Okay, are you all ready? All right, let's go ahead and pray and we will get started here. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this time to be together and pray your blessing on us as we talk about apologetics and talk about how it is that we witness to people and evangelize people and make a defense for the hope that is within us and help us remember those things are connected to each other, that it's the gospel that we're defending, that we're never just arguing piecemeal for bits and pieces of the Christian faith, but for the whole revealed truth, the whole system of doctrine that you have given to us in Holy Scripture. So help us understand that well and to realize that once that's in our minds and once that clicks, that witnessing and apologetics is pretty easy to do if we just do it as Christians and committed to your word. So we just thank you for giving us the truth and enabling us to answer all comers. So help us be prepared to do that and to do it with confidence in you. And we ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay, before we get started, I picked up three of these box sets. So this is just one of them. This is the four volumes, answers volumes, some answers in Genesis. This is kind of a gold standard. Basically, any question you're ever gonna be asked on the street or by anyone you work with is asked and answered in here. Everything from radiometric dating, dinosaurs on Noah's Ark, where all the water went, the sun, the moon, the stars. I mean, every conceivable question that you could ever think of related to creation, evolution, and the Christian faith is pretty much answered in here. But then they came out with a fifth volume and they include it now in the box set called a flood of evidence, and this one's focused just on Noah's Ark and the global flood, but I cannot overstate how important these books are, because this is an area where, unfortunately, the seminaries are not doing a whole lot of helping. I was taught the framework hypothesis when I was in seminary, that the framework hypothesis is the idea that Genesis chapter one is poetry, That it's just a literary framework, and therefore, we don't need to worry about how long ago it was or anything like that. But these books are great. In fact, I was looking at, I'm plowing back through them. I've read volume one and two, and I've used three and four as a reference. But gone through these early ones, and I started going through my Kindle version of volume one. And the stuff that's in there is so useful, and just it's really been good to go back through it. The first chapter is, how do we know there's a God? The second chapter is, should we accept millions of years? I mean, those are huge questions, okay? And the fact is, as a Bible-believing Christian, I don't believe in millions of years. I don't believe the Earth's been here that long. There is literally no reason whatsoever, none, to believe that anything is billions of years old or millions of years old or anything like that. And that's why I've spent so much time on that, because I could see, even when I was in seminary, that when I got to seminary, I was pretty strong six-day creation guy. But I will say, I mean, I remember listening to Mark Futado. I mean, this guy wrote his own Hebrew grammar that was used at the seminary. And listening to him monologue about the framework hypothesis and all this scholarly speak, and I'm just like, huh. You know, like, wow, that sounds really interesting. But you know why I never bought it? Because I kept going back to my room and reading Genesis 1 again. I'm like, that's not what it says. That is not what it says. And there's no, I kept thinking, is he actually asking us to believe that when the Israelite people heard the book of Genesis read, or when they heard the fourth commandment read, that this is what they were actually thinking, that this is a literary framework, a poetic expression of what, we don't need to worry about how long ago it was or how long it took God or anything like that. I don't buy it. I don't buy it. And remember, I've told you we had to get on a forum, a web forum, and argue with the other views. Because remember, when I was in seminary, there was the six 24-hour days, the day-age theory, and the framework hypothesis. No gap theory? No. No gap theory died a long time ago, I think. Yeah. Does anyone know what the gap theory is? There are gaps. That Genesis 1.1 and Genesis 1.2, there's a gap of billions of years between those two verses. What's the problem with that interpretation? Huh? It doesn't say that. Yeah, good. Man, you are so sharp. You have to have a PhD in Ancient Near Eastern Studies to get that one. Okay, yeah, the gap theory. But day age framework and then six 24-hour days in a class of 70 divinity students. These are 70 guys training for the ministry. Myself and two other guys were the only ones that were kind of holdouts for six 24-hour days. But it's just, it's not compelling. You listen to the day-age theory. Each day is zillions and billions of years each. And I'm just looking at the text. I mean, even when I learned Hebrew in seminary, learning Hebrew in seminary did not shed any light on Genesis 1 at all. None. It means exactly the same thing in Hebrew that it says in English. It did not learn. I thought, well, once I learn Hebrew, then I'll really figure it out. Well, it's just written like historical narrative, like any other historical narrative in scripture. So, those books are extremely useful, helpful. Any question anyone could ever ask you about the flood of Noah, any question anyone could ever ask you about what was on Noah's Ark, and how big it was, and what the world was like before and after the flood, about the exponential decrease of ages and things like that, that people used to live, the piling on of mutations, all that stuff. Radioisotope dating, that's all addressed in those books. Where did Cain get his wife? Remember I told you last time I was listening to the Foundations series, because we're going to try to do that as a Sunday school class for some of our younger kids here. He says, I've talked more about Cain's wife than my own wife throughout my whole life in ministry. So I do highly recommend that. So I got that box set, and there's a couple other ones. Those are the gold standard. It would be well worth your time to go through that with a pencil and make notations and underline stuff and everything else. I've got all five of those on Kindle. So I go through it and highlight them. I put highlights in there. And what's cool is that my Kindle app on my computer, all my highlights will show up on my phone because my Kindle on my phone and on my iPad and everything else. So highly recommend that stuff to you. Because the thing is, there are really good answers. And the answers are not actually that complicated. You don't need to be an expert in science or anything like that. to know the answers. But the key to doing evangelism is being able to answer questions like that. Because people will throw out questions like that, if you can give them a good answer to scientific questions or questions about creation and evolution, the point is to answer those questions so you can get back to the gospel with them. Because that's always what we're wanting to get to people, is the gospel of Christ, okay? So let's talk here briefly, kind of as an introduction to the issue of what is apologetics? What is apologetics? What is apologetics? What do we mean when we talk about apologetics? The defense of the faith, right? It comes from the Greek word apologia, which means a defense. It was done in court. You would make a defense of your client or of your position. You'd make your arguments. Now, what is the relationship between apologetics and evangelism? How are those two things related to each other? Does not apologetics get the objections out of the way so that you can share the gospel? That's the whole point of apologetics, yeah. The whole point of apologetics is to answer people's objections and questions so you can get back to the gospel, so you can stay focused on Christ and the cross. Is it getting hot in here, or is it just because I'm talking a little bit? I'm not sure. Hopefully I'm not getting sick. Okay, so apologetics and evangelism are very much related to one another. Just listen to a few of these passages. When Paul the Apostle stood before the people of Jerusalem, when he stood before Felix, before Agrippa, he also said this, brethren and fathers, hear my defense before you now, meaning the defense of the gospel. Philippians 1.7, he says, just as it is right for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my chains and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers with me of grace." And then a few verses later, he says, I am appointed for the defense of the gospel. 2 Timothy chapter 4, at my first defense, no one stood with me. So when you share the gospel with someone, in a real sense, in doing that, you're making a defense of the truth, a defense of who God is, a defense of what it is they're supposed to believe if they want to go to heaven. No matter what context you're sharing the gospel and you're making a defense of the hope that is within you. And think about that, that term hope, expectation, the expectation that I have to go to heaven. I mean, that's kind of a, someone might look at me and say, really, you expect to go to heaven? Why? Well, because God has spoken. And how do you know that? How do you know the Bible is God's word? How do you know that there is a God? How do you know God created all this stuff? Okay. The key to being confident when you witness to people and the key to being confident when you defend the faith is the method that you use. Okay? And this is all about worldviews. Okay? Everything is about your worldview. Everything goes back to that issue. There's the atheistic worldview. There's the Christian theistic worldview. There's Christian counterfeits like Mormonism, Islam, the Jehovah's Witnesses. But everything ultimately goes back to your presuppositions and your worldview. Now, who can tell me what is a presupposition? Yeah, something that you assume to be true apart from scientific investigation, apart from experimentation, testing, or anything like that. It's a belief that is already in place before you look at anything, before you even look at the evidence. Now, most non-Christians that you know and will talk to do not realize that they have these. Remember, I've used the illustration for you. In fact, I've got it here in my notes. I want to bring this out here to you. When the Christian apologist William Lane Craig He's one of the greatest defenders of the bodily resurrection of Christ. He's written four books on it. I've got a couple of them, they're really good, about the historical evidence for the resurrection of Christ. He did a debate with this really, really nasty atheist chemistry professor from Cambridge University or Oxford, one of those places, a fellow named Peter Atkins. Anyone ever heard of Peter Atkins? He's one of the nastiest atheists ever. And William Lane Craig stood up and made a devastating presentation on the resurrection of Christ. And I remember watching the debate going, how is he gonna respond to this presentation? It is just devastating. And so Craig points out, look, here are the facts. Here are the facts that even the most liberal, unbelieving historians agree on. Jesus was a real person. and he was crucified and he actually died under Pontius Pilate. Even the most liberal scholars in the world will acknowledge that. Okay, secondly, he was buried in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb. That's actually usually seen, even by liberals and unbelievers, as a historical fact. You know why we know that that happened? No, it's actually in your Bible. Yeah, it's recorded by all four of the Gospels. All four of them say it. that he was buried in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb. The third fact, his followers died claiming that he had been resurrected from the dead. Now, what do you think the best explanation for what actually happened for those three facts? He was a real person, he really died, he was actually buried, and all of his disciples died horrible deaths without a single one of them ever breaking ranks and denying it, saying that he was alive, that he had actually resurrected from the dead. Okay, the best explanation is that it actually happened okay now when that was presented to the atheist What do you think his possible explanations were? He said there were two either all 12 of them were hallucinating or they were lying What's missing from his list of possibilities yeah that he actually rose from the dead why I What are his presuppositions? I'm sorry? Yeah, it's a presupposition of his. There is no God. There can be no supernatural. They're either lying or hallucinating. So you see, until you've challenged someone's presuppositions, you haven't really given them the full force of the gospel message. Okay, and I've told you that story about that kid I met in the orthodontist office many times. His name was Gavin. That kid illustrated every biblical issue related to apologetics and evangelism I can imagine in a two-hour conversation. But it just showed how easy it is to talk to someone. Because as soon as I told him, I'm a Christian, I believe the Bible, he's like, well, I'm an atheist, I believe in evolution. Every single time he tried to say that people should do this or shouldn't do that, I was like, no, no, no, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. Should and should not, that only makes sense to me, not you. What do you mean? I said, you think people are just rearranged pond slime. What difference does it make? Why should we treat people a certain way? You see, should only makes sense if you're a Christian. I'm a Christian, I have the Bible. The Bible tells me, God tells me what I'm supposed to do, what I should do. You're an atheist and evolutionist, you shouldn't do anything. Well, I think that women should have rights. And I'm like, no, you're talking like a Christian. You're borrowing my worldview. Nobody should do anything and nobody has rights if your worldview is true. Okay, over and over and over again. And eventually he started to see it, that that's true. I can't make any value judgments about anything. So it was just kind of like, once someone has said, I'm not a Christian, I don't believe any of this stuff, you can just kind of sit back and let them talk. Because what will they do as they're talking? They'll contradict themselves. They'll contradict their worldview. Anytime they make value judgments, anytime they say something's right or something's wrong, you can point out, well, that doesn't make sense given your worldview. That only makes sense in my worldview. That's right. That's right. Everyone knows in their heart of hearts that there are certain things that are wrong across cultures. Can anyone think of a historical event that really illustrated that well? that morals are not determined by cultures? The Holocaust. What happened after World War II? The Nuremberg Trials. How did the Nazis defend themselves? They pled ignorance. Some of them pled ignorance, and some of them said, well, we couldn't do anything about it because of our rank. OK. We just followed orders. OK. And they also just said, you know, morality is determined by culture, right? It's determined by society and culture. And he and I, me and this young kid at this orthodontist office were talking about that too. And he said, well, in our society, it's okay to abort children. I said, do you realize that's the same argument the Nazis used after World War II? In our society, our Supreme Court defined Jews as not human. So who are we in the West to go over there and force our cultural values on them? And you know what the prosecutors said? They said, no, there's a law that's higher than ours. They did. They said, there's a law that's higher than ours. So we don't care that your society and culture said this. And what did we do to those Nazi thugs that we caught at Nuremberg? We strung them up, most of them, or put them in jail for the rest of their lives. Why? Because there are laws that are higher than ours. If you say that society is where the buck stops, then in the ultimate sense, no nation could ever get upset at any other nation for anything that they do. I mean, is it wrong that Hamas just, you know, attacked Israel? I mean, well, in their society and culture, it's okay, right, to do that, okay? You see, that's what all forms of unbelief, they create worlds that nobody can actually live in, no one can actually function in. So everything is about worldview. Now, William Lane Craig does not use that approach because Craig is not reformed in his theology. But I want to give you a contrast between William Lane Craig and Greg Bonson. Greg Bonson and the way that he debated for the existence of God and the way that he did debates. Has anyone ever heard any of Bonson's debates like the Bonson-Stein debate? You've heard the Bonson versus Stein, okay. I've heard the Bonson-Stein debate described as a chainsaw through warm butter. Because it was very obvious that Gordonstein had never run into anyone like Bonson. But here's William Lane Craig. Listen how weak this sounds. Here's Craig's argument when he argued for the existence of God. The available cosmological scientific evidence, the fine-tuning of the balance of life, the existence of moral absolutes humans tend to agree upon across cultures, and the uniqueness of the person of Christ in history, and the strong evidence in favor of Christ's bodily resurrection from the dead, all favor the probable existence of a God." That was his argument, that it's, I'm probably right. Now, when Bonson debated the atheist, Gordon Stein, at the end of Bonson's opening statement, he says, in order to debate at all, We have to be able to justify logic, reason, science, and morality. Atheism can justify none of these things. Only the biblical Christian worldview is able to, and therefore, Dr. Stein, by showing up to the debate, you've already abandoned your worldview and embraced mine, and therefore, you lost. And it's like, the guy was like, what is this guy talking about? But that debate is iconic. That was in 1985. It's actually on YouTube. You should go listen to it. and listen to the cross-examination and listen to how well Bonson did. And I remember listening to that for the first time. Someone gave me those tapes like just a few months after I got married back in 1997. And I listened to that debate over and over and over again. And I was like, I'm not sure exactly what he's doing, but it's just awesome to listen to. Like, wow, you presuppose. It kind of hit me. Yeah, everybody does that. Everybody presupposes certain things. But if what you're presupposing makes mincemeat out of human experience, then you shouldn't be presupposing it then, right? Okay, so apologetics is not neutral. Many people will try to tell you that, okay, in order for us to argue, you've got to put aside the Bible and I'll put aside my commitments and we'll try to set on neutral ground and argue with each other there. Is that possible? Neutrality is not possible when it comes to world views. Okay, so when it comes to the issue of neutrality, always remember the saying Dr. Bonson taught us, they aren't and you shouldn't be. When it comes to neutrality, I don't care who you're talking to. They're not neutral, and you shouldn't be. I'm a Christian the whole time I'm talking to someone. And no matter how much they get upset, well, you just keep quoting the Bible. Yeah, that's my worldview. That's right. That's who I am. That's where I'm coming from. And so at no point am I gonna abandon that or throw that away when I'm talking to people about anything. Yes, sir. You can see that in the difference between the two, Craig and Bonson, because Craig will say over and over, I've not argued tonight for the Christian God. That's right. I'm arguing for a generic God, a monotheistic God that can be affirmed by Jews, Muslims, or Christians, whereas Bonson gives an answer, a hope, a reason for the hope. Yeah. The Christian God. That's right. That was another thing that was so unique about his approach, is at one point Stein says, I'm not sure I really like your definition of God, Dr. Bonson. I want to talk about a more generic version of God. And then when Bonson does his rebuttal, he says, I just want to let Dr. Stein know that I will join him in refuting any and all non-Christian versions of God. I'm not arguing for generic theism. I am only and always defending the Christian God and only the Christian God, because none of the other gods exist. And he even said that none of the other gods exist and all of the religions that push them forward, whether it's Islam or Mormonism, they all undermine reason and human experience by their worldviews. Okay, but please do listen to the Bonson-Stein debate. In fact, I might even have Claire email that out to everybody. So I want to contrast for you. the brick-by-brick approach versus the entire Christian worldview approach. And I really want you to understand what I mean by this. The brick-by-brick approach to doing evangelism or apologetics means I'm going to try to construct or try to get you on my side of the debate one little brick at a time. I'm going to try to prove to you that a God exists. And then I'll try to prove to you that the Bible is generally historically reliable. And then I'll try to prove to you that Jesus is really, really unique in the panorama of world history. That's the brick by brick approach, and that's not biblical. That's not what the apostles did. That's not what Christian missionaries and evangelists should be doing either. So we don't use the brick by brick approach. That was William Lane Craig's approach. It means that you try to build your case for the faith one small brick at a time, instead of bringing the entire Christian worldview to bear upon the unbeliever. Now, let me give you an example of a real concrete example of why this is so important. When I've talked to people over the years, and I've discussed things with unbelievers, when we talk about the resurrection of Christ, let's say that I actually prove to someone that that actually happened in history. What could they do with that if I haven't really challenged their worldview yet? Couldn't they just say, huh, some dead dude came back to life. Cool. Call Ripley's believe it or not. That's neat. Does that mean they're necessarily gonna confess him as Lord and Savior and believe that he rose from the dead? No. I'm not just arguing that this Jewish guy was crucified and came back to life. I'm arguing that this Jewish guy is the Messiah. He is God. He was prophesied in the Old Testament. and you need to repent and believe in him as the conqueror and sovereign Messiah over death, okay? See, I'm always arguing for every part of the Christian faith with the whole system in view. Does that make sense? I'm not just arguing for a disembodied part of it to see if I can get you to believe that one piece of it, okay? There was actually a book that came out, I can't recall the title of it. It was by a Jew, a guy who's Jewish, who actually argues that Jesus did rise from the dead. He says the historical evidence is overwhelming that this is a fact. Doesn't mean he's God, doesn't mean that he fulfilled prophecy, doesn't mean that the Bible's true. It just means a dead guy came back to life once. See, but that's the problem with the brick by brick approach. You see, as a Christian, I'm always gonna come at people with a whole worldview intact behind everything, every single thing I'm saying. Okay, now, the entire biblical Christian worldview, that approach, since God has spoken only in scripture, And the scriptures teach that if you reject scripture, you're reduced to foolishness in your reasoning. I'm going to show that everything you take for granted is destroyed by your own presuppositions. And when I say everything that the non-believer takes for granted, I mean logic, knowledge, inductive reasoning, science, reason, morality, human dignity. Why is science possible? Now, we know that unbelievers do science, right? They all do it, right? Can they give an account as to why they can do it? They can't. But can we? Why, from a Christian world and life view perspective, why is science possible? That's right. That's right. Question 11 of the Shorter Catechism. What are God's works of providence? God's works of providence are His most holy, wise, and powerful. preserving and governing all his creatures and all their actions. So that's why he preserves and governs things in a law-like way, so that we can take dominion over it, so we can study it, so that it will behave law-like going into the future. One of the great quotes that Bonson uses a lot is, atheists can count, atheists can count, but they can't account for counting. They can't tell you why we can count. Okay, whereas we're saying, without the Christian worldview, you can't justify everything you've got to take for granted. Okay, one of the big things that came up in the Bonson-Stein debate, it's one of the most pivotal parts of that whole debate, is Stein, the atheist, keeps saying, well, I can't believe in Christianity because it has all these logical binds and logical self-contradictions. Okay, now, Gordon Stein, the atheist, was a materialist. What is a materialist? That the only thing that is real the only thing that exists is matter And Bonson Left him in a powder on the floor doing that very approach right there. He said dr. Stein you mentioned logical binds and logical self-contradictions. Yes, I did But do you believe that there are laws of logic then? Of course. He said, are they material in nature? How can a law be material, he says. He said, well, that's the question I'm asking you. How can a law be material? And then when Stein turns back to cross-examine Bonson, he says, Dr. Bonson, is God material or immaterial? Bonson says, immaterial. And Stein says, what is something immaterial? And Bonson says, something not extended in space. And he says, Dr. Bonson, can you give me an example of anything immaterial that exists other than God? And he says, laws of logic. And the place cracked up. I mean, the debate was over at that point. And Bonson's whole point is, without the Christian God, you can't justify the existence of universal, invariant, non-material entities like logic. You know, Boston just used the illustration. Can you go to the fridge and get a couple pounds of logic? Can you trip over a law of logic? They're not made of matter, and yet we all know they exist. They exist in the conceptual realm. But if you're an atheist, if you're a naturalist materialist, how do you justify using that kind of thing? Your worldview doesn't allow for it. Okay, so that's the thing to remember. Now, usually, if you're witnessing to someone or talking to someone, you're probably not gonna get into the transcendentals for the laws of logic. You might do that with folks, but just remember, all forms of unbelief do this. All forms of unbelief essentially saw off the branch they're sitting on, okay? All right, so let's talk about worldviews a little bit more here. This is really important. A worldview is a network of presuppositions which are not verified by the procedures of natural science regarding reality, Knowing and conduct. So if you want to get real technical, metaphysics, what exists, what's real, epistemology is how we know things, or if knowledge is even possible, and ethics. Okay, so metaphysics, what's real, what exists, epistemology, how we know what we know, and then ethics. Every human being, I don't care who they are or how old they are, has beliefs about all three of those categories. About metaphysics, about epistemology and ethics. What's real? Is knowledge even possible? And of course, anyone here like the history of philosophy or anything like that, or like R.C. Sproul and everything? What's kind of happened with modern thought when it comes to knowing things in epistemology? What's kind of? Yeah, can't know anything. What was that? Yeah. Yeah, yep. Everything is basically subjective. There is no absolute truth. Bonson did his, well, except the statement that there's no absolute truth, right? Yeah. If there were no absolute truth, you would just be quiet and never say anything, right? Okay. Everyone knows that there are absolutes. You can't function in the world without them. But yeah, in a lot of ways, the whole realm of knowledge has just been completely discarded because they, they know that there's just no way to justify knowledge claims anymore. So you get all this subjective stuff about my truth, your truth, and everything else. I think I've told you all this story. When I was a computer programmer, I remember Sitting in a room with my boss and my boss's boss and a bunch of other programmers and we had been working But just working forever on trying to get this all the bugs out of the system and before the conference call started We're talking about the gospel and talking about religious stuff and they knew I was a seminary student on the side So they're just pounding me with all these questions and I'm trying to answer and they're like, well, that's true for you But not for us and I said truth doesn't work like that Okay, if something is true, it's true for all of us, isn't it? No, it's everything subjective. Everything's just true for me and true for you, and this is my truth. I'm Catholic, and I, you know, pray to the Virgin Mary, and your truth is, you know, you just feel really strong about this justification, whatever the heck you're talking about. And we're into this other stuff, and he's a Zen Buddhist, and Vijay, this other programmer named Vijay, he was a Hindu, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So then we get on this conference call, and they're going down the list. These business owners are going down the list. There's this problem, and this problem, and this problem, and this problem. So we're writing down everything that's wrong with the system. And then when we got off the call, I said, you know what we should have told them? We should have said, the system works just fine, and that's true for us. And they all laughed. I said, don't you guys see how silly it is to say things like that or think that way? Why do you guys think that ultimate reality would be like that? It's not. And if you're right, I'm wrong. And if he's right, then we're all coming back as aardvarks or something. or worse, that's as high as a computer programmer can come back as a R mark. So presuppositions, they're elementary assumptions in people's reasons, in people's reasoning process. It's not just any assumption or an argument, but listen, a person's worldview is a personal commitment that they have. It's held at a very deep level. And people's presuppositions tend to be immune to facts. evidence they tend to be okay y'all y'all have heard the story I'm sure have you heard the story of the man who thought he was dead it's like the illustration that's that's over some of you not heard that the man who thought he was that John's not heard it okay there's a man who thought he was dead and he told his family sitting at breakfast I'm dead and they thought that was kind of weird but it just continued day after day after day I'm dead I'm dead I'm dead and here he is walking around the house you know drinking eating you know going to work coming home and telling everybody he's dead So they finally took him to a doctor, and the doctor said, this is definitely weird. So he said, okay. Shows him all this scientific evidence and says, sir, can I get you to affirm this one proposition? Only living people bleed. Only living people bleed. Showed him video, showed him scientific reports, only living people bleed. And the guy who thought he was dead finally said, okay, only living people bleed. And as soon as he said it, the doctor pulled out a pen and stuck it in his hand, and there's blood running down his hand. And he says, lo and behold, dead people bleed too. That's the way presuppositions are. They're immune to facts. They're typically not gonna be influenced by evidence. And think about Jesus's opponents. How many miracles did they watch him do? A lot, and it had no effect on them at all. That was one of the things that really actually was one of the catalysts in moving me towards Reformed theology, Because I was a hardcore evidentialist before I was a Calvinist. And I thought, man, these people had evidence up to their eyes, and it had no effect on them. They watched him heal people in the synagogue. They watched him do all this stuff. And the very next verse, they're conspiring to kill him. So there's something more going on there. Okay, so always remember, everyone has a worldview. And listen, the only worldview The only worldview that makes sense of reality, that makes sense of the world we live in is the biblical Christian theistic worldview. Every other worldview out there, whether it's atheism or any of those varieties or any of the cults, they undermine reason and human experience, okay? All right, so when you know how to do worldview analysis, when you know how to try to push people to be consistent with their state of beliefs, it's really powerful, it's really powerful. In fact, that young guy from the orthodontist office, he's not a Christian, but I did convert him to being pro-life. which was pretty surprising. And there was another lady, I worked with another lady in Ohio, witnessed to her many times, but I did get her to become pro-life too. So she's still a liberal, but pro-life. And that young guy too, he said in an email, yeah, I'm gonna be arguing for, against abortion. Isn't that amazing? There's enough of the image of God, even if someone's not converted. If you can just get them to think a little bit, they'll realize, yeah, you should never do that to an unborn child. So. Okay, so I had a few more things here, yeah. I want to get to some of the stuff from the books. I want to do some introductory stuff about worldviews and the importance of that, but I have here in my notes, neutral worldviews are not only impossible, they are immoral. Why is that? Okay. What did Jesus say about it? about who's for and against. That's right. If you're not for me, you're not neutral. You are against me. Okay. So there's no fence sitters ultimately. And you're right. And there's no way to identify anything as, as wrong. Um, if you try to be neutral, then you really have no grounds to call anything evil or anything good for that matter. Billy. Okay. Um, let's see. So you don't want to be neutral. They aren't, you shouldn't be. Yeah, neutrality. I got these from Bonson. Neutrality erases the Christian's distinctiveness. Always remember that. Your identity, no matter where you are or who you're talking to, you are a Christian. You're a blood-bought Christian, and the way you think is to be captive to Christ and to his word. So no matter what people ask me, I'm gonna have a biblical answer for them. No matter how much they might fuss at me for using the Bible, that's your worldview. That's where you're coming from. And they're not gonna give up their worldview to talk to you either, okay? All right, okay, that's good. All right, oh yeah, one last little point. One of the things that Bonson pointed out, I remember when I was in seminary, this is really, really important. This really affects the creation evolution issue too. There are no brute facts, meaning facts don't speak for themselves. What do I mean by that? Okay, right. So what do facts mean to an individual? That's right, that's right. And if I had a whiteboard here, I used to draw a picture of when I used to teach this in Ohio, I always had a whiteboard. Think of a person right here, a human being standing right here, a little stick figure here. You have facts, observable data here, and in front of his head is a box with his worldview in it. All those facts go into that worldview and are rearranged there before they go into his head. So, when an evolutionist, with his evolution worldview in front of his head, looks at the Grand Canyon, what does he see? Millions of years. Slow process, little bit of water, long period of time. I'm a biblical Christian. I have the Bible. That's my worldview. I look at the same thing, the Grand Canyon. What do I see? A lot of water, not much time. Yep. Real quick, and tons of water. Okay? But we're both looking at the same facts, aren't we? Looking at the exact same thing, the exact same phenomenon. Okay, so a lot of times in your discussions with people, as you talk to people, it's hard to get across to them, they don't think they have that worldview thing in front of their head. They don't, they think, well, I'm just a neutral observer of the facts. And it's like, you got to educate them and help them see, no, you have a very distinct way of interpreting everything. Okay, how about looking at a DNA molecule or looking at a cell under a microscope? What does an atheist see when he looks at that? Yeah, a coincidence. Man, look what purposeless chemical laws and physics and gravity did by accident. Now, as a Christian, I look through the microscope and what do I see? I see design. I see something God made. I see something living that only God could create by his creative genius and power, okay? So always remember, that worldview issue, that is absolutely foundational that you understand that. When you see people walking around, try to see them with, visualize in your mind, they've got a little box in front of their forehead, in front of their eyes, and everything that comes in there is rearranged by that worldview to fit that worldview. Everybody does it, everyone's like that. Okay, so if you are aware of that, just know no matter who you're talking to, they're not neutral towards God and you shouldn't be. You're distinctively a Christian person. In our case, I would maintain a solid biblical Calvinist Christian, okay? Where I have, you know, all I gotta do is make sure I get the gospel right, God will do with that what he wants to do. And answer people's questions, no need to get your emotions all up or your blood up or anything or be nervous, you know, God will do what he wants with his work. Okay, all right, I put together three pages of notes from the opening chapter of volume one there. Is there really a God, okay? Is there really a God? Now, we went over already how we're supposed to use evidence and things like that, but I want you to think about the way that an atheist answers this question. It's not even really an issue of evidence. It's just a presupposition, right? God, there is no God. It's not like they looked at things and arrived at that deductively by looking at nature. They just have that as a presupposition. There is no God because God's not allowed to exist. What about things like natural selection and the evolutionary explanation for life? I mean, that's really, strangely enough, that's still the dominant perspective that's held by most university students and most people that I worked with were evolutionists. Even people that were churchgoers, even people that went to liberal churches and Roman Catholic churches, believed in evolution, that everything's millions or billions of years old. What is natural selection? That is something you do need to know. What is that? Darwin came up with that. Survival of the fittest is one way to summarize it. What's better fit for the environment to compete will be the ones that live to pass on their genes. Okay, so as animals reproduce, there's some variety in the way that they reproduce. I mean, if you notice, you have kids. They do look like you a little bit, but they also have variety. Paul is the tallest Heinz of all time. He's a couple inches taller than me, and it still bothers me that I have a son that's taller than me. But I was an inch taller than my dad. His dad was 5'7", my dad was 5'11". I was 6'1", and Paul's 6'3". So Paul will have a son that's like 6'6", or something. But there's all this variety. But the idea of natural selection is whatever animals have the best physical characteristics that enable them to survive, they'll pass those on to succeeding generations. And then as those traits are accentuated, then there's more changes and more everything that happens. Now, does that give us an explanation as to where animals came from? It doesn't. Okay, so that really, What is the key issue when it comes to an atheist understanding of the biodiversity that we see? What's the big question they've got to answer? Say what? Yeah, where did it come from? How did it start? Okay, and there is no answer to that. I mean, you've heard about the chemical soup. You know, I was told I had to write it on a test in sixth grade. Where did life begin? I had to write, a little warm pond. But the fact is, though, would a little warm pond be a good thing or a bad thing when it comes to chemical evolution? What does water tend to do to everything? It destroys it, it destroys everything. So then you have ideas about, well, maybe the whole universe is like an RNA world or whatever, things like that. Okay, it's a grasping at nothing. Evolutionists, atheists cannot explain how life got started. Yeah where matter came from right Yeah matters God yeah, yeah, but the best they can do though is speculate about, well, this accident happened, this chemical reaction happened, or these things came together to form life. So natural selection only works on information that's already present. It doesn't produce anything new. That's one thing that's very important. And by the way, what the Bible teaches is that God created distinct kinds of animals and plants, and they reproduce according to their kinds, okay? And do we see that in nature, that animals reproduce according to their kinds? I mean, you don't see, different kinds of animals that are crossbreeding or anything like that, but you do see diversity within the created kinds. Okay, here's another important issue for the issue of whether there's a God or not. What is information? What is information? There's a lot of it out there. What is it? It's kind of hard to define, but Say what? Okay. Yes, it's stuff in nature that's arranged in such a way as to have purpose and to be useful. Okay, now one of the grand examples, they bring this up in the book, and I've seen this in many other places. When you look at a mountainside, and you see just random rocks and everything like that, you know, you don't think that that arrangement of rocks was designed. But when you look at Mount Rushmore, what do you immediately know when you look at Mount Rushmore? That there was a mind behind its design. Yeah. And why is that? It's kind of a hard question to answer, but why do we know when you look at that, even though you didn't see anybody carve it into the mountain, did you? I didn't, but I know someone did. How? How do I know that? Does that make sense to you? Yeah. It's obviously purposeful. It's supposed to look just like four of our, you know, most important presidents there. Okay. So, information, the existence of information is a huge problem for evolution and for atheism because there's a lot of information in nature, primarily where? Inside the cells. Inside of cells. And particularly inside of what? The nucleus. The nucleus, which has what? This real big, sticky, long... DNA. DNA. What does DNA stand for? Deoxyribonucleic acid. Deoxyribonucleic acid. It was discovered, what was it, in the 1950s by Francis Crick. This thing. And it has the instructions on how to build the entire living system that it's part of. And it's read by enzymes. The enzyme has to read the DNA to make all the parts of whatever kind of life it is. Okay? Where did all that information come from? What is an atheist going to say about that? Aliens? Yeah. E.T.? ? and translatable by something within the cell for the cell to do what it's supposed to do. Yeah. And we have a problem with the DNA. Or the enzyme. Yeah, that read them. Yeah. Yeah. They had to both be there at the same time. Yeah. And that's what, what was that? Because the DNA is what codes to make the proteins that read the DNA. That read the DNA, yeah. So if the whole thing's not there right at the beginning, none of it works. And that's the thing that's so remarkable about all of it. So listen to just a few more quotations here. Can mutations produce new information? Actually, scientists now know the answer is no. Dr. Lee Spetner, a highly qualified scientist who taught information and communication theory at John Hopkins University, made this clear. He wrote a book called Not By Chance, and he says this. In this chapter, I'll bring several examples of evolution, particularly mutations, and show that information is not increased But in all the reading I've done in the life sciences literature, I've never found a mutation that added information. That's a bit of a problem, isn't it? Because they're saying that you and I are standing here, the result of billions of mutations. And they're saying mutations don't add anything. All they do is break stuff. Listen, all point mutations that have been studied on the molecular level turn out to reduce the genetic information and not to increase it. The Neo-Darwinian theory is supposed to explain how information of life has been built up by evolution. The essential biological difference between a human and a bacterium is in the information they contain. All other biological differences follow from that. The human genome has much more information than does the bacterial genome. Information cannot be built up by mutations that lose it. A business can't make money by losing it a little at a time." End quote. See what he's saying? Mutations represent the loss of information, not the acquisition of new information. So he's pointing out, so this idea that mutations are what give rise to the different kinds of animals and different species and new traits, new huge anatomical differences. Think about the difference between a single-celled organism and say like a mollusk or a crab or some of these supposedly lower forms. Think about how massively different they are and how much more information you have to have to build them. And he's saying mutations can't do it. Listen to what he goes on to say. He says, the Neo-Darwinians would like us to believe that large evolutionary changes can result from a series of small events if there are enough of them. But if these events all lose information, they can't be the steps in the kind of evolution the Neo-Darwinian theory is supposed to explain, no matter how many mutations there are. Whoever thinks macroevolution can be made by mutations that lose information is like the merchant who lost a little money on every sale but thought he could make it up in volume. What is macroevolution? Listen, we were taught, maybe here's how it happened. A lizard got together with another lizard and laid an egg and a sparrow was born. And you've got the book, don't you? The, the, what is it called? The wonderful egg. Yeah. It's a book about this, but it gets even cooler than that because two other lizards nearby also got together and laid an egg and another sparrow was born of the opposite gender and they got together and made it and started a new species. That's actually put forward as a possibility. Is that not absurd? on its face. Listen, he goes on, not even one mutation has been observed that adds a little information to the genome. That surely shows that there are not millions upon millions of potential mutations the theory demands. There may well not be any. The failure to observe even one that adds information is more than just a failure to find support for the theory. It is evidence against the theory. We have here a serious challenge to neo-Darwinian theory. Okay, and it goes on from there. One other guy. Y'all know who Michael Behe is? The guy who wrote the book, Darwin's Black Box? Listen to this quotation from him. What is Darwin's Black Box? What is it? The cell. Yeah, that's the title of the book. But what was, what does he mean by Darwin's Black Box? Darwin didn't understand the cell. This is, you know, jelly-like, sort of a plasm. He didn't know what was going on inside it. Charles Darwin knew nothing about genetics or cell biology. What was that, Chris? Yeah, there's no such thing. They thought that they were these little blobs of plasma or whatever, but now that they can examine cells under electron microscopes and see what's going on at the molecular level. Michael Behe wrote a book, and he's not, I mean, is he a theist? Is he? Okay, okay. He says this, now it's the turn of the fundamental science of life, modern biochemistry, to disturb. The simplicity that was once expected to be the foundation of life has proven to be a phantom. Instead, systems of horrendous, irreducible complexity inhabit the cell. The resulting realization that life was designed by an intelligence is a shock to us in the 20th century, who have gotten used to thinking of life as the result of simple natural laws. But other centuries have had their shocks, and there's no reason to suppose that we should escape them. So just a couple more quotes, it says, Verner Gitt, the information guy, he says, a code system is always the result of a mental process. It should be emphasized that matter as such is unable to generate any code. All experiences indicate that a thinking being voluntarily exercising his own free will, cognition, and creativity is required. Listen carefully to the sentence. There is no known natural law through which matter can give rise to information. Neither is any physical process or material phenomenon known that can do this. What are you saying? Okay, but then Behe, this will be the last thing and then we'll knock off here. Behe says this, the fourth and most powerful reason for science's reluctance to embrace a theory of intelligent design is also based on philosophical considerations. Many people, including many important and well-respected scientists, just don't want there to be anything beyond nature. Is that a good reason not to believe there's anything beyond nature? Well, I don't want it. I don't want there to be a God. When Greg Bonson debated Eddie Tabish, anyone listen to the Tabish debate? I mean, that was essentially Tabish's argument. I don't like the idea of a God that would judge us and send people to hell. And Bonson's rebuttal was, that's like a child that pulls the covers over his head. He actually said this in the debate. You're like a child that pulls the covers over his head because his restrictive father makes him go to bed. And he says, well, dad, you don't exist because I don't like you. The fourth and most powerful reason is men don't want there to be anything beyond nature. They don't want a supernatural being to affect nature, no matter how brief or constructive the interaction may have been. In other words, They bring an a priori philosophical commitment to their sciences that restricts what kinds of explanations they will accept about the physical world. And sometimes this leads to rather odd behavior. Okay. So ultimately in the final analysis, how do I know that God exists? It's plain and obvious through creation. And also he's told me about himself and his word. Now, is that going to impress the atheists and the naturalist materials? Probably not. But do you have some idea where you can go with them now? Where you can talk to them now? Any thoughts or comments? Yes, sir. In Delaware River Gorge, we have a gap year program that I help teach in. And I agree, these books are great. We give a copy. There's another book that's really good by Jason Lyle called The Ultimate Proof of Creation. It's not the best title because he goes into logic so much more than proving creation. It's a lot of introductory logic. It's a great addition to this set. That's a good point. The Ultimate Proof of Creation by Jason Lyle is really good. Because you're right, it's really just a manual on how to do apologetics. It's not just the ultimate proof of creation. But yeah, that's another great book. But if you master that, you can talk to anybody and not have to be nervous or anything like that. Yes, ma'am? What is any decent argument that they make for debt? I never understand if we think we're getting better and better. I mean, after billions of years, you'd think we would live longer than just That's a great question Yeah, we're all a mess That's called genetic entropy and that John Sanford guy wrote a book called genetic entropy genetic entropy is the death of Darwinianism Because what that theory, what they are seeing is that as mutations pile on, that's the reason we die. And it's also, it's the reason that animals are not getting more advanced. They're not getting better. They're not getting stronger. We're actually getting weaker. And as the generations continue forward, there's more and more and more stuff wrong with them. We're devolving. In fact, John Sanford has described it as rusting out like a car. So what you see is exactly what scripture says. You have all the created kinds, where you have lots of information here at the top when they were first created, and they're all degenerating. They're all getting worse as the generations are born. There's more and more mutations. Nothing is getting better. Everything's getting worse. Genetic entropy. Is that kind of their, why they blame like man's pollution, it's our fault, that's why we're not getting better? I mean, is that where they're coming? I've never heard a good argument from their side for why. I can see that argument. Maybe that's why there's such a push for, well, if we wouldn't pollute ourselves, maybe we could live longer. Yeah, I've not heard that argument made. I can see them using that one, though. But all the worship of the environment, though, that's part and parcel of their worldview. They think the Earth's conditions for life are accidental anyway, so we could easily mess it up if we hurt it or whatever, where we know from Scripture, creation's a lot tougher. It's a lot tougher than people think. And it's OK to make a rare species of spider go extinct if it will help the people in that area, because the people are more important than the spider, right? They're very religious people. Oh, yeah. It's environmental. If the people are more important than the spider, what about the two more dangerous people? Yeah. Yep. OK. Any other thoughts or comments? Yes, sir. One thing you've oftentimes talked about what sort of terminology is used, what words get accepted, and our presuppositions. I think we gave up a lot when we traded the term natural philosophy, which is a very old term for this love of wisdom about nature, to science. Science just means knowledge. So when the change was made from natural philosophy, which was just This is just science. It was saying, we're the only show in town. Nature is all that there is, and we are the source of all knowledge. So that would have to take us back several centuries to regain the term natural philosophy for what we do in scientific endeavors. Yeah, that's a better way of describing it, is natural philosophy. Yeah, and the thing is And in the Boston Stein debate Stein even says well science science itself is atheistic because we don't look for supernatural explanations just completely Missing the point, but it was Christianity that gave rise to science over the past 350 years or so anyway our doctrine of creation and providence gave rise to it, but Yes, sir I do Yep. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. He said that. He said, you would have faith that at some point in the future, you'd have a naturalistic explanation. And then he says, and that's the problem with my opponent. He lives his whole life by faith. And that just irked him so bad. But it's true. It's belief that will come up eventually with a naturalistic explanation for what we just saw. It's not just faith. It's blind faith. Yeah, completely blind faith. There's no reason to believe. Yeah, except rebellion. I want to stay in my rebellion. Years ago, we went to an ICR conference when they were still doing them. And one of the things they talked about is the groups of atheistic scientists in Russia who pursued their discipline. And it was all different kinds of discipline, you know, biochemistry and this and that and the other. The further they got into it, the more they came to a conclusion, this cannot be an accident. Wow, really? Yeah Looking at that. Yeah, I've told you all the story that that guy that showed up at church when I was in college He was a physical therapy student and he had to take gross anatomy where they actually take apart a human body He'd never been to church nothing. He just showed up at a Tuesday night Bible study and we're like did somebody invite him and no Like what? Why are you here? He's like well, we just took apart the human wrist and And looking at the way that that was all designed, the carpal tunnel and the tendons, it's like it just kind of hit me that God made this dead guy. So that means he made me too. So I figured I should probably go to a church. But he got saved. He came to know Christ just by studying. That was such a cool story. We're like, isn't that amazing? Taking apart a human wrist and looking at how it was designed, it freaked him out. It's like I stood there and looked at my wrist, like, wow. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, we can challenge people, but at the end of the day, God has to do that work on someone's heart. And that's not our area. That's what we leave in the hands of God. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Yeah. And not be a nervous wreck and just speak. Don't worry about it. God will help you. Okay, well let me stop there because I can see the little ones are getting a little feisty and edgy. All right, let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for the power of your word, and we do pray that you'd open doors and give us opportunities to speak about the finished work of Christ to people. Help us to be able to answer the challenges, the questions about science, about why science is possible, and about information in our bodies and in the world, and help us to be ready with an answer. and to point people to Jesus and to help them see their sin. And we pray that your spirit would go before us in all that we do, that your name would be glorified in it. We ask in Jesus's name, amen.