Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 60077. Peter tells us to be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in us, and I suspect that verse has produced more guilt in ordinary Christians than almost any other. We read it and picture a debate we would lose. But look at…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 60001. Nobody teaches most of us how to defend the faith. We learn to pray, we learn to find Habakkuk without the contents page, and then one day a colleague says something about the Bible being edited by emperors and we discover we have nothing to say. Scripture is not vague about this. It…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 60000. Christian apologetics sounds like something you do when you have offended somebody. It is one of those words that has drifted, because the English apology now means an expression of regret, whereas the Greek behind it means nothing of the sort. So let me clear the ground. Christian apologetics is the work of…
Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 11018. Most Christians want to share the gospel and do not, and the reason is rarely a lack of conviction. It is that the moment arrives and they have no idea what to say, so they say something about church instead and spend the evening annoyed with themselves. So this is a practical answer…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 11017. Biblical evangelism is the announcement of good news that has already happened. That is what the word means, and getting the definition right settles most of the anxiety that surrounds the subject. Say the word in a congregation and watch the shoulders tighten. People picture doorsteps, awkward conversations and the friend they alienated…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 4134. The power of the Holy Spirit in Acts 1:8 is Jesus’s last commission before His ascension, and it is often misread. We tend to hear “power” and imagine a dramatic experience – something intense, overwhelming, perhaps visually or emotionally spectacular. But the word Jesus uses (Greek: dunamis) means effective enabling capacity: the ability…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 04028 The work of the Spirit in evangelism is the most overlooked factor in the whole business of telling people about Jesus. We fret about our nerves, our lack of training, our awkward attempts to steer a conversation toward the gospel, and all the while we forget that the decisive worker in any conversion…