Tag Archive for: apologetics

7 Legit Reasons Why So Many Kids are Bored by Church

Last Sunday, our church did its annual multilingual service, with three congregations—Mandarin-speaking, Spanish-speaking, and English-speaking—all coming together for worship. We had readings in multiple languages, and a sermon was given in Spanish with an English translator. There was no Sunday school this week, so kids joined their parents in adult church.

When we informed our kids Sunday morning of what would be happening, there was a collective and passionate, “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!” (Honestly, I should have typed more o’s to reflect the true level of protest.)

“PLEASE, let us stay home! We can do home church! Please, not THAT service! It’s SO BORING!”

Apparently, they remembered it well from the prior year. We dragged them into the car in spite of the whining and endured their pleas all the way there.

I’d be lying if I said this was a rare occurrence of my kids not wanting to go to church. The nature of this service perhaps made them complain more loudly than normal, but there are plenty of typical Sundays when our kids ask, “Do we have to go?” I’d bet a lot of money that you’ve been asked the same.

The question of what to do when kids don’t want to go to church has been one of the most frequent ones I’ve received over the years from readers, and it’s one of the most commonly discussed questions in various Christian parenting forums (you can join my own Christian parenting group on Facebook by clicking here).

The running theme of kids’ complaints is usually that church is boring, and they don’t want to go because of it. Parents tend to assume it’s their job to convince their kids that church isn’t boring and are looking for ways to do so.

But that’s a really bad assumption.

I think there are actually quite a few legitimate reasons why so many kids are bored by the church and/or Sunday school. In other words, kids aren’t always just making up random excuses to not go; a lot of times, their avoidance reflects a genuine problem.

Here are several “legit” reasons for boredom at church that parents should consider.

There’s too much emphasis on fun at Sunday school.

This probably sounds counterintuitive. After all, if Sunday school is a lot of fun, then kids should want to go, right? No, no, and no. Now, if Sunday school truly was some kind of incredible amusement park-like experience, that could be the case (and kids would choose to go for the wrong reasons). But Sunday school “fun” usually consists of relatively mild amusement like crafts, foosbal, or maybe an indoor relay race using spoons and M&Ms.

This kind of “fun” can never compete with your child’s idea of fun at home, where they can do anything they want.

Of course, they will want to stay home; church fun is boring compared to home fun. When a Sunday school program focuses on entertainment, this is the natural apples-to-apples comparison a kid’s going to make. Who can blame them?

If most of what your kid takes away from church is that there’s a little lesson with a lot of social time, you’re going to have a hard time convincing them that “church” isn’t boring (when “church” is Sunday school entertainment in their mind).

“Adult” church is beyond their current grasp.

Parents sometimes try to get around the lack of substance found in many Sunday school programs by keeping their kids with them in “adult” church each week. This can work really well for some kids. My 11-year-old daughter has recently been opting out of Sunday school to come with us to adult church because she’s able to follow along and says she learns much more than in class. When my 9-year-old daughter saw that her sister was doing this, she wanted to come too. But when she did, she spent most of the service with her head on my shoulder trying to sleep—she just doesn’t have the interest or attention span yet that my older daughter does. When she told me after church that day that it was boring, I told her, “Of course it was! You chose to sleep!”

For kids like my older daughter, who want to attend adult church in lieu of Sunday school, this can be a great choice. But for those like my younger one who aren’t ready to track with what’s being taught and instead spend the time doodling in a bulletin or daydreaming, boredom will be the inevitable outcome. That doesn’t necessarily mean that kids’ Sunday school will be seen as less boring, but rather that adult church isn’t always the answer.

Their family attends church sporadically.

Every pastor I know laments the fact that families are attending church with less regularity than they used to, for all kinds of reasons (Sunday morning sports being a big one). A “regular” attender is now someone attending once per month.

I know this is going to rub some people the wrong way, but it’s important to say: A church could have the best Sunday school program in the world, but if a family only attends sporadically, it’s natural that a child will find it boring—they’re not really connected to what’s going on or what’s being taught. You can’t blame a kid for mentally checking out at that point.

Faith in their family is mostly about going to church on Sundays.

Even if your family attends church every week, if you’re not regularly praying together, studying the Bible together, and having conversations about faith at home, your kids will rightly wonder why they should bother going to church. Church will come to be seen as just one more thing they have to do each week, without any meaningful connection to their daily lives. In other words, it will become an unnecessary time burden in their minds because it’s irrelevant for the rest of the week.

They regularly engage in deep faith conversations at home.

Here’s another counterintuitive point, but I’ve seen it happen in a lot of families that are very committed to their faith. If your family consistently has deep faith conversations (the kinds I write about in my books, Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side and Talking with Your Kids about God), in all likelihood your kids are gaining a far more intellectually robust faith than they’ll get from the average Sunday school—and Sunday school will seem extremely boring in comparison. A telltale sign that this is the problem is when your kids complain they aren’t “learning anything” or say that it’s the “same stories over and over.”

Though parents often assume there’s some kind of problem with their kids’ spiritual development when they don’t want to attend Sunday school, it can mean the opposite in this case; kids may simply have much higher expectations for what should be discussed in a Sunday school environment and be bored by the 600^th telling of Noah’s ark followed by popcorn.

They have doubts about God or the truth of Christianity.

It should be obvious, but I’m surprised how many parents never consider this possibility: If kids have stopped believing in God or in the truth of Christianity, they’re going to find church boring.

Imagine for a moment that you had to attend a church (or other group) you didn’t agree with every single week, and someone expected you to take interest. They study a book you think is fiction but apply it as truth in their lives and think you should too. Chances are, you’d find that boring because you don’t believe what they do. Why study a fictional book so deeply each week?

In the same way, kids who no longer hold a faith in Jesus are going to get tired of hearing about Him every Sunday. It’s outside the scope of this post to weigh the pros and cons of making such kids attend church, but there are two points for our current purpose to take away here:

If your kids find church boring and/or fight you on going, have a conversation with them about what they currently believe regarding God, Jesus, and the Bible. You may be surprised by what you learn.
If you discover that their boredom with the church is rooted in unbelief, your greater concern (by far) should be to discuss their doubts and to have conversations about the evidence for the truth of Christianity.

They’re human.

On the drive to the church service I described at the beginning of this post, I turned to the kids in the back of the car and said, “Hey guys. I have something surprising to tell you.” They got quiet, and I continued.

“I don’t feel like going to church today either. I don’t really enjoy this particular service. I would rather be at home this morning.”

They looked at me with wide eyes, anticipating we might go home.

“But I’m going anyway. You see, as humans, it’s often easiest and very tempting to stay home from church on Sunday mornings. That’s a totally normal feeling, and adults have it too sometimes. But we make it a priority to go in spite of those occasional feelings for several reasons: 1) It’s one way of putting God first in our lives (by committing to church each Sunday morning); 2) Church isn’t only about learning—it’s also about worship, and worship transforms our relationship with God; and 3) It’s important to develop relationships with other believers and be in community (Hebrews 10:25). I’m not going to church this morning because I can’t think of anything else I’d like to be doing, but rather because I love the Lord, and this is one way I put him first.”

In other words, I explained to them why their boredom shouldn’t be the deciding factor in attending church.

I didn’t try to convince them that they shouldn’t ever think the church is boring.

This is a critical distinction for kids to understand because as I’ve hopefully shown in this post, there are many legitimate reasons why kids may find church boring at times. When they understand why church matters even when they find it boring, it can lead to far more productive conversations than just ramming heads every Sunday morning.

Stay tuned for next week’s blog post, when I’ll do a cover reveal with the table of contents for my new book coming in March! I’m so excited to share it with you! Also, I’m running a giveaway of four of my books on my blog’s Facebook page through December 5. If you don’t follow me there already or haven’t seen it, click over!

Was the Deity of Christ A Legendary Development?

Jesus Christ, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Ryan Leasure

Skeptics of all stripes vehemently deny the deity of Christ. Besides their a priori commitment to philosophical naturalism, a major argument they put forth is that the earliest Christians didn’t believe Jesus was divine. Rather, this belief in his deity was a legendary development, as evidenced by the four Gospels.

It’s the skeptics’ contention that the earliest Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) don’t teach a divine Jesus at all. Instead, they portray a very human Jesus. It’s not until the Gospel of John, written some sixty years after Jesus’ death, that we find a clear reference to Jesus’ divinity.

The argument goes; these Gospels reflect what the earliest communities believed about Jesus. Thus, the earlier Gospels, which don’t portray the deity of Christ, suggest that the earliest communities didn’t believe in the deity of Christ. Once we get to John, however, legends of Jesus’ divine nature have had time to spread throughout the Christian community, hence the high Christology in John.

Bart Erhman, Of Course, Agrees

Bart Ehrman sums up this view in this article:

The problem is that the only Gospel of the New Testament, where Jesus makes divine claims about himself is the Gospel of John. In the three earlier Gospels, you do not find Jesus saying things like “I and the Father are One,” or “Before Abraham was, I am,” or “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” These sayings are found only in the Fourth Gospel, as are all the other “I am” sayings, in which Jesus identifies himself as the one who has come from heaven to earth for the salvation of all who believe in him.

He goes on to say:

The most common way that scholars have explained this almost inexplicable omission in the Synoptic Gospels is simply that their authors did not think of Jesus as a divine being who was equal with God and pre-existed his birth, who became incarnate as the God-Man…

And the ultimate payoff is that this view of the Fourth Gospel is not the view of the historical Jesus himself. It is a later view put on his lips by the author of John or his sources.

Is Ehrman right? Was the deity of Christ a legendary development as he suggests? I don’t think so for at least two reasons.

Paul Writes Earlier Than the Gospels

First, hardly anyone disputes the fact that Paul wrote his letters before the Synoptic Gospels. And interestingly enough, Paul has an incredibly high Christology. Consider these two texts:

Romans 9:5

To them (the Jews) belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.

Writing sometime in the mid-fifties, here’s a clear reference to the deity of Christ. The legendary hypothesis doesn’t seem to work here. Nor does it with the next text.

Philippians 2:5-11

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

There’s little doubt this text proclaims Jesus as the pre-existent God of the universe. Paul gives us at least two reasons for reaching this conclusion.

First, he states that Jesus was “in the form of God.” The word for “form” in the Greek is morphe, which denotes the exact substance or nature of something.

Second, Paul suggests that Jesus was equal with God when he wrote that Jesus “did not count equality with God something to be grasped.”

What is especially interesting is that even though Paul penned these words, scholars agree that this portion of Philippians was an early Christian hymn dating much earlier than Paul’s letter itself.

In other words, the pre-Pauline Christian community sang these words in their corporate gatherings and collectively worshipped Jesus as God.

Larry Hurtado highlights this truth:

The singing/chanting of such odes is one of several phenomena that demonstrate the remarkable and innovative nature of early Christian worship, in which Jesus was programmatically included in the “devotional pattern” of early Christian circles along with God, and in ways otherwise reserved for God.1

While Ehrman and other skeptics try to persuade the masses that nobody believed in the deity of Christ until the end of the first century, Paul’s writings seem to indicate otherwise.

The Synoptic Gospels Highlight the Deity Of Christ Too

The second reason we should reject the legendary hypothesis is that the Synoptics, though not as explicit as John, still portray a divine Jesus. Let me give you a few examples:

Matthew 1:23

Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. And they shall call his name Immanuel, which means God with us.

From the very beginning, Matthew seems to indicate that this baby Jesus would be pretty special. Divine actually. His very name would mean “God with us” — a clear expression of the incarnation.

Mark 2:5-7

After the men had lowered the paralytic man down through the roof, Mark reports:

And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

The scribes ask a crucial question. Who can forgive sins but God alone? Of course, the answer is no one. Yet, we have Jesus pronouncing forgiveness upon this paralytic man, and backing up his pronouncement with a healing miracle.

Luke 1:16-17

As the forerunner of Jesus, Luke speaks of John the Baptist:

And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared.

John’s prophetic role was to prepare the people of Israel for the coming Lord. And we know, based on the rest of the text, that coming Lord was Jesus himself.

Matthew 28:18-19

Jesus proclaims in the famous Great Commission:

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Here at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus lumps himself in with the Trinity — God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Notice he uses the singular for “name” not plural “names.” In other words, Jesus understood himself as one with the Father and Spirit.

Mark 14:62

As Jesus stood on trial, the Jewish leaders asked if he was the Son of God. He unashamedly affirmed:

“I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One coming on the clouds of heaven”

It’s a common misconception to think that Jesus’ favorite title for himself — Son of Man — refers to his humanness. The exact opposite, however, is the case.

Jesus’ self-claim is actually a reference to a prophesy about a divine figure found in Daniel 7:13-14. That text reads:

In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.

It’s not hard to see the parallels between Jesus’ statement in Mark 14 and the prophesy in Daniel 7. Jesus claimed to be this apocalyptic figure who would come down from the clouds of heaven to judge the earth. He had all authority, glory, and power. All the nations would worship him, and his dominion would last forever. How could anyone think these qualities belonged to anyone other than God?

I could give several other examples, but this should suffice for now.

A Final Verdict

Skeptics have gotten a lot of mileage out of the claim that the deity of Christ was a legendary development. Yet, the data seems to suggest otherwise.

Despite not being as explicit as John, the synoptic Gospels still present a divine Jesus. They present him as the second person of the Trinity, the apocalyptic Son of Man from Daniel 7, and the one who has the authority to forgive sins.

Additionally, Paul — who wrote before any of the Gospels — presents an even higher Christology. Not only does he say things like Christ is God (Rom. 9:5), he quotes from pre-Pauline hymns that exalt the divinity of Jesus, demonstrating that the early Church believed in the deity of Christ from the very beginning.

It’s time we dispel the myth that the early Christians didn’t believe in the deity of Christ. As Richard Bauckham succinctly puts it, “The earliest Christology was already the highest Christology.”2 And who could argue based on the evidence?

Was Jesus Married?

Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Mikel Del Rosario

Every Christmas and Easter, I tend to get into conversations about Jesus with people who see Christianity differently. But I’ve also found that even Christians can ask questions raised by skeptics in the public square like, “Was Jesus married?” Often times, Christians find challenges to the Bible’s portrayal of Jesus in a popular book, movie, YouTube video, or somewhere online and wonder how to respond.

Recently, the question of whether or not Jesus had a wife has come up again. So, was Jesus married?

There is no ancient evidence that explicitly tells us that Jesus was married. But raising the question makes a good conspiracy theory. For example, think about popular conversations surrounding Dan Brown’s novel, The Da Vinci Code, and the alleged “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife” fragment. Still, it’s not the kind of thing that historians who study Jesus professionally spent a lot of time debating. In fact, there is a virtual consensus among professional Historical Jesus scholars that Jesus was single.

In this post, I share four challenges to this virtual consensus and show how historical data can help us understand cultural concerns. (1) Was Jesus Married to Mary Magdalene? (2) Was Jesus Married to the Woman Who Anointed Him? (3) Was Jesus Married Because He was a Rabbi? (4) Was Jesus Married Because He was Jewish?

Was Jesus Married to Mary Magdalene?

Why might some people think that Jesus was married? Here are four culturally-based questions that tend to come up in conversations about Jesus’ marital status.

First, it wasn’t common for Jewish women to travel or live alongside men in Jesus’ culture. So, some people wonder if this was socially acceptable only because Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ wife. But Luke says that there were three women who travelled with Jesus: Susanna, Joanna, and Mary Magdalene (8:1-3) And he doesn’t say anything that links Mary to Jesus as a wife at all. Beyond this, Jesus was known to challenge cultural views of how men and women should relate to one another, so operating outside the norm by letting women minister alongside him wasn’t a departure from his modus operandi. Later, as Jesus was dying on the cross, he didn’t show any special attention to Mary Magdalene, but instead gave special attention to his mother and John.

Was Jesus Married to the Woman Who Anointed Him?

Second, some people wonder if the sinful woman who anointed Jesus was actually his wife (Luke 7:36-50). They reason that the whole situation wouldn’t have been as offensive to a Jewish audience if the woman was married to Jesus. But Luke reports that the whole situation was in fact offensive, which is why the Pharisee said “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner” (Luke 7:39). That objection wouldn’t make a lot of sense if the woman was Jesus’ wife.

Was Jesus Married Because He was a Rabbi?

Third, some people argue that since Jesus was a rabbi, he would have gotten married because that was the tradition of the rabbis. But this starts from a faulty premise. Even though people called Jesus, “teacher” and “rabbi,” he actually wasn’t a rabbi in any official Jewish capacity. This is one reason why the Jewish leaders were often challenging his authority to interpret the law. Beyond this, his teaching about becoming a (metaphorical) eunuch for the sake of the kingdom seems to relate to his own example of singleness and devotion to God (Matthew 19:10-12).

Was Jesus Married Because He was Jewish?

Fourth, some say that Jesus had to be married because he was Jewish—as if all Jewish men in the first century felt compelled to marry by their culture. But this just isn’t true. Again, it’s based on a false premise. We know there were first-century Jews who chose to remain single. And their singleness was nothing to be ashamed of in their culture. Some people even looked up to them for it.

A Hellenistic Jew, Philo of Alexandria, wrote that not all Jews thought they had to be married. In fact, some very pious Jews tried to avoid being married as part of their religious devotion (Hypothetical 11.14-17).

The Essenes were a Jewish sect that produced the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in the Qumran caves. They were very concerned about being faithful Jews. These Jews didn’t think they had to be married and chose to be celibate for religious reasons. For them, it helped them keep God as their top priority. Still, archeologists have discovered evidence that there were a minority of women who lived alongside the men at Qumran. This goes to show that Jewish women did live alongside some pious Jewish men who chose to stay single.

The first-century Jewish historian Josephus wrote that, for the Essenes, celibacy was not required, but it was strongly encouraged. He said that they admired abstinence, even to the point where they “neglect wedlock” (Jewish War 2.8.2.121-22).

Josephus also said that many Jews admired the Essenes because of their religious commitment (Antiquities 18.1.5.20). So, not all Jewish men felt compelled to get married, and their singleness was nothing to be ashamed of because it was part of their religious devotion. Paul actually mentions a similar idea in a Christian context (1 Corinthians 7). Which brings me to an extra observation.

Paul on Marriage and Singleness

Here’s a little bonus: It’s interesting to see how Paul does not refer to Jesus in a couple of discussions about marriage and singleness. On the one hand, he didn’t appeal to Jesus while telling the Corinthians about how a pastor had the right to be married (1 Cor 9:4-7). If Jesus was married, this would be the perfect place to say, “Since Jesus was married, all pastors can be married, too.”

On the other hand, when Paul gives his own personal advice about staying single, he doesn’t mention Jesus either. This is because he wasn’t telling Christians that they had to stay single in order to be fully devoted to God. So, he didn’t want to say, “Since Jesus was single, all Christians should be single, too.” Jesus never taught that, and putting an end to families would spell the end of the Christian movement! Still, my point is that Paul’s silence about Jesus’ marital status in these discussions makes good sense if Jesus was single.

Jesus was Single

So, was Jesus married? No. All the data supports the virtual scholarly consensus that Jesus was single. Contrary to what some might say about first-century Jewish culture, a pious Jewish man could remain single and have no problem fitting in with Jewish society. Jewish culture did understand and appreciate singleness, especially when connected to a lifestyle of religious devotion.

Money, Greed and God with Dr. Jay Richards

Podcast

Podcast: Play in new window

Many people seem confused about what socialism is and whether or not it would be better than America’s capitalistic system. If there’s one book you should read on this—in fact, it’s one of the best books on economics you’ll read anywhere—is the new edition of Money, Greed and God: The Christian Case for Free Enterprise by Dr. Jay Richards. On this show, Frank interviews Jay and gets clear answers to these questions:

What are Socialism, Marxism, and communism and how do they differ?
Shouldn’t Christians be communists based on the early believers communing their resources in the book of Acts?
We hear that socialism works in Sweden. Is that true?
Why doesn’t socialism work?
Why do you think so many young people are attracted to a failed system?
Isn’t capitalism based on greed? How can Christians be for it?
We hear a lot about income inequality. Is that a bad thing, and, if so, what can be done about it?
When politicians use the phrase “paying your fair share”, what standard are they using to determine what is fair?
Our welfare system actually pays women to have kids out of wedlock. How do we improve the safety net to prevent that from happening?
Why does religious and economic liberty fall together?
The two industries in which the government controls significantly are education and health care. Why are prices high and quality low in those industries?
You say that no one person at Apple, including CEO Tim Cook, knows how to make an iPhone. What does this say about the difference between socialism and free-market capitalism?

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December 14, 2019/by Guest

20 Things Christians Can Create to Share Truth With Others

Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Jeremy Linn

The Apologetics world is filled with truth-infused books and lectures, many of which have made a lasting impact on people. But in a culture that’s dominated by entertainment platforms like YouTube, Netflix, and Disney+, not everyone is drawn to read a 300-page book, or to watch a one-hour lecture on an Apologetics topic.

What can often appeal to people is entertaining, creative content that does not compromise on presenting powerful truth. Just as there is a need for books and lectures, there is a need for Christians to use creative content as a platform to share the truth with others.

With this need in mind, I’ll list out 20 types of creative content Christians can use to share truth about the Christian worldview. For each type, I’ll provide a content idea and an existing resource, with the hope that they will help you develop new content ideas.

An Original Song

This is a nearly untouched area for Apologetics-type content. Music can provide a means to connect people with truth repeatedly in a way that can reach to people’s emotional core.

IDEA: Write a song about the order found in nature and how it points to an intelligent source.

RESOURCE: Christian rap artist Lecrae’s song Truth introduces concepts like the self-defeating nature of relative truth.

A Video or Book Filled with Humor

Humor lightens the tension people can experience in listening to and considering truth about deep topics. It also forms connections and builds relationships between a creator and the audience.

IDEA: Make a video called “A Consistent Jesus Mythicist,” which shows a “mythicist” who makes strange attempts to deny the existence of various historical figures.

RESOURCES: The Muhammad’s Boom Boom Room YouTube series by Acts17Apologetics supplies a bundle of humor wrapped up in truth about the content in the Muslim holy book, the Quran. On the book side, The Atheist Who Didn’t Exist by Andy Bannister comments on objections to Christianity in a humorous way.

An Entertaining Skit

Due to the entertainment value of a skit done well, a skit can draw people in to want to watch and consider content that they wouldn’t through a normal video presentation.

IDEA: Act out examples of what it would actually look like to live out “self-defeating statements.”

RESOURCE: The Apologetics YouTube channel Whaddo You Meme has released several entertaining skit videos.

A New Analogy

Analogies give Christians practical ideas for presenting the truth to others, and they help a truth-seeker to connect a concept with everyday experiences.

IDEA: For people in engineering, compare the relationship between science and theology with the relationship between mechanical and electrical engineering. In the two relationships, both areas reveal the truth about different aspects of reality but integrate in some spots.

RESOURCE: The book Faith is like Skydiving by Apologist Rick Mattson provides analogies for multiple areas in Apologetics.

A Magic Trick Routine

Magic creates an opportunity to talk about a topic while people watch eagerly in anticipation of what will happen next.

IDEA: Use a “disappearing coin” trick to discuss the need to see physical evidence vs. using “unseen” historical testimony as evidence.

RESOURCE: Magician Drew Worsham incorporates magic to introduce people to concepts related to the gospel.

A Letterboard Post

A comment or quote shown on a letterboard will stick out to people on platforms like Instagram right away, causing then to read and consider whatever is written. They’re especially great for location-based organizations.

IDEA: Take a picture of a letterboard with a C.S. Lewis quotation at the C.S. Lewis museum in Illinois.

RESOURCE: The ministry Twin Cities Apologetics has shared letterboard posts on their Instagram page, with the pictures taken in their local area.

A Satire Piece

Satire provides a perfect platform to combine truth, humor, and current events that are relevant to the reader.

IDEA: Write a satire piece called “10-year Challenge Reveals Richard Dawkins’ Chair Still Empty for His Debate With William Lane Craig.”

RESOURCE: The Babylon Bee has released some great satire pieces related to deep topics.

A Relevant Meme

Memes provide an opportunity to work creativity and humor into sharing truth and often require little effort to produce and share. Adding a recent pop-culture reference can especially attract people to view and share the content.

IDEA: At the top of a meme, write “When someone says there’s no good evidence for the existence of Jesus.” On the bottom show the SpongeBob picture that says “Ight imma head out,” and paste on pictures of some of Paul’s letters, the gospels, and the works of historians like Josephus.

RESOURCE: The ministry Standardized Apologetics has done excellent work with creating high-quality, relevant, and impactful memes.

An Interview Featuring Unique Questions

Interviews of well-known Apologists are abundant, which creates potential for questions to be repeated often. Discussion that features unique questions rather than the “same old” questions can help viewers think of a concept in a different way.

IDEA: Interview a Christian Apologist about the most difficult conversations they’ve had with an Atheist, and then a Christian, and ask what they learned from both experiences.

RESOURCE: The ministry Capturing Christianity featured an interview with Apologist William Lane Craig, where a unique question was asked about the arguments Craig is most and least confident in. The question provoked an intriguing response.

An Interactive Game

A game creates an interactive environment where people want to actively think about the game and its contents.

IDEA: Write individual words/phrases on pieces of paper and hold a competition where participants pull together the sheets of paper to make the best (or funniest) philosophical argument they can.

RESOURCE: Perspective cards made by the organization Cru get people talking about worldviews in a fun and interactive way.

A Fictional Story

A fictional story entertains and mentally transports the reader into a “new world,” all while applying real-world truth to the story.

IDEA: Write a story about “The Restart,” a made-up moment in history where everyone suddenly lost the memory of the past, and need to “start over” to determine what is true about the world.

RESOURCE: C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia is probably the most obvious example of a book that transports people to another world while applying Biblical truth throughout the story.

An Artistic Poem

Poetry appeals to a more abstract and artistic crowd – a crowd that may not be as attracted to a straight lecture. It opens people up to think about ideas in a different, relatable way.

IDEA: Write a descriptive poem about what you observe in nature and how it reveals the glory of a creator.

RESOURCE: T.S. Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi” takes the Biblical account of the wise men and turns it into an imaginative poem which invites people to think about “death” and “birth” from a Christian standpoint.

An Instagram Story Series

Instagram stories are a new wave of video content that many people are viewing daily. Instagram stories can drive traffic on that platform and can be repurposed for other platforms.

IDEA: Share 15-second clips of your experiences and some content from an Apologetics conference you attend.

RESOURCE: Jorge Gil from CrossExamined does an Instagram Livestream each weekday, where he talks about a deep topic and answers audience questions. He also shares Instagram stories on a regular basis.

A Helpful Diagram

A diagram adds a visual element that allows people to better grasp the truth you are presenting.

IDEA: Lay out some of the arguments for God in a Venn diagram and show how some of the arguments overlap in what they tell us about God.

RESOURCE: It’s not exactly a diagram, but a video by Reasonable Faith provides a visual of the Kalam Cosmological Argument that helps people to see how the premises of the argument flow to the conclusion.

Posts That Explore Unique Topics

Some topics that are addressed often in the Apologetics community (for example, the Moral Argument). Sharing content based on a topic not commonly addressed leads people to think about reality in a new way.

IDEA: Respond to the Atheist claim that Christians are “indoctrinated” by defining and analyzing the concept of indoctrination.

RESOURCE: The YouTube channel InspiringPhilosophy has released some impressive videos that cover topics not often addressed, especially related to the formation of the Universe.

A Visual Presentation

As our culture consumes more video content, people in our culture are learning in a more visual way. Adding visuals to a public speaking opportunity can help people connect with the content presented.

IDEA: Present on the fine-tuning argument and provide visual representations of the precision for various constants needed to make life possible.

RESOURCE: J Warner Wallace creates engaging visual presentations as he guides his audience into an investigation around topics like Jesus’ resurrection.

A Talent-Based Performance

When people see a talent performed in a way that displays excellence, they are generally willing to listen to truth and consider what is being said.

IDEA: If you are skilled at juggling, put together a juggling routine and talk about how God is needed to have order in the universe and to ground scientific laws like gravity.

RESOURCE: This is more of an example than a specific resource, but various Christian ministries use a mime performance to share truth related to the gospel.

A Location-Based Video

Videos based on Apologetics topics are often filmed at a church or in someone’s room. A video filmed in a public place can create a more personal connection with people, especially those who live in the area the video is filmed in.

IDEA: Go to your nearest downtown location and film yourself talking about a topic relevant to the area you live in.

RESOURCE: Apologist David Wood filmed a continuous video through a city subway testimony, all while sharing his testimony and a load of truth throughout the video.

A High-Quality Quote Post

Similar to the letterboard post, if you design a graphic featuring a quote where the words can be clearly read, and the background looks professional, it can draw people in to read the quote and consider the truth presented.

IDEA: Share a quote from Frank Turek about how Atheists need to borrow a foundation for morality from Christianity in order to discuss moral truth, featuring a graphic with a high-quality greyscale image of Frank.

RESOURCES: CrossExamined consistently shares high-quality quote posts. New York Apologetics also does a great job with sharing these types of posts.

A Song Parody Video

Through a parody, you can take something that people can already relate to (like a popular song) and create something humorous that can get people thinking about truth presented in the lyrics.

IDEA: Take the music to Taylor Swift’s song “You Need To Calm Down,” change the title to “Is The Kalam Sound?” and write lyrics that defend the premises of the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

RESOURCE: There aren’t many parodies that feature Apologetics topics, but a band actually called Apolgetix creates song parody videos about topics related to scripture and the gospel.

These are not the only types of creative content that could be shared. But this list provides a look into the areas in which Christians can present truth in an attractive and entertaining way.

Do you want to begin sharing truth with others through creative content? Pick one of the things above, take a concept you have learned, and combine the two together to make something new. God can use your creative efforts to lead people in your local area – and even around the world – one step closer to truth.

Bethlehem To Bedlam

Jesus Christ, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Bob Perry

If Christmas is supposed to be about “Peace on Earth,” why all the chaos and stress at this time of year? It started when we, through an ironic accident of language, warped Bethlehem into bedlam. But the history of that change is incidental to what we’ve done since then. It starts every “Black Friday.” The truth is that God never promised us peace on Earth. But he did send a Savior to Bethlehem to offer peace between God and man. We can begin to reclaim the meaning of Christmas by first learning to turn bedlam back to Bethlehem.

Bethlehem Becomes Bedlam (Literally)

It all started back in 1247 when the Sheriff of London (a man named Simon FitzMary) founded a small monastery just outside the city. He dedicated it to serving the sisters and brothers of the holy order named “The Star of Bethlehem.” The monastery’s sponsoring church used the building to house and entertain the bishop and canons of St. Mary of Bethlehem. Soon, it became known as the Priory of St. Mary of Bethlehem.

By 1330, records show that the priory had become a hospital. And by 1403, some of its patients had begun to remain there permanently. When King Henry VIII later dissolved the Catholic monasteries in Britain, the city of London took over the hospital. In 1547 it was officially designated as an insane asylum. Soon, it became infamous for the brutal ill-treatment of those who lived there. People outside could hear the clamor, commotion, and pandemonium of the mentally disturbed patients inside. It didn’t take long for the locals to begin equating the name of the place with the chaos they heard emanating from within it. And because they spoke in a dialect that didn’t quite live up to the King’s English, their cockney pronunciation of Bethlehem came out as “bedlam.”

So, in a way that only human beings could contrive, the word we now use to describe lunacy and chaos actually has its source in the name of the city of Jesus’ birth.

What We’ve Made Christmas

The linguistic origin of “bedlam” is ironic. But the more modern way we have transformed Christmas from Bethlehem into bedlam is embarrassingly real. Though the madness begins earlier every year, “Black Friday” now marks the beginning of the Christmas season. In the past, that special day has come complete with mall shootings, annual brawls, and the frenzy we have come to expect both online and at our favorite retail locations.

The lunatics are shopping in the asylum.

Even people who aren’t Christians seem to realize that this madness is not “the reason for the season.” Jesus is. But the chaos in which we all participate is the reflection of a deeper flaw in the way we have come to celebrate his birth. We are complicit in turning what was supposed to be about the celebration of the birth of Christ into a consumer marketing extravaganza. And it started with the generous idea that we should give each other gifts.

Gift Giving Gone Haywire

There is some logic to the whole gift-giving idea we now associate with Christmas. God gave us the gift of his Son. The wise men (“Magi“) in the biblical story brought gifts to honor the newborn king. To memorialize those, we began giving gifts to one another. So far, so good.

But then we did something humans always tend to do. We took something good and corrupted it. Once we commercialized the gift-giving, the basement was the limit. Giving gifts became a form of worship. This year, the average American will spend about $920 for Christmas. That means that as a nation we spend over $1 Trillion. As a point of reference, the 2019 U. S. Defense Department budget was $652 Billion.

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems like we might have overdone the gift-giving thing.

A Warped Idea Of Giving

The point of the Christmas story seems to be buried at the bottom of our shopping bags. Christmas is not about roasting chestnuts by an open fire. And it isn’t a time for Santa to reward the nice little boys and girls. It certainly isn’t about eggnog, or even so that we could have a special time to feel good about our families. These are all nice things. There is nothing wrong with any of them.

But they are not the heart of Christmas.

The incarnation — the second person of the Trinity becoming a real, live human being — was a one-way gift. It was a gift meant to offer peace with those of us who’ve turned Bethlehem into bedlam. It is a gift offered by a God who owed us nothing.

Peace Offering

The peace treaty was undeserved and unsolicited:

“An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone all around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David [Bethlehem] a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.’

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.'”
(Luke 2:9-14)

It was a peace treaty between heaven and Earth.

“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.” (Romans 5:1-2)

Despite what we’ve turned it into, these passages are not about our joy, or our giving, or our love, or our families. The focus is on God alone.

Back To Bethlehem

It is human nature to turn things that are supposed to be about God into things that are all about us. It makes us feel good to say that Christmas is our hope for “peace on earth.” But God knows that hasn’t proved true over the 2000 years since the first Christmas. World peace didn’t break out on that cold winter morning in Bethlehem. God came down in a human covering to offer the only possible way of reconciliation between His perfect moral goodness and the rebels who have been creating bedlam since the day they arrived on the scene.

We’ve been waging war with God. And Christmas is His peace treaty.

The joy comes in realizing that to be true. The giving and love come in mimicking the selflessness we witnessed in the gift He gave. That gift cost us nothing. Our families are the means by which we replicate and disseminate a love “for all the people.” The difference is important. Each of these things is impossible to celebrate appropriately unless we first make peace with our Creator and Savior.

“When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.'” (Luke 1:15)

Rethinking Christmas

This is not a naive call to boycott Christmas. It’s nothing more than encouragement to change our mindset and refuse to take part in the bedlam. Shop less. Contemplate more.

I’ve never seen it used as a Christmas card, but I can’t imagine a better representation of what we Bedlamites have made Christmas into than the fresco on the Sistine Chapel that Michelangelo titled, “The Creation of Adam.” In the most gracious act in human history, the Creator himself reached down to touch us in human form. And we appear only vaguely interested.

Look at the way God is stretching to reach out to the man – and at the way, the first Bedlamite halfheartedly reaches back.

May we all celebrate this Christmas by rethinking Michelangelo’s artful depiction of our state. “Peace on Earth” is a worthy goal. But “Peace with God” must come first. Christmas is meant to remind us of the subtle difference.

A Neglected Proof for the Resurrection – The Sign of Jonah

Jesus Christ, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Erik Manning

When arguing for the resurrection of Jesus, Christian apologists often make a historical case for the empty tomb and the appearances of Jesus that occurred after his death. I’d certainly never say that isn’t a legitimate way to argue, but there’s an additional reason to believe in the resurrection that flies under the radar: Jesus’ resurrection was a fulfillment of Scripture. The New Testament writers are pretty emphatic on this point.

Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead… (Luke 24:45-46)

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures…(1 Corinthians 15:3-4)

Here’s where I’ve always been puzzled — the phrase that the Messiah was to be raised from the dead on the third day according to the Scriptures. What scriptures exactly are Luke and Paul referring to? Many commentators say that the third-day is referencing Hosea 6:2, which reads, “After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him.” But from the context, the passage refers to national Israel. It’s a bit of a stretch to turn this into a reference about the Messiah, and none of the NT writers used this verse as a proof text. In fact, it’s not until the early third century do we see this verse applied to Jesus by the church father, Tertullian.

Not your Flannel Graph Version of the Story of Jonah

Some clarity came to me regarding this strange and confusing passage when I read The Case for Jesus by Dr. Brant Pitre. To understand this 3rd-day motif, Pitre says we have to go back to the gospels themselves. What did Jesus say?

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. (Matthew 12:38-41)

Pitre says that at first blush, this interpretation feels a bit forced, and I have to admit it, I’ve always felt the same way. OK, three days and three nights…there’s a parallel there, but it doesn’t feel all that impressive. No disrespect to Jesus, but Jonah feels like a fictional kid’s story to us; our minds often flash to Veggie Tales movies or children’s books when we think of it. In these kid’s version stories, Jonah is very much alive in the fish’s belly.

And it’s for that reason that even Muslim apologists like Shabir Ally and Zakir Naik will cherry-pick this very text to show that Jesus didn’t really die on the cross, verifying the Qu’ran’s supposed accuracy. (Qu’ran 4:157-158) But here’s where our modern minds and the Muslim apologists get it wrong. If you read the text, Jonah very clearly dies in the belly of the great fish. I completely overlooked this.

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish, and he said,

“I called out of my distress to the Lord, And He answered me. I cried for help from the depth of Sheol; You heard my voice. “You had cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the current engulfed me. All Your breakers and billows passed over me. “So I said, ‘I have been expelled from Your sight. Nevertheless, I will look again toward Your holy temple.’ “Water encompassed me to the point of death. The great deep engulfed me, Weeds were wrapped around my head. “I descended to the roots of the mountains. The earth with its bars was around me forever, But You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. “While I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, And my prayer came to You, Into Your holy temple. “Those who regard vain idols Forsake their faithfulness, But I will sacrifice to You With the voice of thanksgiving. That which I have vowed I will pay. Salvation is from the Lord.”

Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah up onto the dry land. Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh…” (Jonah 2:1-3:2)

The Sign of Jonah – Jonah Was Raised from the Dead

Pitre gives three arguments to support the miraculous death and resurrection of Jonah.

First, the phrases belly of Sheol and the Pit are Old Testament terms that refer to the realm of the dead. (See Job 7:9, 33:18, Psalm 40:2, 49:14-15, 89:48)

Secondly, the Hebrew says that his soul or nephesh fainted, meaning he took his last breath like a dying man.

Lastly, when God says to, Jonah “arise” this is the Hebrew word קוּם. This is the same word Jesus used when he raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead. Mark 5:41 reads Taking the child by the hand, He *said to her, “Talitha kum!” (which translated means, “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”)

Woah. So now the Jonah parallel makes a lot more sense! But wait, there’s a whole lot more going on here! In the Jewish reader’s mind, hearing about someone being raised from the dead would be interesting but not mind-blowingly significant. After all, the widow of Zarephath’s son, Shunammite woman’s son, and an Israelite man who came in contact with Elisha’s bones were all raised from the dead. There’s no major religious significance tied with these events, other than they show Elijah and Elisha were powerful prophets.

Pitre argues that there was an even greater miracle that happened with Jonah — Nineveh actually repented! Now, if you know anything about Old Testament history, Nineveh was no friend of Israel. The historical Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian empire in the late seventh century BC. There was no love lost between the ancient Israelites and Nineveh. The city’s king, Sennacherib, laid siege to Jerusalem in 701 BC (2 Kings 18:13-19:37). Nahum, the prophet, practically rejoices over Nineveh’s destruction by the Babylonians in 612. He says Nineveh is a “city of bloodshed.” (Nah 3:1)

It’s for these reasons Jonah ran the other direction. Jonah, like many Jews of the time, hated Nineveh.

The Sign of Jonah – The Gentiles Repent and Worship the God of Israel

So when Jesus says to the Pharisees that they only sign they would see is the sign of Jonah, he’s not only saying that he’d rise from the dead, but also that the resurrection would turn the pagan Gentiles to the God of Israel. But instead of just one pagan nation turning, much of the Gentile world would turn to God.

If you know about the history of Christian apologetics, the success of the church was what Christian thinkers from Augustine to Aquinas would point to as proof of the truth of the gospel. Says Pitre:

“Over and over again, whenever the early church fathers wanted to make the case for the messiahship, divinity, and resurrection of Jesus, they did not (as a rule) point to the evidence for the empty tomb, or the reliability of the eyewitnesses. They did not get into arguments about the historical probability and evidence and such. Instead, they simply pointed to the pagan world around them that was crumbling to the ground as Gentile nations that had worshiped idols and gods and goddesses for millennia somehow inexplicably repented, turned, and began worshiping the God of the Jews.”

This tiny band of vagabond fishermen turned the world upside down, and their effect was seen generations later until now. Christianity has spread all over Europe, North Africa, and Western Asia in the first-century and is more recently rapidly spreading all over Africa, South America, and even in Communist China. And of course, Christianity is prevalent in North America and in parts of Europe today. Billions of non-Jews from all nations have repented and worshiped the God of Israel over the past two millennia. The fourth-century church historian Eusebius’ words are still apt today:

“Behold how today, yes in our own times, our eyes see not only Egyptians, but every race of men who used to be idolaters, whom the prophet meant when he said “Egyptians,” released from the errors of polytheism and the daemons, and calling on the God of the prophets!…

Yes, in our own time, the knowledge of the Omnipotent God shines forth and sets a seal of certainty on the forecasts of the prophets. You see this actually going on, you no longer only expect to hear of it, and if you ask the moment when the change began, for all your inquiry, you will receive no other answer but the moment of the appearance of the Saviour.

For He it was, of Whom the prophet spoke, when he said that the Supreme God and Lord would send a man to the Egyptians, to save them, as also the Mosaic oracles taught in these words: “A man shall come forth from his seed, and shall rule over many nations”; among which nations the Egyptians would certainly be numbered. But a great deal could be said on these points, and with sufficient leisure, one could deal with them more exhaustively. Suffice it to say now, that we must hold to the truth, that the prophecies have only been fulfilled after the coming of Jesus our Saviour.

… And who would not be struck by the extraordinary change—that men who for ages have paid divine honour to wood and stone and demons, wild beasts that feed on human flesh, poisonous reptiles, animals of every kind, repulsive monsters, fire and earth, and the lifeless elements of the universe should after our Saviour’s coming pray to the Most High God, Creator of Heaven and earth, the actual Lord of the prophets, and the God of Abraham and his forefathers?” (Proof of the Gospel, 1.6.20-21)

The Old Testament prophets said that one day, the pagan nations would worship the God of Abraham. This was a fulfillment of many passages of Scripture foretold centuries before. Just check out Genesis 12:3, Isaiah 2:1-3, Isaiah 25:6-8, Isaiah 66:18-21, Jeremiah 3:15-18, Micah 4:1-2, Zechariah 8:20-23 and Amos 9:11-12. Only now in hindsight can we see this obvious fulfillment. That this prophesied change perfectly coincides with the life, death, and resurrection appearances of Jesus piles on a powerful additional proof on top of our modern-day historical resurrection argument. We’d do well to not neglect it.

Why did Evangelicals Vote for Trump?

Podcast

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Frank attended two meetings with candidate Donald Trump in the weeks leading up to the 2016 election. The first meeting in Trump Tower is the subject of the new article in RollingStone Magazine in which Frank is quoted twice. This podcast is Frank’s response to that article, particularly the article’s audacious assertion that Donald Trump is a standard-bearer for American Christians. Frank highlights what the article gets wrong, what the media, in general, gets wrong about evangelical Christianity, and then offers five reasons why most evangelical Christians voted for Donald Trump. Regardless of what you think about Trump, Christianity or politics, this show will help you have better conversations with people as we enter an election year.

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Transcript

December 7, 2019/by Guest

One Woman’s Quest for Straight Answers from Public Health Organizations

Legislating Morality, Culture & Politics

By Terrell Clemmons

After three years’ research on traumatic brain injuries he’d seen in prematurely deceased football players, Dr. Bennet Omalu wrote a paper in 2005 detailing his findings on the syndrome he named Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). He was hopeful that NFL doctors would build on his discovery for the well-being of NFL athletes. But instead of welcoming his data, an NFL medical committee called for it to be retracted. A thoroughgoing medical scientist, Omalu would do no such thing, and it took a full four more years of increasing pressure before the NFL publicly acknowledged the link between concussions sustained on the field and CTE.

A similar kind of David versus Goliath challenge may be developing between investigative journalist Punam Kumar Gill and the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH). A Canadian citizen of Indian descent and a lifelong pro-choice feminist, Gill became troubled after hearing questions raised about potential long-term risks of induced abortion. An honest investigator, she was quick to notice two things: (1) Although the questions did not concern the legality of abortion, because they were associated with abortion, few people seemed willing to listen, let alone talk about them. And (2) she herself might be guilty of allowing bias to blind her to a valid women’s issue where one might lie.

The dual discovery set her mind to thinking: What if there really were critical health risks to abortion? What were women actually being told before having one? And how were they doing afterwards? These were serious health care concerns, in some cases, matters of life and death. Shouldn’t they be discussed openly, rather than being dismissed as pro-life propaganda?

An Unlikely Team & A Balanced Report

She thought they should be, as did pro-life filmmaker Joses Martin of Mighty Motion Pictures. And so, although they came down on opposite sides of the pro-choice/pro-life divide, Gill and Martin teamed up to search out the truth about these questions for the sake of women everywhere. Their investigation is chronicled in the excellently produced documentary Hush: A Liberating Conversation About Abortion and Women’s Health. Here’s an overview.

Abortion & Breast Cancer

Gill interviewed several medical doctors. Is there evidence of a link between abortion and breast cancer? She asked. Yes, said Dr. Ian Gentles, coauthor of Complications: Abortion’s Impact on Women (2013); there have been “many dozens of studies [that] show a real, statistically significant link.” Yes, said Dr. Angela Lanfranchi, a breast cancer surgeon who has seen it in a textbook and in her practice. No, said Dr. David Grimes, an ob-gyn and abortionist for more than four decades, “there are no long-term consequences from abortion.” This issue is settled, he said. Doing continued studies would not only be inappropriate but unethical.

Thus, right off the bat, Gill and Martin encountered the deep divide between medical professionals. But Grimes had underscored his point by adding that his opinion was the same as that of all the major medical organizations. This did seem to add credibility to the “no consequences” side, so that’s where they went next.

One after another, Gill contacted them: The American Cancer Society. The Canadian Cancer Society. The National Cancer Institute. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. The Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in London. The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. And finally, the World Health Organization. But to her surprise, not only would none of them consent to an interview, they would not even speak to her. Not one. The case was closed, they all said. Anything she needed to know could be found on their website. It was as if they were all working off the same script.

With no other option, and now starting to feel suspicious of those denying any link, Gill went to their websites. Each one referred to a 2003 conference held by the NIH cancer division, the National Cancer Institute (NCI), where it had been concluded once and for all that there was no link between abortion and breast cancer. Upon this discovery, she tried again to speak with someone at the NCI, going so far as to visit in person. But when she arrived, she was swiftly escorted off the grounds by security. What was going on here?

A thoroughgoing journalist, Gill was not one to be intimidated into silence. She continued to dig and question until, eventually, she located a recording of the 2003 conference online and got to the bottom of the “no abortion-breast cancer link” conclusion. She explains her findings in some detail in the film but suffice it here to say that a careful look raises serious questions about who or what dictated the outcome of this seminal conference. Was it honest medical science? Or was it abortion politics?

Abortion & Pre-term Birth

Pre-term birth rates have doubled in the U.S. since Roe. Every year, more than 11,000 newborns die on the day of their birth in America due to prematurity, and those that survive exact untold emotional and financial costs on health care resources and families before ever leaving the hospital. After discharge, they face heightened risks of such lifelong disabilities as cerebral palsy, autism, chronic lung disease, and other vital organ maladies.

“It seems there’s a real clear unwillingness to deal with the science on this,” said Dr. Martin McCaffrey, a neonatologist who has frontline experience in caring for preemies and their families. He was invited in 2008 to serve as an expert panel member at the Surgeon General’s Conference on Preventing Preterm Birth, held by the NIH. He brought up the abortion-prematurity link and presented 122 articles as supportive evidence, but the co-chairs would not allow discussion, even though the link has been demonstrated in more than 80 studies. McCaffrey estimates that abortion accounts for 18 percent of very preterm births (earlier than 32 weeks’ gestation), yet in all the material published to raise awareness of prematurity, there is no mention of prior abortion as a possible risk factor. None. The question is, why not?

Abortion & Adverse Psychological Effects

This has been covered in Salvo before. Gill cites the alarmingly high rates of such maladies as PTSD, eating disorders, depression, substance abuse, and suicide in post-abortive women, but the most moving evidence of post-abortion trauma comes from the post-abortive women she interviews, many of whom suffer heart-wrenching grief and regret decades later.

Shouldn’t women considering abortion be provided with this information? Gill asks. No, insists Dr. Grimes, the abortionist. That would be “a very overt attempt to dissuade or discourage women from exercising their right to have an abortion.” Apparently this is what passes in his world for medical ethics.

The Moral Imperative of Informed Consent

For people of conscience, though, informed consent matters, and women considering abortion deserve factual information. Since neither the abortion industry nor the bureaus of medical apparatchiks will so much as countenance the data, Gill and Martin have brought it to the public themselves. Meanwhile, they continue to press the NIH and NCI to address the questions Hush raises, but so far, they have received no response beyond the same scripted suggestions to visit the NCI website, which in turn still cites the 2003 conference.

Hush is top-notch work. In many ways, you, the viewer, feel like you’re along on their quest. And where appropriate, well-crafted graphics depict the medical explanations, making the breast cancer and pre-term birth connections understandable.

“Over time,” said Dr. Patrick Fagan, who coauthored a 2014 paper on the abortion-breast cancer link, “the 2003 NCI conference is going to become an embarrassment in the history of the NCI itself.” Indeed, it may. It took Dr. Omalu four years to awaken the conscience of the NFL. The consciences of the NIH and NCI have already been slumbering for over thirteen years. One can hope that Hush will, paradoxically, finally wake them up.

45 Quotes About Relativism vs. Truth

1. Does Truth Exist?, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Luke Nix

“When it comes to truth, the outcome affects not only individuals but nations and even civilizations. What starts looking like a small abstract issue ends with titanic, public consequences for all who love freedom and justice.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Although someone’s beliefs and assumptions may not be true and do not describe reality, they will still drive their behavior. So if someone doesn’t believe in truth, count on him to lie. If someone says there are no objective facts, expect her to be careless with facts to further her own interests. If someone explains everything by referring to evolution and the ‘selfish gene,’ be sure that at some point, he will be extremely selfish on behalf of the fitness of his own survival.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Our challenge today is not to lament, protest, or simply talk about the crisis of truth in one of a hundred ways. Rather, it is to do something about it by becoming people of truth and learning to live free.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Far from being a naive and reactionary notion, truth is one of the simplest, most precious gifts without which we would not be able to handle reality or negotiate life.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“When nothing can be judged except judgment itself– ‘judgmentalism’–the barriers between the unthinkable, acceptable, and doable collapse entirely. And then, since life goes on and the sky doesn’t fall, people draw the conclusion that the original concern was unfounded. Lighten up, the newly amoral say as they skip forward blithely, complicit in their own corruption.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“If truth is truth, then differences make a difference — not just between truth and lies but between intimacy and alienation in relationships, between harmony and conflict in neighborhoods, between efficiency and incompetence in business, between reliability and fraud in science and journalism, between trust and suspicion in leadership, between freedom and tyranny in government, and even between life and death.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“While we all may have a sense of what is evil and what is good under the philosophy of cultural tolerance, evil and good can only be relative ideals. Without an objective truth—a set of universal moral values—good and evil are defined by the individual, community, or society. Therefore we have no moral basis by which to judge another person, community, or nation for what they do or don’t do.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance
“Right up to the end of the nineteenth century, the most important course in an American student’s college career was moral philosophy, or what we today call ethics.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Much of today’s focus is on ‘prevention ethics’ rather than on principled ethics. It is more concerned with ‘not being caught’ (or sued or exposed in the press) than with doing right.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“What is seen as important are issues related to corporations, schools, courts, governments, and the treatment of the environment– not the individual’s virtue and responsibility that underlie these secondary issues.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“The current ethics is often taught with a shallow view of human nature and an even more superficial view of evil in human society.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“The emphasis now is on surface, not depth; on possibilities, not equalities; on glamour, not convictions; on what can be altered endlessly; not achieved for good; and on what can be bought and won, not gained by education and formation.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“The present preoccupation with ethics in elite intellectual centers has an element of absurdity because they have no moral content left to teach. The fruit of the Western universities in the last two hundred years has been to destroy the possibility of any moral knowledge on which to pursue moral formation.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“If truth is contingent upon the society in which we live…there is nothing intuitive or universally or absolutely true about freedom from torture or freedom from slavery; our society just happens to have come up with these values over time.” Stephen McAndrew, Why It Doesn’t Matter What YOU Believe If It’s Not True

“If moral truths do not exist as a foundation for law, then the law itself becomes merely a system of raw political power accountable to no one.” Scott Klusendorf, The Case for Life

“Just as iron filings are drawn to the strongest magnet, so minds weakened by a loss of truth are drawn to the most powerful positions.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“What happens when we succeed in cutting away truth-claims to expose the web of power games only to find we have less power than the players we face? If truth is dead, right and wrong are neither, and all that remains is the will to power, then the conclusion is simple: Might makes right. Logic is only a power conspiracy. Victory goes to the strong, and the weak go to the wall.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“Just as the Greeks entered Troy concealed in the hollow wooden statue of a horse, so post-modernism is providing the cover for all sorts of ideas and practices to enter American life–ideas that on their own would have difficulty gaining entrance.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Short of total isolation, the American society you live in today is going to influence how your children make moral choices in one way or another. Stop and think about it. What are the voices of society telling your children about the choices they are about to make? What is the central theme that today’s culture emphasizes over and over again? If you were to reduce it to a single sentence, it might look like this: You have the right to choose for yourself what is right for you and what is wrong for you–and no one should judge that choice.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“When nothing can be judged except judgment itself— ‘judgmentalism’—the barriers between the unthinkable, acceptable, and doable collapse entirely.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“If everything is endlessly open to question and change, then everything is permitted, nothing is forbidden, and literally nothing is unthinkable.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“Applying to the skeptics the skepticism they apply to others [pushes] them out toward the negative consequences of their own beliefs.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“While all beliefs appear consistent to those who believe them, they always have one of two problems. They are either constricting or contradictory. In the first case, the beliefs are more consistent but are incomplete in the sense that they are too small for the fullness of life…And in the second case, the beliefs are more comprehensive but are inconsistent—which in the worst cases makes them self-refuting- a problem Chesterton calls ‘the suicide of thought.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“Inevitably, moral choices based on our own moral compass will often be wrong choices. And wrong moral choices can result in consequences ranging from minor disappointments to major disasters emotionally, relationally, physically, and spiritually.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“Truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“It is that truth, like meaning as a whole, is not for to us to create but for us to discover. Each of us may be small, our lives short, and our influence puny. But if truth is there—objective, absolute, independent of minds that know it— then we may count on it.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“In order to discover truth it is necessary to coldly dissect and examine all of our prejudices and inherent biases to ensure we receive unbiased answers. This takes effort. It is always easier to simply accept the ideas presented to us than to question the status quo.” Stephen McAndrew, Why It Doesn’t Matter What YOU Believe If It’s Not True

“While we all may have a sense of what is evil and what is good under the philosophy of cultural tolerance, evil and good can only be relative ideals. Without an objective truth—a set of universal moral values—good and evil are defined by the individual, community, or society. Therefore we have no moral basis by which to judge another person, community, or nation for what they do or don’t do.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance
“We are all entitled to our own beliefs, but this doesn’t mean each of us has our own truths. Our beliefs describe the way we think the world is. Truth describes the objective state of the world, regardless of how we take it to be. Beliefs can be relative, but truth cannot. So when we consider the nature of truth—that it is an objective description of reality—it makes no sense to say that something is true for you and not for me.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“Without truth, a belief may be only speculation plus sincerity.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“While we all may have a sense of what is evil and what is good under the philosophy of cultural tolerance, evil and good can only be relative ideals. Without an objective truth—a set of universal moral values—good and evil are defined by the individual, community, or society. Therefore we have no moral basis by which to judge another person, community, or nation for what they do or don’t do.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“It is often said that to have a fulfilling life, three essentials are required: a clear sense of personal identity, a deep sense of faith and meaning, and a strong sense of purpose and mission.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“For those who find themselves without faith in God and who conclude that the world they desire does not fit with the world they discover, life is fundamentally deaf to their aspirations.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“For all the fragile precariousness of our human existence on our tiny earth in the vastness of space, we may throw the whole weight of our existence on God, including our truth-seeking desires, because he is wholly true.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“Those who put their faith in God do so for all sorts of good reasons, but the very best reason is that they are finally, utterly, and incontrovertibly convinced that the faith which they put their confidence in is true.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“All truth is God’s truth and is true everywhere, for everyone, under all conditions. Truth is true in the sense that it is objective and independent of the mind of any human knower. Being true, it cannot contradict itself.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“The beauty of intolerance is its opposition to wrong and evil in the world—in alignment with God’s righteous and perfect standard of justice, equality, human rights, and caring for others. Intolerance of evil is not mean-spirited and condemnatory; it is actually the only way to be loving and caring.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“What is more beautiful than God’s intolerance expressed in his moral outrage toward the tragedies of poverty, racism, sexual abuse, slavery, AIDS, bigotry, and other such evils?” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“Human beings are truth-seekers by nature, and truth persuades by the forces of its own reality.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“It is impossible to experience love without being truthful, and it is impossible to discover truth without loving it.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“Truth is our best friend, and it is an inseparable part of what real love is. While cultural tolerance may disguise itself as caring, understanding, and loving, it lacks the moral authority of an authentic love that looks out for the best interest of others. That is another quality of authentic, real love—it is always other-focused.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“As human beings, we are by nature truth-seekers; as fallen human beings, we are also by nature truth-twisters. And a proper account of truth in the human project must do justice to both.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin
“Conforming our desires to the truth is harder in the short term but easier in the long. We give up our need for control and submit to truth outside us, which, if we were wrong about truth before, requires repentance rather than rationalization. We have to face up to reality rather than trying to fit reality into our schemes. But the long-term outcome is freedom because…truth is freedom and we are engaging with reality at it truly is.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

“What distinguishes God’s unconditional acceptance from that of our culture is authentic love. His love is intended to make the security, happiness, and welfare of another as important as his own. It is other-focused, not performance-focused. God knows the real truth about us—that we were created in his image—and that truth allows him to separate the person from performance. God unconditionally values us for who we are without always approving of what we do because he separates the value of the person from the acts of the person.” Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, The Beauty of Intolerance

“The Christian faith is not true because it works; it works because it is true. It is not true because we experience it; we experience it—deeply and gloriously—because it is true. It is not simply ‘true for us’; it is true for any who seek in order to find.” Os Guinness, Time For Truth: Living Free In A World of Lies, Hype, and Spin

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