The Changing Face of Apologetics: I Agree with Lee Strobel

Well, it looks like I agree with Christian apologist Lee Strobel. If he's right then I got it right in my book. In an interview for the evangelical magazine Christianity Today, he was asked this question: How have evangelism and apologetics changed? Here is his answer:

They have become more relational, more story-driven. Josh McDowell would go on college campuses and describe why to trust the Bible. And people would come to faith in droves. Then they stopped coming to faith in so many numbers, and he didn't know why. And now he takes a story approach. "You know," he says, "I was the son of the town drunk. This is how it affected my life and my relationship with [my dad]. This is what prompted me to seek spiritually. This is the evidence I found. This is how my life was changed. This is how I reconciled with my father." So it becomes a story.

That's what my ministry is about. I tell my story: I was an atheist. I scoffed. My wife became a Christian. It prompted me to investigate. Here's the evidence I found, how I received Christ, the difference it's made. It's a story. And I found that in postmodern America, people often are willing to engage on the level of story.

Link.

If he's right then deconversion (deprogramming) stories are useful in counter-apologetics too. In my book I tell my story. I tell how I came to faith, what experiences I had in the church, what experiences led me away from that faith, and why I personally decided there was no God. It's a complete story about my past Christian life, some parts of which are ugly. I also produce what some people describe as a massive refutation of Christianity in it, but it contains a story, my story.