Southern Seminary Magazine (Vol 90.1) The Light of Truth: Apologetics in the 21st Century

timothy paul jones
the risen Christ.
The philosopher Aristotle used the words apologia
and kategoria to describe the two types of speeches
presented in a court of law. Kategoria was a speech of
accusation related to events that had happened in the
past; the apologia was a speech of defense in response
to the kategoria. The apostle Peter used this term for a
defense when he wrote these words to Christians in
Asia Minor: “In your hearts regard Christ the Lord as
holy, ready at any time to give a defense to anyone who
asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you” (1 Pet,
3:15, emphasis added).
Here’s how I define “apologetics,” on the basis of this
text and others scattered throughout the Scriptures:
apologetics is the reverent, reasonable, and humble defense—through
our words and through our lives—of the
hope we have in the risen Christ, as this hope has been
revealed in his Word and in his world. Apologetics isn’t
saying, “I’m sorry”; it’s a defense that reveals the incoherence
of the unbeliever’s worldview by pointing to the internal
coherence and external evidence for the believer’s
hope in the risen Christ and in his written Word.
2
Holiness provides the foundation for the proclamation
of our hope.
The words of Simon Peter in 1 Peter 3:15 can become a
bumper sticker for apologetics, but this text is far richer,
deeper, and more beautiful than we sometimes recognize.
This text seems to have been written to Christians who are
beginning to experience social exclusion and perhaps even
civic consequences for their faithfulness to Jesus. In this
context, the first defense of the faith to which Peter calls
them is holiness (1 Pet. 1:15–17; 2:9–17; 3:13–17).
Our defense of the Christian faith doesn’t end with our
holiness, but it must start with holiness. Holiness won’t
ultimately protect the people from persecution, but it ensures
that whatever they suffer will be for the sake of their
Savior and not because of their sin.
3
A Christian’s hope is centered in the resurrection—and
so is our defense.
Throughout 1 Peter, Simon Peter centers the Christian’s
hope in the resurrection (1 Pet. 1:3, 13, 21).
Sometimes, his focus is on the resurrection of Jesus on
the third day; other times, it’s centered on our future resurrection,
which the resurrection of Jesus guaranteed. But,
either way, resurrection is the foundation of our hope.
So, what does this mean for apologetics?
If apologetics is giving a reason for our hope, and hope
is centered in the resurrection, the resurrection should be
central in Christian apologetics. When the resurrection is
not central in apologetics, the practice of apologetics can
turn into a bad game of theological trivia, with the unbeliever
raising a random series of objections until he or she
“wins” by coming up with a question that the Christian can’t
answer. When the resurrection of Jesus is central, however,
apologetics can never stray far from the gospel, and we respond
to the unbeliever’s questions by turning the question
toward the cross and the empty tomb.
If you choose to focus your apologetics on convincing
an unbeliever that a particular approach to creation
is correct—even if you convince the unbeliever that
you’re correct—that individual has still not been confronted
with the gospel. If you convince someone that
there are sound philosophical reasons why a good God
might allow evil in the world, and they agree with you
but never hear the hope of the resurrection, your defense
is a miserable failure. Why? In your passion to defend
the truth, you have wandered from a focus on the gospel—the
life, death, and resurrection of Jesus by which
God is reconciling sinners to himself and revealing his
reign in the world.
Any apologetic that defines the truth and defends the
truth but never delivers a call to believe the gospel is
empty and vain. Apologetics is a means that God chooses
to use for his glory; the power, however, is not in our
apologetics but in the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel
alone is “the power of God for salvation” (Rom 1:16).
That’s what Charles H. Spurgeon was getting at when
he said, “Suppose a number of persons were to take it
into their heads that they had to defend a lion.… Open
the door, and let the lion out!… He would take care of
himself.… The best ‘apology’ for the gospel is to let the
gospel out.… Preach Jesus Christ and him crucified.
Let the Lion out!”
Timothy Paul Jones is Vice President for Doctoral Studies
and C. Edwin Gheens Professor of Christian Family Ministry.
44 the southern baptist theological seminary