A Late Thinker

I've been finding on a regular basis that as I analyze issues and try to come up with answers or relevant biblical points of view on those issues, that sometimes I have some pretty good ideas. Now, there are other days, mind you, when my brain is as dull as a spoon. But every once in a while, something makes sense in my brain before I've read anyone else who came up with the same idea. When I have such a thought, I sometimes wonder if anyone else has thought of this yet, and immediately book ideas begin to spring into my mind...until I'm reading along and find that someone else has already had that thought and been published.

Now, none of this really matters at all, except for perhaps the shot it takes at my pride (you're not as smart as you think you are, Travis), which is probably a good thing. Nonetheless, I am going to officially get a jump on this particular one, just for the record's sake. As I'm reading The Next Reformation, I noticed that the next chapter has a section entitled, "Presuppositionalism." So here are some thoughts I've been developing before I read someone else who has written about it.

For some time now I've been formulating the idea in my head that the advent of postmodernism should drive Christians back toward a presuppositional form of apologetics. In other words, we start with the existence of God and the truth of His Word, rather than attempting to prove it by empirical evidence first. Spurgeon said that one does not need to defend the Bible in the same way that one does not need to defend a lion. One only needs to let the lion out. That's a good illustration of presuppositional apologetics.

Sounds mindless, right? Well, let's head back to the Garden of Eden. "In the beginning, God..." That's presuppositional. There's no footnote with 10 philospohical reasons that God exists. Now, He creates the whole world, and Adam and Eve have all the evidence they could possibly need for the existence of God. What did they do? Sinned. So, did all that empirical evidence do them any good? Is that what they really needed to really trust God? "Faith founded on fact"? And that was the human condition pre-Fall!

If the human problem is sin, and the solution is the regenerating power of the Word of God, and we believe the Word of God is, indeed, powerful enough to transform a sinner into a saint through the proclamation of the death of Jesus, then evidential apologetics must take a back seat. It may be important for certain discussions or may be a starting point to dialogue, but no one is going to say, without the regenerating work of the Spirit, "Ok, I have enough evidence now. I'll receive Jesus."

This relates to postmodernism in this way - the postmodern person has been burned by the claims of rationalism and empiricism. It turns out we don't all have the exact same rational capacities, and there is no definite conclusion to which the principles of universal reason will lead us. Indeed, the very belief that there is such a universal reason has caused the more powerful people to impose their way of life on those who disagree with them, based on these "universal principles." One group imposes, by force, its "universal principles," which are not really universal, on another.

Yet Jesus came in humility as a man and boldly challenged those who imposed their way of doing things on the poor and downtrodden.

Many postmoderns don't care how much "evidence" we have. And "evidence" won't change anyone anyway. We must return to the simple, bold, and humble proclamation of the Word, and let it have its own transforming work. Postmoderns are looking for genuine, honest people, not people with the most evidence and statistics to back up their arrogant claims. Dependence on evidential apologetics betrays a lack of trust in God's Spirit and Word.

Ok, then, thanks for entertaining this over-simplified version of my thought. I'll let you know how Raschke's section on presuppositionalism compares and contrasts with mine when I get to that point in the book.