Dr Greg Bahnsen - Introduction to Apologetics: Methods I (Part 10)

All right, let's begin tonight's lesson with a word of prayer. Lord, we come into your holy presence with humility tonight, recognizing that before your awesome power and majesty and glory and perfection, we are nothing. We recognize that before your perfect righteousness we are ashamed of our sin and our unrighteousness and confess to you that we have no right to stand before you. We acknowledge that if you should mark iniquities, we could not stand. And yet we praise you tonight, Father, that we do have a standing before you and that we are justified in your sight for the sake of the righteousness of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Now we thank you, dear Lord Jesus, that you came into this world and that you were willing to live among us. That you declared through your teaching the Father's holy will, showing us our own foolishness and our rebellion and how much we warranted condemnation, but as well declaring to us your grace and mercy and love. And we pray tonight that we might experience that love as we ask you to forgive our sins and to receive us according to your promise. We pray that your Holy Spirit might live in us, might direct our thoughts and our words and our deeds. We pray that your Word would guide us and that you would help us through our study tonight to know better how to defend that word. We pray that you would fill us with the fruit of your spirit as we do defend it, that we might demonstrate not only the truth of the gospel by word, but also the truth of the gospel and our attitudes, our actions. We thank you that you have brought us here tonight. We ask for your blessing that you would be with us in Jesus name. Amen. All right, we're beginning a new unit in our study of apologetics. In the syllabus we've already gone through the unit on the lordship of Christ in the realm of knowledge and the conditions that are necessary for the apologetical task. In unit one, foundations having to do with the practice of defending the Christian faith, we saw that neutrality is not a possibility for the Christian. That we can't take a no one knows as yet attitude at the outset and in fact it's immoral to do so. It's right then and there a denial of the faith that we're defending if we try to be neutral about it in order to gain the respect of the world as we're defending the faith. We also noticed that unbelieving thought stands antithetically over against believing thought. That the way that the believer reasons is going to be different than the way the unbeliever reasons. We have a Different starting point, we have a different method of reasoning, we have different standards of evaluation, and we come to different conclusions. We also saw thirdly that God's revelation is necessary and foundational to the knowledge of anything, not just to the knowledge of what people might narrowly consider religious things, but is necessary for the knowledge of the world around us as well. To know the creation, we must know the Creator and the Creator's Word and therefore God's authority. That which we are defending as Christians is going to be defended as self authenticating. God's authority is the highest authority. Without it we couldn't know anything. There isn't anything beyond God's authority by which we could authorize His Word. And we noted that every system of thought, every philosophy, every school of thinking is, is going to have a similar kind of ultimate authority circularity about it. When all is said and done, one's ultimate authority is authorizing itself or it's not the ultimate authority. And so we see that the lordship of Christ is paramount to us as we defend the faith. In our second unit, we considered the conditions that would be necessary for carrying out apologetics, because three arguments or three objections might readily be raised against this presuppositional approach that I've just outlined. One would say that the presuppositionalist is being an obscurantist, unwilling to enter in meaningfully into a dialogue and debate with the unbeliever, and is just being kind of arrogant. We countered by saying no. There is a boldness to what we're saying, but it's a humble boldness. Because of the grace of God we have the privilege of seeing things a little more clearly than others, but we do not have that because we are smarter or wiser or somehow more righteous than other people. It has been argued against presuppositionalism that it leaves the unbeliever in utter ignorance. And yet we look at the world and we know that unbelievers have a lot of knowledge of things. And so presuppositionalism must be wrong. We countered by saying no, as a matter of fact, in principle, the unbeliever could not know anything. If the unbeliever would live up to what he says philosophically, if he would consistently keep to his presuppositions, he could know nothing. But we don't buy the premise. We don't take the assumption that the unbeliever is living up to those presuppositions. He says one thing and he does another. The unbeliever does not understand himself as well as God understands him and describes him in the Bible. Because God's revelation is inescapable, the unbeliever cannot escape knowing things and in fact does know things, but not on his terms. He knows things on God's terms. It has been argued against presuppositionalists that we wouldn't be able to communicate or cooperate with unbelievers at all because there's no common ground between us. Well, we've already said that in principle that might be true. And in principle the unbeliever couldn't know anything. But we want to add to that that there is all sorts of common ground. Everything that God has made and everything that happens in this world is common to believers and unbelievers. A rose is a rose is a rose. Whether you're a believer or an unbeliever, the symphony sounds the same to the believer as to the unbeliever. And everything in this world, every experience is common. It's just that the unbeliever can't account for that experience, can't account for the intelligibility of what's happening in the world, whereas we can. So we would say that there is common ground, but it's not neutral ground, it's God's ground. And then finally we noted that we can make a point of contact with the unbeliever, not in what the unbeliever says about himself or about the world, but our point of contact or jumping off spot and talking to an unbeliever is found in the image of God, that is in that person, because that person is made in the image of God. He or she can understand our witness, we can get through to them, we can make contact. And so we come to the third section of our apologetical syllabus and I realize there's been a measure of eagerness and maybe impatience because you all this is what you want to know. Well, how do you do this now, Dr. Bronson? How can we defend the faith? I mean, we understand what you're saying, we see what you write, or we may have seen you debate sometime. But how can we do that kind of thing? I mean, do we have to go to school and get a PhD in Philosophy and we have to be reading books all the time? No. And that's all I wanted to say tonight. Tonight's lesson. Basically, you don't have to do that, but since we have a little extra time, I'll elaborate a bit on that answer. No, you don't have to do that. In fact, one of the advantages of the presuppositional method of defending the faith, and I think it shows that it's founded in God's word, is it doesn't require formal education. Now what does? Well, then why get a formal education? Well, some people need to get a formal education because we talk to people at different stratas of society, right? And somebody's got to be able to talk the language of the people with a formal education. It helps sometimes to have a physicist to talk to a physicist or a philosopher to a philosopher or somebody who's interested in literature talking to somebody who's interested in literature. Okay? So if you want to talk the language of the intellectual, then you've got to study the language of the intellectual. And intellectuals are just as much sinners in need of God's grace as non intellectuals. I sometimes get a little hurt and maybe indignant when people start putting down the ivory tower intellectual and so forth. We want to deal with real people. They're real people. They have real hurts and real problems and real confusions and they're really going to go to hell just as much as other people are going to. So if you want to talk that language, just like if you wanted to witness to somebody in German, you'd have to learn German, wouldn't you? You wouldn't sit around and mope and complain saying, well, that's just not fair, I can't talk to these people in German. Well, if you want to talk in German, learn German. And if you want to talk to the university trained person in this day and age, you probably it would be helped to be a university trained person. That's the advantage, communication. It doesn't give you any more in terms of the foundations and the functions that you need to defend the faith, however, and I think you'll be convinced of that by the time we finish this unit. So how do we defend the faith then, whether we are university trained or not? Chapter 13 is entitled the Foolishness of Unbelief. And I think this opening paragraph kind of captures everything in a nutshell as to what you need to be doing. I should have added before I got off that university issue that even if you don't go to the university or even if you don't have a PhD, you can still defend the faith with university people. It's just it's going to take a large measure of humility on your part to not be intellectually bullied by them because you see, they will refer to things or authors or vocabulary that's unfamiliar to you. So if you have to stick to it, ness and the humility to say, now you explain that to me and I'll try to answer you, but don't try to just go leaping away with your fancy vocabulary. As long as you don't allow them to bully you in that way. You will notice that the simplest Christian can bring down a Socrates. You just need to know the issues and be very clear headed about them when you talk to people. Okay, so now what do you want to talk about? What do we want to do when we're defending the faith? This opening paragraph of chapter 13 says the central declaration and challenge of Christian apologetics is expressed by Paul's rhetorical question, hath not God made free foolish the wisdom of the world, which we find in First Corinthians 1:20. That's the theme of Christian apologetics. That's what you want to show the unbeliever. That's what you'll be able to do very simply, because the unbeliever will give you enough rope to hang himself or herself. And even if you don't know their system, all you need to do is say, talk about it, tell me what you believe and if you know what to look for, the unbeliever will show how foolish his or her system of thinking is. Now at this point you may say, well I can't be sure that that conclusion is true, Dr. Bonson, until I've worked out for myself the foolishness of all these different systems. That is, you're going to take kind of an empirical approach that says I'm going to test this one and test this one and test this one, and then finally I'll be convinced and I'll feel real confident that I can begin with this. I'm going to show the foolishness of unbelief. Well, but of course you're missing the point. I'm going to take you to the back of the book. I didn't say all these systems were foolish, God did. You need to begin on the authority of God, speaking in the Scriptures, knowing that regardless of what this person comes up with is going to turn out to be foolish, that God has made foolish the wisdom of this world. Apologetics begins with faith, trust and confidence in God. When God says that, you take it on, you say so, you believe that it's so. I grant you that the more you talk to people and the more you see their systems come crumbling down, the more confidence that will give you on a day to day kind of basis. But you can begin, and you must begin with the understanding that what you're there to do is nothing less than and apply a flamethrower to the unbeliever. This is not a ping pong game. This is not a polite sort of. I mean, it's supposed to be polite in the way you talk. But I mean, we're not. It's just not giving up a point here or there that we're talking about. We're talking about the whole enchilada. We're talking about the grand scheme of things. We're talking about what's real, how we know it and how we should live our lives. We're talking about the most basic fundamental questions that all men have to ask. What is this world? What's man's place in it? What's life all about? We're looking at the big questions. And on those you can't just say, well, I'll take a little bit of this and a little bit of that. And what we're going to say to the unbeliever, though I'm not suggesting tactically that what you want to start out with is a sentence, but what you want to be demonstrating to the unbeliever is that he or she has nothing to stand on. I still remember one of the better presuppositionalist students of our day coming to me at one point and saying, well now, Dr. Bronson, let me make sure I have this right. And said he now to my unbelieving professors, what I want to point out is not simply that I've got an answer for this problem and an answer for that problem and so forth, and very likely Christianity can stand up to their attack. But what I want to show them is that they've made the most fundamental ABC kinds of mistakes in philosophy, that on their system they couldn't know anything. I mean, I don't want to grant them any space at all. It's not like you've got some good stuff and I've got some good stuff, but my good stuff outweighs your good stuff. No, I want to say in principle you haven't got anything. I said, that's right. That's presuppositionalism. Well, it seems so simple. That's right, and it's effective. But they're not going to want to say they haven't gotten anything. They want it to be kind of, well, okay, you've challenged me more than I thought I could be challenged. I said, that's right. They aren't going to like that. As Dr. Van Till put it, you've got to apply the flamethrowers. We're going to pursue them into the caves and we're going to drive them out. There is no place to stand. You understand what we're doing now? We want to bring down the unbeliever's ability to know anything. The unbeliever says, well, you've got this problem in your system. We say, well, okay, let me answer that. Let's say the unbeliever shows me an alleged discrepancy in the Bible. Now, out of courtesy and to show him that I'm not just trying to run away from things, I may go find an answer to that discrepancy. Okay, so you may have to do a little bit of homework. You may have a few of these tucked away. You know, you know how to deal with. Any believer says, well, you know how. How can creation be true? There's all this evolutionary evidence. And you go, oh, all this evolutionary evidence, Would you. I'm not. My file on evolutionary evidence is empty at home. Could you please tell me what I might put in there and deal with them on that? Or they, they show some historical discrepancy in the Bible and you try to give them an answer for that. But then you see after 1, 2, 3 such things you're going to want to eventually say to the unbeliever. Now, we could go on talking like this, and my guess is you'd probably come up with objection after objection after objection, and I could come up with objection after objection, objection. But what we really have to ask is how do we know anything at all? What really is the basis for any knowledge whatsoever in terms of your outlook on life? How do you know what you know? What do you think is real, and why do you say what you do? What is the basis for your statement? And when you force the unbeliever into that arena of a discussion of his world and life view, his outlook on reality and knowledge and behavior, then it will not take long for you to show him that, as a matter of fact, he's taken many things for granted that he has no right to take for granted, and that the things he takes for granted, ironically, all come from a Christian outlook on life. Because in a Christian outlook on life, the regularity of nature can be taken for granted. The Christian outlook on life. We can't assume that there is a correspondence between our mind and the world outside our mind. In the Christian approach to life, there is a foundation for the universality of the laws of logic. And there is a way in which the non material world of thinking can be in touch with the material world which is not thought thinking. Some of these fundamental philosophical questions that he will not be able to answer as an unbeliever because he just takes all that for granted. We can supply the presuppositions and then of course you will notice eventually that he will not want to have those things supplied by you. He'll want to say, no, we can come up with another philosophy. The minute the unbeliever is on the run looking for a philosophy to do what the Christian philosophy can do, realizing that his taken for granted philosophy has not worked, you've got him. Don't let him go at that point, because that's when he's not going to want to talk very much. I'm going to have to go do some study. And so he's. Now wait a minute, wait a minute. Does that mean you're not going to balance your checkbook or drive your car or draw any other ethical conclusions until you've worked all this out? What are you going to do in the meantime? How do you account for the things you've known up to this point? And that's where witnessing becomes very personal. You say, is it not the case that you have really known the God that I've been talking about all along and now you're just frightened to death to face him? And that's why you want to go looking for a philosophy. You've got your conclusion and now you're looking for a reason for it. And in philosophy we call that rationalizing. There must be some reason why I'm right. I know what my conclusion will be, but I haven't got the premises for it yet. So I'm going to go looking for them. And you want to betray. You see his basic lack of integrity as a scholar. At that point you want to point out to the unbeliever you're cheating. You're cheating because you don't want to lose this argument. Too much is at stake. And then you got to tell him, give up. The only way you're going to win is by confessing that sin and letting Jesus Christ save you. So, have I said anything so far that sounds so intellectual or doctoral candidate kind of stuff that you couldn't follow? Of course not. You can do this and you can learn to do it with the issues that you understand best and the vocabulary that is most comfortable to you. What you must show the unbeliever after you've done him the favor of answering some of his questions. You know, if Christianity is true, why are there Jim Bakers in this world? And the kind of, you know, pop problems that are brought up after you deal with those things, you need to force him to the foundational questions. When you force him to the foundational questions, you will show how foolishness, how foolish his philosophy of life is. It doesn't make possible any knowledge. And then you will see him begin to look for some other alternative to Christianity. And then you're going to move in and say that that's one of the fundamental sins of a inconsistency and arbitrariness, and you're guilty of both now. So the central declaration and challenge of the Christian apologist is what Paul said in First Corinthians. Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? Begin with the confidence that God has made foolishness foolish the wisdom in this world. And now it's just up to you to pull the curtain back and show the garbage. You know, what you're doing is not creating foolishness. All you're doing is pointing to it. You know, the little boy in the story that the king has no clothes? The little boy didn't take the king's clothes off. He just said, look at that. The king doesn't have any clothes on. Of course, that was enough to. To earn him a lot of scorn and disfavor. And it may earn you some scorn and disfavor, but you see, all you need to do is point to the nakedness of the unbeliever's philosophy. You're not going to have to work real hard to do that. Trust me, you won't. Because as I said, if you let the unbeliever talk long enough, he will hang himself. You know, back when I was traveling a bit more than I do now, in airports, you run into people a lot. And when you're waiting for planes or on planes, people, there are some more or less normal people, but there are people that want to talk about things, and there are religious groups that want to push a philosophy or something. And it would be tempting or it would be natural to think, well, man, I'm going to have to read up on all this junk that I'm running into, you know, this particular sect of the Hare Krishnas or whatever it may be. So I know their theology. After a while, I realize I don't have to go reading all their stuff. I've got books and books in my library, and sometimes I have to refer to it. But for the most part, I haven't Got to read up on their stuff. I just have to say, talk to me, tell me what you believe. And, you know, after a while, they're finally going to put the two things together that are going to come into conflict. And I'm going to step in and say, now wait a minute, let me give an example of this. Real easy example of this. I'm in the airport talking to somebody who wants to give me a basically Hindu understanding of reality. The Hindu Eastern way of looking at reality says that the distinctions that we experience in this world, the differences between you and me or us and the trees and the sky and everything around us, all distinctions are illusion. And it's because we think in terms of these distinctions that we get into trouble in this world. That reality, ultimate reality, is one. Everything's united, and there are no distinctions. There are no distinctions of color, no distinctions of place or time or person or economic distinctions or anything like that. All of nature, all of reality, everything is united into one. And so the problem that I have as a Westerner here in this airport, thinking in these, you know, Christian, capitalistic, greedy, nature destroying, personally alienating terms, a problem I have is that I'm thinking in terms of distinctions. And I need to get away from that. I need to meditate upon the oneness of the things. And eventually it will come to the place where I will not have to go through the wheel of life anymore, I will not have to be reincarnated anymore, and I will enter into the state of mind known as nirvana. In Nirvana, you see, the drop falls into the boundless ocean and is lost forever in the oneness of being. And when that day comes, then all of my troubles will be gone and I won't have to return as an aardvark and work my way up, you know, through whatever the system is to Nirvana. Now, you've been listening to this story. What has it taken four or five minutes to tell you the story? This is an outlook on life. If you were sitting in the airport, would you just say someone who told you all that they've given you a gospel, right? They said, look, there's good news. Nirvana is ahead. How long will it take you to get there? All depends upon the state of your meditation. Are you going to give up this, you know, thinking in terms of distinctions and this greedy, capitalistic way of doing things? Are you going to start meditating and trying to get closer to Nirvana? Well, so I say to this sect of Hindus that want to promote that point of view, well, I have a little bit of a Difficulty in what you've told me because you have assumed that I am one place now where essentially everything I see is Maya illusion. Because I'm thinking in terms of distinctions and because I'm in that illusory way of thinking, I keep having to go through this wheel of life. I've been coming back here over and over and over again. I just can't get it right. And I'll be saved. I'll be helped. I can get to that state of mind known as Nirvana if I start thinking the way you're telling me to think. That's right. Sounds like maybe a convert's on the way. Right. But then, you see, that assumes that where I am now is not Nirvana. But what you just told me is all of the error in my thinking is tied to the fact that I believe in distinctions between things. Distinctions of time or place, place or person or thing. And if there are no distinctions, then there can be no difference between where I am now and Nirvana. And therefore, in terms of your philosophy, I am in Nirvana now. And thanks for the cup of coffee, but my plane is about ready to leave now. Did that slip past anybody? On the one hand, I am told that distinctions are impossible. They are illusion. On the other hand, I'm being told there is a distinction between where I am now and the state of mind known as Nirvana. And you see, I didn't have to work hard at that. There was no sweat in this. I just had to listen. And by listening closely, I will find these people have a philosophy that contradicts itself, that says on the one hand that there are no distinctions, and yet on the other hand, that there are. Alright, so what I'm getting at is that God has made foolish the wisdom of this world. So let the wise guys of this world talk and talk and talk. And if you know how to listen and you know how to pick up the pieces, you will show their contradictions. You will show that on their basis they couldn't know anything. Let me see if I can get through this paragraph. Critical attacks which are leveled against the Christian faith in the world of thought cannot be met by piecemeal replies and appeals to emotion. In the long run, the believer must respond to the onslaught of the unbeliever by attacking the unbeliever's position at its foundations. He must challenge the unbeliever's presuppositions, asking whether knowledge is even possible given the non Christian's assumptions and perspective. That's it. We're going to be asking in one form or Another, we're going to be asking, could we know anything if what you believed about the world is true? If your philosophy of life were accepted, would knowledge of anything even be possible? The Christian cannot forever be defensively constructing atomistic answers to the endless variety of unbelieving criticisms. We must at some point take the offensive and show the unbeliever that he has no intelligible place to stand. He has no consistent epistemology, I.e. no consistent theory of knowledge. He has no justification for meaningful discourse. I mean, eventually you'll be able to show the unbeliever that even your talking would be impossible if what he said about the world were true. There's no justification for predication. When you say the barn is red, you're predicating redness of the barn. And that most simple sentence would be impossible on an unbelieving approach to life. There would be no basis for argumentation. The pseudo wisdom of the world must be reduced to foolishness. In which case, none of the unbelievers criticisms have any force. If you want to neutralize the unbeliever, what you want to show is that he doesn't have a place to stand when he wants to criticize your position. And that it's really an unconditional surrender situation. It's all or nothing. He'll have to accept that he knows nothing. Or he'll have to accept the good news of the gospel that you're offering. That can account for the knowledge he has and also take care of his eternal well being. Dr. Van Till said before, the unbeliever is able to shoot his big guns at us. By that he meant like the big tanks and so forth and the cannons. The unbelievers first going to have to find a foundation to plant them on, right? You know, the problem that the Germans had in trying to aim cannons across the English Channel from the Netherlands is that the soil in the Netherlands was so soggy, you know, and they just couldn't get a foundation sufficient for their cannons. And Dr. Van Till, being from the Netherlands, must have remembered that because he used that example over and over again. He said, before Big Bertha can fire anything, Big Bertha's got to be planted somewhere. And before the unbeliever can aim his big guns at us, he's going to have to find a place to plant those cannons so that when they go off, they don't just shoot back at him. And we're going to show there is no place to stand. The biggest reason the unbeliever will not want to follow Your argument to its conclusion is you say, now wait a minute, that can't be right because I do know things. Things. And since I do know things, your proof that I couldn't know things has got to be wrong. And what you want to show is you do know things, but you can't account for what you know, not on the philosophy you've been giving me. And so in apologetics our aim is going to be to show the foolishness of unbelief. We better understand what the Scriptures understand by a fool then. And this is what chapter 13 does. And it's easy to understand from this point on. So I'll just try to summarize it and then we'll end our lesson for tonight. In the scriptural perspective, the fool is not basically a shallow minded, illiterate ignoramus. You know, we hear Mr. T say, you fool, we think, you know, that kind of person that gets that kind of response is what the Bible's talking about not true. When the Bible speaks of a fool, it's talking about somebody who may be very smart, very literate, very with it, very educated, but very foolish. And so what does the Bible mean by a fool? A person is a fool because he's forsaken the source of true wisdom, which is God, in order to rely on his own self sufficient intellectual powers. In Proverbs 15:5 the fool is called unteachable. In Proverbs 12:15, the way of a fool is right in his own eyes. That's what a fool is, a person, you see, who can't be taught. He assumes that he's right in his own eyes. He's got this self sufficient, he's accepted his his position as true and not in need of correction. He has self confidence and imagines himself to be a law unto himself, Autonomous. As Proverbs 28:26 says, he who trusts in his own heart is a fool. He can't imagine that he's mistaken. Proverbs 17:10. He judges matters according to his own pre established standards. And that's why his thoughts always turn out to be right in the long run, because on his standards he couldn't possibly be wrong. Proverbs 14:16. The fool bears himself insolently and is confident. Proverbs 29:11 says, he loves to utter his own mind. Now see, there's the fool's understanding of himself. But in actuality this autonomous man is dull. He's stubborn, boorish, obstinate, he's stupid. He professes himself to be wise. But from the opening of his mouth, it's clear that he is a fool. As Proverbs 17:28 says, he would seem wiser if he keep his mouth closed. The heart of fools proclaims foolishness. He flaunts his folly. He eats it up unreflectingly, poor pours it out, and in a gross but memorable proverb, he returns to it like a dog to his vomit. This is an important psychological insight that the Bible gives us. The fool does not really want to find the truth. In the end, the truth is secondary to self justification. That's a very hard thing to say, but it's very true. Unfortunately, it's true of many of us who are Christians too. Truth would be great if we could have it. But in the end, the most important thing is that I appear to be right. The unbeliever is infected with that. He feigns objectivity. But as Proverbs 18:2 says, A fool has no delight in understanding, but only that his heart may reveal itself. He's committed to his own presuppositions at autonomy, so he won't depart from evil. He has lying lips, he talks proudly. And as the proverb says, a fool's mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul. You see why when you go into the airport, no matter what philosophy of life greets you there, you can say, just keep talking. His lips will be the snare of his soul. He will, by his own foolishness, trip himself up. How does a man become such a self deluded, allegedly autonomous fool? Well, Proverbs 1:7 tells you the beginning of knowledge is the fear of the Lord. But fools hate what wisdom and instruction. That's how he becomes a fool, because he won't begin with reverence for God. That's another reason why you want to pull the rug out from under him when you're doing apologetics. You don't want to get him to flatter himself thinking, well, I've got all this knowledge about science or logic or history or whatever it may be, and I've got these Christians on the run. You want to pull the rug out from under him because if he doesn't learn to humble himself before God and reverence God, he can't really know anything. Scripture describes people who do not know God or his ways and his judgments as foolish people. Fools live in practical ignorance of God because as we read in Psalm 14, the fool says, in his heart there is no God. Out of the heart are the issues of life. The fool lives as though there were no God in that sense. There are some people who are practical atheists who nevertheless profess to believe in God. But out of the heart, where the issues of life stem, they are fools because they say there is no God. Well, of course, those who say there is no God God, those who deny the Christian God also have that problem, that from the heart they live that way they live and reason atheistically. They serve the creature rather than the Creator. Romans 1:25 tells us, you remember the story of the wise man who built his house upon the sand, excuse me, upon the rock. Whereas the foolish man built built upon the sand. Jesus said, well now what is the sand rock contrast all about? Jesus says, my word is rock. Those who don't build upon the word of Jesus Christ are then building where? On the sand. And who is it that builds on the sand? The fool. The Bible. Whether you look at Proverbs or Romans 1, or the Parables of Jesus, the Bible is consistent about that. Foolishness means not beginning with God's authority, reverencing him and letting his Word be your foundation. The fool is the one who doesn't make God and his revelation the starting point of his thinking. Let's turn to 1 Corinthians, chapters 1 2, and we'll do our scripture reading at the end of our lesson tonight. Try to bring this all to a head for you. First Corinthians 1:2. I'll begin reading in the 17th. For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel. Not in cleverness, actually, the wisdom of words, cleverness of speech. That the cross of Christ should not be made void. For the word of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness, but to us who are being saved. It is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will set aside. Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? How's not God made friends foolish the wisdom of this world. For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For indeed Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified to Jews, a stumbling block to Gentiles foolishness. But to those who are called, called both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. And God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong and the base things of the world. And the despise. God has chosen the things that are not that he might nullify the things that are. That no man should boast before God, but by his doing. You are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption, that, just as it is written, let him who boasts boast in the Lord. And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, the him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit. And of course, power. That your faith should not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. Yet we do not. Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature. A wisdom, however, not of this age, nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away. But we speak God's wisdom in a mystery. The hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory. The wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood. For if they had understood it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But just as it is written, things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man. All that God has prepared for those who love him. For to us God revealed them through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the Spirit of the man which is in him? Even so, the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God. Which things we also speak not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit. Comparing spiritual things things was spiritual. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised. By no man so who has known the mind of the Lord that he should instruct him. We have the mind of Christ. So as we do our work in Christian apologetics, be assured that God has made f foolish the wisdom of this world and that our power doesn't come from the persuasiveness of human wisdom, but our power comes from the Gospel, the foolishness that God has revealed to us, and the power of His Spirit. And God in His grace will be able to use that kind of humble but powerful testimony to bring the wise things to of this world to nothing. I assure you, whether you have a university training or not, you will be able to do it. But you'll only be able to do it if you embark on the path that we've started with tonight to show the foolishness of unbelief, not just that it's wrong at this or that point, but that it's fundamentally wrong and couldn't know anything. Do you have any questions you'd like to ask? All right, if there aren't any questions, we'll continue our lesson a week from this Lord's day, Lord willing, in Sunday school, where Pastor Curto and I will be making the switch. He will be here on Thursday nights and I'll be doing Sunday school. And we'll begin with chapter 14, a two fold apologetical procedure. And when we finish the syllabus, which I hope to do before our quarter is up, then I will go to dealing with some practical problems in apologetics and try to give you some illustrations on how to answer them.