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Christian Critical Thinking

by Alex Smith

Skeptics. The moment you open your mouth and state your faith in Jesus and the Bible, they will ask you penetrating questions about what you believe and why you believe it. Take the following statements and questions for instance:

"Suppose there is a god and one true religion somewhere in the world…. There is a good chance that it won't be your religion. So it wouldn't matter whether you believed in God or followed the teachings of your church. You would be going to hell anyway. So why worry. Focus on the life you are living now. All we can do is live the best way we can."

I used to think that skeptics were honest inquirers, people genuinely looking for answers in a relativistic society. However, I have begun to think differently. One day, an atheist told me, "There are so many different interpretations of the Bible. You can’t possibly know which one is correct." After explaining to him the Biblical method for interpreting Scripture, found in 1 Peter 1:20, he still would not acknowledge the fact that you could actually understand what the Bible means.

It was then that I realized something: this man was not honestly seeking to understand the Bible; he was trying to prove that the Bible could not be understood so that he did not have to obey it. That is a real problem! However, it forces us Christians to ask ourselves some penetrating questions:

Many of us might be tempted to say, "I was raised a Christian, have trusted Christ as my Savior, and I’m attending a good church. Isn’t this enough?" However, we must realize that our responsibility as believers goes beyond salvation and church attendance. While these things are good and necessary, we live in a world where a war is being waged—a war for the souls of men and women. The Bible tells us that we must be actively engaged in this war. As Paul put it, we must, "Fight the good fight of faith" (1 Timothy 6:12).

Since no soldier goes into war unprepared for battle, what does "boot camp" look like for the believer who is training to fight the good fight of faith? One of the first places for us to start is our minds: what do we think about? God tells us, "As he [any man or woman] thinks in his heart, so is he" (Proverbs 23:7). The way that we think will determine who we are and ultimately how we act.

This is why the Bible tells us, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 2:5) also saying that Christians have "the mind of Christ" (1 Corinthians 2:16). We are to be thinking like Christians every day of our lives. Some Christians refer to this as the believer’s "worldview." A Christian is to view the world in the same way that Jesus did.

However, the fact that God want us to "earnestly contend for the faith once delivered unto the saints" (Jude 3) does not mean that He is looking for troublemakers. Rather, He is looking for people who "know their God" (Dan. 11:32)—He tells us that they are the ones that will influence the world. They are the ones that "shall be strong, and do exploits." (Dan. 11:32)

Thus, the first step to positively affect our world starts in our own minds. As believers, we must have the mind of Christ to properly understand and respond to the lost and dying world around us. This starts by knowing our God. May we be aware of what God wants us to understand about Him, know Him in an intimately personal way, and go forth to spread the good news of the Gospel, filtering all we see and hear through the grid of the Scriptures.

For more information about Alex and his writing, contact us at acceleration@collegeplus.org.



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