Defenders
of the Faith-Apply Apologetics! By
Kelly Durant 3-18-12
On trial in
the Methodist board in England, they were trying to persecute William Booth to stop
his evangelistic activity which would bring the poor in the church. He was hearing
the authority and then it came his turn to speak. He was silent a moment, and
then Catherine stood up in the back and shouted, “Don’t you shilly shally!”
Meaning, don’t procrastinate, to be so slow to answer! He must have been embarrassed!
But the Booths influence is still with us today because they were a team
defending the right!
Have you
ever been slow to respond when unjust people are imposing their values on you?
Probably most all of us have at some time or another. We must prepare. We must
know their arguments and then be ready to respond. 1 Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord
God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that
asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:
All your
life as a Christian you will be challenged, made fun of, and provoked by those
who have everything in their minds mixed up, these are the people with their
minds fashioned by the corrupt worldviews of the day or false doctrines. These
people are always confused and the author of confusion is Satan and we must
answer him back when he uses people around us! To defend the faith implies we
need…
Apologetics:
Apologetics (from Greek ἀπολογία, "speaking in defense") is the
discipline of defending a position (often religious) through the systematic use
of information. It is not an apology as some minds might deduct it is a polemic
stance with intelligent defense! How intellectually prepared are you to defend
Christ? To defend you must be opinionated; you have a right to believe what you
choose! Never let another person intimidate you that you must accept heresy!
Focus: Tertullian
(c. 160 – c. 225} was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against
heresy. Tertullian is called "the father of Latin Christianity"[3]
and "the founder of Western theology."[4] Though conservative, he did
originate and advance new theology to the early Church. He is perhaps most
famous for being the oldest extant Latin writer to use the term Trinity (Latin
trinitas),[5] and giving the oldest extant formal exposition of a Trinitarian
theology.
The theology
of God the Father, God the Son, and God the holy Spirit as being equal in power
still stands today due to him, which formulated the Nicene Creed, or Apostles
Creed which was written in the 4th century. The opposing view of the Arians, that God is
superior and that Christ really is nothing, being inferior, provoked a war for
centuries and thousands died defending the stance of the truth of the Trinity!
Even today, the Unitarians, Jehovah’s Witness and other sects still support the
rejected for centuries Arian view! It is called Arian because it is from the
teachings of Arius ( AD 250–336), an Egyptian who taught the primitive church
his misguided doctrine. And how much conviction do you have?
To take an
example of apologetics on the trinity look with me at: Doctrine 3 of the
Salvation Army says what? We believe that there are three persons in the Godhead - the Father, the
Son and the Holy Ghost - undivided in essence and co-equal in power and glory.
In the
history of the Christian church, Tertullian, was used by God to persuade the
Romans to respect the Christian worldview as valid. Among his apologetic
writings, the Apologeticus, addressed to the Roman magistrates, is a most
pungent defense of Christianity and the Christians against the reproaches of
the pagans, and an important legacy of the ancient Church, proclaiming the
principle of freedom of religion as an inalienable human right and he demanded
a fair trial for Christians before they are condemned to death.
In other
words, we have the freedom to read about Tertullian today instead of some pagan
Romulus and Remus because he was a hero and a bold Christian who fought for the
rights of those of the true Christian faith. He approached the authorities with
the risk of getting himself killed! So he was polemic and opinionated,
politically involved in defense of Christ, and intelligent in his arguments. He
was a model for all of us!
Christian
conservative stances in todays’ world that are reported upon more and more as
stupid and antiquated as the propaganda news channels repeat to everyone
subliminally and overtly that no one intelligent would ever be biased or
express religious convictions. For decades now Satan has been at work in all
the media outlets to discredit Christians like you and me. It is time to fight
back with intelligence and persuasiveness.
What a lie
people have swallowed that no one must ever mix politics and religion! The
politicians impose their immorality and escape the even the law. They say, keep
your morals, religions, and opinion to yourself! How shameful they want to make
you look if you offer intellectual discourse going against the grain of the corrupt
society exposing that it is their debauchery that is bankrupting the nation!
We are
living in times as it was in Isa. day, Isaiah 5:20
Woe unto
them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light
for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
The world is
going to hell before our eyes so we must improve in our apologetics! It is our
fight, this one against evil in the world, defending the thing most dear to us,
our loving savior Jesus Christ! The one who frees us from the slavery of sin!
A true
gardener does not just love the flowers, he also hates the weeds that would
kill the flowers! The same it must be with Christians, we must combat the
popularization and acceptance of evil systems that destroy each person’s
salvation, hope, and health! Actually,
there are quite a few Christian groups in the world that protest against sins
and the heretical blasphemers of the Holy Scriptures but notice how they are
ignored, attacked, and mocked by the news!
But the
blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church! Rome couldn’t wipe out the
Christians by mass extinction in the Coliseum! No nation can stop Christians,
not even the Communists, where 26 million were killed under Mao Tse Tung, and
10 million under Stalin, and who knows how many under Castro and others! But we
are responsible for not letting the truth of the Holy Scriptures disappear!
What we as a
church must focus on is the spreading of our faith, which includes right living
or holiness, as this was the fight of our movement’s founding fathers. Our
apologetics come to light as we vocalize to others how we combat sin, poverty,
and addictions. The Salvation Army is most effective in these areas.
Each church
movement has its niche in the world, Our niche is evangelism as a means to
overcome deep seated sin to bring each one into light and holiness! There are
multi-millions we have educated in God’s word to become clean useful citizens
for the rest of their time on earth and they will continue on in holiness
eternally in God’s Kingdom! Satan would love to stop us!
If you want
to know how to strengthen your faith in apologetics, start digging through the
historical books of church history. Start asking yourself, “why, do I believe
what I do”?
Today I took
the tried and proven Trinity doctrine as a practice run. But now let’s play the
devil’s advocate a minute and ask some hard questions. A Muslim would confront
you on this belief that you are worshipping not just one God but 3 gods and
therefore you are a pagan being polytheistic and a heretic must die! What are
you going to answer to that? (pause)
To answer you
might have to do a personal Bible study to discover that the Son, Jesus, and
the Holy Spirit, have been with God ever since the beginning. Many verses in
the O.T confirm this, such as the Holy, Holy, Holy salute to God, but in the
end 3 being one in equality is in the essence of the N.T. and justifiability
considered a mystery. Ephesians 3:9
And to make
all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of
the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ.
It is sort
of like the egg, with the shell, the white, and the yolk, all three make up the
egg, but we just accept Jesus words who commanded us to Matt 28: 19 Go ye
therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: (in other words these three are required and
are therefore equal in authority, being though different in their
manifestations)
A Jehovah
witness would tell you that you have the Trinity all misunderstood. That the
Father is dominant, so the son just had to obey Him and therefore the son is
just a man so you must pray only to Jehova. Say what?! By this they strip Jesus
of His redemptive importance insulting to God! John 16:26 At that day ye shall ask in my
name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you:
So Jesus
makes it clear everyone must now get to the Father through Him only!
Heretics arguing
from ignorance, or from Satan’s logic, contradict basic doctrines or
conservative principles that have been debated and resolved by the most
intelligent Bible scholars of all time for centuries and centuries.
You have to
conclude that argumentative people, people who will not accept that intelligent
anointed by God men must be right in their teachings, are just honestly mentally
challenged and have a reduced capacity to reason and apply abstract logic, or
they are full of pride wanting to show off, or they just love to divide and
take away the peace from others! With misinformed people we will show some
tolerance, but with prideful people causing division we must expose it for what
it is, and reject those who promote heretical stances contradicting God, from
satan himself.
Proverbs 26:12
Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool
than of him .
Everyone has
an idea of right and wrong, but please Christians, defend the faith when you
know there is a verbal or unjust attack happening. Start doing your research in
your Bible, in the library, or on the internet as to why you defend the truth
of what is right!
The
challenge I give you today is to be bold and courageous because as the word
says 2 Timothy 3:13But evil men and
seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived. 2 Timothy 2:15Study to shew thyself
approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing
the word of truth. Are preparing yourself to fight the good fight of faith? Ask
Jesus for wisdom, and ask Him for a passion to defend the right things of God,
His truth!
