Category: Convos, Observations, and Quotes
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skopein uses "TAG"
Sometimes presuppositionalists are mocked for holding what they do concerning their own view being right and others being wrong. We can expect this in a largely postmodern context. After coming in on a discussion where some atheists were speaking negatively about TAG because of its affirmation of exclusivity and problems with non-Christian positions, I tried to put the point back to the atheist. A few other topics came up during the discussion. This is not the greatest of conversations but maybe someone will find something useful.
skopein: it’s the Transcendental Argument for God.
skopein: here is a good summary of …
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TAG Does Not Save
There is an objection to TAG out there that goes something like this:
TAG cannot save anyone.
Depending on your context, sometimes it goes like this instead:
Apologetics cannot save anyone.
Of course, this is not much of an objection. It is more so just a slightly annoying comment. Perhaps that is an indication that I need to be frequently reminded of it. Apologetics do not save; the Gospel saves. I do not save; Jesus Christ saves. But then, how many times does it take before I have the categories here straight? Could it be that the person raising this …
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Barking at Thunder
While working out in my yard today, it began to rain. Along with the rain, as often happens in South Mississippi, came thunder and lightning (there is a small tropical storm in the Gulf). Immediately, my year old Great Dane/Rottweiler mix, Huan (Yes, he’s named after the Hound of Valinor! My youngest daughter’s middle name is Luthien, incidentally. You do the math…), began to bark at that thunder, as if to chase it off! Now, looking at the mix there, you can imagine the size of my dog. He is a massive specimen of canine. He’s not as tall …
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Doubt
Then, Christian men, behave like men! It is childish to doubt; it is manhood’s glory to trust. Plant your foot upon the immoveable Rock of Ages; lift your eye to heaven; scorn the world; never play craven; bend your fist in the world’s face, and bid defiance to it and hell, and you are a man, and noble. But crouch and cringe, and dread, and doubt, and you have lost your Christian dignity, and are no longer what you should be. You do not honor God. – Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “Fear Not!”, 1857
In our day, as in many days …
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Christianity Today Article, Harold Camping, and Intro to Apologetics
Jim Spiegel wrote in Christianity Today on Unreasonable Doubt.
Check out a site pertaining to Harold Camping called Rapture Fail.
Remember that the introductory series on Covenantal Apologetics is done and can be bookmarked here. It is also available by clicking on the Series button at the top right of the page.…
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Harold Camping Documentary
Harold Egbert Camping (born July 19, 1921) is a Christian radio broadcaster and president of Family Radio, a California-based religious broadcasting network that spans more than 150 outlets in the United States.
Camping’s trademarks include his deep, sonorous voice coupled with a slow cadence. He has also used mathematical predictions applied to the Bible to predict dates for the end of the world. His current end times prediction is that the Rapture will be on May 21, 2011 and that God will completely destroy the Earth and the universe five months later on October 21.
Click here to learn about …
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A Tale of Two Philosophers
Those of you who are actually good at philosophy spend so much time reading and studying it that you forget what it is you started studying it for in the first place. You are more concerned about the accuracy of your abstract analytic philosophical musings than you are about defending the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. You look down upon those who are not gifted the way that you are and immediately dismiss entire realms of Christian thought in the areas of historical and systematic theology (etc.) because of it. You are more concerned about how the philosophical community …
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Atheist Thrasymachus Admits He's Unreasonable
Thrasymachus is a contributor to Urban Philosophy known for writing lengthy diatribes concerning his hatred for Christ. His posts generally take a shotgun approach and are so full of bad rhetoric that they discourage even the most Mother’s-basement-confined-E-pologist from taking the time to respond. Still, there are certainly problems to be found in his posts.
Just this morning I began reading a new post from Thrasymachus with the (grammatically incorrect) title “Why Apologetics Sucks.” In the Abstract for the post Thrasymachus states that, “Reasonable people should not take Apologists seriously.” He then proceeds to seriously evaluate apologetics as a …
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Christian Kitsch
…Many Christian bookstores stock — and sell — more kitsch than books. Although such work and those who buy it may certainly be sincere, Christians should try to grow in their tastes as well as in the other areas of their lives. The problem with religious kitsch is that its cuteness and self-gratifying nature can domesticate and thereby distort the Biblical faith. Christianity is not a sickly sweet religion, contrary to the saccharine plaques and greeting cards that clutter up the bookstores. The anemic figurines of Jesus Christ are poor testimonies to His deity and His Lordship. The self-congratulatory moralism
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Full Assurance, Epistemic Certainty, and Christ
Much to my dismay, there have been those who would consider themselves in the camp of Presuppositional/Covenantal apologetics that have moved away from the idea that we can be epistemically (having to do with knowledge) certain of our faith. Contrary to their claims, the Apostles knew nothing of an uncertain apologetic. This has been argued many times by Presuppositionalist/Covenantal apologists such as Dr. Greg Bahnsen.
I appreciated how Dr. Lane Tipton defined the distinctive of The Westminster approach to apologetics (i.e. The reformed, biblical, covenantal approach) in a Youtube video entitled “Christ-Centered Apologetics”
…Where I think our distinctive