Introduction As the only philosopher in a symposium on “Biblically Sensitive Philosophy,” I feel considerable pressure to represent my people well. But I feel a competing interest to defend the value of biblical texts as data for philosophical consideration and analysis. Indeed, the latter claim needs defense. Some of the challenges that Dru discusses in…

Dear Darrel, Thanks for reading my book The Quest: Exploring Creation’s Hardest Problems and taking time to write to me. I’m very grateful for your friendship, and I’m thankful you wanted to read and respond to the book. To be honest, much of the book has been shaped by our relationship. Our time together has…

Dear Todd, I was pleased to read your book, The Quest: Exploring Creation’s Hardest Problems. Indeed, I enjoyed it so much I read it twice. Young age creationism books abound in today’s evangelical world, however The Quest is different than anything I’ve ever seen. It is a frank discussion of the challenges facing the young…

Future historians will be able to capture the spirit of our time by recognizing our gradual loss of certainty. Even in the present we can see that both our intellectual and popular cultures manifest the disintegration of traditional categories of thought, assumptions, behavior, and belief. All of this disintegration has left us with the specter…

If you have ever played chess or some similarly structured game with someone of comparable experience, you understand that the quest for certainty can seem particularly elusive. For any one move, the number of possibilities is quite limited, often restricted to a single option or two. In chess as with much else in life, we…

Like Theophilus of Luke’s gospel, many American, inerrantist evangelicals today are expectant “to know the certainty of the things [they] have been taught” (Luke 1:4). As I reflect upon the forum topic, three questions come to mind: 1) How did we get to the point we are now? 2) What options remain? 3) How does…

Modern assumptions about certainty are deeply embedded in the contemporary mind. Exhausted by Medieval debates over seemingly obtuse metaphysical matters, Modern philosophers broke away from this tradition by establishing “certainty” as the new measure for what counts as human understanding. Some philosophers, such as Descartes and Leibniz, thought we could prove the existence of God…

From conversion to death, Augustine was captivated by Genesis 1–3. He kept writing and re-writing commentaries on these chapters, and they pop up his other works as well (many have noticed, often with puzzlement, that even the Confessions climax into an exegesis of Genesis 1). Then, for 15 years, he labored on a kind of…

Imagine a young man in his late teen years. He has recently moved to the city to go to school. In the course of his study, he becomes convinced that Genesis 1 is no longer consistent with the most sophisticated intellectual trends of the day. He rejects the Christian faith in which he was raised,…

Prophetic action has a way of unsettling the devout. What does the crucifixion and resurrection teach us, however, if not that God will always surprise (and upset) us? How, then, should we answer those who question us while about the Lord’s work? A Lutheran pastor and catechist, Johann Spangenberg (1484–1550) published the Postilla Teütsch, a…

A Humble Petition (Canto IX) What better way to enter Purgatory than with an act of humility? This may seem obvious, but we’re prideful people who don’t generally even appreciate how prideful we are. Think about how easy it is to confess to a variety of Christian “struggles,” to go on missions trips or attend Christian…

But for you, O Lord, do I wait; it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer. For I said, “Only let them not rejoice over me, who boast against me when my foot slips!” For I am ready to fall, and my pain is ever before me. I confess my iniquity; I am sorry…