Learning Objectives

Upon successful completion you should be able to:

• Identify the general mindset of postmodernism but distinguish between hard and soft postmodernism

• Develop a well-balanced apologetic that avoids the dangers of over-contextualizing or under-contextualizing the gospel

• Sympathetically address postmodernism’s effects on how the emerging generation views truth and morality, its own sense of authentic self, and how to live in free community

• Apply missionary-like thinking to the task of reaching out to the emerging postmodern generation

Course Outline

Unit 1: The Reason for This Course

• Learning from Lesslie Newbigin and Tim Keller

• Finding a Passage and Creating a Collection

• Contextualization and Culture

• Dangers of Contextualization

• How Apologetics Helps Us Overcome Fear

• Using Psalms Explorer to Study Fear in the Psalms

• Paul as an Example of Contextualization

Unit 2: Philosophical Foundations

• From the Medieval World to the Enlightenment

• The Failure of Modernism

• The Postmodern Turn

• Pessimistic and Optimistic Postmodernism

• Using Wikipedia and Combing Notes from Different Resources

Unit 3: Postmodernism: Five Characteristics

• Morally Aimless: Moral Relativism

• Using the Factbook and Creating Quote Slides

• Morally Aimless: Morals Only a Social Construct

• Morally Aimless: Moral Individualism

• Morally Aimless: Blind to the Moral Dilemma

• Captive to Consumerism

• Broken Relationships

• Binge Drinking

• Lacking Interest in Social and Political Life

• Postmodern Characteristics: Conclusions

• Exploring the Ten Commandments

Unit 4: Postmodernism: Three Losses

• Lost Horizons (Part 1)

• Lost Horizons (Part 2)

• Lost Sense of Self

• Lost Freedom

• The Losses: Bottom Line

Unit 5: Postmodernism and Apologetics

• “Boosters” versus “Knockers”

• Example of Culturally Sensitive Christian Apologetic

• Healthy Contextualization: Confronting and Completing

• Common Ground: Human Beings Are Moral Animals

• Common Ground: Human Life Is Shaped by Liturgy

• Common Ground: Examples of Social Liturgy

• Denying Reality: Fear of Death

• Denying Reality: Transference

• Denying Reality: Is “Normal” Really Normal?

• Denying Reality: The Solution to Facing the Fear of Death

• Adapting Our Preaching to This Apologetic

• Regaining the Ideal Self: Biblical Narrative

• Regaining the Ideal Self: Illustrated by Eustace Scrubb

• Using Clause Search to Find Where Jesus Calls

• Regaining the Ideal Self: Dead to Sin but Alive to God

• Creating a Custom Guide to Study a Book of the Bible

• Calling: The Secret Signature of the Soul

• Regaining Horizons: C. S. Lewis and the Power of Story

• Regaining Freedom in Community: Dietrich Bonhoeffer

• Finding Information about Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Your Library

Details

• Title: AP211 Show and Tell: Apologetics in the Postmodern Context

• Instructor: Jim Belcher

• Publisher: Lexham Press

• Publication Date: 2014

• Product Type: Logos Mobile Education

• Resource Type: Courseware, including transcripts, audio, and video resources

• Courses: 1

• Video Hours: 6