TBC BOOK REVIEWS 📖

“On Guard” is another apologetics book on the list Amanda Baker gave me to read. At first I was overwhelmed because William Lane Craig is not only reviewed to be one of the finest minds in philosophy and Christian apologetics but he also has a vast background in science that shows when he discusses creation vs. evolution. But I hung in there and I am glad I did.

He covers some creation and some old earth vs. new earth apologetics but then he hits the New Testament and dismantles the arguments we hear that Jesus never actually existed, that Jesus was not the person the Bible portrays, or that Jesus did not rise from the grave. I love that he repeats something I have heard before. He says the reason he went to such lengths to present evidence for God creating the world with His word is because, for a God who can do that, virgin birth and resurrrection are not hard at all!!!!!

What I really want to emphasize though, with some thoughts of my own afterwards, is his last apologetics point. He covers the one that he says is the hardest to answer for most of us. The one that asks what happens to people in times and places that have never had a gospel witness.

First he covers some possible reasons why God would even create people whom He knows will reject Him in the end. He goes over the idea that God does not want heaven filled with robot-like humans who follow Him because they must. And, in creating a world where not following Him is an option, there will undoubtedly be a certain percentage who do not. He gets really deep here and you really need to read his words because I cannot possibly reconstruct all of the reasons he gives for this in words that will explain as clearly as he does.

But the gist of the answer for people born in a time and place without a gospel witness is that Romans 1:18-20 tells us every person is given enough through nature and his own conscience to be aware of God’s existence and to ask what that requires. From there, some seek God as He seeks them and get saved. Others don’t, and are condemned.

He says God may very well have arranged the percentages of those who get saved to be the very people born in those times and places that have a gospel witness. In fact, we have to trust that that is exactly what God did. He believes, and I now agree, that there will be not one condemned person ever who can say to God, “If I had been born in a different time and place I would have received You.”

Now my follow-on thoughts, as we have had mission emphasis all month while I was reading this: I do not believe there is one country that has never had a gospel witness any time in history. Yesterday, Brother Andrew Livingstone mentioned two million French Huguenots a few centuries ago. According to Brother Craig’s apologetics, God would have sovereignly arranged for the French people whom He knew were going to receive Him to be largely born then. And some to be born now, even in an era of hard French hearts, because when He called the Livingstones, He called them to people He knows need them! I recall the Apostle Paul knowing he was called to Macedonia in a vision and, going there, finding Lydia and some women awaiting a gospel witness. That would explain why missionaries know exactly where God wants them to go. And why He sometimes finetunes their calling afterwards. There are other Lydias, throughout history, calling out to know more about this God they see in nature and sense in their consciences. A sovereign God, which He is, can easily be seen to operate in this way. Ephesians 2:10 might be in operation here. He calls all of us, under the great commission, but missionaries in particular, to good works which He has always had in mind for us.

One additional thought to show we really do not always see a full picture of God at work in history. I recently read a book on Congo that surprised me with the number of churches like ours that existed in Congo in the early 20th century before they had a civil war in which a large number of white missionaries were martyred. I believe that pattern exists in many places we don’t know about because we just have not studied that part of history. We will have many Congolese brothers and sisters in heaven. They just might mostly come from decades when we were not here. God is sovereign; we are not.

And I love that Livingstones’ little girl is named Lydia!