I
Peter 3:15-16 (NLT)
And if someone asks about your Christian
hope, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way.
Have
you ever been asked, perhaps challenged by someone trying to embarrass you or
refute your belief, to explain why you believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior
(your Christian hope)? Maybe some of you
have been confronted many times. I have been asked to explain my faith only a
few times. However, whether many times
or just a few, each of us must be prepared to give an answer in a convincing
manner why we believe what we believe.
Have you ever
seen the movie “Inherit the Wind”? It
tells the story of the
Scopes “Monkey Trial”, one of the most famous battles in history between
evolution and creationism. In 1925 in Dayton, Tennessee, public schoolteacher
John Scopes was taken to court for teaching evolution, which had earlier been
banned by the state of Tennessee. The ensuing court battle pitted two famous
men at the time as defense and prosecutor lawyers. The defense lawyer was William Jennings
Bryan, a former Democratic presidential candidate. The prosecuting lawyer was Clarence Darrow. The movie depicts Bryan as a fundamentalist
Christian with blind faith who cannot answer basic questions logically about
his faith. The movie puts Christianity
in a bad light because of the bumbling failures of Mr. Bryan to defend
adequately why he believed what he believed.
Sadly, Bryan’s failures depict the status of the majority of Christians
today who also cannot defend why they believe what they believe.
How can you be
prepared to respond to someone who asks you why you believe in Jesus as your
Savior, especially when that someone is challenging why you believe? Sooner or later, if you are being a faithful
witness about your faith (others in your life know clearly that you are a
Christian), you will be strongly challenged to defend why you are a Christian,
why you believe the way you do. Those
who do not believe in Jesus Christ as their Savior typically have these
characteristics:
· Do not believe that the Bible is the inspired Word of God.
· Do not believe that Christ died a substitutionary death for
the sins of mankind.
· Do not believe that mankind is morally corrupt and sinful.
· Do not believe that God is sovereign
· View God in some false way, not the way God is taught in the Bible
So you need to be
prepared to respond to questions related to these characteristics of the
non-believer.
Did you know that
if you are a Christian, it is your duty to be an apologist? The term
“apologist” or “apologetics” refers to the reasoned defense of the Christian
faith. This is what I Peter 3:15 is
saying. In fact, the word “explain” (or
other translations use the phrase “make a defense”) comes from the Greek word
“apologia”. The Word here is saying that
you need to be ready to defend your faith, to give rational and reasoned
explanations to doubters about why you believe they way you do and why you
believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord.
You need not only
to be ready to defend your faith, but also you need to know what you are
defending and be comfortable with your position. Examples of how Paul did this are found in
Acts 14, 17, and 19. Note that he
reasoned with doubters and critics because he knew his Bible (the Old
Testament). For you today, the main key
in defending your faith is that you must know your Bible, at least to some
extent. You must have solid knowledge of
the faith you profess. It’s also a good
idea to have some knowledge about other religions. For example have you ever interacted with a
Mormon or a Jew or someone of another religion who not only could clear
articulate what their beliefs were, but also knew the basics of
Christianity? You can be made to look
really bad if you are not equally prepared.
The best way to
be prepared to defend your faith, especially against someone who thinks that
you’ve been ‘brainwashed’ or you are not being intellectual or you are being a
‘prude’, is to declare that you simply believe that you were a sinner, but
Christ died for your sins, you believe that this is true and that His Spirit
lives in you because you confessed your sinful nature and gave your life over
to His authority. Your basic defense is
the gospel and your story in describing what the gospel has done to change your
life. A few basic Bible verses
memorized—the famous ones like John 3:16 and John 14:6 go a long way in helping
you defend your faith.
In your defense
of your beliefs, I Peter 3:16 also says that you should be gentle and
respectful. You do not need to get into
a shouting match. You should not put
down others for what they believe or don’t believe. You should be calm, cool, and collected in
your demeanor where it is obvious that your faith is strong and deep and allow
others to see that your actions back up your words. Perhaps our church and all other churches of
those reading this devotional should periodically teach their flocks how to
defend the basics of their faith.
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