I just love Dr. Phil. Not just because he loves God and has done amazing things for people over his career, but because I find him wildly entertaining. One of my favorite Dr. Phil quotes which he frequently uses is: “Do you wanna be right, or do you wanna be happy?” Now, imagine him saying the following is his big ‘ole Texas dialect: “Y’all are some of the biggest right fighters I’ve ever met in my life.” Right fighters – a pretty understandable term considering he spends a great deal of on-air time trying to unlock the horns of miserable married people. Not only a useful term from the mental health worldview, did you know that this phrase is also useful from a biblical worldview? Let’s find out how by taking this conversation off the counseling couch and moving it to the church pew.
Have you ever been so certain of something that you would do anything to prove you’re right? Moreover, have you ever been crushed to find out that you were, in fact, horribly wrong? I have, and it stinks. I, like many other people, have been willing to argue my truth (ugh, “my truth” – coming in a later post), that I didn’t care if it embarrassed my opponent or if it really even mattered in the grand scheme of things. I wanted to WIN! Now that I’ve grown and matured, however, it is much easier for me to tame my tongue when my competitive nature rears its ugly head. Now, winning is not as important as keeping my relationships healthy and strong. Okay, on to the pew as I promised.
More important than any other relationship in the world is my relationship with God. So when it comes to His written Word, the last thing I’m going to be is a right figher. God is right – all day, everyday, every where, and every time. I know this for a fact because I spent a painful 12-year period of spiritual growth that proved to me – beyond the shadow of a doubt – that God is real and Jesus is His Son. During those years, I studied Hebrew, read my bible, confessed regularly, attended worship every chance I got, and read every Christian apologetics book I could get my hands on. The last discipline I just mentioned will make sense to you once you remember how competitive I am.
Apologetics (if you don’t already know) is the art and science of defending the truth and reasonableness of Christianity in order to win souls to Christ, those being people of opposing religious views. Basically, it’s arguing. Wait…I get to argue? Sign me up! Here’s what I learned to defend:
- That Jesus died on the cross and was not faking – some people like to argue that Jesus didn’t die at all, and that he woke up three days later. This is called “Swoon Theory,” and there are countless problems with it.
- That Jesus was raised from the dead, literally – there is far too much historical evidence to support the Resurrection.
- That Jesus appeared to thousands of reliable eyewitnesses after His Resurrection – another theory called “Hallucination Theory” is commonly used to refute this part of the narrative.
- That the Gospel is true – Jesus fulfilled more than 300 Old Testament prophecies about who the Jewish Messiah would be. The only one He has not yet fulfilled is the second coming when He will judge the living and the dead.
Please believe me when I say this is a short list of reasons I believe, and why it is my mission to help the Western Church grow in spiritual maturity. We need to stop reinterpreting scripture to suit the culture around us. This is a sign of spiritual immaturity. Instead of being a right fighter – telling God that He is wrong and that His Word couldn’t possibly mean what it actually means – let’s just trust that He is sovereign, and that He is right. Whether it’s His plan for marriage, His plan for church leadership, His plan for families. His plan for Israel, or His extremely exclusive plan for our salvation, we need to stop arguing and start trusting. Final question: do you wanna be right, or do you wanna be saved?
To learn more on the topic of apologetics, I recommend you read/watch the scholarly work of our some of our greatest apologists today – Gary Habermas, William Lane Craig, Dr. Michael Brown, and Lee Strobel.
