Episode 142 – Truth and Proof – Part 2 – The Starting Point Welcome to Anchored by Truth brought to you by Crystal Sea Books. In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” The goal of Anchored by Truth is to encourage everyone to grow in the Christian faith by anchoring themselves to the secure truth found in the inspired, inerrant, and infallible word of God. Script: All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. Second Timothy, Chapter 3, verses 16 and 17, New International Version ******** VK: Hello! I’m Victoria K. Welcome to Anchored by Truth brought to you by Crystal Sea Books. We’re excited to be with you as we continue with our recently started series on Anchored by Truth that we’re calling “Truth and Proof.” As we mentioned last time this series was inspired by a teaching series that Dr. Gregg Alexander did for his Sunday school class and a few years ago. As just about everyone knows, the Christian faith in America has been subjected to more challenges in the last decade than probably in the first two centuries of the country’s existence. So, we wanted to follow Dr. Alexander’s lead and do a series on what is often called “apologetics” – in essence the defense of the Christian faith. Apologetics helps us demonstrate that the Christian faith has a firm basis in reason and evidence. To help us explore this very important topic today in the studio we have RD Fierro, author and founder of Crystal Sea Books, in the studio today. RD, would you like to remind everyone why you felt that it was so important for us to do this series? RD: Well, as we mentioned last time on Anchored by Truth, we live in an age where our historical cultural consensus has shifted. Some commentators have said that we are now living in a “post-Christian” world. For people who are not believers this means that they live in a world that has gone “beyond” the constraints and “narrowness” of Christianity. Mainline churches are experiencing declines not only in membership, but in influence on society, government, education, family, and the culture as a whole. And as we look around us we see that young people are far more consumed by what’s happening with popular celebrities than what happened with Jesus when He ministered on this earth. We also see that more people are more concerned about temporary pleasures than their eternal destiny. It seems that everywhere our societies are all about money, entertainment, free expression, anything goes – everywhere it’s Babylon: the city of Satan, where it’s “all about me.” This is obviously is dangerous to individual destinies but it is also dangerous to the destiny of our communities and nation. That’s why it’s so important for the church to remind everyone around us that this kind of cultural calculus is not only dangerous, it’s unsustainable. But we in the church need to remember that our primary mission is one of reconciliation – reconciliation between men and God. So we don’t want to lose sight of the need to marry our intellectual defense of Christianity with our intentional concern for the welfare of our neighbors. VK: That’s a great point. At the close of our last episode we mentioned that we cannot help people understand the basis for our faith without reminding ourselves of the importance of both head knowledge and heart concerns. There’s an old saying that “people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Or, as Dr. Alexander put it in one of his lessons, knowing what is in our heads is not as important as the One Who is in our hearts. We will never assist the Holy Spirit in drawing anyone to Christ if we rely only on the objective and academic facts of Christianity. Christians called to the ministry of reconciliation, i.e., bridging the gap between Christ and those in need of knowing Him, and pulling the one who is unwilling toward the One who is always willing. And we must do these things as the apostles taught us – with patience, diligence, and love. RD: I think that’s always an important reminder. The primary reason apologetics is an important area of study is because of its relevance to salvation. And, unfortunately, that’s never been truer than in this day and time. We live in an age where our historical cultural consensus has shifted. In this “post-Christian” world many people who are not believers don’t see the relevance of Christianity to their daily lives. They think that they make whatever choices they make and their will never be a day of reckoning. Unfortunately, they are completely unaware of Jesus’ warning in Matthew, chapter 7, verses 13 and 14 which says we need to “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But ...
