I received a call from someone asking for help in developing a good apologetic in witnessing to Jehovah’s Witnesses. His enthusiasm was encouraging in a world where fear and apprehension, complexity and a sense of helplessness are the usual faire. It made me reflect on the process that might bring someone to this place of finally wanting to do something constructive when they answer the door.
Christians who have never been in a cult will often imagine, whatever else might be said, it is an exotic experience, touched with a frisson of danger and romance. This really is incorrect, but people are sometimes drawn because of this mistaken notion. Neither the cult nor the ministry are romantic, certainly the ministry is not especially popular among churches and church leaders; too ‘confrontational.’
What I find is often the case, however, is an encounter with Mormons, or Jehovah’s Witnesses, or some other group, drives someone back to their Bible. There they search for answers to questions they have not previously thought about. In their searching they discover the thrill of wrestling with the great truths of Scripture.
It isn’t so much that they found answers as they found insights. Now, not only do they have an answer for the next Jehovah’s Witness at their door, they have a depth of understanding that feeds their faith and helps them mature in Christ. It is a depth of insight and understanding that is, in my experience, woefully absent from the lives of many Christians today.
‘Positive, adj.: ‘Mistaken at the top of one’s voice.’ Ambrose Bierce
If you don’t know how to speak to people about your faith it is almost certainly because your Bible is gathering dust on your shelf. That, or perhaps you only bring it off the shelf to affirm yourself with the pleasant verses, to find proof texts that reinforce your narrow theological choices, not to be taught, reproved, corrected, and trained in righteousness. (2 Tim.3:16)
If I had a penny for every time I have come across Christians still complacently using arguments they learned thirty and forty years ago, I would be in a better financial state today. Arguments they have leaned on, never having troubled themselves to learn more, learn better. The word of God is eternal and unchanging, our understanding of it isn’t. In our understanding and application we are meant to grow.
These arguments have sometimes proved with time to be mistaken, but they have carried around this killer text for all that time, whipping it out at every opportunity, positive it’s right. It was Ambrose Bierce who defined ‘positive’ as, ‘Mistaken at the top of one’s voice.’
Cynical, I know, but I remember this when someone shares a thought I haven’t come across before. I don’t repeat my argument, thinking volume will compensate for content, I go back to my Bible and search out the truth there. If I was wrong I adjust my thinking. If I was right all along I cannot take credit but glorify God that I was able to send someone else back to their Bible and find it for themselves.
Those who decry the confrontational aspects of ministry will find themselves on the wrong side of the argument. To be steeped in the word of God is to be immersed in apologetics.
It is to stand with Jesus as he challenges the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, calling them ‘whitewashed tombs.’ (Mt.23:27)
It is to stand with Paul as he challenges the claims of the Judaisers in his letters, even challenging Peter at one point to his face for choosing tradition over truth. (Gal.2:11-14)
It is to stand with John as he refutes the false teachings of Gnosticism, calling Christians back to the three basics of Christian life: true doctrine, obedient living, and fervent devotion. (1 John)
It is to stand with Jude as he warns of the false teachings of those who have surreptitiously entered the church and are perverting the faith. Jude’s is a call to aggressively defend the truth, to ‘contend for the faith.’ (Jude 3) The word here translated ‘contend’ is epagōnizomai meaning to struggle, to fight. The KJV translates ‘earnestly contend.’ Are we earnest in our defence of truth?
The lesson is, as we contend for the truth we find ourselves coming to better know the truth every day. With that knowledge comes better understanding, and with that understanding comes insight, enlightenment that leads, in turn, to application and growth. All because we followed the counsel of Paul to Timothy, ‘Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by doing so you will save both yourself and your hearers.’ (1 Tim.4:16)
Some people store their money in a Bible because they know that it’s never likely to be opened
The Bible is so precious and reliable that a young Luther, answering his accusers, was confident to stand on its promises, saying, ‘Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Holy Scriptures or by evident reason...I cannot and will not recant, because acting against one’s conscience is neither safe nor sound. God help me.’
The Bible is so dangerous a book that emperors, kings, and prelates have killed men to keep it out of circulation, and that is true today. So precious and vital that men have died under torture and at the stake in their pursuit of its being put in the hands of ordinary people in their common tongue. They did not make such sacrifices so we could neglect the fruit of their labours.
The Bible is filled with adventures, and its own story is an adventure.
It is filled with wisdom, of which we are surely in short supply today.
It is filled with truth, something people need as a foundation for their lives.
It is filled with life, ‘living and active’ able to read men’s hearts, renew minds, and instil hope with its promises.
It has been said, some people store their money in a Bible because they know that it’s never likely to be opened. There is treasure far greater than earthly wealth in our Bibles, if only we would go to the trouble to look.
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