Barry's Blog

Tim Keller, the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan,  is having a significant impact in the Big Apple as he seeks to reach young urban professionals. His book, The Reason for God, has moved its way up to number seven on The New York Times nonfiction bestseller list, and his book tour, hosted by the Veritas Forum, has attracted thousands of people to various universities throughout the country. In a recent interview in Christianity Today, Keller provided some thoughtful commentary worthy of reflection. Here are a few of his responses:

Are the doubts that believers face the same as the doubts that unbelievers face? 

It's your society that gives you doubts. If you go to the Middle East and ask people what makes Christianity implausible, they're not going to say, "Because there can't be one true religion." They are going to say, "Because of how oppressive America has been as a Christian nation, and if you look at their culture, it's lascivious and debauched." But if you ask Americans, "What makes Christianity implausible to you?" they're not going to say, "Your popular culture is filled with sex and violence." They will say, "How could there be one true religion?" My guess is the personal issues are different. If they came from a very homogeneous, insular Christian community and they go to college and their roommate, who they think is wonderful, is Hindu, and they really feel like all Christians would be better than all Hindus, then they're confused.

The recent Pew study talked about changing patterns of belief in America. Has that affected your apologetics ministry?

The Pew study showed that the moderate middle has atrophied--people who are kind of Christian. They now take Christianity metaphorically.They believe the Resurrection is a wonderful symbol. That group has just been shrinking, and secularism and orthodoxy are growing. So we have a polarized society...One reason for this is because I think there's been a backlash. Evangelicalism has been so identified with conservative Republican values that a lot of people who might be more moderate have decided they are not religious. I've seen this happen in New York. They're moderate or liberal politically, and they feel like orthodox Christianity is so identified with conservative Republican politics that they have actually distanced themselves from the faith.

You reject marketing apologetics (defending the Christian faith) like, "Christianity is better than the alternatives, so choose Christianity. Why? 

Marketing is about felt needs. You find the need and then you say Christianity will meet that need. You have to adapt to people's questions. And if people are asking a question, you want to show how Jesus is the answer. But at a certain point, you have to go past their question to the other things that Christianity says. Otherwise you're just scratching where they itch. So marketing is showing how Christianity meets the need, and I think the gospel is showing how Christianity is the Truth. 

C. S. Lewis says somewhere not to believe in Christianity because it's relevant or exciting or personally satisfying. Believe it because it's true. And if it's true, it eventually will be relevant, exciting, and personally satisfying. But there will be many times when it's not relevant, exciting, and personally satisfying. To be a Christian is going to be very, very hard. So unless you come to it simply because it's really the truth, you really won't live the Christian life, and you won't get to the excitement and to the relevance and all that other stuff.

"One of the great difficulties is to keep before the audience's mind the question of Truth. They always think you are recommending Christianity not because it it true but because it is good. And in the discussion they will at every moment try to escape from the issue 'True --- False' into stuff about a good society, or morals....You have to keep forcing them back, and again back, to the real point...One must keep on pointing out that Christianity is a statement which, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be is moderately important." -C.S. Lewis, "Christian Apologetics," from God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics.

For FinishingWell,

Barry Morrow