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PRESUPPOSING: How to Defend the Faith The Methods of Francis A. Schaeffer & Cornelius Van Til

David R. Leigh

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847-571-3011 [email protected] © 2012 Copyright David R. Leigh. All All Rights Reserved. ISBN-13: 978-1477590263 ISBN-10: 1477590269 BISAC: Religion / Christian Theology / Apologetics Apologetics ASIN: B00883P2DQ

"Say what you will, just remember that without Francis Schaeffer, Schaeffer, most evangelicals would not even be in a discussion like this." —John F. F. Alexander 1

"Cornelius Van Til .... is the kind of thinker with whom we may disagree, but whom we can ill afford to ignore, for he forces us to face issues involved in the project of Christian philosophy, issues that must be confronted if we are to think in a manner that is true to the Christian revelation.... Cornelius Van Til writes as an apologist." —Arthur F. F. Holmes2

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John F. Alexander, as quoted by Stephen Board, "The Rise of Francis Schaeffer," Eternity 28 (June 1977): 40. Arthur F. Holmes, "Language, Logic, and Faith," in Jerusalem in Jerusalem and and Athens Athens , E.R. Geehan, ed., (Phillipsburg, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1971), p. 428


Contents PREFACE.............................................................................................1 My Introduction To Apologetics..................................................6 How Presuppositional Apologetics Is Different..........................7 Different................... .......7 A Warning Warning About Pedestals......................................... Pedestals...................... ................................. ...............1 .11 1 INTRODUCTION..............................................................................13 What Is "Apologetics"?.............................................................15 The Schaeffer-Van Til Connection............................................15 The "True Spirituality" of This Book.......................................16 A "Mannish" Note About Inclusive Language........................18 I. WHY JUXTAPOSE JUXTAPOSE SCHAEFFER & VAN VAN TIL?.......... TIL?..... .......... .......... ........ ...21 21 Van Til's Initial Reaction to Schaeffer......................................22 Schaeffer's Initial Reaction to Van Til......................................24 Schaeffer's Attitude About Their Differences..........................26 Van Til's Attitude About Their Differences..................... Differences................ .......... ......... ....28 28 Real Or Imagined? Great Or Small?........................................29 II. "TRUE TRUTH" ON DEFINITIONS & CATEGORIES........31 CATEGORIES........31 How Did Van Van Til and Schaeffer Schaeffer Define Apologetics?....... Apologetics?.... ...... ...... ....31 .31 Which Methodological Categories Should We We Use?................33 Use?........... .....33 Choosing a System of Nomenclature.........................................37 Van Til's Methodological Categories........................................37 Schaeffer's Methodological Categories.....................................42 Settling the Nomenclature Question.........................................46 III. VAN TIL'S APOLOGETIC METHOD....................................49 Van Til's Negative Emphasis.............. Emphasis................................. ..................................... .....................50 ...50 Van Til & Fideism.......................................................................51 Pertinent Aspects Aspects of Van Til's Theology for Apologetics....... Apologetics.........53 ..53 Van Til's Basic Methodology.................. Methodology.................................... .................................. ..................58 ..58 Van Til, Proof, and Verification....................... Verification...................................... .................... .......... ......61 .61 Van Til, Evidence, and Verification....................... erification.................................... .................. .......64 ..64 How to Mount a Worldview.......................................................69 The 1929-30 Apologetics Syllabus.............................................73 Summarizing Van Til's Method.................................................77

IV. IV. SCHAEFFER'S APOLOGETIC APOLOGETIC METHOD—PAR METHOD—PART T I..... I ......... ....... ...79 79 Reviewing the Van Tillian Method............................................80 Where to Find Schaeffer's Method...........................................81 Schaeffer Looks Back on Schaeffer...........................................82 Schaeffer Explains How to Practice Apologetics.....................88 Schaeffer & Point of Contact.....................................................89 Schaeffer's Basic Methodology..................................................93 Step I: Finding The Point of Tension........................................94 Step II: Exploiting the Point of Tension..................... Tension.................................. ...............97 ..97 Step III: Presenting the Christian Answer...............................97 Taking the Roof Off....................................................................98 Schaeffer & Verification.............................................................99 Schaeffer & Proof.....................................................................101 1. Schaeffer's Ripped Book Analogy.......................................101 2. Schaeffer's Criteria of Proof................................................104 Schaeffer & Evidence...............................................................107 Conclusion.................................................................................110 V. SCHAEFFER'S APOLOGETIC METHOD—PAR METHOD—PART T II... II ...... ..... ....113 ..113 Schaeffer in Action....................................................................114 The Metaphysical Necessity.....................................................115 The Moral Necessity.................................................................119 The Epistemological Necessity.................................................123 Summarizing the Relationship Between these Methods.......128 VI: VAN TIL GRADES SCHAEFFER..........................................131 A Van Tillian Shift?.......................................... Shift?....................... ..................................... .........................132 .......132 Van Til's Critique of The God Who Is There and Escape From Reason.................137 Reason................ .137 Harmony....................................................................................137 Difficulties..................................................................................138 Specific Points Of Difficulty.....................................................139 Absolutes....................................................................................139 Starting Point............................................................................142 Schaeffer's Ripped Book Analogy...........................................144 Schaeffer's Criteria of Proof....................................................147 Method.......................................................................................149 Three More Problems With Schaeffer....................................150 I. A test set by autonomous man..............................................151

II. Beginning with what man knows about himself...............154 III. Certainty verses "possibility" ..........................................155 Van Til's Critique of He Is There And He Is Not Silent............................................156 Van Til's Critique......................................................................156 Evaluating Van Van Til's Critique of He Is There........................ There................... ......158 .158 Summary....... Summary................ .................. .................. ................. ................. ......................................... ................................ 160 CONCLUSIONS ON THE CONFLICT........................................161 EPILOGUE: Where Do We Go From Here?................................163 The Current Scene....................................................................163 Grading Schaeffer and Van Til................................................165 How Shall We Then Defend The Faith?.................................165 Presuppositional Presuppositional Apologetics Is Needed More Than Ever... Ever. ...167 .167 Why do you believe?.................................................................169 Like Coming Home...................................................................171 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................173


PREFACE

Why does anyone become a Christian? Some who are born into Christian families will tell you they don't remember a time when they did not believe. Some of these may have had times of doubt or even a season of "falling away" away" but returned to to their childhood childhood faith in later later years. Still others came to Christ out of non-religious or non-Christian backgrounds through through a process of seeking, or skepticism, or or perhaps even after running from God. I was the son of a Roman Catholic father and a mainstream Protestant mother. My mother was the daughter of an agnostic Jew who'd married a Gentile teenage bride. As my parents attended separate churches weekly, I was always aware of the religious tension in our family, especially on visits to my relatives. I recall many a family gathering erupting with controversy, debate, and confusion whenever someone dared broach the subject of religion. To complicate things further, although my parents raised me as a Catholic and my sister as a Protestant, I came to believe in the gospel of the Jesus Movement while I was a high school sophomore, introducing introducing yet another option for my family and relatives to anguish over amidst the existing tumult. It happened that I came to a place of "saving faith" after one of those short and typical rebellious stages of "acting out" common among American teenagers. My upbringing had nurtured a conscience in me that stirred and troubled me because of my own rebellious behavior. behavior. Add to this an emerging feeling of being dogged by b y lostness and loneliness, which began in my adolescence, and by the time I was a young teen I was ripe for hearing the good news of salvation by grace though faith in the risen Lord Jesus Christ and his finished work upon the cross. Ripe, that is, except for one thing: the spirit of rebellion was still in me.

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I often think of myself in those days as being like a rat in a Skinner Box. The rodent in such an experiment knows he's hungry but does not know the mechanism he needs to get food. He moves about the box, trying to climb walls or sniff out a path to sustenance. Suddenly he hits the lever planted by the trainer, and food drops into the incarcerated creature's desperate world. A rat is a rat, not the smartest or the stupidest of the animal kingdom. At first he may not get the connection between the lever lever and the food. food. But eventually eventually,, the repeated "accident" adds up in his mind to cause and effect. The result is a trained—and sated—rat. Such was my season of searching as a teenager in the 1970s. I did not know what I was looking for. I only knew I was not fulfilled in my restless state. Enter Margaret, an older high school student with long curly hair, hair, who despite her buck teeth never stopped smiling—ever! I knew her as one of those "Jesus freaks" who seemed to be everywhere in those days. I wouldn't even have cared to talk with her except that the rat needed something. The cheerleader cheerleader who dumped me was a friend of hers. I thought if I could spend a little time with Margaret she might have some answers for me on how to fix that. Margaret had answers. But not the kind I thought I was looking for. Like that rat, I fumbled about looking for the wrong things. Margaret knew my agenda was misguided and would never really satisfy me. She was determined to be the lever that would introduce me to ultimate fulfillment, knowing that neither she nor my ex-girlfriend could sate the rat. Margaret started by asking me questions and listening to me talk. She'd smile and think about the things I said. Each of my replies prompted yet more questions from her. Before I knew it, we were talking about the meaning of life, the question of God's existence, and the nature of spirituality. Oddly, Margaret contributed little more than questions that day. But she ended by saying, politely, how interesting she found my ideas to be. She then told me she knew some people whom she thought would find my ideas interesting also, and whom I'd probably find interesting to talk with. She invited me to a Bible study at a friend's house and I couldn't believe my own ears when I heard myself accepting the invitation and making plans for how to get there. It 2

wasn't that I felt any kind of romantic attraction to Margaret. I just felt so accepted and so comfortable talking with her that something inside me couldn't help but want more of whatever it was she had that kept her smiling. I spent the next day da y kicking myself, though. Not wanting to back out, I resolved to go to the meeting with a strategy of resistance to what I anticipated would be a load of strange ideas. I'd been raised in a church, after all, and I figured I knew a thing or two. Oh, how wrong I was! When Margaret and her friend Scot picked me up at my house, I got into his car determined not to get sucked in by these religious fanatics. Yet I was undeniably curious about what Margaret found so appealing about the group. For the past day and a half, I'd schemed out, and even bragged to friends, friends, how I was was going to stump stump the Jesus freaks with questions I was sure they'd never be able to answer. We drove off to the meeting and Scot began the process of getting acquainted—more acquainted—more questions about me. Margaret was right about Scot. He was interesting to talk with— especially when all the questions were about me, a self-absorbed teen trying to find meaning and acceptance in this world. Remarkably, neither he nor Margaret was daunted by the ego of this cocky selfstyled skeptic. If I worried about Jesus freaks, Scot was a great introduction to them. First off, he looked like Jesus in glasses. His long hair and beard made him a poster child for the movement. He was college-aged, intellectual, and articulate. Something about Scot's manner instantly put me at ease and made me feel like I'd found a friend—which, as it turns out, I had. When we got to the meeting, I discovered my strategy had not prepared me at at all for what what I found there. there. We We walked through through the door and were rushed by excited teenagers eager to welcome us with hugs and laughter and joy. Again I felt a unique and curious sense of belonging. The group gathered in a large circle on the floor of the finished basement of our our upper-middle upper-middle class hosts. Scot pulled out out a guitar and 3

led the group in folk songs I'd never heard before. But with printed words in hand I followed along and began to get a feel for what these people were so so happy about. Scot put aside his guitar and attention attention shifted to his brother, brother, Harold, a short, thin pre-seminary college student with a clean shaven face, a mop of hair, and horn-rimmed horn-rimmed glasses. If Scot looked like a classic Jesus freak, his brother was the opposite. Today we would call him a nerd. As it turned out though, Harold had his own charisma and I came to respect him highly for his intellect and knowledge of Scripture. Harold invited the group to open their Bibles. Not having one, I looked at Margaret's and was thankful for her abilities to find the references being called out. out. Despite my lifelong weekly weekly attendance at Sunday mass, along with catechism and confirmation classes, I didn't know the difference difference between a Gospel or an Epistle, let alone their locations. As Harold led the discussion, centered that night on a passage from Luke, I found myself resonating with the ideas of the text being discussed. My heart was already starting to stir and yield to the Spirit pervading that room. room. I watched watched Harold in awe as something something inside me said, "Someday you will do this." I don't remember asking any of my questions that night. But I did answer a few of theirs and was surprised at how warmly my thoughts were received, even when they didn't square with Harold's point of view. The next morning I chided myself for being so easily seduced by the group. I made up my mind that next time I would pull out my toughest questions. But yes, there would be a next time. God was at work in me, whether I understood this or not. I felt drawn to these new friends in ways I couldn't explain. But God was not going to draw me without some kicking and screaming on my part! I continued to hang out and party with my non-Christian buddies buddies who ridiculed ridiculed my interest interest in religious questions. But something inside me was already realizing I would soon arrive at a fork in the road that would force me to choose where my loyalties would lie. And so it went for a period of weeks. I'd go to Bible studies and church meetings, hitching rides from other group members who'd pick me up in VW bugs and purple or green Pintos (it was the '70s, after 4

all). I'd ask my questions and participate in the conversations. And I'd come away deeply affected by the answers. Then I'd get up the next day, dust myself off as if I'd been decked out in a fight, and I'd resolve to come at the leaders with even tougher challenges. Each time, though, I returned from the gatherings another step closer to my moment of surrender to Jesus Christ the Lord. As I reflect on those days, I find there were three things most vividly at work in me. First, there was the irresistible draw of a loving community that made me feel immediate acceptance and belonging. I didn't know it then, but I was experiencing what Francis Schaeffer Schaeffer called "the apologetic of love" and "the apologetic of Christian community." The second attraction for me was the fact that real and satisfying intellectual answers existed. Not only did I feel like I could embrace this faith without having to turn off my brain, but I came to realize that the real intellectual suicide would be to reject this faith. Third, there was the spiritual dimension of it all. I found myself moved in the depths of my soul by what I later came to understand as the presence of God's God's Holy Spirit Spirit bearing witness witness within my own own spirit to God's truth. When I finally reached my crisis of decision, I found my choice was either to deny what my heart-of-hearts was telling be about this beautiful Savior, Savior, whom I'd fallen in love with, or to surrender to his revolution in my soul and in the world. The rat had found the lever. I was satisfied. But was that really enough? As I began to live out my new faith, I instantly found others wanting to challenge me! The tables had turned and now I had to know how to be the lever others needed so that fulfillment could be dispensed into their lives. I needed answers for others—beyond those I'd asked for myself. Most of all, I needed to know not just what the answers were but how to go about presenting them. I had stumbled, as it were, into the realm known as "apologetics"—how "apologetics"—how to defend the faith!

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My Introduction Introdu ction To To Apologetics

By the time I became a college freshman, in addition to reading through the Bible I also read a wide range of books intended to equip me for the task that Peter's first epistle exhorts us to: "sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense (apologian) apologian) to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence..." (1 Peter 3:15, NASV). While still in my teen years, I discovered my love of theology. At the urging and guidance of a pastor/mentor/friend, pastor/mentor/friend, I cut my theological teeth on Calvin's Institutes Calvin's Institutes and a number of Reformed systematic theologies. Of course, when it came to apologetics, there were also the works of C.S. Lewis, Josh McDowell, and yes, Francis Schaeffer. But it all seemed like one big mass of information overload to me. I saw that there were different kinds of theologies (Catholic, Arminian, Arminian, Calvinist, etc.) and I quickly became acquainted with the people and beliefs of a variety variety of churches churches from various various denominations denominations (Catholic, Baptist, Wesleyan, Fundamentalist, Reformed Presbyterian, Charismatic, and so on). I studied the orthodox and the heterodox, cults and sects, including how to respond to Mormonism, the Jehovah's Witnesses, Witnesses, and Seventh-Day Adventism. Adventism. But it took me a while to understand that there were different approaches to apologetics that came down to being very different different schools of thought. I naively viewed it all in as one huge armory of arguments and evidences intended to pull down spiritual strongholds, buckshot style. My first clue that there might be something seriously flawed with my indiscriminate, hodge-podge hodge-podge approach came when, for my first academic quarter as a freshman at The Ohio State University, I enrolled in a communications communications class about persuasion and classical rhetoric. The professor gave us an assignment to write a paper that should persuade our reader of one thing of our own choosing. In my naiveté, I chose to persuade the professor of God's existence. Turning Turning to my systematic theologies, I reproduced the classical proofs of Anselm, Aquinas, Paley, and the like. Confident that I'd nailed it, I handed in the paper not just j ust hoping that the professor would be persuaded of God's God's incontrovertible incontrovertible existence, existence, but that somehow somehow (I 6

wasn't sure how) he'd make make the leap from believing in God to wanting to become a Christian. Imagine my surprise when the paper came back with an ugly C+ inked into the corner, with the words below it: "Not persuasive!" I didn't even make it to first base! Again feeling like a Skinner Box rat who just didn't "get it," I went on through college fumbling and scratching and climbing, hoping to hit the right apologetic lever. I tried the approach of Evidence Evidence That Demands A Verdict erdict , by McDowell, only to have unbelievers shrug their shoulders and fold their arms in skepticism. I tried the "Lord, Liar, Lunatic" argument of Lewis, only to meet the same wall of resistance. Despite my experience in my communications communications class, I even continued trying to make the classical proofs work. Somehow I hoped that, even if no one individual weapon in the arsenal was sufficient to take down a stronghold, the cumulative impact of all the impotent ammo combined would somehow bring down a Goliath. If you've ever traveled that route, you know how disappointing it is. It can even begin to make you doubt the faith yourself. By the time I'd graduated from OSU, this rat had yet to identify the lever that would make apologetics work. How Presuppositional Presuppositional Apologetics Apologetics Is Different

The thing is, people who already believe commonly accept the classical and evidential proofs uncritically. uncritically. After all, they already embrace the faith, usually for other reasons; causes that are typically t ypically unrelated to apologetic arguments. Kierkegaard's axiom comes to mind, sometimes "the heart has reasons that reason cannot comprehend." So when they hear anything that sounds supportive of their conclusions, they're typically happy about it and wonder why such lines of argument have no effect on their unbelieving and skeptical friends. I was one of those people, even as someone highly engaged in evangelism throughout high school and college. But upon graduating from OSU my need for a compelling apologetic approach approach was about to 7

escalate. Because I'd started and led a Christian fellowship on campus for four years, I caught the eye e ye of a campus ministry organization in north central Ohio, which recruited me to join its outreach to college campuses after I graduated. The school assigned to me was rich with young intellectuals who scoffed openly at Christianity. All of us on the staff became acutely aware of our need to give sound intelligent answers for the hope within us, as we came into daily contact with intellectuals ready to dissect and roast us until well done. We found the help we needed in the writings of Francis Schaeffer and his mentor Cornelius Van Til. Assisted by a young professor from Ashland College and Seminary, Douglas Chismar, who at that time taught at the college's department of philosophy and Christian thought, and who at one time studied personally under Van Til, we learned the power of presuppositional presuppositional apologetics apologetics amidst the "rough and tumble" of heated debate and strenuous "on the job training." Professor Chismar coached us and participated with us in engaging unbelievers in dialogue on a variety of campuses. He emphasized not only philosophical responses responses to skeptics' skeptics' objections but reminded us that people had all all kinds of motives motives for what they they believed. Their unbelief unbelief was not always the result of logic or facts. Someone might reject Christianity, for example, because they were abused by a youth pastor or mistreated by a religious parent whose life was full of hypocrisy h ypocrisy.. He suggested we begin by asking people not what facts or arguments led them to their current convictions, but what experiences in their lives most shaped their thinking about the claims of Christianity. Christianity. He talked about partnering with the Holy Spirit who comes "alongside" us and the unbeliever, unbeliever, as the "Paraclete." If we would do the same, we might find ourselves behaving less like adversaries of the unbelievers we met and more like counselors, who in cooperation with the divine "Counselor," "Counselor," could guide the unbeliever through their presuppositions by giving them the right questions questions to ask of their their own conclusions, conclusions, and then of Christian faith. In other words, as Margaret had done with me, we needed to ask questions, build trust, show acceptance, and help unbelievers see the need not just for answers, but for identifying the right questions. This would most effectively open them to the answers they needed, seeing us as allies in their search and not as rivals. Likewise, this would 8

enable us to partner partner with the Holy Spirit in in preparing their their hearts and working in them as the gospel finally came into focus as the answer it is. This is not a mere sales ploy of building rapport; it brings the discussion where it belongs, exposing and examining each person's actual motives and assumptions that are in play as they wrestle with questions about God. For those who have never stopped to examine themselves in this way way,, the process itself can be one of self-discovery and therefore a window of opportunity through which the truth of the Christian worldview can shine. This reality was brought home to me though Joanne, a young college coed whom my partner Bob and I met with every week for whole semester at Oberlin College. Joanne came in response to an event we sponsored on campus, where she filled out a request form to meet with us for dialogue about the Christian faith. Joanne told us she was an atheist. All our discussions with her seemed to hit a cement wall, confirming her assertion. Yet remarkably, keeping every appointment, she kept coming back for more! It finally dawned on Bob and me that we were overlooking a key disconnect between Joanne's words and actions. We asked her, "If you're so sure there is no God, why do you keep meeting with us?" Joanne paused, looking at us like a deer in the proverbial headlights. "I want to believe in God," she finally blurted, "but I'm afraid if I do I'll have to stop living with my boyfriend because we're not married." Now Bob and I were the deer deer in the headlights! headlights! All this time time we'd been focusing on Joanne's arguments against God. We had no idea she even had a boyfriend. The subject of her struggle with her conscience regarding this or any personal matter had never come up. We'd overlooked a basic step that Professor Chismar admonished us to pay close attention to. We'd failed all those weeks earlier to gently bring out Joanne's real motives for blocking the living God from her life. Had we faithfully followed the presuppositional approach that Chismar taught us, we'd have realized we were not dealing with an atheist at all, but with a "truth "truth suppressor" who needed the loving guidance guidance of the divine Counselor. 9

When I later went on to grad school, I chose to write my master's thesis on the two apologists whose writings influenced me most—and who were most effective in helping me influence others toward faith: Cornelius Van Til and Francis A. Schaeffer. The bulk of this book, from the Introduction to the Conclusion, represents a lightly edited revision of that work. But having encountered so many people like Joanne, and having undergone a spiritual odyssey of my own in the decades following the completion of that thesis, I felt this edition needed a Preface and Epilogue that would take the discussion of these men's apologetic methods to a personal, less-academic less-academic level. That said, I should point out that although the original thesis material found in this book was completed in 1990, I've made no attempt in this edit to incorporate or interact with developments in fields of apologetics or in Van Til or Schaeffer studies that have occurred in the decades since then. It may be a worthy endeavor for the reader to pursue and explore explore those developments, developments, as plenty of books have been published during during those decades. decades. But because I worked almost almost exclusively in primary source material, the uniqueness of this work should serve to justify it as standing on its own. Our focus is on what each of these two men taught about, and how they practiced, their apologetic method—not what others since then may think of their approaches. My hope is that this book, then, will enhance your own effectiveness as an apologist, through both the core material and my additional reflections in this Preface and the Epilogue, which I offer as a kind of helpful envelope to that core material. Perhaps the end result will motivate you, as one who must give an account of the hope within you, to reach out to even the toughest of those who challenge the faith claims of the Christian worldview. Most importantly, importantly, I hope it will also better equip you to make use of the important methods and insights of both Schaeffer and Van Til, as you seek to impart the blessed hope to those you love and encounter in apologetic contexts.

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A Warning About Pedestals

There's one more thing I want to drive home to you before you embark on the material that follows. Please keep in mind that you will be reading about two great men who are, in the end, still flawed human beings. This This book itself is also written written by a not-so-great not-so-great man, who is surely even more of a flawed human being than the subjects of our exploration. The chapters that follow are not always flattering to Van Til or to Schaeffer. Yet the legacy they left us is a treasure cove of apologetic insights and lessons with indispensable applications. Please do not let the shadow of either man's humanity hinder you from seeing the precious truths truths they discovered discovered and wrestled with. with. In the same same vein, the more anyone gets to know me personally, personally, the more they will find me to be in need of even greater grace. I make no pretense at being a great apologist. Nor can I even claim with confidence to be a good role model as a Christian. But God has always used flawed and sinful human beings to deliver his good and perfect truths. It is therefore my hope God will do the same with this sinner and through the frail mentors I've written about. Dave Leigh Gurnee, Illinois May 2012

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INTRODUCTION

Amidst all the strange events of the 1960s —flower children, children, hippies, marches for peace, and marches for Jesus—as college students challenged the establishment, the Vietnam War, racism, and conventional social structures, an even stranger thing happened. A squeaky-voiced little man in knickers, who had yet to write a popular article or book,1 who made no broadcasts or recorded messages for distribution,2 and who didn't know a word of the local language, was attracting young intellectuals from all over the world to a lonely chalet in the Swiss Alps. Alps. The man was Francis A. Schaeffer (1912-1984), a zealous Presbyterian Presb yterian missionary, missionary, who in 1948 felt called by God to move with his family to the Swiss Alps, despite not knowing French. Yet by the end of the 1960s Schaeffer's Schaeffer's remote chalet became a place of refuge for young people searching searching for answers to to life's deepest deepest and most troubling troubling questions. The phenomenon became known worldwide as "L'Abri" (French for "the shelter"). Rev. Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr., who served the Schaeffers as their pastor in the last years of Dr Dr. Schaeffer's Schaeffer's life, describes describes L'Abri's L'Abri's beginning: 1

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Schaeffer wrote articles in the 40s and 50s, but these were in academic or theological publications, not generally accessible to the public, and the focus of these writings was highly specialized, unlike his first books. Schaeffer's books and tapes were a gradual development as a demand grew for copies of his lectures (see Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr., Francis Jr., Francis Schaeffer: Schaeffer: The Man and His His Message (Wheaton:Tyndale, 1985), p.92). Also, Edith Schaeffer gives a delightful account of how her husband originally resisted the idea of being tape recorded. In In 1958 his first tape-recorde tape-recorded d message was was made without without his knowledge because Edith and a L'Abri worker, fearing Dr. Schaeffer would never allow a recording to be made, resorted to actually hiding a microphone in a plant. Even then, then, few recordings recordings were made made over the next next few years years (see The Tapestry, Tapestry, (Waco, Texas: Word, 1981), pp. 515-516).

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L'Abri began in a very real way with Priscilla [Schaeffer's [Schaeffer's daughter] on the weekend of May 6, 1955. She brought home from college a girl who had many questions, and so began the flow of people. L'Abri came to be a spiritual "shelter" for people with real real and honest questions. God's God's hand was so obviously in the work that Dr. Schaeffer courageously wrote his mission board on June 5 and resigned. He asked that all salary be cut off immediately, and he told of the beginning of L'Abri Fellowship. The Schaeffers Schaeffers had had the reality of the existence of God demonstrated to them in real ways up to that point, and L'Abri L'Abri was begun begun simply from a desire "to demonstrate the existence of God by our lives and our work."1 From this humble beginning Schaeffer's work began to grow and to attract attention. In the late 1960s Schaeffer began to speak at American colleges like Wheaton in 1967 and, later, at Westminster Seminary. By the end of the decade and the beginning of the next Schaeffer was speaking at Harvard (1968), Princeton (1972) and Yale (1973) as well as prestigious universities in Europe and Asia. Asia.2 It was during this same period that Schaeffer began to publish his lectures in book form. But as the strangeness of the 1960s passed into the apathy of the 1970s, and as many of the popular causes and personalities of that era faded into the warm fuzzy memories of yuppies in the 1980s, another strange thing happened. Rather than passing from the scene, Schaeffer's ministry and fame grew. In the late 1970s Schaeffer began a campaign for Christian political involvement primarily aimed against abortion. Seeing his own social concerns as similar to those of earlier Christian leaders who promoted democracy, abolition, and other civil reforms, Schaeffer's Schaeffer's efforts included books and film series that sought to outline the biblical and historical precedent for Evangelicals to take aggressive social action. By 1982, Schaeffer gained notoriety in the secular media as Kenneth Woodward, of Newsweek Newsweek , proclaimed Schaeffer "the guru of Fundamentalism." Fundamentalism."3 1 2 3

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Parkhurst, p. 85. Parkhurst, p. 93. Kenneth Woodward, "Guru of Fundamentalism," Newsweek Fundamentalism," Newsweek 100 100 (Nov. 1, 1982),

It was Schaeffer's social conscience that kept him before Evangelicals and Fundamentalists long after the social conscience of the '60s lost its radical passion. But it was Schaeffer's apologetic effort to offer Christian answers to philosophic questions in the '60s and '70s that originally put his L'Abri on the Evangelical map. Although Schaeffer Schaeffer went on to other causes, his apologetic continued to influence many Evangelicals and seekers long after his death. What Is "Apologetics"? "Apologetics"?

While Schaeffer can be credited with introducing many Evangelicals to the field of apologetics on a popular level, apologetics is a discipline that has a rich heritage dating back centuries. The word apologetics derives from the Greek legal term for giving an answer of defense against charges in court. Plato uses the term to title his classic account of Socrates' trial in Athens, The Apology. Apology. This is the term Peter uses in 1 Peter 3:15 when he says, "always be prepared to make a defense to anyone who calls you to account for the hope that is in you ..." (RSV, emphasis added). Famous apologists include: Justin Martyr, Martyr, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Joseph Butler, William Paley and C.S. Lewis. In the context of Christian theology and religion "apologetics" generally refers to the study or practice of how to give a defense of the faith. But there are many different kinds of apologetic methods and different ways to categorize them. For this reason, classifying Schaeffer's Schaeffer's apologetic has been a controversial matter among his critics and in some cases, even his friends. The Schaeffer-Van Til Connection

As we will see in the story about to unfold, it was originally assumed, by Schaeffer Schaeffer himself and and therefore by others, that Schaeffer's Schaeffer's apologetic followed the method of his Westminster Seminary professor, professor, Cornelius Van Til Til (1895-1986). This method, called "presuppositional" "presuppositional" or "presuppositionalist "presuppositionalist apologetics," proposes that rather than trying to prove Christianity by satisfying the requirements

p. 88.

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of other worldviews, each worldview ought to be tested on its own presuppositional premises.1 Very early on, however, this categorization of Schaeffer's approach became widely and severely challenged. challenged. Was he truly a Presuppositionalist? Was he Van Tillian? In one of the first extensive critiques of Schaeffer's work (1976), Thomas V. Morris argued that Schaeffer had really just reworked classical arguments, such as the argument from design.1 Some time later Gordon R. Lewis argued that Schaeffer's Schaeffer's approach really should be called "verificational" more than "presuppositional."2 The "True Spirituality" of This Book

This book will explore the relationship between Van Til's presuppositional approach to apologetics apologetics and the the approach that that first won Schaeffer not only recognition but converts to the faith from all over the world. We will explore the extent to which Schaeffer shows dependence on Van Til and the extent to which he deviates. If we find Schaeffer is decisively "non-Van-Tillian," then the question of categorizing Schaeffer's Schaeffer's approach remains open for others to explore. But should we find that he is in fact within Van Tillian parameters, then future discussion of Schaeffer's approach will have to take this into consideration. In the process of this adventure, we'll also gain some wonderful and useful insights from both men into how each of us can be better apologists. Prepare to let these two world-class apologists serve as role models and mentors in the apologetic task! 1

1

2

For instance, Empiricism requires empirical proof, Rationalism requires that we be able to reason reason our way to our conclusions, conclusions, etc. Presupposition Presuppositionalism alism proposes proposes that these philosophies will fall apart when their own foundational premises are examined and worked out consistently, and that only Christianity can survive such a test. Christianity alone, the Presuppositionalist argues, provides a basis for believing in empirical reality reality and for reason, reason, etc. We We will present present and explore a fuller definition of presuppositional apologetics in the pages to follow. Thomas V. Morris, Francis Morris, Francis Schaeffer's Schaeffer's Apologetics Apologetics:: A Critique Critique, (Chicago:Moody, 1976), p. 22 ff. Gordon R. Lewis, "Schaeffer's Apologetic Method," in Reflections in Reflections on on Francis Schaeffer , ed. Ronald W. Ruegsegger (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986), pp. 69104.

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This manuscript began as a thesis project at the Wheaton College graduate school in Wheaton, Illinois, which was completed in 1990. I am grateful to the late Dr. Timothy R. Phillips and to then graduate school dean Walter A. Elwell for being my readers and guides in that endeavor. endeavor. It is being released now in book form with some revisions and updates. Like any good researcher, researcher, I focused on primary source material as much as possible. I even used original copies of Van Til's syllabi (class lecture notes dating back to the years Schaeffer studied there, and some even earlier). I accessed personal letters to, from, and regarding Schaeffer. Most of this I found in Van Til's personal files preserved by the Westminster Theological Seminary archives in the late 1980s. Of course early publications of each author's books and other relevant publications have have also been carefully carefully studied and and noted. noted.1 The result is not only a study of two men's differences, or two examples of defending the faith, but a kind of manual on how—and sometimes how not— to use a presuppositional apologetic. To explore the relationship between Schaeffer and Van Til is to enter a realm of academic distinctions, requiring us to define the categories within which we can discuss their methodologies. Once I've done that, 1

Desiring to obtain as much primary source material as possible, I spent considerable time in October of 1987 in the Van Til archives at Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia. The archivist there informed me I was the second person from from outside the seminary seminary to use the archives archives since Van Van Til's Til's death. The first person used them to study Van Til's relationship to Karl Barth. Here I uncovered many of Van Til's unpublished syllabi dated at or around the time Schaeffer took his courses. What Van Til called a syllabus was actually an unpublished typed manuscript usually more than 100 pages long, which he required students to read and which he used as lecture notes. Drawing upon the seminary's catalogues of those years, which listed what courses students were required to take at each class level, I was able to determine which syllabi Schaeffer was exposed to. Others from the same time period I drew upon to infer Van Til's thinking of that time, which would have been reflected in class discussions. Furthermore, I was able to uncover numerous correspondences between Schaeffe Schaefferr and Van Van Til, Til, and between Van Til Til and others who who interacted with him about Schaeffer. I also made use of other unpublished materials available through the archives and the seminary bookstore.

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I will summarize Van Til's apologetic method at the time Schaeffer studied under him, in order to establish a frame of reference for Schaeffer's Schaeffer's own thinking. I will then summarize Schaeffer's basic approach by using his earliest apologetic writings as well as his collected works compiled in the last days of his life. In the process, you and I will listen in on the passionate and intense dialogue that took place between these two men over the span of several years, which was both personal and academic. And And then we will compare and evaluate the methods each employed. Please note the operative word here is "method " method ," ," not "message. "message."" My primary concern concern is with the structure and mechanics mechanics of each each man's apologetic, not with an evaluation of their theological content or differences. differences. After After all, it is completely possible that someone might imitate a method but abandon the presuppositions that spawned it, even change the content delivered by the method. In some cases, it appears that Schaeffer may have done this. A "Mannish" Note About Inclusive Language

In the era in which Schaeffer and Van Til lived, inclusive language was barely emerging emerging as a convention, convention, much less less a concern of conservative scholars and theologians. But by the time Schaeffer released his Complete Works, orks, the issue had taken a foothold in western culture. I was present when Schaeffer announced that publication at the Rochester, Minnesota, L'Abri conference in 1982. To my pleasant surprise, Schaeffer Schaeffer lamented not being able to go through all his works and revise their language with sensitivity to what he regarded as a legitimate concern: that language should be clear and inclusive when it applies to both genders. In writing this survey of Schaeffer and Van Til's apologetic methods, I was faced with the same question. I dared not revise what these pioneers had written. written. I could only be watchful watchful of my own own language. But even then, in order to preserve the sense of what they wrote, I have at times had to follow their use of masculine language. In the same way, when I've encountered typos, variant spellings, stylistic differences, differences, or grammatical errors in source documents, no effort has 18

been made to "clean up" or or call attention attention to such things things when providing quotations. quotations. I hope the reader will understand that words like "man" and "he," when referring to humanity in my own observations and commentaries, have been used sparingly but as the demands of this discussion require, in order to preserve consistency in the context of the original discussion. They are intended, as with their original use, to be inclusive.

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I. WHY JUXT J UXTAPOSE APOSE SCHAEFFER & VAN VAN TIL? TIL ?

April 1969, a new book had the Evangelical world buzzing with In April

questions and debates about apologetics. In a letter to Westminster Seminary professor Cornelius Van Til, Donald M. Sautter of Dallas Seminary wrote with "triumphant" exuberance over the impact Francis A. Schaeffer's The God Who Is There was having at the school: many of the Dallas Seminary professors and students have been conducting conducting fireside discussions, discussions, debates, debates, and focus groups groups who listen to Schaeffer's Schaeffer's tapes. The entire seminary is REALLY EXCITED about Schaeffer's approach to the 20th century man!1 Sautter was excited because, as a Van Til loyalist, he felt Schaeffer's success was a success and door to opportunity for Van Til. In the same letter he writes: Now you and I both know that Schaeffer Schaeffer represents your system of apologetics more than any other.... The great point of all this is that some of the students who have listened to his tapes have already heard Schaeffer himself say that he gives you the credit for his apologetic approach, for he learned it from you at your feet. Schaeffer Schaeffer also encourages people in his tapes to get hold of your books books and read them. them.2 Sautter was being almost literal when he said Schaeffer studied at Van Til's Til's feet. From autumn 1935 to spring 1937 Schaeffer was one of just 25 Junior- and then 20 Middle-year students at Westminster. Although 1

2

Donald M. Sautter, personal letter to Van Til dated April 12, 1969, p.1, found in Van Til archives of the Westminster Seminary Semi nary library libr ary.. Ibid., pp. 1-2.

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PRESUPPOSING: How to Defend the Faith - Now For Sale

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