God Speaks

The presuppositional apologetic to the Christian faith is based on God’s ability to speak with clarity and mystery in history, nature, and the 66 books of the Bible. Proverbs 1:7 makes this case in “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” Put another way, without an acknowledgment, and therefore fear of The all-powerful, all-determining God of the Bible, one cannot meet the preconditions of intelligibility.

This put one more way that I can understand at least, without the God of the Bible, one cannot truly know anything. His standard is something else that is limited. He borrows from God of the Bible. When speaking his many ideas, he speaks through the air provided by God, and rationalizes through the spirit, heart, and mind created by Him.

This is confirmed and established in the text of our faith in Colossians 1:17 “And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together,” and later in the same letter ““See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental principles of the world, and not according to Christ.” Colossians‬ ‭2‬:‭8. The philosophy of Christ is in the consistent mind of the believer in Him.

The believer vs the unbeliever

The problem for the unbeliever is not only philosophical, or intellectual, but spiritual in its fullest sense. Romans 1:18-21 says of the unbeliever “who by their unrighteousness, suppress the truth” so that they are “without excuse.” 1 Corinthians 2:14 confirms “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned,” and returns in 2:16 with “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” This contrasts the conditions of the unbeliever and believer in Christ.

This does not leave the current unbeliever without hope. For no believer rationalized his way to salvation from the irrationality of unbelief. Ephesians 2:1-9 is the foundation of our salvation. It is the text that brought me to faith. It states of the believer “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” Anyone who boasts of his rationality and knowledge, does so as a fool. Boasting is made completely irrational for the believer. He knows it is all of grace, and all of God.

Colossians continues, speaking of Christ, who’s mind is conforming the believer’s mind to his own, “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments.” Colossians‬ ‭2‬:‭3‬-‭4‬. There are arguments that sound plausible on the surface to our limited minds, but when we reach down into the depth of our knowledge, we see that we need someone else, the endlessly gracious Christ, to trust in and lean fully upon his wisdom and knowledge.

The Gospel Truth

Come and welcome to Christ. Trust in Him. Turn from your suppression of the truth in the unrighteousness we all once had (Ephesians 2:1-4) and receive the grace of Christ, knowing He knew you before you were born, loved you, and chose to give you the grace and freedom of wisdom and knowledge He dispenses.