Steve Hays vs. The Internet

by Stephen Rodgers

If this sort of thing is deadly poison, then all I can say is that it’s a very slow-acting poison, for I’ve been reading this stuff for years, and it hasn’t killed my faith or precipitated a crisis of faith or even raised a flicker of doubt. Like small, incremental doses of venom, administered over time, the effect of this stuff is not to kill the patient, but to build up an immunity. If it’s had any impact, the effect is rather the reverse. I’ve read books like this before. I always come away thinking to myself, “Gee, if this is the best they do, then they must be pretty hard up for excuses!” So, no, the encounter with his book did not precipitate any Exorcist-inspired head-twirling. (Steve Hays, “Satan’s School for Girlie-Men”)

For those of you who have wondered, but largely been too kind to comment, we’ve been scrambling a bit this week on the Beacon. Pastor Patrick is traveling, I’m battling a flu, and it seems that an unfortunate confluence of events have conspired to wreck our normal weekly schedule. Fortunately, I’ve got a few backup articles in various states of readiness, and this seemed like a good opportunity to both extend a little grace to our content-providers, while still supplying something our readers could really sink their teeth into.

I’ve mentioned in other contexts that atheism has a history of attempting to subvert traditionally Christian forms of argument, and a rather prolific example of this is the so-called “free-thought argument.” The form of that objection varies, but the gist of it generally goes something like this: “Religion in general (and Christianity in particular) are faith-based, dogma-driven, irrational belief systems. If only the Christian would take a step back, examine competing claims from a neutral perspective, and apply universal standards of logic and reason to what they believe, they would quickly realize the error of their ways.” They then go on to typically pepper the believer with a wide range of challenges and counter-claims for why Christianity must be false.

Now, anyone who knows me understands that I take umbrage with a rather large number of those propositions, from the claim of irrationality to the smuggled assumption that there is such a thing as a “neutral” perspective. But what I’d like to explore (briefly!) today is that this line of argument is actually derived from Christian principles. And as invariably happens when we compare and contrast Divine wisdom with human wisdom, we discover that God did it first, and God did it better.

You see, Proverbs 18:17 warns of the dangers of naive acceptance in the face of human persuasiveness, and admonishes us to to be discerning and (appropriately!) skeptical of such claims. Luke records that diligent examination of questions in the light of Scripture is not a blow to dogma, but rather something “noble” (Acts 17:11).

That is why I am incredibly grateful for the hard work that many apologist have done and continue to do in refuting the many, varied, and (seemingly increasingly) odd and desperate challenges that are raised against Christianity.  And I want to take a moment to highlight one of those men, and perhaps turn you on to some of his work in the hope that you will not only be educated, but edified.

Steve Hays blogs prolifically at the famous Triablogue which as been referenced here on the Beacon a number of times. Today I just want to raise awareness of a few of his more substantial efforts to review and refute some of the more popular offerings contra-Christianity. For anyone interested in familiarizing themselves with these objections (and their subsequent refutations), this would be a good place to start:

He has also written or co-written a number of book-length responses to other published anti-Christian books.  The more notable of these are:

Last but not least, I expect you would benefit from a few of his other works as well:

  • Love the Lord with Heart and Mind, a survey he conducted with a number of theologians and apologists regarding their reasons for embracing Christianity
  • Why I Believe, (part 1 and part 2), his positive case for the Christian faith

For what it’s worth, a number of these resources (and others!) are available in various ebook formats as well.

For those of you who are going to be reading these for the first time, I envy you: you’re in for a treat.