APOLOGETICS training by Dr. G. Bahnsen - III. Worldviews in Conflict

Dr. Greg L. Bahnsen - Basic Training for Defending the Faith.
Worldviews in Conflict
http://www.youtube.com/user/gregbahnsen#grid/user/05D136E41B80F9F0

There exists an anti-thesis (opposition; contrast) between God and the world:

"...you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds..." --Colossians 1:21

"You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." --James 4:4

In principle, unbelievers will think and behave in a systematically different way than believers do.

But of course we see commonalities in the ways unbelievers and believers say or do things... why? 

The unbeliever must ask the question:

Which worldview comports with what is being said and done where we see outward conformity and agreement between the unbeliever and the believer?

The key to defending the Christian faith:

• Show that the unbeliever's worldview cannot make sense out of those things that you do in common.
• Show that they are not living up to their philosophy, rather they are living on "borrowed capital;" by a worldview that is not they're own; living by the Christian worldview but denying it; internal contradictions
• The unbeliever renounces the Christian worldview, and then when its convenient, lives in the Christian worldview = inconsistent
• The unbeliever will have to depend upon the Christian worldview to strike out at it; the unbeliever will assume things that only believers have the right to assume, in order to denounce.
• Illustration: the son sitting on his father's lap, slaps the father's face
• The son can only slap the father's face because the father is supporting him; as is with the unbeliever.
• The unbeliever will not admit to the anti-thesis, or that they're prejudice; instead will profess neutrality... they will say if they don't believe,its because God is not persuasive or there's not enough evidence. They'll infer that one must sacrifice intellect to have an emotional commitment to Jesus. They must say that, otherwise they admit that they are sinners.
• Roman 1:18-2 -- 
• [18] The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, [19] since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. [20] For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. [21] For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.

The key to defending the Christian faith when there are warring worldviews is to show the vanity, unreasonableness, and inherent self-contradictions in the unbeliever's worldview.

Literature: Bahnsen's discussion on Bertrand Russell's article "Why I am not a Christian"