Tag Archives: apologetics books

Atheism, General Apologetics, Top Ten Posts of 2009

Some Great Pascal Quotes – #8 Post of 2009

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

I am reading Pascal’s Pensees right now and couldn’t help but stop and record some of the wonderful quotes I’ve run across.

Blaise Pascal

With regard to the interaction between faith and reason, Pascal said:

The heart has its reasons, which reason does not know.

With regard to the search for God:

There are only three kinds of persons; those who serve God, having found Him; others who are occupied in seeking Him, not having found Him; while the remainder live without seeking Him and without having found Him.  The first are reasonable and happy, the last are foolish and unhappy; those between are unhappy and reasonable.

With regard to belief or non-belief in God:

I would have far more fear of being mistaken, and of finding that the Christian religion is true, than of not being mistaken in believing it true.

With regard to the person who hears the gospel and immediately believes without ever reading the Bible:

Those who believe without having read the Testaments, do so because they have an inward disposition entirely holy, and all that they hear of our religion [Christianity] conforms to it.  They feel that a God has made them; they desire only to love God; they desire to hate themselves only.  They feel that they have no strength in themselves; that they are incapable of coming to God; and that if God does not come to them, they can have no communion with Him.

And they hear our religion [Christianity] say that men must love God only, and hate self only; but that, all being corrupt and unworthy of God, God made Himself man to unite Himself to us.  No more is required to persuade men who have this disposition in their heart, and who have this knowledge of their duty and of their inefficiency.

Evil, Pain, and Suffering, General Apologetics

The Case for Faith, the DVD

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

Last night I watched the DVD, The Case for Faith, featuring Lee Strobel.  The Case for Faith DVDThe video deals with two issues from the book that bears the same name: 1) How can Jesus be the only way? and 2) How can God exist and there be so much evil, pain, and suffering?

In the DVD, Strobel features the words of Charles Templeton prominently and lets his challenges to the Christian faith drive the discussion.  Templeton, if you recall, was a co-evangelist with Billy Graham back in the 1940’s.  Templeton suffered a crisis of faith and eventually turned his back on Christianity.  Strobel interviewed Templeton for his book, The Case for Faith, which quickly became a Christian apologetics classic.

The DVD answers these tough questions by interviewing some of Christianity’s greatest living apologists and scholars.  Some of those who participated were Craig Hazen, Greg Koukl, J. P. Moreland, N. T. Wright, Ben Witherington, and Peter Kreeft.  I may be leaving some out, but those are the ones that come to mind.

Along with these scholars, the film also features the stories of two people who suffered greatly, and how their suffering affected their relationship with God.  These stories are truly powerful and balance the documentary between intellectual arguments and heart-felt experience.

All in all, I highly commend this DVD to all Christians who have ever thought about these two key issues and to skeptics who are open to hearing for themselves from some of Christianity’s best and brightest.  This DVD was truly fantastic.  I regret waiting so long to see it.

General Apologetics, Skeptics

Why Are You a Skeptic of Christianity?

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

Apologist and author Bill Foster has just written a new book entitled Meet the Skeptic.  I was unfamiliar with Bill before reading this book, which was given to me by one of our church staff.

I have read a truckload of books on apologetics, so I was a little bit dubious that there was anything new here, but I was pleasantly surprised.  Bill certainly covers some familiar ground, but the difference between his book and others is that he attempts to model skepticism by placing modern skeptics of Christianity into four categories, based on their worldview.  He then describes the “root idea” of each of these worldviews and gives readers some suggested approaches to conversing with each of these kinds of skeptics.

The first kind of skeptic is the spiritual skeptic.  The root idea is: “Good works get you to heaven.”

The second kind of skeptic is the moral skeptic.  The root idea is: “People should decide for themselves what is right and wrong.”

The third kind of skeptic is the scientific skeptic.  The root idea is: “The natural world is all there is.”

The fourth kind of skeptic is the biblical skeptic.  The root idea is: “The Bible is man-made.”

As I have conversed with skeptics over the years, I have certainly encountered all of these.  In fact, in some cases I have interacted with a skeptic who could be placed in multiple categories.  It is always helpful to have a mental framework of where a person is coming from when speaking to them about Christianity, and this book will nicely serve that purpose.

One caution, however.  Every skeptic is an individual, and they will not always fit neatly into a category.  Most people can’t stand being labeled, so anyone using this book needs to be careful that they don’t come across like a Christian label-maker.  I’m sure Bill Foster would agree that these categories serve as guidelines, but we always need to truly engage with a person and learn about them as a unique individual.   

A couple questions for our blog readers.  Do these categories seem right to you?  If you are a skeptic, what is your reaction to these four categories?

Something just occurred to me.  Maybe the skeptics have written a book called Meet the Apologist …..

General Apologetics

Great Modern Apologetics Books

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There have been many good apologetics books written, but there are a few that I find myself going back to over and over to do additional research.  You can’t go wrong consulting these volumes:

Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics

I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist

Scaling the Secular City

Handbook of Christian Apologetics

Again, I realize that there are many other good ones, but you will be well-served by these.