23AR28-32

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AR 28:32 - Making the gospel compelling in an age of despair

In this issue:

APOLOGETICS - bringing "the full implications of the gospel to bear on the deepest longings and troubles of modern hearts"

ARCHAEOLOGY - early evidence for "King David's Judah" confirmed

EASTERN MYSTICISM - Everything you do, is for yourself - "and there isn't one."

Apologia Report 28:32 (1,629)
September 11, 2023

APOLOGETICS

"Apologetics in an Age of Despair" by Gavin Ortlund (Keller Center, Jun 12 '23) -- summarized: "[M]odernity is characterized by the loss of transcendent meaning. This influences our lives profoundly - yet often unconsciously or semiconsciously."

   Ortlund observes that "Many modern people can relate to the emotions involved in [the aura of modern despair (such as the metaphors of 'wiping away the horizon, unchaining the earth, plunging into empty space')] - even if they're not sure why."

   He explains: "The sense of chaos and disintegration introduced by atheism is powerfully conveyed in Friedrich Nietzsche's famous parable of the 'madman.' This character (generally regarded as representing Nietzsche) runs to the marketplace and cries out, 'Whither is God?' ... 'I will tell you. We have killed him - you and I. All of us are his murderers.'"

   Ortlund gives the example: "Jean-Paul Sartre rejected the efforts of earlier French atheists to retain objective morality apart from God, stating that 'the existentialist . . . finds it extremely embarrassing that God does not exist, for there disappears with Him all possibility of finding values in an intelligible heaven.' For the existentialist philosopher Albert Camus, the loss of transcendent meaning entailed the absurdity of life."

   Ortlund finds that "Our culture generally feels normal to us - it's the glasses we look through, not the landscape we look on. ... In his Making Sense of God, <www.bit.ly/3shRN0P> Tim Keller even proposes most modern people are so unhappy that it takes years to fully realize the nature of their unhappiness."

   Put another way, "It's the feeling that 'our actions, goals, achievements, and the like, have a lack of weight, gravity, thickness, substance.'"

   He cites A Secular Age by Charles Taylor <www.bit.ly/3sMgXVH> (a Keller favorite), which "draws attention to the problem of disenchantment and the loss of meaning in the modern era. This phenomenon is historically recent - while most modern people intuitively understand the problem, it would be difficult to explain to those who lived 500 years ago."

   He also cites Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: "If I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened.' ...

   "Here are two ways, in particular, we can make the gospel compelling in an age of despair. [First:] Proclaim the Fullness of the Gospel....

   "John Stott, commenting on Paul's speeches in the book of Acts, put it like this:

   "Many people are rejecting our gospel today not because they perceive it to be false, but because they perceive it to be trivial. People are looking for an integrated worldview which makes sense of all their experience. We learn from Paul that we cannot preach the gospel of Jesus without the doctrine of God, or the cross without the creation, or salvation without judgment.

   "As apologists in an age of disenchantment and despair, we must bring the full implications of the gospel to bear on the deepest longings and troubles of modern hearts. Most basically, we must identify God himself as the answer to modern despair. ...

   "Preaching the gospel in an age of despair will therefore require patience and long-term perspective. Evangelism will often be a longer and messier process. ...

   "We must therefore appreciate the enormity of the task in front of us. Apologetics in an age of despair involves attempting to help others awaken to a sense of God, a sense of eternity and glory."

   Second: "Proclaim the Beauty of the Gospel....

   "Pascal is saying we must show Christianity is respectable and then desirable before we show it's true. This is necessary because of the innate, natural resistance to the gospel in the human heart ('They hate it and are afraid it might be true').

   "This Pascalian approach is profoundly relevant for apologetics in the age of despair. Our great challenge is more often apathy and distraction than sharp counterarguments. [M]any modern people aren't even interested in whether the gospel is true. We have to start further back, helping people understand why the gospel is worth considering in the first place. To this end, the beauty of the gospel is a profoundly useful tool. It can cut through apathy to arrest the attention of our hearers. ...

   "[A]pologetics must engage the 'unrest' that occasionally surfaces in modern hearts. We must situate the gospel in relation to the deep longings of the human heart. Our work will be less like winning an argument and more like breaking a spell. ...

   "Apologetics in an age of despair will also mean showing the drabness of secular explanations of human desire. ...

   "Simply put, secular people long for religious qualities that no longer make sense within secularism. This may explain the recent rise in various forms of 'religious nontheism.' ...

   "In the gospel, we have the message for which modern hearts ache. We have the food for which the world is perishing with hunger. We're offering to people an ancient tradition to join, a transcendent cause for which to strive, and an eternal glory to enjoy forever. Once again, to help our friends understand the magnitude of what's at stake...." Share what you've learned. Trust His Spirit to communicate through your expressions of hope. <www.bit.ly/47qmi53>

   Ortlund, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Ojai, California, also runs the YouTube channel Truth Unites. <www.bit.ly/3OBNQvp>

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ARCHAEOLOGY

"King David's Judah Found? The archaeological evidence for early Judahite state" by Nathan Steinmeyer (Biblical Archaeology Review, May 30 '23) -- "Despite King David's prominence in the Hebrew Bible, little archaeological evidence has been directly linked to the early years of the Kingdom of Judah. As a result, some scholars have argued that Judah only became a developed polity in the ninth or even eighth century B.C.E. A 2021 study, <www.bit.ly/45ugbL4> however, seeks to refute this idea based on the findings of an extensive regional archaeological project in the Judean foothills, the very region where the Bible says King David's kingdom was born. ... [Please note: This links to a large pdf that may be slow to open. The substantial excellent graphics are well worth the wait.]

   "Far from showing a region devoid of population, the evidence revealed a small yet quickly expanding kingdom during the Iron Age IIA period (c. 1000–925 B.C.E.). Garfinkel suggests that this kingdom likely developed in Hebron before expanding north to include Jerusalem.... Soon thereafter, it grew further to include Lachish in the southwestern hill country, Beer Sheva in the Negev, and several other cities that would become large administrative centers in the latter centuries of the Iron Age (c. 925–586). This expansion closely mirrors the biblical description of King David's kingdom beginning in Hebron and only later extending to Jerusalem, then growing further during the reign of King Solomon."

   According to the study's author, prominent Hebrew University archaeologist Yosef Garfinkel, "the earlier lack of archaeological evidence for this period can be attributed to not having data from excavated destruction layers. Destruction layers actually serve to preserve many archaeological finds that would otherwise have been removed or reused by a site's inhabitants. As a result, periods of conflict often leave behind much clearer signs in the archaeological record. This can be seen especially towards the end of the Iron Age, where the destruction layers left behind by both the Assyrian and Babylonian armies are easily identified in many archaeological sites." <www.bit.ly/3qBDLa4>

   It's unclear why it's taken since 2021 for this important news to appear in Biblical Archaeology Review.

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EASTERN MYSTICISM

Some may think of Jeremiah, the biblical prophet, as a mystic. In Jeremiah 17:9 we read: "The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?" However, in "Eastern philosophy says there is no 'self.' Science agrees," Chris Niebauer (The Well, Jun 9 '23) argues that: "Western philosophy typically conceptualizes the self as a stable, controlling entity, comparable to a pilot, while Eastern philosophies such as Buddhism argue that the self is an illusion, a byproduct of our thought processes. ... This false sense of self, which is often equated with the incessant internal dialogue, contributes significantly to human mental suffering. ...

   "This may be a difficult point to grasp, chiefly because we have mistaken the process of thinking as a genuine thing for so long. It will take some time to see the idea of a 'me' as simply an idea rather than a fact. ... It seems all-important, so it often comes as a shock when I tell people that based on my work as a neuropsychologist, this 'I' is simply not there - at least not in the way we think it is.

   "The big difference between the Eastern spiritual traditions and psychology is that the former has recognized this experientially and the latter did so experimentally (and accidentally, for that matter). And in my view, this means that those who study and teach psychology are still largely unable to appreciate the implications of these findings. ...

   "In research undertaken to try to mitigate severe epilepsy, Roger Sperry and Michael Gazzaniga believed that by cutting this bridge between the two sides of the brain, seizures would be easier to control. They were correct, and Sperry would win the Nobel Prize in 1981 for this work. ...

   "Over the last 40 years, several additional studies have shown that the left side of the brain excels at creating an explanation for what's going on, even if it isn't correct....

   "The truth is that your left brain has been interpreting reality for you your whole life....

   "So, for the first time in history, the findings of scientists in the West strongly support ... one of the most fundamental insights of the East...."

   Niebauer concludes: "For now, the essence of this idea is captured brilliantly by Taoist philosopher and author Wei Wu Wei [d. 1986] when he writes, 'Why are you unhappy? Because 99.9 percent of everything you think, and of everything you do, is for yourself - and there isn't one.'" <www.bit.ly/47GTi9l>

   (Note: The publisher uses "bigthink.com" as its domain name. Significant irony there.) 

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