The testimony of Scripture is clear in teaching that man cannot come to an under stand ing of God (and thereby of God’s world) by means of his inde- pendently exercised reason. One does not first satisfy his intellect with certain autono mous proofs that God exists and has a particular nature, and then after gaining this under standing place his faith in the Lord. Rather, reve rence and faith precede one’s understanding or knowl edge of God and all that He has made. To know God in sal vation and approach unto Him has definite precondi tions or requirements. The motto of the Wisdom literature is that “The beginning (i.e., the first and controlling principle) of knowl edge is the fear (or reverent submission) of the Lord” (Prov. 1:7). About this verse Mat- thew Henry aptly comments: “In order to the attaining of all useful knowledge this is most neces sary, that we fear God; we are not qualified to profit by the instructions that are given us unless our minds be possessed with a holy rever- ence of God, and every thought within us be brought into obedience to him.”
The book of Hebrews repeatedly touches on the theme of drawing unto or coming to God (e.g., 4:16; 7:25; 10:22; 12:22), which has been made possible by the perfect ministry and accomplishment of redemption by Jesus Christ (cf. 8:1-13). This benefit of the New Covenant is summarily desig nated “knowing
the Lord” (v. 11; cf. John 17:3). The un avoidable prerequisite of coming to the Lord in saving knowledge is laid down in Hebrews 11:6 as faith; without this it is impossible to please Him. Faith enables us to draw near unto God and know Him.
That which God demands of men is that they have faith in His Messianic Son (John 6:28-29), and Jesus declared that doing the will of God was neces- sary if one were to gain the knowledge of God’s true revelation (John 7:17). From this it is evident that autonomous knowledge does not first pick out the genuine revela tion of God, and then savingly trust the Savior who is revealed
72 One Must Believe in Order to Understand therein. Faith is the precondition of a proper understanding. Augustine drew the inference with clarity: “Under standing is the reward of faith; there fore, do not seek to understand in order to believe, but believe that thou mayest under stand” (Homilies on the Gospel of John 29.6). Virtue or personal rectitude
(i.e., the discipline despised by fools who hate knowledge, Prov. 1:7b-8, 29) is the neces sary support for knowledge; if a man’s heart is wrong, his thinking will corres pond ingly be futile. Just as knowledge is supported by virtue, so also virtue is supported by faith (2 Peter 1:5). Thus we must conclude that faith precedes knowl edgeable under standing.
Since this is the case, and since repen tance is unto faith (Matt. 21:32), the apologist must aim to bring those who live in ignorance to repentance (Acts 17:30). Knowledge can only be gained when the unbeliever repents and comes to faith in Christ: aside from this radical “change of mind” and confident submission to the truth of God, knowledge would be automa tic ally excluded. Therefore, apologetical success depends on the sinner’s conver sion: his thinking must be complete ly turned around, not simply supplemented with autono mous arguments. Faith and repentance, which produce reverence for the Lord, are founda tional to knowledge, not vice versa. Understanding is not
gained in the wisdom of man, but only when such pseudo-wisdom is aban- doned for the truth of God. The apologetic method of the believer must take this fact into account at all times: if it does, the apologist will be faithful and bold to present the full challenge of presupposi tional argumentation rather than the piecemeal attempts of those approaches which fail to call the sinner to abandon his system of thought with its autonomous assumptions and futile methodology. The opponent of the gospel will not come to knowledge until he renoun ces his sinful pride and alleged intellectual self-suf ficiency—that is, until he epistem ologically bows before the Lord in repen tant faith.
But if repentant faith is necessary for the un believer to see the truth of the gospel which we defend, then the success of our apologetic is in the hands of our sovereign Creator and Redeemer. Our polemic will be convincing only to the extent that our unbeliev ing hearers are renewed in their minds and recre- ated by God’s Spirit in the holiness of the truth (Eph. 4:23-24). Only then will they stop walking in the vanity of their minds with darkened understanding and ignorance (cf. vv. 17-18). Knowledge requires repentance and faith, and thus knowledge depends on the grace of God who gives faith as a gift (Eph. 2:8) and grants repentance (Acts 5:31; 11:18). When the sinner is benefited in these ways by God’s mercy and love, then he “puts on the new man who is
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The Conditions Necessary for Apologetic Success
renewed unto genuine knowledge according to the image of his Creator” (Col. 3:10).
Faith requires that one be born of God (1 John 5:1) who gives repentance unto a genuine knowledge of the truth (2 Tim. 2:25). The apolo gist’s opponent must
come to repentant faith if he is to gain under standing and knowledge, and this takes place, not by superior knowledge or clever reasoning on the part of the apologist, but by God’s gracious work in the sinner so that he is enabled to know the truth of the apolo gist’s faithful testimony and argument (as they are rooted in Christ’s word and are powerful according to Christ’s Spirit).
God must give us the success in our apologetic en deavors. Thus we must “walk in wisdom toward them on the outside” (Col. 4:5), not arguing from the foolish presup posi tions of unbelief but according to the presupposed author- ity and truth of God’s wise revela tion in the gospel. When we do this we will know how to answer every man (v. 6), looking to God in continu ing prayer that He might grant apologetical success by opening a door for the word (vv. 2-3). The corrupt communication which characterizes humanistic thought (cf. Matt. 7:17-18) must not proceed from our mouths, but rather good words which represent the mind of God (cf. Matt. 19:17) and can minister grace to our hearers (Eph. 4:29). As Paul, our speech must not be with the enticing words of human wisdom but with the powerful proof (demon stra tion) of the Spirit (1 Cor. 2:4), knowing that the faith of our opponents must stand in the power of God and not the wisdom of men (v. 5). Such faith is unto under- standing. Con sequently the apologist must work from the presup posed word of Christ, be constant in prayer, and look to God for the door to be opened to the word (cf. Acts 14:27; 1 Cor. 16:19; 2 Cor. 2:12) and for the granting of wisdom, genuine knowledge, and en lighten ment (cf. Eph. 1:16-17).
74 Strategy Guided By the Nature of Belief