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Apologetics Quotes

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Apologetics Quotes

“Indeed, a quick glance around this broken world makes it painfully obvious that we don't need more arguments on behalf of God; we need more people who live as if they are in covenant with Unconditional Love, which is our best definition of God. (p. 21)”

“The creation of man is evidence for the love of God, the preservation of man is evidence for the patience of God, and Christ is evidence for the forgiveness of God. It is when we are wrapped up in our own little peeves that we begin to displace His benevolence with malevolence.”

“BOOK EXCERPT Did Jesus actually die on the cross? The Roman soldiers were responsible for ensuring that all three crucified prisoners were dead. That was their job. The Roman army had brutal discipline for soldiers who didn't do their job correctly. For example, falling asleep on guard duty was punishable by death. Other corporal punishments included being beaten or having their clothes set on fire. The soldiers would have broken his legs if there was any possibility that Jesus was alive. They didn't. There wasn't anyone there who cried out, "He's still alive!" The Jewish rabbis in attendance wanted him to die. They would have said something if Jesus was still alive. After all, they wanted to guarantee that he died. I don't know how anyone could have survived being beaten, scourged, had a crown of thorns forced onto one's head, crucified, and then stabbed in either the lungs or the heart with a spear. The scourging alone would have been deadly. Jesus' dead body remained on the cross for a short while. Still, it would have been long enough for blood to accumulate in his lower extremities and for his body to cool. His lower extremities also would have turned bluish. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus retrieved the body and would have noticed at once if Jesus weren't dead. His body would have been warm, and his extremities would not have been distended and bluish. Joseph and Nicodemus didn't notice that, though, because they would have stopped preparing his body for burial if they did.”

“The Evangelical is not afraid of facts, for he knows that all facts are God’s facts; nor is he afraid of thinking, for he knows that all truth is God’s truth, and right reason cannot endanger sound faith. He is called to love God with all his mind’ and part of what this means is that, when confronted by those who, on professedly rational grounds, take exception to historic Christianity, he must set himself not merely to deplore or denounce them but to out-think them. It is not his business to argue men into faith, for that cannot be done; but it is his business to demonstrate the intellectual adequacy of the biblical faith and the comparative inadequacy of its rivals, and to show the invalidity of the criticisms that are brought against it. This he seeks to do, not from any motive of intellectual self-justification, but for the glory of God and of His gospel. A confident intellectualism expressive of robust faith in God, whose Word is truth, is part of the historic evangelical tradition.”

“The way we do apologetics looks different when we are motivated not by our desire to conquer the other person, but by our genuine love and compassion, and by our desire to see people discover God's lifegiving truth.”

“Not only does every Hebrew word have its own definition, but every Hebrew letter, within the word, has its own meaning. God placed before you a great banquet of universal truths. All this in 22 Hebrew letters. Every letter contains a progressive curriculum designed to teach you about this marvelous world that God gave us. These letters will flavor each word’s definition claiming its place in God’s well organized universe.”

“The problem is obvious, once the Father began creating, He risked that, although perfect, His new and autonomous family could choose badness. How else did we get demon angels? Two is a risky number. The solution is unifying, or amening, with the original “one.” Only recently has science been able to monitor a quasar. The elements that compose the stars is too base for the creation of higher forms of life. When these stars die, however, they go through two steps: First, the star implodes. Second, the star explodes. Only after the second step does the quasar create higher elements, from which we are formed. Stardust: We are made of stardust. The universe we come from is lyrical. From polarity, matter, energy and light eventuate. Even a black hole emits a super-charged jet. For the birth of any new thing, there must be polarity. For any children to exist, there must be a man and his opposite, woman. It is no mystery why the ancient Sumerian words for, “one” and “two” are the same words for, “man” and “woman.”

“Mr. Dawkins' assertions are self-refuting- ie. Actual infinity vs. potential infinity easily makes the most reasonable argument for theism and a Deity. Now, the argument for the Creator God of Christianity requires much more time, energy, and logical effort." ~R. Alan Woods [2007]”

“Or, to put it another way, presuppositional apologetics--such as that developed by Francis Schaeffer, but also by Cornelius Van Til and, to a degree, Herman Dooeyeweerd--rejects classical apologetics precisely because presuppositionalism recognizes the truth of Derrida's claim that everything is interpretation (though I am admittedly radicalizing their intuitions).”

“Therefore, the authority of Christ and His word, rather than intellectual autonomy, must govern the starting point and method of his apologetics, as well as its conclusion. He challenges the philosophical adequacy of the unbeliever's worldview, showing how it does not provide the preconditions for the intelligibility of knowledge and morality. His case for Christianity, then, argues from the impossibility of the contrary. From beginning to end, both in his own philosophical method and in what he aims to bring about in the unbeliever's thinking, the Christian apologist reasons in such a way "that in all things Christ might have the preeminence" (Col. 1:18).”

“For many people, apologetics is one of the biggest things that God has used to strengthen their faith and help them grow in their relationship with Him. Learning about the various ways that science, history, and philosophy cohere with God and how apparent conflicts can be resolved is exciting and edifying. Like Jacob struggling with God and refusing to let go until God blessed him, apologetics allows us to struggle with God over the deep philosophical and theological questions of our time. There’s a blessing for us in that struggle!”

“Atheism will appeal to psychology and sociology to explain human behavior, which is legitimate, but what explains human psychology? Atheism can only find explanatory power in evolution such that the mind is - paradoxically - a mindless organ that is forced to act according to its chemistry and cannot act otherwise. The fact that humans are capable of recognizing depravity in others, are offended by it, seek to reform it, feel guilt, and are capable of redemptive behavior all speak against this explanation. The fact that humans are capable of meta-cognition - thinking about thinking - and are therefore able to postulate their own mindlessness is counter-intuitive to say the least.”

“Once again, it is difficult to start from the premise of mindless evolution and end with the idea that humans are anything more than organisms bent on preserving and passing on their DNA. The fact that humans not only pursue art, philosophy, and science, but also exult in those things more than reproduction cannot easily be explained through materialism.”

“Among the favorite arguments of the irreligious, one that they almost invariably advance in their opening offensive in their attacks on faith is this: that conflicts fought in the name of religion are necessarily ABOUT religion. By saying this the irreligious hope to establish that religion is of itself the cause of conflict. This is a crude factual misunderstanding. Some conflicts fought in the name of religion are specifically religious. Many others are not, or cannot be so simply classified. The only general lesson that can be drawn from these differing wars is that Man is inclined to make war on Man when he thinks it will gain him power or wealth or land.”

“Now if the teaching of Moses is inspired and Deuteronomy 13 and 18 tell you that future revelations must be judged according to previous revelation, and if the alleged future revelation of the Quran conflicts with the previous revelation of Moses, who has to go? By their own logic who has to go? The Qur'an has to go. Those who advocate the worldview of the Qur'an are not able to live according to their own worldview, there's this inconsistency”

“the argument is, if God is all-good and God is all-powerful how could any of these things happen, there's an inconsistency in your Christian worldview. The intellectual answer is there is no logical inconsistency because not only do we believe God is all-good and all-powerful, we also believe there's a morally sufficient reason for everything God does. That's one of our presuppositions, as Abraham said, shall not the Judge of all the earth do right [Genesis 18:25]. We believe that everything God does He does well for a good reason, that He is wiser than us, and even when things look tragic we know that God will bring good and His glory out of tragedy”

“The task of the apologist is not simply to show that there is no hope of eternal salvation outside of Christ, but also that the unbeliever has no present intellectual hope outside of Christ. It is foolish for him to build his house on the ruinous sands of human opinion, instead of the verbal rock of Christ (Matt. 7:24-27). He needs to see that those who suppress the truth of God in unrighteousness inescapably "become vain in their reasoning… Professing themselves to be wise, they become fools" (Rom. 1:21-22). Their opposition to the faith amounts to no more than a "knowledge falsely so called" (1 Tim. 6:20-21), by which they actually "oppose themselves" in ignorance (2 Tim. 2:23, 25).”

“By His grace let it be that 'sound doctrine' is, in itself, not a burden but a privilege to the Christian life. Let it be a form of worship. It is my belief that God has His ways of entering hearts and revealing Himself to people of the world who, perhaps by no fault of their own, have little to no access to doctrine regarding His character and nature and what He is and has been about; but as a people who claim to be His children, ones saved by grace through faith, would it not be hypocritical to downplay a deeper, more intimate understanding of the Lord of our lives in heart, soul, and mind? Where we display shallow relationships, where we salute an arrogant and willful ignorance of the God we serve and the Christ we represent, it is understandable that truth seekers will turn elsewhere for truth. It is with humility, honesty, and respect that every non-nominal Christian is a theologian and an apologist to some degree, to their ability God has gifted.”

“Without freedom, both the possibilities for people to love and to destroy would be eliminated. The problem of evil is the problem of freedom. God is Love incarnate (1), and despite the high amount of choice that He allows, He also is bursting to lavish His Love not merely on the perfect, which existed solely in Christ, but on the imperfect who could never deserve it by virtue of their imperfection (2). He does not completely shield the more deserving, not even the sole perfect One in all of human history, from destruction, yet He loves to redeem and restore, even through death at times as with His only begotten Son (3). His love is completely undeserved for the imperfect, despite their notions at times of amassing karma by their good deeds, yet He loves to pour out grace on the undeserving (4). Everything good in our existence, including the very life that we have, the air that we breathe, and even the good things that we do are by His mercy and grace (5). May all praise be to the One who has lavished loving-kindness on us in times of plenty and in times of want, who even seeks to grow us in the darkest of times when the cost of freedom is most clear, who remains with those who have found Him even though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death (6). 1: 1 John 4:16; 2: Romans 3:9-31; 9:16, 23-29; 11:5-6 3. Job, Isaiah 53:3-6, 11 (prophesied centuries before Christ), Romans 3:24-26, 2 Corinthians 5:21 4. Romans 5:6-8; 11: 35-36, Isaiah 64:6, Ephesians 2:7-9, Psalm 50:7-15 5. James 1:17, Romans 2:4 6. Romans 8:28, Ephesians 1:3-10, James 1:2-5, Philippians 4:4-9, Psalm 23, Deuteronomy 31:8”

“It has always been difficult for Jews to take Christians serious, mostly because Christians lack the fundamentals that religious Jews learn in their youth. It remains an embarrassing fact, that modern Jews can comprehend the New Testament better than modern Christians. There is no excuse for this. Christians have dropped the ball and should be anxious to remedy that neglect. Not only would they benefit themselves, but their community too.”

“Adam was told to name the animals. Adam studied each kind and gave them a name based on his observations. Every animal “kind” has some behavior or characteristic that is unique to that animal type. When you know the Hebrew name for an animal, you get a peek at how a perfect man, speaking a perfect language, understood that perfect animal.”

“To merely blank the page and vaguely assume that 'religion' is the cause of all the world's problems is, on the contrary, an allegation brought about by nothing more than cognitive lethargy; it is when unburied, unpacked, and exposed but a stale conclusion and a misdirection for the one overwhelmed by centuries of sound theology, scholarly thought, and spiritual development.”

“Therefore, when a person refuses to come to Christ it is never just because of a lack of evidence or because of intellectual difficulties: at root, he refuses to come because he willingly ignores and rejects the drawing of God's Spirit on his heart. No one in the final analysis fails to become a Christian because of a lack of arguments; he fails to become a Christian because he loves darkness rather than light and wants nothing to do with god.”

“The nihilist looks around at everything and comes to terms with what seems to be obvious. The sun is one tiny dying star in an enormous universe. One day the sun will burn out or explode, destroying us all. The earth is a molten rock that could either be blown up by nuclear weapons or an erratic comet. We are one of the seven billion nameless faceless ones currently living on this rock. What does our existence matter to this rock floating around a dying star within the expanse of an enormous universe? Not much.”

“Apologetics is both a science and an art. It is a science because it deals with the truth found within the various disciplines of knowledge—philosophy, biology, physics, math, and history. It is also an art because each person has the flexibility to craft their arguments however they wish." (Life Hacks, p.85)”

“Religious pluralism is a popular belief in Western culture. At first it sounds very inclusive, but it is really just as exclusive as any other claims. Religious pluralists are those who argue that the “real God” is actually a mix of the gods of all the religions combined (ie. the Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Jehovah’s Witness; and we can even throw in ancient Greek gods). By mixing all the major religions, they are discounting the exclusive truth claims to which religions strictly adhere.”

“Who made who? Did we create God, or did He create us? Can God’s existence really be proven? Could other explanations be equally plausible? In the New Testament we find the claim that God has clearly made Himself known to mankind through the created order, and that all are without excuse (Romans 1:19, 20). But how far can we take this? Has God really proven His own existence? Can we know that He exists with absolute certainty? Does this also mean that no other explanations are possible?”

“The consequence model, the logical one, the amoral one, the one which refuses any divine intervention, is a problem really for just the (hypothetical) logician. You see, towards God I would rather be grateful for Heaven (which I do not deserve) than angry about Hell (which I do deserve). By this the logician within must choose either atheism or theism, but he cannot possibly through good reason choose anti-theism. For his friend in this case is not at all mathematical law: the law in that 'this equation, this path will consequently direct me to a specific point'; over the alternative and the one he denies, 'God will send me wherever and do it strictly for his own sovereign amusement.' The consequence model, the former, seeks the absence of God, which orders he cannot save one from one's inevitable consequences; hence the angry anti-theist within, 'the logical one', the one who wants to be master of his own fate, can only contradict himself - I do not think it wise to be angry at math.”

“Speaking a painful truth should be done only in love - like wielding a sword with no hilt - it should pain oneself in direct proportion to the amount of force exerted.”

“The wrath of God is never an evil wrath. God gets angry because he loves people like a mother would love her child if someone were to harm it. There is something wrong if the mother never gets angry; it is safe to say that that is the unloving mother.”