News

Why Bother With ‘Apologetics’?

by Editor

Why is apologetics so important? For those unfamiliar with apologetics, it might be helpful to define the term ‘apologetics’ before looking at why it’s important. Simply put, Christian apologetics is giving a reason or defence for the Christian faith.
There are two sub-disciplines of Christian apologetics: positive apologetics and negative apologetics. Positive apologetics involves giving an argument for Christianity. For example, giving arguments for God’s existence or the reliability of the Bible. Negative apologetics involves answering objections against Christianity. For example, answering the problem of evil.
When people ask me why we should engage in Christian apologetics, I have four broad responses:
First, the Bible commands it.
Apologetics is not optional. Every follower of Christ is instructed to be an apologist. Let me give you a few verses to back this up. Probably the most often cited passage comes from the apostle Peter. He writes,

[I]n your hearts honour Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defence to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect. (1 Peter 3:15)

The apostle Paul says the same thing in a different way. He writes,

Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. (Colossians 4:5–6)

In my favourite passage on the subject, Paul says,

For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:4–5).

Paul also tells the church in Philippi that they are all partakers with him of grace, both in his imprisonment “and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel” (Philippians 1:7). Similarly, Jude says it was “necessary for him to write appealing to [his readers] to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).
The Bible is clear. Yet, if you walked into most churches today and asked what they teach on apologetics, they would probably look at you like you had three heads. This is because apologetics is treated as if it’s an extra at best or an error at worst. Whether it’s apathy or animosity towards apologetics, both are often fuelled by anti-intellectualism.
As we’ve seen, God commands apologetics. Therefore, those who refuse to “make a defence” or “answer each person” are disobeying God’s command.
So, why do apologetics? Well, the Bible commands it. And that alone should be reason enough. But that’s not the only reason why we do apologetics.
Second, the culture demands it.
The late philosopher and theologian Francis Schaeffer referred to apologetics as ‘pre-evangelism’. This is the idea that God uses well-reasoned answers and arguments as a springboard to the gospel of Jesus Christ. In his book Mere Apologetics, Oxford theologian Alister McGrath says, “Apologetics lays the ground for the invitation; evangelism extends it.”
For example, it makes no sense to talk about the Son of God—who communicates the word of God, and performs acts of God, and brings the salvation of God—unless there is a God. Apologetics lays the groundwork for belief in God through arguments and evidence.
In addition, the culture is deeply saturated in three dominant philosophies: relativism, pluralism, and naturalism. Relativism says there is no absolute truth. Religious pluralism says there is no exclusive truth in religion (all views are equally true). Naturalism says there is no supernatural truth.
Do you see a problem in doing evangelism in this cultural climate? We are presenting an absolute truth to a relativistic culture, an exclusivist message to a pluralistic culture, and a supernatural view to a naturalistic culture. It is no surprise that Christians are confronted with questions like, “How can Jesus be the only way?”, “Has science proven that miracles are impossible?” or “Who are you to force your morality on me?”. These questions grow out of the soil of a secular worldview. Apologetics responds to these questions at the worldview level.
Not only does the Bible command apologetics, but the culture also demands it.
Third, the church needs it.
This fact cannot be overstated. We just looked at how apologetics is pre-evangelism to the culture. However, apologetics is also post-evangelism to the church. The challenges to faith don’t evaporate once you become a Christian. In fact, they intensify. This is where apologetics comes in.
Arguably, the most important generation of the church is the next generation. Yet, all the research we have shows that approximately three in five young people disconnect from their church by the age of 15.
This isn’t a new phenomenon. In Judges 2:10, after Israel finally enters the Promised Land and Joshua dies, we read, “And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.” It took one generation to abandon God and turn to idols.
How do we help curb the next generation’s drift away from God? The answer is—yes, you guessed it—apologetics.
Lest you think this is merely the biased opinion of a professional apologist, consider the research of David Kinnaman—the president of Barna Research. In 2012, Christianity Today summarized Kinnaman’s findings into six reasons why young people leave the church. What’s interesting about the list is that each of the six reasons relates—in some degree—to apologetics. If the church would begin to take the life of the mind more seriously and equip its young people to understand and defend their faith, we could meet these challenges head on.
The church desperately needs apologetics because it helps to provide real responses to the reasons people leave the faith.
Fourth, the results confirm it.
Apologetics works. That is, we have evidence of people coming to a knowledge of the truth through apologetics.
For instance, there are multiple occasions in Scripture where the disciples model the use of reason and evidence, and people are persuaded as a result.
For example, Acts 17 says Paul employed apologetics in Thessalonica. It reads:

Now when they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And according to Paul’s custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you is the Christ.” And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large number of the God-fearing Greeks and a number of the leading women. (Acts 17:1–4, NASB)

It was Paul’s custom—his routine—to reason with the people he spoke to. And as he reasoned from the Scriptures, he would appeal to evidence to make his case. Paul was doing apologetics. As a result, people were persuaded and followed Christ.
There are also many contemporary stories of people coming to know and trust God through apologetics. These include C. S. Lewis, Lee Strobel, J. Warner Wallace, Nabeel Qureshi, Abdu Murray, and many others.
Why bother with apologetics? Well, the Bible commands it, the culture demands it, the Church needs it, and the results confirm it. Taken individually, each reason should motivate us to engage in apologetics. However, taken all together, these provide a powerful apologetic for apologetics.

speaker-tim-largeTim Barnett writes for “Stand to Reason”, an apologetics ministry based in California. This article was first published by them here and is re-printed with permission.

Solas on The Road, Andy Bannister’s work in Liverpool.

by Editor

“I’m back from a really exciting weekend of mission in Liverpool, working in partnership with a local church, called “The Lane”. It was a series of training and evangelism events which is exactly the kind of thing we love.
On the Friday night we kicked off with an event at the local golf club. One of the things we do at Solas is to encourage churches to use neutral spaces such as coffee shops, pubs or restaurants; but in this case the church had rented the local golf club. There were 85 people there for a dinner, about half of them were not Christians. They’d asked people to submit questions, and for about an hour after dinner, I engaged with people’s questions. It was everything from ‘God and Science’ to Hell, to suffering, all kinds of questions came.
There was a really good mixture of people there. At a table right in front of me there was a very enthusiastic atheist guy about my age, called Chris. He fired question, after question at me. He didn’t quite heckle, but very much raise his hand and interject into stuff. Actually it really worked, the audience really enjoyed the way that it became more of a dialogue. He came to speak to me afterwards about his personal story and why he had ended up in Atheism, having come from a very Catholic background.
Some of the other questions and conversations afterwards went to really good places. I was hugely encouraged that we had people signing up for the Alpha Course. That was the church’s goal, to use the event to promote Alpha, and now people are starting that journey; we trust towards Christ.
Then on the Saturday morning we did a training event. We love doing these training events for churches. This one was just half a morning, people came for 9:30AM, and we fed them breakfast, and then I had a couple of sessions with them. We were training them and helping them to think through how to answer some of the big questions of our age. We landed with a session on ‘how we can be sure that the resurrection of Jesus actually happened’.
Then on Sunday, I preached to the church of about 200 people. It’s been really encouraging to see this church growing. The pastor there, is an old friend of mine, and a few years ago it was a church of 60, now its around 200. They outgrew their church building and are now meeting in a local school. Now they are outgrowing the local school and are struggling with the question of where to move next! It’s exciting to see growth and exciting to see lots of young Christians and it was really good to be able to be part of that.
One of the things Solas loves to do is to partner with local churches. So if you are reading this, and you’d love to have Solas come and work with your church, in terms of reaching your community, or training folks to be more confident in their faith; do reach out to us, we will happily come to you!
__________________
PS: (From the editor) The local church were encouraged and added the following to Andy’s report:

“I would recommend Andy Bannister to any church that is interested in engaging with some of the more challenging issues of our day. He has the ability to combine serious philosophical argument with a winsome, friendly and humorous style. He is a very gifted communicator both in the answering searching questions and in preaching ‘the word’”: Nick Johnson, Pastor, “The Lane”, Liverpool.

Book Review: The Overstory by Richard Powers

by Editor

Shortlisted for the 2018 Man Booker prize, The Overstory stands apart from most other contemporary novels. The first surprise is that it doesn’t centre around people and their problems; the second that it is fundamentally evangelistic. By that I don’t mean that it is a Christian book (far from it, in fact), rather that it aims to convict readers and change their thinking and lives. The message that it proclaims on every page are that trees are complex “social beings with memory and agency” (1) , which deserve our reverence.
It might be a shock to you to learn that trees communicate with each other. It certainly was to me, and if I hadn’t stumbled upon this fact a couple of months ago when turning on the radio (you can hear about it here) , I might have dismissed The Overstory as fictional whimsy. But this, or at least the bare bones of it is genuine science. The root systems of trees in forests send messages to each other, appearing to collaborate and share resources. Above the ground, trees learn to recognise danger and then to anticipate it. Or maybe something like that – it’s hard to write about this without using anthropomorphic language.
But the trees aren’t the main characters in The Overstory, though they are its point. Instead the book begins with eight separate stories, revealing to us nine characters who have significant relationships with trees. One inherits a book of photos of the same chestnut tree, taken a month apart over decades. Another has a father who teaches her everyday about the forest. Another has his life saved when he falls from an aeroplane onto a banyan tree. Yet another hears ancient voices telling her to rescue trees. These lives become gradually intertwined into a narrative centred on eco-activism, a seemingly doomed fight to save ancient US woodland.
The book is long. 500 pages of unremitting present tense action and powerful description. I was taken with it and found it hard to put down, but ultimately it is frustrating. Powers’ aim “to resurrect a very old form of tree consciousness, a religion of attention and accommodation, a pantheism of sorts”(2) failed to convince me stylistically as well as philosophically. There is no debate or nuance in this book, despite the careful sentences, colourful vocabulary and genuinely interesting ideas. All the activists are good, all those who would chop down trees bad. For fiction to work, above all else characters need to be credible and complex, but these were not.
So why did has it done so well? I think because it speaks into our world dominated by dismal evolutionary materialism, with a call to awe and purposeful action focused on a massively important theme. Like today’s veganism and identity politics, it offers something which looks like immediate virtue but is an ultimate dead-end. Nature can lower the blood pressure, but it can’t teach us right from wrong. Whilst pantheism might look noble, it comes close to nihilism; human life matters little from the perspective of a tree.
There is a challenge for Christians here then. Are we prepared to honour the creator of trees by truly caring for His complex, beautiful creation? More than others we should be filled with wonder at nature (Psalm 8), as it testifies to an even greater beauty. More than others we should be ready to reduce our consumption so that we steward God’s resources for the good of all, for we know of His love for all he has made (Psalm 145).

SRA head shot
Sarah Allen is a wife, mother, student and teacher. She lives in Huddersfield with husband, a decreasing number of children and her dog.

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1.Los Angeles Review of Books, Interview with Robert Powers https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/heres-to-unsuicide-an-interview-with-richard-powers/#!
2.Idem.

Why are you Christians so divided?

by Solas

“Why would I take Christianity seriously when Christians are so divided?” The disunity of Christians often deters people from taking the message of Jesus seriously: so in the latest SHORT ANSWERS video, we take a careful look at this common question.

 

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"For The Love of God: How the Church is Better and Worse Than You Ever Imagined": Film Review

by Editor

Gavin Matthews

I have to confess to being a bit of a history nerd. Having spent several years studying it, accumulated countless books and an insatiable reading habit, I find the past utterly absorbing. It’s common to hear politics, ethics, education, nationalism or multiculturalism being described as ‘battlegrounds of ideas’, but historians are equally aware that our view of the past is every bit as contentious. We are all aware of “Black History Month”, which has grown steadily in significance, as the once accepted racism which erased Black people from our historical consciousness has been steadily rejected. Historians once looked for great themes and great men (yes, it was usually just men!); but many these days look for “usable pasts”; which are often little more than selective trawls for evidence with which to weaponise history for contemporary polemics.
Religious history, has of course been subject to both these trends. Biographies of saints and martyrs have been produced to stir the devotions of the faithful; while the memory of atrocities committed in the name of “belief a“, are kept alive by the adherents of “belief b“.
What we make of the history of the church, is then something of great importance, and not just for history geeks like me. How the history of Christianity is handled is a significant marker in the current battle of ideas. Of course some Christians want to paint a picture of unbridled progress and blessing; while some atheists, such as the late Christopher Hitchens, wish to portray every aspect of the church’s record as being fundamentally malign.
presentersPerhaps only the foolish, unwary or brave would step into this vast field of two millenia of contention! Certainly the aim of presenting a fair and balanced picture of the church’s moral and ethical record, which is neither a Hitchensesque hatchet-job or a hagiographical series of ‘lives of the saints’, is a bold one. However, this is exactly what CPX (The Centre for Public Christianity in Australia) have done, in a 90 minute film entitled “For The Love of God: How The Church is Both Better And Worse Than You Ever Imagined”. Fearing the worst, I watched this film with some trepidation, but they have really pulled it off, it is a great piece of work.

Bonhoeffer
Bonhoeffer’s House

Filmed with high quality production values, CPX presenters John Dickson, Justine Toh and Simon Smart, are recorded in locations around the world, where Christians have made an impact for good or ill; and assessed the history. They tell stories such as massacres in the Crusades perpetrated on innocent Muslims in the name of Christianity, to Martin Luther King Jr’s noble quest for Civil Rights; from Christian failures to oppose Nazism, to roots of Western charity and philanthropy in the early church even as it was persecuted by Roman Emperors. The story telling is enhanced by dramatic readings of historical texts, and segments of academics discussing and assessing the meaning of these stories.
Wonderfully put together, well-researched, and presented in a lively style, the film itself is compelling viewing. The analysis is fascinating too; as they seek to assess where the church has gone wrong and where it has made a contribution. John Lennox, the noted Christian professor of Mathematics at Oxford describes the ‘shame’ of some of the things done in his native Northern Ireland in the name of Christianity. On the other hand Rowan Williams explores the way in which many disputes driven by other factors, (such as land, power, or resources) have gained a religious veneer or justification; but were not inherently caused by clashes of belief.
The treatment of Colonialism is quite remarkable. Coming from Australia the film begins with the damage done to Aboriginal people by the white settlers, who brought everything from land-seizures to new diseases to Australia; sometimes justified in Christian terms. Yet, they also show that it was Christians who almost uniquely rejected a racist hierarchy of races, because they couldn’t accept social-Darwinism, because their faith told them that all people were made in the image of God. Likewise the role of William Carey in India is examined, and not just in terms of his exemplary work in education, and development. His long campaign against ‘Sati’ (widow-burning) can be seen as either imposing western values on India; or as a bold step towards the equality of the sexes, and thoroughly in line with the idea that basic human rights are universal, not allocated by the powerful; or awarded in response to capacity or contribution. This, likewise is an idea which only became embedded in western culture when Christian ethics replaced Greco-Roman morality in which things such an infanticide were almost de rigueur.
Robert Woodberry’s thesis that Protestant missionaries have left a massively positive contribution towards social and economic flourishing in virtually every context in which they operated, is also given a well-deserved hearing.
Equally fascinating was the (perhaps not immediately obvious) subject of character. The weight of evidence that the ancients, despite all their philosophical sophistication, saw humility as despicable; was very well explained. The Christian view of the cross of Christ. the humiliated God, was radically counter cultural; and leads directly to so many of the values which we in ‘the West’ assume are universal, but actually are rooted in Christianity.
ulsterFinally the filmakers ask us to examine the record of the church, as it stands up against the teachings of Jesus Christ himself. The obvious point that Jesus’ ethical teaching commands great respect isn’t laboured, but rather what is observed is that where the church has stuck to his words and example, it has been beautiful; but where it has veered off into contemporary cultures, it has looked ugly. Central to this discussion is Jesus’ charge to his people to “love their enemies”. This main thesis is explored through a charming musical metaphor, which I won’t explain, but will leave you to enjoy in the film.
The film can be viewed as a single 90 minute “Cinema Cut” or in several shorter episodes; 1) War and Peace, 2) Rights and Wrongs, 3) Rich and Poor, 4) Power and Humility. It can be rented or purchased online, for streaming or by buying the DVD from https://www.publicchristianity.org/fortheloveofgod/ from where free clips, and study guides for groups or schools can also be downloaded.
tohThis honest film leaves little room either for Christian triumphalism on one hand, or mud-slinging anti-Christian polemics on the other. In that sense, CPX have done a remarkable job in opening up a sensible discussion in which the very real contributions of Christian ethics, and Jesus’ teaching can be  seen alongside many of the sins of the church. As such the film will perhaps contain surprises for people on both sides of that debate. There is some uneasy viewing for Christians, especially on the Crusades and the Nazis; while some secularists will be alarmed at the extent to which so many of the values we celebrate in the western liberal tradition have distinctly Christian roots, and were pioneered in history by Christians. Furthermore, many of them are grounded in Christian beliefs, and sustained by them, and are indeed inseparable from them.
IsraelCPX are to be congratulated on the way in which they have stepped so nimbly across this historical minefield, and produced such a stimulating, thought-provoking film, which is both visually stunning and academically rigorous.

https://www.publicchristianity.org/fortheloveofgod/

Sharing the Gospel on Radio Orkney!

by Editor

Towards the end of last year, Solas’ Andy Bannister was invited onto Cameron Stout’s radio show “Moved by Music“, which goes out on Radio Orkney. Cameron gained a lot of a publicity when he won the Reality TV series, “Big Brother”, before returning to his native island. Every week, Cameron invites his guests on to chose tracks and discuss their choices. Andy’s choices included Sammy Horner (Friend of Sinners), Kate Rusby (Falling), Tim Neufeld & The Glory Boys (I am Yours). The conversation was wide ranging and explored The Bible, Jesus, Evangelism, Islam, Scotland, Solas, Church, Grace and Works, Tribalism, The Atheist Who Didn’t Exist – Book, Meaning and Purpose!
Hear the whole show here: enjoy!

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Glasgow Cathedral & Christmas Carols with Students

by Editor

image3.jpegIn the run-up to Christmas, I spoke at Glasgow Cathedral for the joint Carol Service of Glasgow Caledonian and Glasgow Strathclyde University Christian Unions. It was a fantastic event in an amazing location, with hundreds and hundreds of people in the packed Cathedral. Lots of the students had invited non-Christian friends. University carol services offer great evangelistic opportunities, and the students really made the most of it in Glasgow.
It was a beautiful evening of carols and Christmas music and then I spoke for about half an hour, on the topic of “the perfect gift”. I looked at the qualities of the perfect Christmas gift which are that it is personal (it reflects your relationship with that person), practical (it’s actually usable, not something that they are going to just throw in a cupboard and never use again), it’s paid for (you don’t want to be paying it off on your credit card for the next year). Then of course I segued to the gospel showing that God’s gift that first Christmas was personal (it was God come in the flesh, it was Immanuel – God with us), practical because it dealt with our need for forgiveness, reconciliation, and our sin being dealt with. Of course, it was also paid for, because you can’t understand Christmas without also looking at Easter, which is the price that Jesus paid for us.
image1.jpegIt was a huge privilege to share that message with the students. A couple of weeks later I received a lovely e-mail from the CU saying that they felt it had gone well, and that it touched lots of people, and led to many useful conversations afterwards. I’m back there to do a mission week, for the University in 2019, so it was a good kind of set up for that.

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The leaders of the Strathclyde and Glasgow Caledonian University CU’s added their own comments to  Andy’s report.

It was great event, Andy spoke well and the gospel was clearly portrayed to everyone, as far as I know we’ve had at least 10 people respond which makes it all worth it! We’re going through a time of real growth at Caley CU with people hearing and responding to the gospel, students are genuinely interested in what we have to tell them and the Carol service is always one of the best ways to do this! Thank you for your support for us and with this event, it is hugely appreciated!
-Callum, President of  Glasgow Caledonian Christian Union

The Carol Service was fantastic, we were so encouraged. Andy spoke very well, exactly the tone we were looking for and incredibly engaging. There were a few responses from people who were interesting in finding out more, so we are just praying that the Lord will bless them as they pursue that. It’s made us really excited for Andy coming to speak at our Events Week next year!
-Kirsty, Vice-President, Strathclyde University Christian Union

How can we disagree without killing one another?

by Solas

In a world in which people seem ever more divided, how can we find a way to disagree without resorting to hatred, hostility, or even violence? Solas Director, Andy Bannister, explores how the radical message at the heart of the Christian faith offers a powerful basis — and in Jesus, a powerful model — for how we can respond with compassion and kindness to those who are are utterly different to us.

 

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"I hated God, but God loved me!" Nathaniel’s Story

by Editor

Like many people who grow up going to church, I completely dropped out when I was 14. I was glad to have Sundays free to do whatever I wanted.
Around this time I started my GCSE courses at school and I remember thinking a lot at that time about the question of suffering; specifically, how can a loving God allow suffering? However, it didn’t stop there, I concluded that I hoped there wasn’t a God, and I got very angry and passionate about this. How could a God do this to the world?, I kept asking. This angry scepticism was my ideology throughout my final 4 years of school. Along with my beliefs, my lifestyle changed too. I was no longer the good little Christian boy, and thought the best things in life were drinking and having a good time with my mates.
This didn’t stop at school, in fact it got more and more extreme at university. I found myself over 300 miles from home, where no one knew me, and where I had the opportunity to be whoever I wanted to be. So, I started University at Dundee, studying Philosophy and Politics. Thinking about the existence of life whilst going out and drinking most nights turned out to be a dangerous combination.
‘Freshers week’ was a blur, waking up at 3 and drinking at 10, a week of getting to know as many people as possible and living the life that I wanted to. So why did I hate it? By the end of that year I hated what I had become, something didn’t seem right.
I  survived first semester, and had convinced myself that I was happy but that was not the case. I remember one specific night especially vividly. Now imagine this, Dundee at 4am in the morning on a Thursday, you’re walking back to your flat on a cold day by yourself, trying to remember the names of the people that you met that night, still trying to be someone you know you’re not, feeling completely alone. In other words, I was utterly depressed. I remember crying on the side of the road, not wanting to go to bed, to wake up and repeat the same day over again.
Walking 25 minutes home for a cheap lunch or spending £3 on a meal deal was about the biggest decision I’d had to make at in first year at University! One Thursday I was having that same debate in my head during a break between lectures. It was refreshers week at the Student Union, so every society were handing out leaflets about their events. Someone handed me one from the Christian Union, offering a free lunch to listen to some guy speak about God for 20 minutes. ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’ I thought as I headed to the room.  The topic was on how a loving God can allow suffering, the very question that I wrestled with years ago. It was a question that I thought was completely unanswerable. Now I can’t relate to you exactly what the man (Solas’ very own Andy Bannister!) said but I remember clearly being hooked almost from the beginning, as he talked about God as a loving Father, not forcing his children to love him but wanting them to. He also quoted a famous nihilist philosopher supporting God. This completely threw me, it changed everything I thought was true.
I didn’t become a Christian immediately after that, but it was the start of a journey to knowing God. I met up with a guy from the Christian Union every week from then until I left Dundee for the summer. Together we talked about Christ, read The Gospel of John together (Uncover John) and became good friends. I remember one of the first times we met up I asked him something that I couldn’t understand. I asked him why God would want to love and save me, a sinner; someone who actively hated Him! He told me about Paul, a man in the Bible who persecuted Christians chosen by Christ, but then became a Christian himself! We looked at some of his words in Romans 7 v24-25, ‘What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!’.
Its not been an easy journey to come to know Jesus, but its completely changed my life since that talk. The most important thing in the world has become the most important thing in my life. God has changed everything I do through his love. I’m not saying living as a Christian is easy, you will be challenged by people, by groups in society, by suffering, by conflict, through problems in work and with family. But we know that through it all, our God the saviour of the unworthy, who gave his life for the wretched, is with us always.

I Saved Christmas!

by Editor

A few years ago, I saved Christmas.
Normally that would sound like a misleading headlines, designed to grab a reader in and then impress you with my wit as I try to explain what I really meant. But I do literally mean that. I saved Christmas. Father Christmas, to be exact.
I was on an American road-trip, with my great friend Jamie. We’d begun in the metropolis machine of New York, and had now driven our way across to Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was early December, and starting to get a bit chilly. So one night, Jamie, myself and a few other Tulsinian friends ventured downtown to hear some carol singing. We walked the city, saw the lights, and then came across Father Christmas, along with his wife – named, Mother Christmas, I think. They were the real-deal. Both were delightfully old, and had faces that were warm and inviting. The beard was legitimate, the wrinkles were real, and their smiles and rich Southern accents oozed authenticity. We chatted to them both, shared our Christmas wish-lists, and then moved on to get hot chocolate. We wandered. And ten, as we went back to our rental car to head off – we saw an unusual site.
Father Christmas, trying to break into the car next to us.
At first, we were flummoxed. Wasn’t Santa meant to travel by sleigh? And wasn’t he meant to give gifts – not steal them? But a quick conversation later, and we realised the problem. Mother Christmas had been getting too cold, so had taken one of their cars home. Only – she had both sets of keys in her jacket – leaving Santa short of a ride.
He didn’t know what to do – and was about to ask the police if they could assist him in breaking in. We had a better idea – and offered to take him home. He jumped in the car, we put on appropriate Christmas carols – and had a delightful 20 minutes of taking Father Christmas home – knowing that we had done the world a favour.

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A selfie from that night!

Now, the more astute reader will note – that we were in all likelihood not carrying the real Father Christmas at all. Instead, we were carrying an ordinary man, who had lived in Tulsa his whole life.
And with them – I’d agree. Apart from one little word – ‘ordinary.’
You see, according to the story of Christmas, there’s a husband and wife who live a mystical life in the North Pole. They oversee a team of elves, who create toys – which Santa and his magical reindeer deliver across the globe on Christmas Eve.
According to the story of scientism – the belief that science is the only way of knowing – the person sitting in the car with us was a mixture of organic chemicals and compounds. His life was determined entirely by his environment and the way these factors drove his decision making.
And according to the story of the Hebrew and Christian scriptures – this man is one who bears the thumbprint of the divine on every aspect of his life. This is one who is no mere mortal, but is crowned and charged with possibility and mystery in their very being.
This is one thing I love about a worldview that transcends scientism, or materialistic determinism – it makes your world that much bigger. You see, pure scientism – think Richard Dawkin’s atheism – says that what-you-see-is-what-you-get. There is no room for magic, for mystery or for miracle. It is all science and can all be empirically proven.
In all of human history – there cannot be one miracle. Not one moment of enchantment. Not one sense of spiritual mystery. If there was – even just one little answered prayer – the entire scientism castle would come crashing down.
As G. K. Chesterton quipped:
“If the cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it is not much of a cosmos. The real thing has shrunk. The whole of life is something much more grey, narrow, and trivial than many separate aspects of it. The parts seem greater than the whole.”
Far from being small-minded – the Christian worldview offers a perspective that includes science – but goes wider than it. It acknowledges that science is a fantastic way of knowing – but it does not tell the whole picture.
It enjoys scientific discovery, and seeking to explore the order behind everything we see. And yet, it is open to those rules being broken and transcended – because it recognises that there is Someone bigger than science.
Thus we can have a neurosurgeon praying for his patient. The perfect marriage of scientific rigour and training, along with a recognition that perhaps there is another helper in the room. We can have philosophers who believe in miracles. We can have theologians who apply methods of science to their study of God – and then worship with heart-felt abandon at the one they enjoy.
This is the joy of life. C.S. Lewis also noted that believing in miracles doesn’t mean disbelieving in science. Instead – we have to know the rules of the world, for a miracle to happen. It’s the playful breaking of the rules that makes a miracle – not an ignorance of them.
We know that water doesn’t turn into wine. That’s what makes it so delightfully good when it does.
We know that sickness is fought by an immune system, and can be supported by medicine. That’s what makes it so delightfully great when a miraculous healing occurs. Blind people don’t suddenly see. We don’t get insights into what’s going to happen. We can’t scientifically discover what latent dreams lie on a person’s heart.
We know this – and yet, we see it happen. This is the delight of mystery, and the beauty of the world. And we need a story of everything that includes this mystery and delight. So maybe I didn’t save Santa. Maybe I didn’t save Christmas. But I did enjoy time with one who is made in the image of God, and one who contains more mystery and worth than science would ever allow.
And, who knows? As the book of Hebrews says, “Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.” Angels in your workplace? Amongst the poor? On the side of the road, needing a ride?
That sounds more real to me, more than anything a scientism can tell.
Here’s to mystery, the unknown and a life of faith and adventure – discovering as we follow.
HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

MG_5993-1-1024x984Jeremy Suisted is an Innovation Consultant, as well as a part-time Old Testament lecturer, copywriter and speaker. He is a New Zealander who blogs at www.jeremysuisted.com, where this article was first published.

Are you just a Christian because you were born that way?

by Solas

“You’re just a Christian because you were born in a Christian family!” Is it true that we just believe what we believe because of our culture or upbringing? In the latest SHORT/ANSWERS, Solas Director Andy Bannister untangles this common assumption..

 

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Andy Bannister Reports on Recent Work in Canada

by Editor

canada abA few weeks ago I was back in Canada, where I lived from 2010-2016 — and I always enjoy opportunities to go back and speak in the country that was home for six years.
We had an incredible week of ministry on this trip. We ended up in Toronto, where we worked with one of the huge Coptic churches. It’s an amazing church tradition which I know very little about. The huge Coptic Centre in Toronto wanted me to come and speak to their young people. They expected “a couple of hundred” of them to come on the Friday night, but that was a huge underestimate! We had as many as nine hundred. I have never seen anything like it; they kept coming and coming and coming!
I spoke on “God and Science”. Their leaders asked me to speak about that because a number of their young people were struggling with questions about science at university. After my talk we opened the floor, and answered question after question after question. Some of these youngsters were pretty well read, too. One of the questions on biology contained a term I didn’t even know! So I must admit, I bluffed, and said, “For people in the audience who don’t know what that word means, could you explain it?” Thankfully, he explained it in such a way that the speaker (who is not a scientist!) could understand and then address.
It was amazing to see these young people on fire for Christ. It’s an amazing church community because many of those Coptic families are in Canada having fled from Egypt, where Christians are persecuted quite heavily by the Muslim majority. Hearing stories of Christian families, who have experienced real persecution because of their faith; was very sobering. Many of us ‘Western Christians’ rarely think about these things, while those in the Middle East have been through a lot.
andy B canadaWhen we were in Canada I also took part in a mission at Ottawa University, in Canada’s capital city. It’s always exciting to do university missions in Canada because when I was there (2010-2016), I helped to start them off. To see them now, thriving and having a life of their own is so exciting.
I hadn’t done a mission at Ottawa University before, and it was incredible to see the passion and enthusiasm of the Christian students there. They organised a great mission, and found the perfect location for the talks. Rather than being shut away in a classroom, we used a venue called “The Agora”, a little amphitheatre right in the middle of campus. It’s right by the food courts where students come past all the time. When I was speaking I was surrounded by people on three sides and there was lots of traffic to and fro. There were really good audiences, with hundreds of people coming to our talks. We addressed all the usual topics, like sexuality and identity, suffering, meaning, and significance. I spoke on the resurrection — why we can be sure the resurrection of Christ happened and what it means. It was exciting to see young people come to faith in Christ.

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Young Canadians hearing the gospel in Ottawa

One young man called Ashwant walked into one of our first sessions as a liberal Hindu and, by the end of the week, had come to faith in Christ. We often see people come to faith in Christ in the weeks and months after these university missions. Typically they sign up for an Alpha course during the mission, but the event is just the start of the process. This man though, had a dramatic encounter with Christ! For me to be part of that story, to be part of the group that prayed with him is such a tremendous privilege; and it’s so wonderful to see God at work.
What I love about university missions, whether it’s in Canada or right here in Scotland, is that we see similar things going on all the time. God is very much at work right in the heart of the academy.

"A War of Loves": In Conversation with David Bennett

by Editor

Gavin Matthews spoke to David Bennett, author of the remarkable book, A War of Loves

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SOLAS: So your book is out now?
DB: Yes, released on Thursday the 29th November in the UK, and then mid-December in Australia, but it was out on November 3th in the States. *Purchase your copy at our 10ofThose partner page.*
SOLAS: So has this book been brewing for a long time?
DB: The plan for the book started a year and a half ago when I was with my friend, the late Nabeel Qureshi. He’d written Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus and there was something profound about that book in the way it wove-together story and apologetics. I thought that we really needed a book like that which connects arguments for the scriptural view of human sexuality with a real story, and I had that story. So, I saw the huge value of pairing those two things together. I sense that a lot of people are trying to ‘box’ my book in, but I really hope that people will lay their ‘bug-bears’ down and actually consider the story and what has actually happened in my life.
I had just finished writing my book and was reading the manuscript in a coffee shop, sitting opposite a young girl who was a chain-smoking atheist, a very forthright interesting individual. We got chatting and she said, “I completely disagree with you being celibate, I think it’s ridiculous. But I respect you, and I’d like you to read your book to me!” And after reading the book, she said, “I not only understand why you are celibate”, but also “How do I become a Christian?” Which was amazing, and that’s really the reason I wrote the book!
SOLAS: Your book is part autobiography, part theology — an interesting mixture of different things going on.
image1DB: So the book is trying to bridge the gap between the subjective and the objective, the theological and the personal. I think the question of human sexuality and desire is a profound one to our personhood, in our bodies and in the world. It really requires a different approach than just a statement of belief, it’s something which requires an incarnational, as much as a scriptural response. My book doesn’t say “here’s what scripture says – now go live it”, it says, “here’s what scripture says, this is how I as a human being have lived it.” I think that is so important for gay people that this question doesn’t remain abstract but comes down and dwells with them and relates to them. That’s what I needed when I was going through my own questioning. So I want the book to make people feel that they have ‘company’ and draw them towards intimacy with God. At the very centre of the book is the question, “have you experienced the love of God?”. I really don’t think that the question of who we are, including our sexuality is really answerable until we have experienced the love of God in Jesus. I don’t think you can understand the Christian ethic without knowing Christ. So I wrote this primarily as an invitation to embrace the love of God.
I’m not really celibate today because I’m gay (although that’s part of it). You know, recently, the Lord said to me, “You are celibate, because I’m worthy of that.” This is actually an invitation to worship and to realise how worthy God is. It’s in losing yourself in God that you find yourself and that is the ‘heart-cry’ of the book.
SOLAS: And there’s enough in the autobiographical side of the book to upset those on the more liberal side of the equation and enough in the theology to upset the more fundamentalist… so I suppose there’s enough to upset almost everybody!
DB: That sounds like somebody I know … Jesus!!! I mean, Jesus agreed with the conservatives, with his views on divorce and resurrection but he didn’t agree with the way they lived out the law. He saw that it was hollow, and he reinstated the life of faith, which is living in the dynamic of relationship with Father-God in the Spirit. Jesus steered us back to that relationship in which the moral life actually makes sense and works. I want to walk to the ‘narrow’ Jesus path, and I’m willing to pay a price.
SOLAS: John’s gospel describes Jesus as “full of grace and truth” but sometimes it seems that the Church is always trying to compromise on one of those things or the other — but you seem to be trying to go all out of BOTH grace and truth!
DB: Yes! And how can we claim to worship Messiah-Jesus and not do that? I don’t understand how people think that truth alone will get people there, and I don’t understand how people want to water down grace and make it ‘fluffy’; it’s an insult to his cross. When people ‘watered down’ truth to me, they thought they were loving me, but they weren’t. When people watered-down grace, they weren’t loving me, they were just making it easier for their flesh to feel comfortable with the fact that I was gay. That doesn’t come from God. Whenever a person acts from the love of God, even if they are rebuking you or correcting you, it will always bring life and encourage you to go deeper with the Lord. I hope that in this sexuality conversation, Jesus will be imitated in the church.
SOLAS: Your book is very open, very personal. Were you ever tempted to hide, to just live out your beliefs quietly, rather than publicly?
DB: I deeply disagree with the lack of vulnerability in Christian ministry platforms and the way the Christian world works. There’s a kind of personal authenticity, that I absolutely love about the gay-community and I miss desperately in the Christian community. It’s ironic because I say in the book that I felt a lack of intimacy when I was in various spaces in the gay world. I also have felt more recently a lack of capacity for Christians to have intimacy with one another and be real and honest and authentic; because of the fear of being judged or losing a platform. I am trying to break that and say that the only way to minister Christ to the world is through our weaknesses, vulnerabilities and personal failures. It’s in that space that the glory of God is seen. I think that it is really important to be personally vulnerable and that’s why I put my head above the parapet. Jesus himself, and Paul and the greats of the faith all put their head above the parapet at the appointed time. I feel that God has given me this opportunity with my story. It is scary, and there are times when I think that people will reject me or come after me. I always worry that there will be those people who are just determined to hate, and don’t want to hear what you have to say, or just pre-judge the book from the cover. But my prayer is that people will read the book, allow it to touch them, and that God will speak to them through it. And it’s worth taking that risk, I think.
SOLAS: You got NT Wright to write the foreword! I remember hearing him once say that wherever Paul preached there were riots and people tried to kill him; but wherever he preaches people serve cups of tea! So what kinds of reactions have you had to the book?
DB: Well I had one very unfortunate reaction on Twitter saying that my book would kill people. But that person then apologised and said that they hadn’t actually read it! But that’s probably the kind of reaction you get from someone who had been hurt by the church. However, it’s unfair to judge my book without understanding who I am or my story. My book is far more complex, gritty and real than some clichéd ex-gay narrative. People see “he was a gay-activist who discovered Jesus”. But you have to understand I was an atheist gay-activist! I wasn’t a Christian, in fact I hated Christianity. I was expecting that there would be a backlash but 99% of feedback has been really positive, and lots of people have said that we really need this book for the church and for the gospel. Some have said thank you for being vulnerable. New Christians have picked up the book and said, ‘this is exactly what I needed, God has led me to your book’ sometimes from people living silently in the closet who feel freed by the book. So it’s amazing to see the stories of people who have been transformed by God through it, and I’m humble grateful to God for that. A War of Loves is not a perfect doctrinal statement either. That might follow after I have completed my theological studies, and have more life experience, I’m only 29!
SOLAS: So, tell me about the title: A War of Loves?
DB: I was trying to come up with a title that really summarised the book . An atheist gay-activist has this crazy encounter with God in a pub, and then wakes up the next day! What is that like…?!
SOLAS: I have no idea!!
DB: Not many people have had that experience! I remember saying to God, “I’m an atheist gay activist, I can’t be a Christian!” So it was a war. Who would I stand for, Jesus, or that? The war in me was huge. Do I trust God or don’t I? It got to a point where the evidential threshold was crossed, and I had to follow Christ. But then there was a war for three years about what I did with my sexuality and my romantic life.
But this isn’t just a matter for people who are gay. There is the matter for everyone, with our will and the will of God. Jesus prayed in Gethsemane “not my will but yours be done” which is a war of loves and is the centre of my doctoral thesis. It’s a human struggle that we all have to do the will of God and not our own; including the wrestling of a gay, same-sex attracted person to be a Christian. There is a huge difference between having a desire, the goal or aim of which will never be fulfilled and has to die; compared to a heterosexual desire which could be sanctified in a marriage. When you are same-sex attracted/gay that’s hard, and I hope that’s something that people pick up in the book, that this “War of Loves” is a struggle to follow Christ and to let the war of loves be won. It’s won by God’s love winning over false, idolatrous views of love.
SOLAS: Does that not thrust a spear at the heart of what has gone wrong with Christianity in the West, that we have marketed it like a life-enhancement product for self-fulfilment, rather than looking Christ-like and sacrificial? And that the sort of cost you describe should be the normal Christian life?
DB: I totally agree, and the fascinating thing is being same-sex attracted and gay is secretly a blessing in disguise because I don’t have the option of lukewarm life-enhancement Christianity that is a hobby on Sunday. I literally don’t have that option. I want to say to the church, “Put your idolatry away where it came from. You can’t get away with it, there are people you are actually hurting by not living the full Christian life!” The fact that there aren’t many celibate heterosexual people is a sign that there is an idolatry of romantic love in the church. A young gay man in the book said, “Why can’t we have romantic love? They get to have romantic love and family and kids, and we don’t. How could God be good if that’s real?” And I said, Praise be to God that we have these desires because if we didn’t, we’d sign up to that idolatry and we wouldn’t follow His will. So it is a blessing in that particular sense that we don’t have that option – we have to go for celibacy. It actually forces your hand into a Christian asceticism as there is no other way through for a gay/same sex attracted person.
It’s the same for a heterosexual person, but because of our culture, you can kind of get away with it. I’m hoping that there’s an edge to the book that calls the church to repentance in this area.
SOLAS: I wonder if the church is uncomfortable with your message of high-cost, real discipleship?
DB: I understand that following Jesus isn’t easy and requires a lot of grace to take the step to carry your cross. In my life the people who have blessed me the most have been those loving, stable, Jesus-loving truth-embracing voices who have confronted me or who have sat with me in hard truths I need to accept. So, I wouldn’t want to do anything less for others.
I have had so many responses from people who are not LGBTQI, who have said to me, ‘this book is really helping me in my marriage’ or ‘in my family life’ to actually re-order my loves around God. I hope that this book is doing good work for the Lord’s purposes.
That’s why the stories of gay/same sex attracted people who are living obediently to Christ need to be shared more in the church because they have a prophetic weight. There’s a risk for the church to let them be heard, but I actually think that that God will bless though it. We need more testimonies of people who have come to embrace Jesus’ ethic of sexuality.
There are people arguing that the male-female created order of God doesn’t matter, that we have this new thing in Jesus and that gay-marriage is wonderful in the church. I think that that is such a betrayal of Jesus. He is the creator-incarnate and He made us male and female for a reason. Just deleting that is just impossible. You can’t worship Him as God and delete male and female marriage: that just doesn’t work. So gay marriage will never be at the centre of the church of Jesus. There will only be marriage as God originally intended it, and that’s not even the point in God’s Kingdom. Jesus said there will be no marriage in the future. So God has ratified the created order through Jesus. However, He will transform it in the future into something into which we all have access, are all invited. Of course, people who are celibate are almost starting heaven now! In the sense that they are embodying what the future will be like.
SOLAS: You talk about the difference between “good celibacy” and “bad celibacy”.. is that part of what you mean by “good celibacy”, pre-empting the future in the Kingdom of God?
DB: Exactly! Sarah Coakley’s book A New Asceticism has been a real blessing to me. It’s very careful thinking. She herself is pro-gay relationships in the church, and I completely disagree with that, but I do think that her model of what Christian asceticism looks like is brilliant. The future-orientated vocation of celibacy, is an admirable and honourable Christian vocation. Marriage obviously points to the future as well.
Of course, everyone is invited to be married in Christ! The real marriage we are actually celebrating is the future marriage of Jesus and the bride. Marriage between a man and a woman, or celibacy both celebrate that. In celibacy there is a deep, intense Christian friendship you can experience such as between David and Jonathan, and other biblical characters too. I’m really interested in seeing the church removing the idol of sexuality and experiencing those kind of friendships. I think they are a radical witness to the world, just as a beautiful Christian marriage is.
SOLAS: Our culture exalts sex to a very high place and will misunderstand some of what you are saying as a choice between sexual activity and misery … but you are a joyful person! What is the source of your joy?
DB: I don’t think people realise that God is actually real! I’m not giving my sexuality up merely for an idea! He’s actually real, Jesus is the Messiah, he actually rose from the dead! He rose, and it’s true. Jesus rose from the dead, I have no doubt about it. I have experienced too many of its effects to ever believe otherwise.
God has designs, desires and goals for our bodies and following them is a deep act of worship. Failing to do that is sinning, falling short of the intention He has for your body. That is a pretty big thing, but scripture is so clear that our bodies are not our own.
God’s love actually changes our hearts and desires that fit with His will and purpose though. That has happened with my same-sex desires. I don’t want a gay marriage, or a gay relationship anymore. I want to be completely with God and serve His kingdom. That’s taken a long time, ten years, and there’s been moments where of course I’ve wanted that, but overall you change over time. Once you have ‘tasted’ God, known His presence, you are given a new desire-life which is not orientated around the ‘old man’, but which desires the heavenly future.
Christian joy is so amazing. I am addicted to the joy of God. I think Christian joy is ultimately about union with God, knowing this incredible joy that He has about who we are, or what the creation will be like when it’s finally finished and we can rest in eternal intimacy with Him. And there’s nothing like that. The Bible states that ‘Jesus endured the cross for the joy set before him’, and in some sense I know I’m going to suffer but I’ve got this joy set before me …. Christ! It’s hard to describe what it looks like; but I would say that it looks like a human being, fully alive! Which doesn’t require sex, it’s completely independent of sex. Christian joy is more than happiness, and comes through suffering too. That’s a really interesting mystery in the Christian life. The people who have the greatest Christian joy that I’ve seen, are those who have suffered the most.
SOLAS: Thanks for your time, David!
DB: Pleasure. And God bless you!

Christmas Adverts: Some Gifts Are More Than Just a Gift

by Editor

by Sarah Allen

I’m writing this in the first week of December, but the battle of the ads started a few weeks ago.  Much anticipated, compared and dissected in the press, these adverts from the major retailers have become a tradition over the last fifteen years.  And I guess they do their job, raising the profile of the companies concerned and presenting them as beneficent, family friendly, cheer-bringing organisations – helping us to forget for a month or so that they are really consumption-creating giants battling each other for the contents of our purses.
As Christians who know that Christmas is about the extraordinary, awe-inspiring, dazzlingly beautiful miracle of the incarnation, it would be tempting to despise these ads.  They are often manipulative and cynical sickly-sweet confections, after all.  They promote idolatry of the family and of consumption and gloss over the pain that is so much a part of many peoples’ Christmases.  But maybe we should not condemn too quickly or switch off from their effects; after all these adverts showcase the aspirations and values of our nation.  They are a picture of the yearnings that we all share.

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Used with permission of John Lewis & Partners

Take, for example, the John Lewis advert which tells backwards the career of Elton John, ending in a Christmas gift of a piano.  The origin of his success, we are told, was the generous gift of loving parents, and throughout his famous “Your Song” plays with its refrain, “how wonderful life is, when you’re in the world”.  Parental love and giving are elevated together. 
This sentimentality is really cleverly undercut by the advert from their partner store, Waitrose, in which a teenage daughter attempts to show her parents this John Lewis advert, but they keep fast forwarding it because they want some cake; it seems we can choose – buy into to the schmaltz or laugh at it, either way, family is centre stage.  The same message is there in the 2018 Boots ad; which tells the story of the reconciliation of a teenage daughter and mum.  The BBC too have run their own ad-like narrative showing a working mum walking away from her demanding job to have fun with her son.  And Sainsburys, whose ad seems to have been the most popular so far, featured a mum putting away her phone to watch her daughter’s starring role in a primary school extravaganza.

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Used with permission of John Lewis & Partners

I could go on, but I think the central message is clear.  These are more like religious tracts than traditional adverts.  They call the watcher to repentance and worship and change with their message that family is more important than work, or technology or superficial disputes.  Unconditional love is at the heart of family, they say, and this love liberates.  So, show this love, presumably by buying stuff.
We might agree with a lot of this — Christians think that the family is important and that we should be generous to each other.  But we know as well that the nuclear family, however materially comfortable, cannot provide us with the love we really need.  And the most peaceful, loving family can still be riven with patterns of sin.  The best parents cannot sacrifice enough to bring their kids round.  If the family is where we turn to for salvation, then we will be left full of guilt and shame, trapped into giving (or buying?) more and more and more.
But the religious yearnings of these ads can also point us to a greater reality.  Isn’t our family relationship with our Father in Heaven, and through His Son, with our brothers and sisters on earth, more valuable than anything else?  Wouldn’t you agree that His love is liberating and accepting and generous.  And don’t the undeserved gifts of forgiveness and the outpouring of His Holy Spirit transform lives?  The desire expressed in these ads finds its answer and end in the gospel.

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“Some gifts are more than just a gift”      Used with permission of John Lewis & Partners

 

Are We Matter or Do We Matter?

by Solas

What is a human being? Are we just a collection of atoms and particles? Or merely the result of time, chance and natural selection? Or are we, in the words of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, people with inherent dignity? In the latest SHORT/ANSWERS video, Andy Bannister explores why what you believe about God has a huge impact on what you believe about human beings — and about how we treat those around us.

 

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