This was the first post on Apologetics? (the original blog name).  Since it served as an introduction, I figured it would make a good permanent page in case newcomers do not find it in the July Archives:

A good friend of mine (see friend, Aaron) once imparted upon me some wise words:

BCFencer08 (11:45:33 PM): When you accept that you may very well be alone in your standings, it is a lot easier to understand why people disagree.
BCFencer08 (11:45:51 PM): And then, when people understand you, it is so much more of an accomplishment.

I think it’s self-explanatory. I told him I would save it on my desktop (and, not surprisingly, I ended up saving it in my buddy profile on AIM…) and so here I am bringing it up again.

There are many ways to consider the message in the words above. For Christians, we are told in the Bible that we are set apart both by the way we should live and the way we should think. The way we should consider the world, our perspective.

We are different. We should not conform to the ways of the world. In fact, “[...]friendship with the world is hostility toward God[.]” Thus, once we accept that we are different in almost all ways (except that we all need salvation), it is, as Aaron pointed out, much easier to understand why the world disagrees with us.

Does this eliminate the friction? Of course not. Nor would it if we just agreed with the world.

17:14 I have given them thy word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17:15 I do not pray that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil one. 17:16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17:17 Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth.
John 17:14-17 RSV

But this conversation surrounded a more personal event. Trying to defend one’s faith against the unbelief of a “believer” is a emotionally and spiritually challenging experience. It is incredibly sad to have a friend of many years, a believer in Christ, a fellow church goer whose parents served in the church ministry tell me directly that the Bible is inherently flawed because it was written by men. That we should not consider the Old Testament any longer, and that Paul was an ignorant male who got his facts wrong about women.

More will come on this later. If not here, in our “book” or whatever it turns out to be. But this event, and maybe a few minor ones occurring around the same time, sparked me into action.

I want to defend my faith.

I now have read and am reading about 5 books at once–all focused on either apologetics or anti-Christian doctrine. I am on fire. This is what I choose to do and love to do with my free summer nights.

Peter exhorts us to first claim Christ as Lord, and second to be ready always to make a defense of the faith we have in Jesus.

4:1 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 4:2 preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching.
2 Timothy 4:1-2 RSV

In Ephesians 6, Paul calls us to put on the full armor of God. As Charles Stanley magnificently depicts in When the Enemy Strikes, all parts of the armor of which Paul speaks are centered on scripture and faith in Christ. My faith, all of our faiths, are greatly increased through the reading of the Bible.

We are all given these commands; they apply to all believers. We are all commanded to stand. But

11:3 if the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do”?
Psalms 11:3 RSV

If we do not affirm and increase our faith through the reading of our Bibles and through prayer to Almighty God, only God knows when we will fall. But we will fall.