Apologetics

Question 1

Worldview questions:

Answer 1

• Ontology: What is the prime reality?
  
  • Cosmology: How did everything begin?
  • Anthropology: Who is man?
  • Personal Eschatology: What happens to man after death?
  • Epistemology: How do we know what is true?
  • Ethics: What is the basis of morality?
  • History: What is the meaning of human history?

Question 2

What worldview questions does a “metaphysic” seek to answer?

Answer 2

• A metaphysic is a question about being, reality, or other first principles.
  
  • Ontology, Anthropology, Cosmology, Personal Eschatology?

Question 3

What is ethics?

Answer 3

-Ethics are the basis of morality

Question 4

What is epistemology?

Answer 4

-How we know what is true and the investigation of distinguished justified knowledge from opinion

Question 5

Where is general revelation found?

Answer 5

(Available to all)

• Creation (Rom. 1:18-20, Ps. 19:1-6)
• Providence/History (Acts 14)
• Conscience (Rom. 2: 14-15)

Question 6

What is the function of general revelation?

Answer 6

-The function is to display the glory of God and render man without excuse (Rom. 1:20)

Question 7

Where is special revelation found?

Answer 7

(Only available to some but necessary to salvation)

• Christ (Heb. 1:1-3)
• Scripture (John 10:35, 2 Peter 1:16-21)

Question 8

What is the function of special revelation?

Answer 8

-It is salvific and it teaches us about God and his will. Without it we cannot truly be saved (Ps. 19:7-14, 2 Tim. 3:15-17).

Question 9

According to Sproul, what is the goal of apologetics? (Pg. 5)

Answer 9

-“The goal of apologetic is to destroy falsehood and to proclaim and defend the truth.” Defense and attack against the dark arts.

Question 10

What is the difference between winning arguments and winning souls?

Answer 10

• Winning arguments: If your sole aim is to merely win an argument, you will always be in debate mode and you often be cold and merciless. It all flows from pride. For the sake of you.
• Winning souls: If your aim is to win souls, you will be kind and loving in your words. You will wish to befriend the person and love them (speak the truth in love). Food and Friendship. For the sake of others.

Question 11

What is offensive (destructive) apologetics?

Answer 11

-Sproul calls this “positive negative” apologetics. It is designed to both destroy the enemy’s position and destroy falsehood

Question 12

What is offensive (constructive) apologetics?

Answer 12

-Sproul calls this “positive positive” apologetics. It is designed to first destroy the argument and then build up the case for Christianity by seeking to win the person via the Holy Spirit to God’s kingdom.

Question 13

What is defensive apologetics?

Answer 13

-Sproul calls this “negative negative” apologetics meaning that while we are attacking we are also being attacked. It is negative first because we are acting defensively, responding to attacks from the outside. It is also negative because we are attacking the enemy’s base.

Question 14

When is it appropriate to remain silent when you know how to respond? (Proverbs 26: 4-5)

Answer 14

Don’t throw pearls before swine.

• Sometimes, when you haven’t already built a relationship with them.
• When a person is not physically or spiritually able to hear or recognize the truth
• You know it will cause more harm than good for them to hear the truth

Question 15

What is the “myth of autonomy”?

Answer 15

-The “myth of autonomy” (self-law) is the truth that no human being is autonomous, we are all dependent on God. Man is dependent on God for knowledge itself–in order to gain knowledge, man is dependent upon God’s revelation. The believer confesses this dependence while the unbeliever refuses to acknowledge it. You can’t know things apart from God

Question 16

What is the epistemology of the following philosophical positions? Christian Theism, Naturalism, Positivism

Answer 16

• Christian Theism: God knows everything and is the source of all knowledge. Man is dependent upon God’s revelation for his limited knowledge. Reason and empiricism are helpful but never the ultimate authority.
• Naturalism: Knowledge is based on sense and rational thought. Truth is usually relative and evolves over time. Scientific evaluation of nature is the best tool to reach knowledge. Rationalism is the idea that our reason is the absolute authority verses relativism which says that there are no absolute authorities at all.
• Positivism: Knowledge can only be experienced and explained though the senses or through the meaning of words. (All true statements are empirically verified).

Question 17

How do the following philosophical positions determine what is right and wrong? Behaviorism, Naturalism, Christian Ethics

Answer 17

• Behaviorism: No one can be held accountable for their actions because a person’s actions are just a result of their environment. Man is a biological machine so morals do not exist, just chemical reactions.
• Naturalism: Ethics evolved as societal constructs. Moral values derive their source from human experience. Ethics are situational and autonomous.
• Christian Ethics: God’s nature and His word define good and evil. Man is dependent upon God for ethical standards.

Question 18

What are the epistemological and ethical repercussions of determining truth by our external stimuli?

Answer 18

-If we know things through our external stimuli alone then there is no reason to persuade anyone and we cannot tell the difference between good and bad behavior. There is no standard except for personal experience.

Question 19

How is post-modernism self-refuting?

Answer 19

-Post-modernism is incredulity toward meta-narratives and leads to a skepticism of all world views. As a result, we ought to be skeptical of Post-modernism.

Question 20

How does nihilism lead to catatonia? (Sproul, pg. 114)

Answer 20

-Nihilism is the belief in nothing, the denial of truth, virtue, and meaning. Catatonia is the psychological state in which a person sits motionless not doing anything. This is the logical end of nihilism because without meaning or purpose, there is no reason to live or do anything.

Question 21

How is the problem is evil not a problem for Christians? In what way is it a problem for everyone?

Answer 21

-Nothing implies that Gd doesn’t exist. Without him, evil doesn’t exist at all since it is just a twisted good. Without him, all is neutral flux and entropy. If evil is a problem then there must be a God who is in control and the standard for good. Christians have the answer. Everyone struggles with this simply because evil is an emotional problem.

Question 22

How is Proverbs 26: 4-5 no inherently contradictory?

Answer 22

-There are two ways toe engage scoffers. v4: don’t let him determine the rules and v5: answer him in order to reveal to truth to others around him (drive it off a cliff)

Question 23

Hell in the Great Divorce?

Answer 23

-It is isolated, narcissistic, dingy, drab, dark, rainy, create reality by thinking, have what you want but it is never enough, always blaming others but never yourself, a shadow. “Yes. All Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this world, the Real World. Look at yon butterfly. If it swallowed all Hell, Hell would not be big enough to do it any harm or to have any taste.” (Pg. 138)

Question 24

What is a worldview?

Answer 24

-A set of presuppositions or assumptions which we hold consciously or subconsciously about the make-up of the world (There is no neutrality).

Question 25

In C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, the main character watches as an angel encounters a man with a red lizard on his shoulder. The angel keeps offering to kill the creature. What does the lizard represent? What does the encounter teach us about sin and sanctification?

Answer 25

-The Lizard represents lust. It is with the man wherever he goes. The angel can only kill it with the man’s permission. This shows us how when we sin it follows us everywhere and it’s always our choice. It is our choice to repent, but we can’t do it without the help of God just like the man couldn’t do it without the angel’s help. Sanctification is synergistic: God and us. Salvation is monogistic: God alone.

Question 26

What is the relationship between joy, misery, and pity in C.S. Lewis’ Great Divorce?

Answer 26

• Pitying action vs. pitying feeling: Pitying action will never die and should be used as a spur to drive joy to help misery, it good and sacrificial and never thinks of itself like the lady. Pitying feeling is manipulative and hold joy ransom, it is simply a weapon used by bad men to cheat good people.
• Compassion for the lost doesn’t keep joy out of heaven (lady and dwarf)
• If they insist on being miserable then they will be and we have to five them over to that
• Heaven won’t be heaven if we are miserable.
• The joyful use pity to help the miserable. The miserable use pity to hold the joyful ransom.

Question 27

What is your response to someone who maintained that Christians should adopt a stance of neutrality in argumentation?

Answer 27

• There is no such thing as neutrality.
• Only a dead fish goes with the flow.
• You either believe in God or no God.
• There is often a Trojan horse hidden in neutrality
• You can’t believe in nothing

Question 28

In evangelism, what should your near term goal be?

Answer 28

-You short term goal should be relationship and helping them take the next step toward God.

Question 29

In evangelism, what should your long term goal be?

Answer 29

-To win them over to Christ

Question 30

In evangelism, how do you know when you are “successful”?

Answer 30

-hard to judge but…when you share the gospel through the power of the Holy Spirit and leave the results up to God in prayer.