Equipping Our Children With Combat Skills Part 3: Teaching Apologetics

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I was helping my son with his math the other day and noticed that he was getting the answers correct. He knew the steps for dividing fractions - multiply by the reciprocal, reduce your answer or convert it to a mixed number. And yet he was getting frustrated. Why? Because he had no idea why it made sense to do those steps or what the answer actually meant.

This made me think of our children’s faith. They might be able to give the right biblical answer but do they know why the answer makes sense practically or scientifically? For instance, they might know that the Bible teaches that all humans are descendants of Adam and Eve but do they know how that is scientifically possible? Do they know how we got so many different skin colors, eye colors, and hair colors from two people? Do they understand the math of how we went from eight people (Noah and his family) to 8 billion people in only 4,000 years? (Hint think compound interest!) Or do they just go with a blind faith because God said so? Can they explain why they believe what they believe to an unbeliever? 

In math, it is not enough to simply know the right answer—or even just the steps to get there—we must understand why the answer makes sense. The same principle applies to our faith. We need to understand not only what we believe, but why we believe it, and how the biblical answers truly make sense.

Today, we turn to the third and final component of combat skills in this series—one that studies¹ suggest may be among the most critical: teaching apologetics, or understanding why we believe what we believe. (If you missed them, you can read part 1 and part 2 here.) Research examining why some children walk away from their faith in adulthood while others remain, found a consistent difference: those who stayed had been taught apologetics.

There are several different types of apologetics we should be teaching our children. They include the following with some overlap:

1. Biblical Authenticity - How do we know the Bible is true and hasn't changed over time? How do we know the resurrection really took place? How do we know the Bible is the inspired Word of God? These are some of the questions we need to help our children think through and equip them with answers.

   
   

   During my late teenage years, at a church my family attended at the time, I volunteered to serve in the children’s ministry. As part of the curriculum training, I was instructed to end each lesson by asking the children “I wonder” questions. When my mom found out about this practice she was not a big fan. I remember her saying something like "Why would we leave the children hanging and not give them the truth? We need to equip them with answers!" She was absolutely right. We should not expect our children to figure out the answers on their own. We as parents have been given the responsibility to train and equip our children for the spiritual battles they will face in this life, and that means leading them to the truth. Meanwhile, many atheist professors are eager to offer students their own answers. Our role as parents is to help our children build a firm foundation in truth before they are bombarded with the enemy's lies in this world.

   
   

   To help our children understand the answer to how we can know that the Bible is true and hasn't changed over time, we can teach them about textual variants among Biblical manuscripts (see p. 153-154 in my book Training Godly Warriors for more on that). We can teach them about the chain of custody, about the early church figures records, and about the eyewitness accounts found in the gospels. The book Cold-Case Christianity by J. Warner Wallace is also an excellent resource to learn more about defending the reliability of Scripture (and there is also a kid's version). Natasha Crain's book Keeping Your Kids on God's Side is another helpful resource to equip our children with answers to some of these questions.

   
   

2. Scientific Apologetics - How do we know the days of creation were 24hr days and not millions of years? Why is evolution scientifically impossible and creation true? How do the fossil records prove the earth is young and a global flood occurred as the Bible describes? When does life begin? How many genders are there? Our children will inevitably encounter these questions and more, especially in a world that is growing increasingly confused apart from God. We must be intentional to equip our children with answers, both biblically and scientifically.

The Creation Answers Book by Don Batten et. al. is a fabulous resource that provides answers to many of these questions. I also have a blog post with six free posters to teach children how to defend creation and refute evolution. Answers in Genesis ministry is another great place to find a variety of resources to address these questions. We love their videos on YouTube and their magazine. We also subscribe to Creation Illustrated magazine.

3. Cultural Apologetics - A proper understanding of the cultural norms of biblical times is essential for accurate interpretation of Scripture. We can help our children learn how to use commentaries and encyclopedias to enhance their study of God's Word. For example, we can help our children learn what it looked like to harvest olives in Bible times by hitting the branches with a long stick to knock the olives down. This will help them understand verses like Isaiah 17:6. Just make sure to teach your children to read and study God's Word more than they read and study commentaries. This past week at church someone shared a story with me that they read in a book called The Heavenly Man where a group of persecuted Christians in China only had bits and pieces of Scripture but they were seeing amazing miracles and healings happening based on the people's faith. Then some Americans sent them full Bibles with commentaries that said that the gifts of the Spirit were not longer for today and the miracles stopped happening because the commentaries put doubt in the minds of some believers and they no longer had the faith to receive them.

   
   

   It is also important to help our children understand today’s culture so they are prepared to defend their faith within it. Books like Mama Bear Apologetics, Toxic Empathy, Silence Equals Consent, When Culture Hates You, and Woke Injustice can help us gain a better understanding of the current culture so we can train our children to stand strong in their faith amid the world's pressure to conform.

   
   

4. Historical & Archaeological Apologetics - What evidence (historical documents or archaeological artifacts) do we have, especially from secular sources, that confirm the biblical accounts? There are so many! One of our favorite YouTube channels to watch to equip us with archaeological apologetics is Expedition Bible. Archaeologist Joel Kramer lives in Israel (actually I think he recently moved to Jordan) and explores biblical sites. He gives tons of evidence from archaeology that confirms what the Bible teaches. One example is ration tablets that were found in ancient Babylon, present day Iraq, with the name "Jehoiachin King of Judah" on them. Ration tablets are where the food given to prisoners was recorded. These tablets are proof from a secular source (the Babylonians) that Jehoiachin was a real historical figure who was taken captive to Babylon as 2 Kings 24:15 describes. This is just one example of many. I highly recommend you watch his videos with your children.

   
   

I want to stress again that while teaching our children how to defend their faith is important, the most vital thing we can do is help them cultivate a close relationship with the Lord through daily Bible study and prayer.

I hope you found this series on combat skills helpful as you train your children to love and serve the Lord. If you have any other ideas for teaching apologetics please share in the comments below.

Read more about these ideas in my book, "Training Godly Warriors"

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Onward Christian Soldiers!

References:

1. Ken Ham, "Rescuing Our Kids From The Lie," Answers in Genesis, August 13, 2013, educational video, https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/worldview/rescuing-our-kids/.