Basic Training

Spirituality Column #99
September 30, 2008
Current in Carmel - Westfield (IN) newspaper

Basic Training
By Bob Walters
Author of Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

The most important thing I did as I began my walk with Christ in earnest not so many years ago was to read the Bible … Genesis to Revelation.

Did I understand everything I read? No. Parts of the Bible are great stories, parts of it are stultifying lists, parts of it are depressing truths about mankind, parts of it are scary truths about God, and parts of it are glorious truths about God’s love, hope, faith and salvation. There’s not one part of it that doesn’t serve to teach us about the light and love of Jesus.

All of it I accept as God’s truth, even the parts I don’t entirely understand; even the parts I understand but can’t explain. The Bible is a treasure of truth God has provided. As Christians, it’s where we dig for treasure every day.

Yet, reading the Bible isn’t enough.

So many people either stay away or turn away from Christ, from religion, from church, from the Bible. I’ve yet to encounter a believer whose faith hasn’t been challenged by someone they loved or respected.

Reading the Bible end-to-end may provide some street cred in ecclesiastical circles, but learning apologetics – how to defend one’s faith against the challenges of an all-too-disbelieving world – is time every bit as well-spent as learning scripture.

Apologetics (think C.S. Lewis) means “defense” and is the arena where my faith and trust in Christ Jesus encounter the doubt, distrust, disappointment and even hostility of non-believers. It’s where the rubber meets the road of a Christian walk; it is basic training for being in the army of God.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) originally wrote this in advance of an apologetics conference in the area that was later cancelled.  But ... he posts this as a Classic now because Walters began his walk in faith 11 years ago this weekend, on Sunday, Sept. 2, 2001, at East 91st Street Christian Church in Indianapolis.  It was his first time in church in nearly 30 years and that morning amounted to the "hour he first believed."  It just so happened that very day at E91 was the 50th anniversary of Russ Blowers' ministry at E91, and both Russ and senior minister Dave Faust - who two and a half months later baptized Bob - shared the E91 pulpit that day.  Russ preached on 1 Corinthians 13.  Bob's never forgotten that.  And, a special thanks to Bob's older son Eric (Carmel, 2010), who a couple weeks earlier had suggested the family attend church.  It's funny how things get started ...

The Reason for God

Spirituality Column #80
May 20, 2008
Current! in Carmel (IN) newspaper
Current! in Westfield (IN) newspaper

The Reason for God
By Bob Walters

This week I am writing to recommend Tim Keller’s excellent new plain-language book on Christian apologetics, The Reason for God.

“Apologetics.” It’s too bad we don’t have a more culturally intuitive word for this honored intellectual exercise. It does not mean, “I am sorry for what I believe.” It means, “This is why I believe it.” It’s from the Greek verb “to defend.”

My guess is that in a very short time The Reason for God will ascend to the top of Christian “must read” lists. I’m reading it now. Let’s pray that more than a few skeptics will read it as well.

Keller is a well-known graduate of the prestigious Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. For nearly 20 years he has been successfully delivering the true message of Christ in perhaps the most unlikely of geographical regions and cultural demographics.

Keller is pastor of the thriving Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, a church Keller started from scratch in 1989. Today five services in five separate locations total 5,000-6,000 worshippers every Sunday in the uptown area near Central Park.

Manhattan is sophisticated and hip; filled with non-religious skeptics, critics and cynics. The middle class family, backbone of the church market, has long ago fled the city’s high cost and crime. The Father, Son and Holy Ghost caught the last train for the coast, so to speak, way back in the 1960s.

What Keller has done for Christ and Christians in New York, hopefully his book will do for other places as well.

Keller presses at the great big, skeptical questions of the Christian faith posed by atheists, doubters, skeptics, seekers and heretics in the great secular maw of relative morality and New Age spiritualism.

The Gospels? They are just legends.

The Church? Full of injustice.

Christianity? A straitjacket.

Jesus? A good man, but, c’mon … resurrected?

God? He hasn’t helped me lately.

A Good God? Can’t be; too much suffering in the world.

Answering the knotty problems of Christianity in smart and accessible language is Keller’s special talent and the great gift of this marvelous book.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) recommends you look into the book’s group study guides as well. They look superb.