Apologetics

So Batman is an atheist. Or at least that’s what the headlines said in August 2018. I finally read the issue in question, Batman #53, which is part of the story arc “Cold Days” ( slight spoilers ahead ). In the story, Bruce Wayne, Batman’s alter ego, is serving on a jury. He sees a fellow juror wearing a cross and recalls his Christian upbringing, how he used to believe in God. But when his parents were murdered when he was a child, his whole world came crashing down, his fa

C. Michael Patton, in a recent blog , claimed to do some "math" and concluded that there are five great mysteries in Christian theology. While I am fine with an occasional appeal to mystery regarding a few topics, Christians often punt to mystery far too quickly. If we "punt to mystery" too quickly, we can sometimes give the impression that Christianity is nonsensical. For example, imagine a football team only gaining a total of seven yards after the second down -- three ya

Spoiler Alert! Spoiler Alert!! Spoiler Alert!!! Seriously, if you have not yet seen the movie Avengers: Endgame , stop reading this and go to the movie theater and buy a ticket! Then come back and read this article. Consider yourself warned! One year ago, immediately after watching Avengers: Infinity War on opening night, I came home and started writing an article assessing one of the best movies I had ever seen (See Avengers: Infinity War & Possible Worlds ). I also mad

Last week I reviewed So the Next Generation Will Know by Sean McDowell and J. Warner Wallace . Now I have an interview with Sean giving some additional insight about the book. Enjoy! What were your motivations for writing So the Next Generation Will Know ? My three kids: Scottie, Shauna, and Shane. I wrote this book largely to research and think deeply about how to pass on my faith to my own kids. My hope is that it will both encourage and offer some practical steps for o

You’ve probably seen the statistics and heard the concerns. Young people are leaving the church in greater numbers than ever. While the youth of every generation share many common characteristics, this generation - dubbed - faces new and unique challenges thanks to the ubiquity of smartphones and easy access to the Internet. Young Christians are constantly bombarded with differing ideas and worldviews, all that are competing with the faith of their parents. It’s easy to giv

Recently, Peter Atterton, a professor of philosophy at San Diego State University, published an article in The New York Times entitled " A God Problem : Perfect. All-powerful. All-knowing. The idea of the deity most Westerners accept is actually not coherent. " Given the title, I was excited to read what this philosopher was sharing with the masses since this issue is one of the main foci in my PhD dissertation. After reading it, however, my excitement transformed into sever

By Limanto, John A. and Stratton, Timothy A. Originally presented at the SW Evangelical Philosophical Society (March, 2019) Abstract: Given the works of philosophers such as Plantinga, Wierenga, Leftow, and Nagasawa, the perfect being (PBT) concept of theism has received renewed attention within the philosophical-theological literature. Despite this ambitious revival, Nagasawa admits that the argument against perfect being from evil is one that we cannot “pretend that

In the last post we met seven "new apologists." Now, we ask them crucial questions about how to start and run a young apologetics ministry. What advice would you give to newer apologists about finding their niche/focus? How important is it? How does one find a niche? Here is Scott Olson’s case for why it is so important to find a niche: Scott Olson (Free Thinking Ministries): I think it’s incredibly important to find a niche. I hesitate to say that the apologetics communit

God is doing an awesome work around the world. He is calling His church back to the defense and proclamation of the Gospel and you get to be a part! If you’ve been following this site for a while, my guess is that you have an itch. There is a deep yearning within your soul to take the apologetics knowledge you’ve accumulated and use it to minister to others. “Yes, you’re quite right. But do I know enough?” If you could give me a basic five minute explanation of God’s existe

Spoiler Alert! Spoiler Alert!! Spoiler Alert!!! Seriously, if you have not yet seen the movie, Captain Marvel , stop reading this and go to the movie theatre and buy a ticket! Then come back and read this article. Consider yourself warned! Captain Marvel has a consistent theme: Things are not what they seem. Just when you think that you have something figured out, the characters will discover more information that completely turns everything you thought knew upside down. T

There are many things to keep in mind when sharing your Christian convictions with an unbeliever, such as your attitude, your tone, and even the specific words you use. Certain words common to evangelism, theology, and apologetics have accumulated cultural baggage that can hinder spiritual conversations. Let’s look at three such words and consider some alternatives. Faith - Faith is a thoroughly biblical term. Salvation is by faith in Christ alone. But unfortunately, this wo

In the last article we covered the Genetic Fallacy in some detail so I would refer the reader back to that article for a more in depth explanation of it rather than spend time rehashing it here. For those who have been following along, you will recall that I mentioned th at as we encounter the Genetic Fallacy we can approach it either defensively or offensively when dealing with the notion of Christianity being the white man’s religion. In that article we primarily discus

Question Dear Tim, I posted this quote as my status on Facebook last week by Mark Driscoll, "Not only did Jesus die, He came back from death to give us confidence that He alone can be trusted upon death. Therefore, the worst thing is not to die, but rather to die without knowing Jesus." With that question, I had someone ask me, "but what about those who have never heard about Jesus?" He and I got into a conversation about it, via chat, where I explained to him what my thoug

Stop! Don’t do it!!! Do not engage in an argument with a trained arguer -- at least not until you read this: Have you ever had an argument with a trained arguer -- a lawyer, politician, apologist, someone on the debate team -- and thought, "I wish I could win an argument sometimes?" I’ve been there and I too was tired of being on the losing side of arguments. Because of occasionally finding myself on the "wrong side of logic," I have been secretly working to gain the upper

I invite you for just a moment to step with me into one of the great iconic movie scenes ever: “The Battle of Thermopylae.” I’m specifically talking about the fight scene in the movie “300” in which a handful of Spartans defend a small piece of territory for three days against the formidable Persian army. This scene is when the great King Leonidas inspires his men for the inevitable battle to the death they will soon engage. “This is where we hold! This is where we fight!” K

Since I have turned my research attention to the argument in favour of the resurrection of Jesus (simply called the ), I face the question as to which is the best (or at least a good) approach to take in arguing for the resurrection. The debate about the different approaches to the argument is an in-house debate among Christian apologists and, therefore, non-Christian’s might not find the debate (or this post about the debate) very interesting. A popular approach to the Resur

In my experience, not only do I find myself defending Molinism from the likes of Calvinists and Open Theists, but I am amazed to see the vigor in which atheists also oppose Molina’s doctrine of middle knowledge. After all, why should the atheist care what view a Christian holds of divine sovereignty and human responsibility? It comes down to the fact that while other views fail, Molinism destroys (as the Apostle Paul would say in 2 Corinthians 10:5) their favorite argument

Knowing that to many, my defense of William Lane Craig will inevitably have my Calvinist card revoked, however, I cannot go by without saying anything about this issue any longer. Time after time, I see mind-numbing simplistic dismissals of Craig’s work for very silly reasons. This would encompass the first type of detractors that I see. The second, those who seek to find heresy under every bed of Christian apologetics and make video clips taking people out of context. The th

Why would God allow moral evil? For example, why would God allow Hitler to torture and murder millions of Jews in the horrors of Nazi concentration camps? Why would God allow natural evil? For example, why would God allow hurricanes, tornadoes, and tsunamis that kill and cause so much suffering? Why would God allow what seems to be gratuitous suffering? For example, why would God allow a bunny rabbit to slowly suffer to death in a forest fire? These are good questions and are

Bradley Bowen argues that the resurrection is highly improbable. I wrote a brief response here . Bowen has replied to my response here and here . Now, probability can be a wonderful tool in reasoning if used in the correct way. Unfortunately, there is a lot of confusion about probability. Thus, I think it would be appropriate to discuss Bowen’s views and shed some light on the issue. Let us start by looking at conditional probability. concerns the change in probability w