Lee Strobel, Josh McDowell, Ryan Dobson, Mark Mittelberg, and Alex McFarland. I was blown away at how engaged, interested, and attentive the students were. Many of them took notes and hung around book tables to ask questions. There is clearly a movement of young people who desire to know not only what they believe by why. They want to dig deeper.

continue reading

So many people have been reading and talking about The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, so I finally decided to pick up a copy and read it (twice). While Dawkins is an engaging and entertaining writer, his arguments are surprisingly weak. It is clear that he is completely unaware of the revolution in philosophy of religion that has taken place over the past few decades. It’s amazing to me that he could write a book against God and not deal with philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga, William Lane Craig, or J.P. Moreland. Maybe he knows of them and simply ignores them (just as he refuses to debate someone of the likes of Craig). Or maybe he really is unaware. I lean toward the former.

While this is not the place to respond to all of Dawkins book—after all, it’s over 400 pages!—I do want to respond to Dawkins key claim that the design argument fails because it can’t explain who designed the designer. He says, “A designer God cannot be used to explain organized complexity because any God capable of designing anything would have to be complex enough to demand the same kind of explanation in its own right” (136).

continue reading

A discussion between Sean McDowell and Tony Jones

Tony says:

Sean, today I was watching CNN in the morning, and something occurred to me. Not only are we talking about a woman candidate for President of the United States, but the majority of the CNN hosts and reporters were women. There I was, receiving my authoritative information on the Burma cyclone, the presidential race, and the weather from women. And I got to thinking, Why would women be excluded from presenting me, a man, with authoritative instruction in the Christian faith?

As you might guess, I think that excluding women from full participation in the leadership of Christ’s church is a sin. We’ve talked enough about the Bible in this space for you to know that I take it very seriously, and that you and I differ on how to interpret it at points.

Where did we come from? Why are we here? How did life as we know it come about? Are we accidental by-products of a purposeless, dark, and cold universe (as Darwinian evolution teaches)? Or are we the pinnacle of creation by a loving God? In other words: Is the world a cosmic fluke? Or is the universe the handiwork of personal God? Few questions, it would seem, are more important than these.
If you’ve taken Biology 101, visited a museum lately, or watched a recent Discovery Channel documentary you’ve probably heard that the evidence for evolution is overwhelming. University Professor Francis Ayala recently said, “Scientists agree that the evolutionary origin of animals and plants is a scientific conclusion beyond reasonable doubt.”

This idea shows up frequently in popular television shows, too. For example, in a Friends episode Phoebe and Ross discuss the merits of Darwinian evolution. Shocked to find that Phoebe rejects it, Ross says, “Uh, excuse me. Evolution is not for you to buy, Phoebe. Evolution is scientific fact, like, like, like the air we breathe, like gravity.” If you look closely, you’ll also find Darwinism being taught in the children’s movie Lilo and Stitch and in a recent episode of The Family Guy. The take-home lesson is simple: smart people are supposed to believe in evolution, and only fools believe the world was designed by God.

continue reading

President Bush set off a firestorm of controversy when he claimed, in a lighthearted conversation with a Texas journalist, that intelligent design out to be taught in public schools. He said, “I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought, and I’m not suggesting—you’re asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes.”

Bush’s comments set off such a firestorm that Time magazine shortly had a cover story entitled, “Evolution Wars” that discussed the merits of intelligent design (ID) as a scientific enterprise. The controversy has continued into this election process, as the Republican candidates were asked in a nationally televised debate in 2007 whether they believed in evolution. Former Governor Mike Huckabee, Representative Tom Tancredo, and Senator Sam Brownback, indicated that they did not. John McCain said that local school districts should have the final say as to what is taught in their communities.

For the past couple years “militant atheism,” as the Wall Street Journal put it, has been on the rise. Figures such as Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and others have brought atheism to the forefront of cultural discussion through books, blogs, debates, and TV appearances. While their books have been mega bestsellers, there has been a need for critical responses to their views. David Berlinski—a secular Jew—has recently met that need with the release of The Devil’s Delusion.
The basic contention of the “militant atheists” is that science has disproved the existence of God. Known as the “God of the gaps” argument, it is widely believed that the more science progresses the less room there is for God. But, as Berlinski points out, the exact opposite is true. He says that scientific progress has “made the world more mysterious than it ever was. We know better than we did what we do not know and have not grasped.” While science has certainly progressed, so have the gaps that need to be filled. For example, there is no naturalistic explanation for the following: (1) where everything came from; (2) the emergence of life; (3) the origin of consciousness; (4) the origin of morality; (5) the fine-tuning of the universe (just to name a few). There are certainly speculations about these, but no convincing answers. This is why Berlinski says that the widely held idea that we are nothing more than cosmic accidents is “an article of faith. There is not the slightest reason to think this so.” In this brief review, I am going to highlight some of the key insights of The Devil’s Delusion.

continue reading

The following discussion first appeared in The Journal of Student Ministries, vol. III no. 3 (May/June 2008), published by Student Ministries Partners

Sean Says:

Since we’ve started our discussions, Tony, I’ve wondered how our views on the Bible compare. We’ve both expressed concerns about the lack of biblical knowledge today among youth, but I can’t help but wonder—is it for the same reason?

I am concerned about the lack of biblical knowledge among youth because I believe an accurate understanding of the character and nature of God is critical for spiritual formation. This is why I often wonder, Can true health in the church take place apart from accurately handling the word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15)? This is why much of my concern about new movements in the church is the de-emphasis on the authority of Scripture.

Hey everyone,

I wanted to share with you my continued conversations with Tony Jones, national coordinator for Emergent Village. As you recall, we write a regular column together for The Journal of Student Ministries. In this column, we discuss the role of apologetics in today’s postmodern culture.

Sean says:
The ancient church offers a powerful model for the role apologetics should play as we seek to be missional. There are two key aspects of the outreach of the early church. First, there was the content of the message and, secondly, the appeal of the message. Interestingly, the appeal of the message was not the community of believers, but rational persuasion which included evidences such as fulfilled prophecy and the resurrection.

Consider Acts 17:2-3: “As his custom was, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead.” As a result, some of the Jews, Greeks, and prominent women were persuaded and joined the church. The goal of the early Christians was to change others’ beliefs before they became part of the Christian community.