Truth Really Matters

The task in evangelism – or, more specifically, apologetics – is to show someone that what he says he believes is in conflict with what he knows is true, in fact, in contradiction to what his whole life is telling him, if he were but to listen.

This is one of the themes of Nancy Pearcey’s book, Total Truth:  Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity, 2008.  Pearcey was a student of Francis Schaeffer and, in her works, extends his principles of apologetics into our generation, quite deftly, I believe.  She often makes use of Schaeffer’s two-story diagrams (see my essays on Schaeffer), a model which explains the disconnect from reality that afflicts unbelievers in our present age.  Briefly, the materialist worldview relegates all of life to a lower story where evolution and physics supposedly explain where we come from and how life works.  When people defy materialism by searching for meaning, for purpose, they ‘leap up’ to an upper story for mythical or religious explanations, an irrational leap because in materialism we are simply molecules in motion – there is no meaning.

 

http://ashmann.uk/category/interesting-things/ Upper Story

Nonrational, Noncognitive

______________________

http://bridgewaterfire.com/wp-content/plugins/ubh/up.php Lower Story

Rational, Verifiable

 

Pearcey insists that “it’s so important that we do not put Christianity in the upper story – because then we will have nothing to offer to people trapped in the two-story dichotomy.”  Rather, we must present the Christian faith as a “comprehensive, unified worldview that addresses all of life and reality.  It is not just religious truth but total truth.”

The challenge in this generation, in the West, may be more difficult than ever, because there are so many layers of obfuscation permeating our culture.  Traditionally, for example, evangelism would focus on a sinner’s moral ‘lostness’ and expect him to worry about his standing before a holy God.  Yet today many reject a transcendent moral standard; guilt may be viewed as a psychological problem requiring therapy, instead of necessitating repentance and forgiveness.  Indeed, I have been disturbed to hear sermons in evangelical churches with just this perspective, that the real problem with ‘sin’ is that it makes you feel bad and that is the problem!

I once asked a youth director at a megachurch how they communicated the Gospel to the young people.  She sought to assure me that they were careful to avoid even the terms sin and guilt with the young because of the distressing connotations.

And yet moral guilt is real.  God wired us to know it and unpacks the details in Scripture so that we find the one and only solution – salvation in Jesus Christ.  Furthermore, all of physical creation, along with the nuances of human life are explained fully and satisfyingly in the Bible.

Pearcey:  “Our claim as Christians is that only a biblically based worldview offers a complete and consistent explanation of why we are capable of knowing scientific, moral, and mathematical truths.    Christianity is the key that fits the lock of the universe.”  I have written much on this web site to expand on this principle.  For a quick exposition of a variety of applications, go to ThinkTracts.com for our tract designs; each feature a particular aspect of life or science or history that makes sense only in light of Scripture.

Unbelieving worldviews do not make sense of life.  Pearcey reflects one of Schaeffer’s major themes concerning unbelievers, that “they will not be able to live consistently on the basis of their own worldview.  Since their metaphysical beliefs do not fit the world God created, their lives will be more or less inconsistent with those beliefs.   Living in the real world requires them to function in ways that are not supported by their worldview.”  The evangelist can work to create a cognitive dissonance in order to provoke a hearing of the Gospel.

I have used this principle many times.  I use the argument employed in my tract, “Who are you?”, with atheists to provoke them to listen to the Gospel.  Without the cognitive dissonance that can be generated within just a couple of minutes, they would have no patience to listen further.

Early in the book, Nancy laments how we ‘train’ our children.  At a Christian high school a theology teacher drew a heart on one side of the blackboard and a brain on the other, saying, “The heart is what we use for religion, while the brain is what we use for science.”  Only one student objected.  The rest apparently accepted this ‘two-story’ distortion of reality.

Pearcey warns that if all we give young people is a “heart” religion, they won’t be strong enough to analyze and reject false ideologies.  Rather, equip them with worldview and apologetics training . . . “a Christian mind is no longer an option; it is part of their necessary survival equipment.”

In 2004 when she published the book’s 1^st edition, Pearcey observed that most secularists in the public square were too politically savvy to attack religion directly, but rather consigned ‘faith’ to the value sphere, out of the realm of facts.  They could pretend to respect religion, “while at the same time denying that it has any relevance to the public realm.”

Today, however, the gloves are off.  Attacking biblical Christianity is great sport and conducted on a moral basis.  Woke ideologies are deemed righteous and of such worth that they must be shoved down the throats of anyone who hesitates to bow down.  Yet the strategy will arise when needed, when the anti-Christians find it useful to show a kind face.  The fact/value split relegates the Christian faith to private feelings, not to be taken as genuine knowledge.

Christians should be aware of this background, making sure to explain to unbelievers that we are asserting objective moral truths wired into the very fabric of God’s universe, whenever we discuss sexuality or abortion or the other hot cultural issues.  We’re not attempting a political power grab.  We are warning that God will hold His adversaries accountable.

Pearcey does a nice exposition of the idea of worldview – “literally a view of the world, a biblically informed perspective on all reality.  A worldview is like a mental map that tells us how to navigate the world effectively.  It is the imprint of God’s objective truth on our inner life.”

For example, the classical Marxist sees human behavior ultimately shaped by economics.  The Freudian interprets actions as deriving from repressed sexual drives.  The behavioral psychologist sees humans as stimulus-response machines.  The Bible, however, sees every individual as made in the image of God, with free will and moral responsibility.

Most of the early modern scientists, who established every major field of modern science, were Bible-believing Christians.  Historian R. G. Collingwood writes, “The possibility of an applied mathematics is an expression, in terms of natural science, of the Christian belief that nature is the creation of an omnipotent God.”  Christians believe in an orderly universe, ordered by God-given and God-sustained rules.

Today, American schoolchildren are taught a postmodern view of math, that math is a social construction, that it’s man-made, arbitrary, and solutions can be derived by consensus.  There are no wrong answers.  Those that think so are likely racists.  Pearcey met a young man, recently graduated from high school, whose teacher called him a bigot for thinking it was important to get the right answer.

Pearcey mentions Harry Blamires’ 1963 book, The Christian Mind, which opens with the startling sentence, “There is no longer a Christian mind.”  What he meant was that there is no shared Christian worldview in the West, no biblically-based set of principles upon which to analyze law, education, economics, politics, science, or the arts.  Christians may profess to follow Christ and read their Bibles, but they think like secularists.  We behave in our professions as if we are not different from non-Christians, we entertain ourselves with worldly entertainment, and we send our children off to Marxist, wokist schools.  The megachurch culture is perfectly happy to attract professing Christians with shallow tickle-the-ear music, ‘your-best-life-now’ teaching, and programs that help you feel good without any spiritual growth . . . like charitable initiatives I like to call ‘cheeseburgers for the homeless’ that invariably neglect any actual Gospel outreach.

Just today my wife engaged in a conversation with a megachurch member who was quite proud of their charitable outreach, but clueless about the missed opportunities to preach the Gospel to the beneficiaries.

The biblical Christian sees no fact/value split.  Every part of creation and every nuance of life is informed by Scriptural truth.  (See my 3-part essay in the Apologetics section on Cornelius Van Til to explore this in some depth.)

Pearcey has some insight that reflects my ‘fundie’ experience.  (We spent many years attending Independent Fundamental Baptist churches.)  The fact/value split can also be described as a sacred/secular dualism, in which ordinary work is denigrated, while full-time salaried church work is glorified.

During the Bush administration, Pearcey talked to a congressional chief of staff who complained that it was hard to find people to work in D.C. who were both serious Christians and competent professionals.  The Christians who did come to Washington had been taught by their churches that if they were really serious about their faith they would have been in “full-time ministry.”

Missionary (to India for 40 years) Lesslie Newbigin wrote that Christians in business, industry, politics, etc., are “the Church’s front-line troops in her engagement with the world . . . Are we taking seriously our duty to support them in their warfare?  Have we ever done anything seriously to strengthen their Christian witness, to help them in facing the very difficult ethical problems which they have to meet every day, to give them the assurance that the whole fellowship is behind them in their daily spiritual warfare?”

In Bob Briner’s book Roaring Lambs he recounts his student days at a Christian college, whose culture presupposed that the only way to really serve God was in full-time Christian work.  Anticipating a career in sports management he felt very much a second-class campus citizen.  In my fairly considerable experience in fundie churches, I saw the same dualism.  There was essentially no teaching and no respect for the work done by everyone who pays the bills.  The overriding emphasis was to exhort young people to ‘surrender to full-time ministry.’

There is so much wrong and disgusting with this cultural attitude, which I unpack in some of my ‘church’ essays in the Discipleship section of this site.  One obvious problem is that those who pay the bills in church via their ‘secular’ jobs get the message that evangelism and discipleship – the mission of the church – is solely the responsibility of the paid clergy.  The Lord Jesus refers to this approach as Nicolaitinism . . . which He curses.

A Christian view on work is that it is far more than just putting food on the table.  Work is part of our calling from God.  We serve God with our gifts, with our creativity that extends the work that God did in the first week of creation.  We use “wood to build houses, cotton to make clothes, or silicon to make computer chips.”  Our work is not ex nihilo, of course, but it is crucial to our stewardship responsibilities.

Once we realize that the Bible is TRUE, we are obligated – in gratitude for our salvation – to use all the gifts and energies God has granted us in every area of life.  There is no sacred/secular split.  “God’s Word becomes a light to all our paths.”  Biblical truth must infuse our relationships, our business, our politics, our relaxation, and ignite a passion to reach out to others with the Gospel.

Pearcey was disappointed at the simplistic analysis of an English literature course at her Christian college, which critiqued classic works by tabulating the acts of immorality and profane language.  But why and how does secular literature drive the culture?  What worldviews are embedded in the plots?  Cannot we, as Christians, go deeper in discernment than merely to count cuss words?

She cites Francis Schaeffer’s compassion for secular artists caught in the trap of false worldviews, recognizing the despair in the lives of so many of the most famous ones.  Schaeffer wrote that such works of art “are the expression of men who are struggling with their appalling lostness.  Dare we laugh at such things?  Dare we feel superior when we view their tortured expressions in their art?”

Even in worldly art we can see the creativity that reflects God’s gifts in the image-bearer.  Sin-laden art is a challenge that the Christian can respond to with answers.  Answers are far better than mere, simplistic condemnation or boycotts.  Pearcey and Schaeffer call for Christians to move beyond criticizing culture to creating culture.  When we reach out to the lost we are obligated to employ excellent arguments, thoughtful and attractive tracts, and exhibit patience and compassion.

I know a fellow who, to his credit, has been diligent to share the Gospel with the lost, but to his discredit, is tempted to anger at some of the responses he gets.  No!  How do you expect lost people to act, to think, to speak?  They’re in the Devil’s spiritual trap and need help.  Don’t ever lose your temper when trying to rescue someone!

In addition to being true,  the Gospel works.  In 1996 Guenter Lewy wrote the book Why America Needs Religion, although he started out to establish the opposite theme, a defense of secular humanism and ethical relativism.  The evidence turned him completely around.  He found that where Christianity informs the culture, we find less crime, drug abuse, teen pregnancy, and broken families.  Also, that the culture reflects considerably higher responsibility, moral integrity, compassion, and altruism.

Lewy:  “Contrary to the expectations of the Enlightenment, freeing individuals from the shackles of traditional religion does not result in their moral uplift . . . no society has yet been successful in teaching morality without religion.”

In short, God’s word reveals the principles by which human life flourishes . . . or degenerates.

Pearcey argues that the sacred/secular split is a Western malady.  Christians in Africa, India, and the Middle East can easily understand that the Gospel transforms the entire human experience.  Persecution makes that clear.  American evangelical churches focus their message on personal meaning, family bonding, emotional nurturing . . . the ‘authentic inner life.’  And so, with western culture, government agencies and corporations are free to ramp up the persecution on the churches (during COVID, for example), and on individuals who don’t conform to government or corporate policies, policies often created just to identify those who won’t bend the knee.

Steven Pinker of MIT is a leader in cognitive science and author of a best-selling book, How the Mind Works.  His views on ethics illustrate perfectly the apologetic argument I employ in my tract “Who are you?”  Pinker:  “Ethical theory  requires idealizations like free, sentient, rational, equivalent agents whose behavior is uncaused,” and yet, “the world, as seen by science, does not really have uncaused events.”

Pearcey rephrases Pinker this way:  “The postmodern dilemma can be summed up by saying that ethics depends on the reality of something that materialistic science has declared to be unreal.”  Namely, in atheism there is no soul, no person.  Yet we act as if we are persons, and hold each other accountable as if others are persons, too.

 

Pearcey draws a two-story diagram for Pinker:

 

THE ETHICS GAME

Humans Have Moral Freedom and Dignity

___________________________________

THE SCIENCE GAME

Humans are Data-Processing Machines

 

Recall that we can also term this the fact/value split or the secular/sacred split.  In his day job, Pinker lives in the lower story, but then he goes home at night and takes an irrational leap to the upper story in order to relate to his wife and children.

Marvin Minsky, also at MIT, famously said that the human mind is nothing but “a three-pound computer made of meat.”  But he wrote in his book The Society of Mind, “The physical world provides no room for freedom of will.” And yet, “that concept is essential to our models of the mental realm.  Too much of our psychology is based on it for us to ever give it up.  [And so] We’re virtually forced to maintain that belief, even though we know it’s false.”

That last statement is not just a startling admission from an atheist, it’s also ridiculous on another level . . . how can the clump of molecules between his ears, wholly driven by deterministic brain chemistry, know anything?  Knowing requires personhood.

Pearcey challenges Christians to stand up to their responsibilities, not just to share the Gospel, but also “to learn how to give reasons supporting the credibility of the gospel message.”  We must learn to translate “Christian theology into contemporary language . . . demonstrating that it offers a more consistent and comprehensive account of reality.”  This is, of course, exactly what I’ve tried to do throughout this web site and, in particular, in the design of our tracts at ThinkTracts.com.  These tracts also serve as tutorials for Christians on a variety of topics that might well come up in a 1-2-1 evangelistic encounter.

I’ve made the point before – in order to raise up your children to embrace and contend for the faith, they must engage in 1-2-1 evangelism and study up in apologetics.  Or else.  The Devil is a roaring lion who will devour them through the culture, through the universities, through their lost worldly friends.  Train your children to see their lost friends as lost . . . in need of a strong Gospel witness.

Pearcey challenges churches to embrace a mission to give what Francis Schaeffer called “honest answers to honest questions.”  Train the people in apologetics and worldview analysis.  The culture continues to progress in only one direction:  more secular, more anti-Christian.  It’s a spiritual war.  Let’s fight with spiritual weapons.

For example, applying the Christian worldview to education . . . our children are created in the image of God, and so have a capacity for qualities that have no basis in a materialistic / atheistic worldview, namely love, morality, rationality, artistic creation, and a yearning for meaning in life.  We recognize that the Fall produced and produces sin and corruption; therefore, the Englightenment idea of a utopia apart from God, employing unaided reason, is foolish.  Furthermore, we define an absolute morality, distinctions between right and wrong, in the Bible, not arbitrarily.  “Each child should understand that God has given him or her special gifts to make a unique contribution to humanity’s task of reversing the effects of the Fall and extending the Lordship of Christ in the world.”  Teach the interconnections of all subjects and how they, like all truth, are grounded in God’s truth.

In contrast, Pearcey warns, many (Marxist) educators do not define education as helping students to acquire knowledge and gain skills, but rather to motivate and equip them as activists in approved social causes.  The one good thing that came out of COVID was the dramatic rise in homeschooling as some parents woke up to public school corruption and pulled their children out.  As of this writing, parents have not sent their kids back to that snake pit.

Pearcey notes that those who deny Biblical creation also deny the Fall, and believe that sin and its effects can be social-engineered out of existence.  This inevitably results in totalitarianism, as state power is used to force people to fit into utopian schemes.  Along the way, the family is destroyed lest there be competing loyalties.

I’ll touch just one more theme before concluding.  Total Truth covers a lot of ground and I’ve engaged on only a few themes.  She has a wonderful chapter entitled, “Darwin meets the Berenstain Bears,” quoting atheist Daniel Dennett who calls Darwinism a “universal acid,” referencing a children’s riddle about an acid so corrosive that it eats through everything, including its container.

Pearcey:   “The point is that Darwinism is likewise too corrosive to be contained.  It spreads through every field of study, corroding away all traces of transcendent purpose or morality.”  Darwinism, according to Dennett, “leaves in its wake a revolutionized worldview.”

Pearcey had bought a science book for her little boy Michael, The Bears’ Nature Guide, and was shocked to see a two-page spread with a dazzling sunrise with the bold words, “Nature is all that IS, or WAS, or EVER WILL BE!”  This was clearly taken from Carl Sagan’s documentary wherein he proclaimed, “The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.”

Yes, the war is upon us.  The Adversary is bold and relentless.  We can choose to contend or let him run roughshod over us, our children, and our entire culture.  Nancy blunders a bit in her analysis in this chapter, though.  She opines, “We must learn how to bring God back into the sphere of rational discussion – to win a place at the table of public discourse.”  She’s wrong because the enemy owns even the table today, dominating every institution under the sun.  What Christians can do is what they have always been charged to do under the Great Commission:  Proclaim the Gospel 1-2-1, personally, boldly, compassionately, and relentlessly.

Don’t whine about how the wokists control Facebook and Twitter and the public school system and . . . everything else.  Open your mouth, share the Gospel, hand out tracts, go door-to-door . . . do what Jesus told you to do.  Rinse.  Repeat.

I strongly encourage you to buy the book.  The last two chapters are among the best pieces I’ve ever read on apologetics:  Chapter 12 – “How Women Started the Culture War,” and Chapter 13 – “True Spirituality and Christian Worldview.”  But I won’t review those chapters here.  I won’t spoil it for you!

• drdave@truthreallmatters.com