The lovely picture below is again the Southern Alps of New Zealand, taken from across the foreshore of the east coast South Island fishing village of Kaikoura.

Every so often I go through phases of thinking “what on earth am I doing this for?” and feel like walking away from my website, full of doubts about it’s usefulness to anyone. This is not a crisis of personal faith (doubting the truth claims of Christianity) since that remains strong throughout such times, but more about the worthiness of myself to have anything to say to anyone else, and how much it matters… that kind of thing. So I don’t post for a little while, going off to play at other things, and before I know it my Inbox is receiving emails from all over the place - people who don’t necessarily make comments on-line but who want to tell me what my site has meant to them, or to ask a faith-type question, or to give encouragement and blessings. How can I walk away from that? And so it seems I get turned right around and told to get back to the job.

Up until such time that a Christian friend pointed me to the writings of some great Christian apologists I had no idea that our Faith was so substantial. And that’s just it… our Christian Faith does not substitute for something real, rational, intelligent. True Faith actually is all of those things - real, rational, intelligent - and often more so than worldly knowledge, since it goes well beyond this present earthly existence of ours and addresses the eternal reality. Truth is that which corresponds to reality, and the truth of the Christian Faith corresponds to eternal reality embedded in our Creator Father God. Believe on that and you are leaning on a rock and cannot fall over. Believe on man-made cultural constructs and a crisis can knock you flat.

I have heard the Bible disregarded as a collection of old books written by man and for use as a guideline only. That description saddens me as I know the Bible to be far more than that. There is objective truth about God in Scripture. It is revealed truth. It is proving very difficult to discover God by scientific means, unless you realize that science reveals knowledge of Him through the vehicle of His creation. But when it comes to the Bible, if you let it do so, you will notice that what you read can “ring true” spiritually - not all of it all the time since it is a journey of discovery rather than a time machine to some immediate destination. A healthy scepticism is useful as it stops one from being gullible, but to toss the whole thing out as “just some old guidelines” is to throw away the greatest written account that we have of God and the Christian Faith. Just because something is not immediately understood does not mean that it can never be understood, is not understandable, or is nonsense, or false - nor even self contradictory. More often than not it means one’s own knowledge is lacking instead.

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Christian Apologetics may be defined simply as the defence of the Christian Faith. In fact, it is more than just a defence. Different apologists have emphasized different functions of apologetics, but generally these include the presentation of a rational basis for faith, the answering of objections of unbelief, the challenge and refutation of non-Christian beliefs, and the persuasion that goes beyond intellectual assent such that the other tests the credibility of Christian truth claims for himself. One of the first Christian apologists was the Apostle Paul, and another was Luke, writer of his Gospel and also the Acts of the Apostles, and another John. Paul words his message to appeal to the ears of his listeners, to speak in terms by which they will best understand, although in doing so he does not dilute or distort the message itself. Paul comments on this himself where he says…

1 Corinthians 9:19 Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.
20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.
21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.
22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.
23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

And of course Peter gives the classic biblical statement for the Christian mandate to engage in apologetics with his words that I have written on the image at the top of this post. We are always to be prepared to give an answer.

Since the writings of the Christian apologists persuaded my own belief and strengthened my own faith considerably, I have used my website to build a resource where others may also find the answers they seek, encouragement, and support in their own Christian witness. I take no credit for the work of others, but simply offer a list of links to a number of excellent sites where this apologia is found. Look on the left-hand side bar of this page to find the heading “Christian Apologia and Theology” and a list of no less than 18 sites loaded with gold. You most certainly wont be short of some fascinating reading that should bless you greatly on your journey in faith.