Apologetics to the Glory of God

Tag: skepticism

  • Calvin’s Commentary on 1 Cor 1:18-21

    For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

    In this first clause a concession is made. For as it might very readily be objected, that the gospel is commonly held in contempt, if it be presented in so bare and abject a form, Paul of his own accord concedes this, but when he adds, that it is so in the estimation of them that perish, he intimates that no regard must be paid to their judgment. For who would choose to despise …

  • False If It Helps?

    Many people come to believe and embrace Christianity by means of some tragedy or crisis. They’re driven in desperation to look for something that will help them rationalize and file away their grief, and many times, they find Christianity. Many other times, they grab hold of other things, such as drugs, alcohol, other religions, or even a perceived freedom achieved from relinquishing religion. In any case, tragedy has a way of forcing people into a spiral of desperation while their flailing arms are reaching for something outside themselves hoping that thing can withstand the force, and grant stability once again. …

  • Some people won’t get over it. Get over it!

    Heres’s an excellent post on the “is-ought” problem, also known as the “naturalistic fallacy”:

    http://pureantithesis.wordpress.com/2013/09/26/some-people-are-gay-get-over-it-an-example-in-the-is-ought-problem/…

  • You Asked: Your Questions. God’s Answers. by Dr. Edgar

    Dr. William Edgar of Westminster Theological Seminary has published a new book geared towards teens to answer a lot of common questions they have. I have not read this book yet but I am willing to go out on a limb and say that this book will likely be helpful for parents in answering these questions right along with their teens. Dr. Edgar is the Professor of Apologetics at WTS and edited and footnoted some of Dr. Van Til’s works for their latest editions. Having read those I am confident that this is a book worth looking into.

    Check it …

  • Unintelligent Design?

    Allow me, for a moment, to explain some of my initial thoughts concerning what denial of God’s existence entails with respect to Design. If you hold that there is no God, and that there is no Design to the universe, there are a few things that follow. If there is no Designer, and if there is no Design, then there are no “designers” and there are no individual “designs.” None, at all, anywhere. I will now proceed to explain the same thing in probably too many ways and in probably too many words.

    There is only cause and effect. “Intention” …

  • Stockholm Syndrome And Sympathizing With Sinners

    We are an imperfect people. We believe God is perfect, and that He is perfecting us, conforming us to Christ’s image, who is perfect. But until we are perfected, we are sinners. We live in a world with limited privacy, and as such many of our mistakes are in public view. We profess there is a standard by which men should live, and yet sometimes we fail miserably to live by that very standard. Often, those who aren’t Christians are watching our lives, scrutinizing us, to see whether what we profess is true. When we stumble, we’re called out, and …

  • On God’s “Evil” Actions

    Probably one of the most common objections to Christianity that we hear is one that relates to the Problem of Evil. While the problem of evil asks, “How can an Omnipotent, Good God exist with evil in the world,” this particular one asks, “How can God be ‘good’ if he has done all these evil things?” Men will object to Christianity saying that God has done evil things. And from this they conclude God either doesn’t exist, or if he does exist he is not worth believing.

    We answer the former problem by demonstrating from the Bible that the …

  • The Bankruptcy of Skepticism and the Glory of God

    Christianity is a naturally offensive truth. Not that it offends, but it exposes the offense that is part of the human condition and dares to hold humans responsible. The sinful nature of man, such as it is, detests any effort of the person who would dare to point at that nature and speak about it for what it is. The rebellious man has knowledge of his Creator because it is in the Creator’s image that he has been created. What the Creator of everything calls “truth” involves every single minute, meticulous detail of reality as we know it. Indeed it …

  • When Contra Munda isn’t All About You

    Back in the third century of the church, as I’m sure some of our readers are aware, there was a bishop named Athanasius – his tenacious defense of the doctrine of the Trinity, in opposition to the swiftly growing heresy of Arianism gave rise to the statement “Athanasius contra mundum” – Athanasius against the world. In a sense, this wasn’t quite true – there were other defenders of the Trinity around, but none so prolific, and none who were targeted nearly so heavily as Athanasius, who was ejected from his church five times, and was only vindicated after his death. …

  • Falsificationism And Christianity

    Another difficulty with religious language (and hence, Christianity) that non-religious people have concerns itself with “falsifiability,” or the aspect of any claim which states it must, in principle at least, be capable of subjecting to certain scientific criteria by which it can conceivably be proven false, in order to be considered meaningful. Like Verificationism, Falsificationism assumes an empiricist worldview, and so is subject immediately to some of the criticisms of Verificationism, including for instance, the seeming arbitrariness of the foundational principles undergirding it. Falsificationism was articulated as a way to circumvent the problems inherent in Verificationism. While Karl Popper …