Christianity Requires Defending the Faith

It always astounds me that Holocaust deniers exist. Those who claim the systematic murder of Jews in Europe by Adolph Hitler is a hoax and has no factual evidence behind it often do so to advance antisemitic agendas.^* Despite living Holocaust survivors, extant concentration camps, written and recorded testimonies from victims, photographs, artifacts, and other evidence, there are still those who will not accept the historicity of the Holocaust.

The denial of the Christian faith is less surprising. After all, we worship a God who is Spirit, and proclaim a faith that since its inception has been considered foolish to some and has been a stumbling block to others (1Co 1:23). This faith in a Triune God calls us to believe that the second Person became human through a virgin birth. This God-man did miracles and authenticated His teaching through signs and wonders that included walking on water, turning water into wine, stopping storms with a word, healing the sick, and even resurrecting the dead. This God-man lived a perfect life of complete sinlessness, and loved like no man has ever loved—and yet He was put to death by jealous religious leaders at the hands of the Roman government.

As if this weren’t hard enough to believe, our Scriptures claim that this Jesus rose from the dead three days after He was buried, and then after forty days, He ascended into the clouds. And Christians can accept all of this because we are told these things are true because they are contained in the Bible, a book that is without error, and is completely reliable in all respects. After all, it was given by God to His prophets who wrote everything down perfectly.

As a fundamental Christian, I believe all of this and more. And because the Bible teaches that Christians will share their faith with those who do not believe, we find that there is a need to speak about our faith to people who are devoid of the Holy Spirit, and thus cannot understand the Word as a believer does (1Co 1:18-25; 2:14) without the intervention of God Himself. Simply put, evangelism demands apologetics.

During the first few centuries of the early Church, apologists sought to defend the Christian faith against false teachings, such as Gnosticism and paganism, as well as the continuing threat of Judaism. Quadratus, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Clement, and Tertullian among others worked to refute the heretics that attacked the faith in order to demonstrate what the Word of God truly taught, and what it did not.

But there is another very important reason that the Church needs the discipline of apologetics—it acts as a lifeline to those in danger of being swept away by the evil one. This has to do with the fact that the Church of Jesus Christ is in a spiritual war and the enemy is a master of disinformation. In Colossians 2:8, Paul warned the Church about being carried away into “philosophy and empty deception.” Traps exist in the world system we live in, and many outside the church, and some within it, have fallen into them and have become deceived. Apologetics helps the Christian to reason with the unbeliever who is living according to these lying philosophies and empty deceptions, while also helping the Christian who has stumbled due to these things by bolstering their faith.

We see this most clearly in Luke’s prologue to his Gospel, where Luke wrote,

Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as those, who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, handed them down to us, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in orderly sequence, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty about the things you have been taught. (Lk 1:1-4, LSB)

It must be noted that Luke compiled a carefully researched account that included documents, and eyewitnesses written down in an orderly sequence to bolster the testimony of the faith for “Theophilus.” His title (most excellent) leads many commentators to believe that Theophilus may have been a Roman official or Luke’s wealthy patron.

From Luke’s prologue, we can gather a few important points:

1) Luke does not consider his account the only one out there. The facts are known, they have even been retold and put down in some form or another.

2) Luke’s purpose is to put together an orderly account. Immediately in verse 5, at the beginning of his account proper, Luke shows his deft handiwork as a historian in giving attention to details such as who was feigning at the time, and who was serving in the Temple, including family lines.

3) Luke’s work is an apologetic for the Church. Although initially aimed at Theophilus, Luke/Acts also served the Church as a whole, and it still does! Luke ferreted out the details and did all of the legwork for the benefit of the Christian community so that they could have confidence, seeing the historical moorings of the message of Christianity. Luke’s Gospel proclaims the fact that Christianity did not occur in a vacuum and its message was not manufactured as are the messages of all other religions.

Additionally, 2 Corinthians 10 adds an aggressive dimension to apologetics. While evangelism and defensive measures are important, there is a sense in which our Great Commander has called His Church to take the fight to the enemy. Paul wrote to the Corinthians,

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the tearing down of strongholds, as we tear down speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and are ready to punish all disobedience, whenever your obedience is fulfilled. (2Co 10:3-6, LSB)

Paul pictures the Church advancing into the territory of the enemy, tearing down his fortresses of deception and false ideologies by replacing them with the truth of the Word of God. The Word is the weapon, and apologetics acts as a methodology to wield this sword with deadly results so that the lies come crashing down and the captives who were held by them are set free to the glory of God.

During the Fundamentalist/Modernist debates, great Christian thinkers rose to the occasion and produced strong, biblical polemical works to defend the doctrines under attack. Benjamin Breckenridge (B.B.) Warfield (1886-1902), known as the Lion of Princeton, wrote in defense of the inspiration of Scripture, the Cannon of the New Testament, Christian supernaturalism, the Person and work of Christ, penal substitutionary atonement, and more. Additionally, he argued against the unbiblical teachings of perfectionism, annihilationism, German rationalism, and mysticism. To the work of Warfield, we could add Cornelius Van Til, R.A. Torrey, Louis T. Talbot, J. Gresham Machen, Norman Geisler, Josh McDowell, and Francis Schaeffer. Each one had differing specialties, methodologies, and skill levels, but all were used to advance the cause of Christ.

IFCA International seeks to “Advance the Cause of Christ” through the proclamation of the Word of God, but this will require two things. We must “Equip the Church” and “Defend the Faith.” Each goes hand in hand. We must equip the Church to be able to proclaim and defend. Our prayer is that this issue of the Voice will help you to start thinking about the subject of apologetics and help you to see the great need as we seek to share Christ, defend against false teaching, and settle the hearts of those who are weaker in the faith.

* Holocaust Encyclopedia, “Combating Holocaust Denial: Origins of Holocaust Denial,” https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/combating-holocaust-d…. Accessed 1/14/24.