The teaching of Colossians 2:3-8 is unambiguous. ALL knowledge (note: not simply knowledge of "religious" matters is to be found in Christ.
Greg L. BahnsenBy reversing the proper order of things, the non-presuppositional apologist sees submission to God's Word as secondary, rather than primary, sees demonstration as the basis for faith, sees independent argumentation rather than the Holy Spirit as the source of conviction, and therefore advances the destruction of his own defense of the faith.
Greg L. BahnsenSince the fall of man was ethical in character (not metaphysical) the unregenerate and regenerate share the facts of the world and the rules of thought, but their interpretation and use of them are far from neutral.
Greg L. BahnsenWhen someone's paradigm changes, the world itself changes with it. So "facts" are only facts *for a system* or paradigm.
Greg L. BahnsenThose who follow Christ are distinct from the world and the ways of the flesh. As Christ says in John 17:17, they are consecrated or "set apart" from the world, and the distinctive thing about Christians is that they have the truth. Being not of this world, believers are "set apart" by the truth. And Jesus asserts in the same verse that "God's Word is truth."
As we walk before the unbeliever then, the thing that makes us different is our submission to the Word of God. Our lives and thinking are founded on Scripture, while the essence of the unbeliever's life is rejection of the revelation of God. Our presupposition of Scripture's truth is at diametric odds with that of the world, and because we have been given the Word of God, the world hates us. From the outset, the focus of the world's opposition to the faith is the Word of God itself.
God either rules as sovereign in interpretation over *all* areas of life or none.
Greg L. BahnsenWhen an apologist attempts to be autonomous in his reasoned argumentation he indicates that he considers God to be less certain than his own existence and that he places greater credence in his independent reasoning than in God's Word.
Greg L. BahnsenMost philosophers do not want intellectual matters to reduce to a question of morality (obedience or rebellion to God's Word). They want to hold the intellect or reason to be above matters of moral volition. They hold that truth is obtainable and testable no matter what ethical condition the thinker is in.
Hence, they maintain that all disputes must be rationally resolvable, and a rational case for a philosophic position relies on a valid chain of discursive argumentation that takes us back to incontestable first principles or facts.
Paul sets forth the attitude to which the defender of the faith must be committed: "Let God be found true, but every man a liar.
Greg L. BahnsenTo reason with the non-Christian in a fashion purporting to be independent of God or independent of reliance upon revelation is to honor the unregenerate's notions of "evidence" and "verification" as legitimate and correct. However, for the Christian, it is Scripture that governs *every* aspect of his life, even his concept of "evidence" and the way he reasons with skeptics.
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