I frequently have opportunities to defend my worldview. In fact, almost daily I have conversations about my "old-fashioned" morals and my "scientifically untenable" religious convictions. Whenever the dialogue reaches an awkward and inevitable impasse, I ask my favorite question: "By what standard?"
People don't start with objective, indisputable, uninterpreted facts. Everyone has presuppositions, and these presuppositions determine the shape and structural integrity of everything we build on them. Asking "by what standard do you judge this or that to be right or wrong, good or evil" reveals a persons presuppositions about this world, because everyone has a faith position - even the militant New Atheist down the street. Understanding how to uncover another person's assumptions, as well as your own, is the only way to make any progress towards fruitful conversations about religion. This is precisely why you should read Expository Apologetics by Voddie Baucham.
Several years ago, Mr. Baucham wrote The Ever-Loving Truth to tackle the allusive moving target of postmodernism - objective truth. Now he's written a "how to" of sorts to help laymen and ministers defend objective, absolute truth using nothing but the source of all truth (I.e., the Bible - it's circular, I know).
In his latest book, Expository Apologetics, Mr. Baucham helps ministers and laymen alike ride the expository carousel successfully. Using Paul's "apologetic waltz" in the epistle to the Romans and in the narrative of Acts 17, Mr. Baucham winsomely argues that the apostles used the Old Testament to answer objections to Christianity. The reason for using Scripture to defend the claims of Scripture is because it is authoritative.
Mr. Baucham contends that building an argument for the Christian faith on anything but the Bible cuts the legs from underneath our central argument that the Bible is absolutely true. Appealing to reason and carefully constructed scientific arguments to vindicate God and the Scriptures inadvertently undermines our claims that the Bible is our authority and relegates apologetics to the small minority of folks that can comprehend and employ such arguments. Instead, he suggests that laymen and ministers contend for the faith under the Protestant banner of Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone).
Of course, the common critique of this kind of thing is that our reasoning is circular and is, therefore, indefensible. However, true to his thesis, Mr. Baucham recognizes this objection and demonstrates that a good number of Christianity's critics borrow from our worldview to score points against us. Others, he argues, simply live lives that are inconsistent with what they profess to believe. Once foundations have been established and presuppositions laid bare, all parties in the conversion can begin to examine how consistently those foundations have been built upon.
Sola Scriptura doesn't negate the use of tradition for Mr. Baucham. In fact, he argues that catechisms, creeds, and confessions are essential preparation for apologetic encounters. As he notes in his observations about Paul's methods of defending the faith, Expository Apologetics doesn't always involve quoting a Bible verse, chapter, and book. Frequently, orthodox biblical theology is appealed to more generally by the apostles. In order to do the same, we must be intimately acquainted with orthodox doctrine as it is found in Church tradition.
Finally, Mr. Baucham spends a good deal of time writing about the disposition of a godly apologist. He admits that Christian apologists have a nasty reputation for being arrogant and picking fights. He contends that this is out of place and that Scripture requires us to be gentle and peaceable while explaining and defending the hope we have in Christ.
As Mr. Baucham writes in his book, publishers don't like it when an author's target audience is "everyone." But being the contrarian he is, Mr. Baucham did things his own way and wrote a book for everyone. He's succeeded, in my estimation. So I recommend this book to Christians (laymen and clergymen) because it is simple, biblical, and practical. I also recommend it to unbelievers, whether they be militant atheists or unconvinced seekers. Mr. Baucham makes the case for the veracity of Scripture as clearly and competently as anyone, and you just might find yourself believing something different about the world when you finish the book than you did when you began.
To purchase the book, visit: https://www.crossway.org/books/expository-apologetics-tpb/