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Full Description
Even after Christendom, our culture is fertile ground for gospel renewal. We need apologetics for the whole church tailored to this moment.
Since the fall of Christendom, Christians in Western countries can no longer assume their neighbors share basic familiarity with the Bible or even a sense for God. We now face a strange mixture of apathy and antagonism toward the gospel. Some people view Christianity as yesterday's news. For others, it's the source of today's problems. Lately, though, more and more are open to the idea that Christianity may be tomorrow's hope.
Amid these confusing and conflicting shifts, we need apologetics for the whole church and not just for those who enjoy arguing. Cultural apologetics can help uncover opportunities to proclaim the gospel as the only way to fulfill longings for truth, beauty, and goodness. Churches that embrace this approach can be strengthened and renewed as they demonstrate an appealing and convicting way of life that stands out in the world.
In The Gospel after Christendom, scholars and practitioners from the Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics define cultural apologetics, explain its biblical and historical grounding, and demonstrate its importance for the church today. Their diverse viewpoints, united in the gospel, offer a balanced approach that can guide Christians to share the Good News with their neighbors in this challenging but exciting time.
With contributions from:
Sam Chan
Joshua D. Chatraw
James P. Eglinton
Skyler R. Flowers
Rachel Gilson
Collin Hansen
Rebecca McLaughlin
Ivan Mesa
Alan Noble
Gavin Ortlund
Derek Rishmawy
Daniel Strange
Bob Thune
Christopher Watkin
Trevin Wax
Contents
Introduction (Collin Hansen): What Is Cultural Apologetics?
Description: In a time when many Christian voices look outside and tell the weather of the day, in this introductory chapter, Hansen conceives of cultural apologetics as climatology. Cultural apologetics is the proactive study by Christians of the deep-rooted values, ideologies, narratives, and patterns at work in their culture. These aspects of a culture are, at their core, religious in nature. They are the pursuit of meaning and eternal life. Understanding them in this way helps the cultural apologist, rooted in the gospel, to correct and connect so unbelievers can see their sin and need for a Savior. Done properly, this means that cultural apologetics presents a vision of Christianity that compels the non-believer to see the Christian faith as truth, good, and beautiful even before they have believed. This is not a call to "redeem the culture," and the task must constantly be attuned to the ways the church itself needs to be challenged and edified by a cultural apologetic that by scripture. Every culture in its self-serving idolatry thinks it can have the benefits of Christianity while subtracting actual faith in it. The ultimate task in cultural apologetics is to not only to comprehend and critique the ways the culture does this, but also to consummate their own story in the story of Jesus Christ.
Top Choice:
Collin Hansen serves as vice president for content and editor in chief of The Gospel Coalition, as well as executive director of The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics. He hosts the Gospelbound podcast and has written and contributed to many books, most recently Timothy Keller: His Spiritual and Intellectual Formation and Rediscover Church: Why the Body of Christ Is Essential. He has published with the New York Times and the Washington Post and offered commentary for CNN, Fox News, NPR, BBC, ABC News, and PBS NewsHour. He edited Our Secular Age: Ten Years of Reading and Applying Charles Taylor and The New City Catechism Devotional, among other books. He is an adjunct professor at Beeson Divinity School, where he also co-chairs the advisory board.
Part I: The Concept of Cultural Apologetics
These first three chapters serve to introduce the conceptual underpinnings of the task of cultural apologetics. This section will include a precise definition, drawing on theological and philosophical resources, a biblical presentation of the methodology's scriptural basis, as well as a historical analysis of its employment through various thinkers. Each chapter will serve the project's goal of presenting cultural apologetics as a means by which the church articulates the gospel truth in light of its cultural context for the sake of renewal in churches, hearts, and homes.
Chapter 1 - Why Cultural Apologetics?
Description: We are living in the largest religious transformation in American history. Forty million Americans have left the church in the last 25 years. Many other countries have already seen similar declines. With this massive shift in religious demographics comes an equal shift in the underlying beliefs, desires, and hopes of a culture. For centuries in the West, these fundamental aspects of human life were largely understood within the concepts of Christiendom, making the task of evangelism the relatively simple task of connecting the dots. With the advent of post-Christendom, these shared cultural touch points no longer exist. Christianity is not merely rejected but is thought to be unbelievable. This need calls for a reassessment of evangelistic practice in the modern world. This chapter offers cultural apologetics as the needed corrective to effectively share the gospel and form Christians today. Cultural apologetics steps into this situation bring the truth, goodness, and beauty of the gospel as the fulfillment to these shared beliefs, desires, and hopes. Thus, cultural apologetics makes Christianity comprehensible, commendable, and compelling t
