Chapter 2.4

Born Again Reasoning

The Human Equipment for Believing

Overall Objective

To describe and defend the philosophical and spiritual importance of human reason.

Table of Topics

A) Reason & Christianity

A.1) The Praise of Reason in the Bible: Loving God with our logic (Matt 23:37-8)

A.2) The Enemies of Reason in the Church: Postmodernism, charismaticism, & anti-intellectualism

B) Reason & God

B.1) God Reasons: Isa 1:18

B.2) God is Logic: John 1:1

C) Reason & Humans: A computer of beliefs

D) Reason & Creation

E) Reason & Reality: vs. contradictions, fideism, & postmodernism

F) Reason & Communication: Everyone speaks through propositions- including God

Extras & Endnotes

Primary Points

• Scripture assumes and demands a great deal of reasoning.
• The consistent disparagement of the mind in the modern Church is unfortunate, unbiblical, and even demonic.
• Emotionalism is experience without reason, fideism is faith without reason, mysticism is revelation without reason, and the foundation of all these is anti-intellectualism.
• It is our God-given ability to reason that separates us from animals. Yet it would seem that this is precisely how those who ignore or devalue the place of reason, would want us to live—more like animals, by instinct, impulse, or emotion.
• Tozer: “The Bible has much to say about our thoughts; current evangelicalism has practically nothing to say about them.”
• Frame: “Theology was once known for its logical character. Now it’s difficult to find any positive words about logic.
• John Wimber: “At some point critical thinking must be laid aside. When are we going to see a generation who doesn’t try to understand this book (the Bible), but just believes it?
• The quality of our relationship with God is demonstrated by virtue, not emotion.
• God Himself reasons. Denouncing logic is just as immoral as denouncing love for both are a reflection of the “heart” of God.
• While in His epistle the Apostle John said “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16), in his Gospel, He says God is logic (John 1:1).
• It is because the Creator functions with reason and order that the planets and atoms reflect and depend on the same.
• Because logical thinking is so much a part of God, being illogical and rejecting reason is so much a part of the devil.
• It is not humble or spiritual to demean human reason. That is what the devil wants because his primary weapon is lies.
• “When summarizing human devotion to God as involving heart, soul and strength, Jesus intentionally added “and mind” to the original wording of Deuteronomy.”
• God does nothing to or through us except through our reason.
• Not even God expects us to believe something without reasons and reasoning. Sproul: “Faith without reason is superstition.
• If one still doubts the importance of reasoning in the Christian life, try to imagine any kind of life without it.
• Postmoderns deny the God-given ability of reason. Reformed theologians speak of the bond between “the Word and the Spirit.” However, the biblical emphasis is between the Word and the regenerated mind.

A) Reason & Christianity

A.1) The Praise of Reason in the Bible: Loving God with our logic (Matt 23:37-8)

In general, it can be said that there is a very great emphasis on human reasoning in the NT. Accordingly, we have fully discussed elsewhere the centrality of human reasoning in the following aspects:

• Reason’s central psychological function in producing our beliefs, desires, and emotions, all of which are ultimately decisions of reason. ^[1]
• Reason’s central epistemological function in private judgment in which we decide who and what to believe. ^[2]
• Reason’s importance in all types of Christian activity, including decision making. ^[3]
• The centrality of the moral reasoning of our conscience. ^[4]
• Reason’s essential relationship to faith. ^[5]

Here, we wish to briefly note some additional references to the important functions of reason in Scripture. For example, no one can deny that our reasoning faculty is included when the King says “the first and greatest commandment” is to, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart [kardia] and with all your soul [psychē] and with all your mind [dianoia]” (Matt 22:37-8). Accordingly, James Emery White comments on Christ’s statement and the centrality of reason in the Christian life:

This was certainly the conviction of Jesus, who made it clear that our minds are integral to life lived in relationship with God. When summarizing human devotion to God as involving heart, soul and strength, Jesus added “and mind” to the original wording of Deuteronomy, as if he wanted there to be no doubt that when contemplating the comprehensive nature of commitment and relationship with God our intellect would not be overlooked. ^[6]

There may be some significance to the fact that all three Synoptic Gospels use this rather special word dianoia in the context of the greatest commandment. One might expect the more general term nous (mind), but as G. Harder notes:

nous [mind] is capable of embracing all the instruments of sensual and conceptual perception . . . dianoia, by contrast, belongs more to the narrower, intellectual category of discursive [analytically reasoned] thought. ^[7]

In other words, there seems to be a special emphasis on the fact that we are to love God with our logic.

God knows the truth processed, accepted, and understood by our reason dictates our attitudes toward Him and actions for Him. Along these lines, the Bible states that Abraham was considered God’s friend because he believed what God had said (cf. 2 Chron 20:7; Isa 41:8; James 2:23). How did Abraham believe? What God-given human faculty did Abraham use to form this belief about God resulting in friendship? The writer of Hebrews explains that Abraham “reasoned [logizomai: “reason, thoughtful consideration”]” that God could raise the dead, thus believing God’s promise (cf. Heb 11:19). It was that act of faith, predicated on reason, that formed Abraham’s friendship with God, a friendship that would have been impossible without reason.

The same relationship between our reason and God is conveyed when the Apostle Paul prays for the Ephesians: “that the eyes of your heart [dianoia: “mental reasoning”] having been enlightened ^[8] may know the hope to which He has called you . . . (Eph 1:18), and that they may, “grasp [katalambano: “comprehend” with the reason] how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ” (Eph 3:18). No truths, even these great spiritual ones, will be available to us if they are not received, accepted, and understood by our reason.

There are other references to the importance of human reason in the Christian life as well. It was because of this that the Apostle exhorts the Philippians: “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable–if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think [logizesthe: “let the mind dwell on” cf. NASB] about such things” (Phil 4:8).

Likewise, the King specifically rebukes His opponents for their faulty reasoning when He tells them, “Stop judging [krisis: a decision from judging] by mere appearances, and make a right judgment [krino: to determine]” (John 7:24). In the same vein, He tells the Pharisees: “You know how to interpret [diakrino: “discriminate, discern, and hence to decide, to judge” ^[9]] the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret [diakrino] the signs of the times” (Matt 16:3).

Likewise, the Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians that it is a “shame” if they cannot find someone among them who is smart, prudent, reasonable, and, “wise enough to judge [diakrino] a dispute between believers” (1 Cor 6:5).

Reasoning is certainly included in the Scripture’s admonishment to be discerning. The Apostle says, “Test [dokimazo: test, prove, scrutinize] everything. Hold on to the good” (1 Thess 5:21), a process that obviously requires reasoning (cf. 1 John 4:1; 2 Cor 13:5). The same thought is included when the Apostle remarks: “The spiritual man makes judgments [anakrino– to examine, investigate, question] about all things” (1 Cor 2:15).

It is to pursuing reason that the Apostle appeals to for a holy life when he says:

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by [because of] the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable ^[10] [logikēn] service.

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind [nous], that you may prove [dokimazein: analyze, accept] what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

³For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think [uperphronein] of himself more highly than he ought to think [phronein: to have understanding, to think], but to think soberly [sōphronein: have sound judgment], as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. (Rom 12:1-3 NKJV).

First, the Apostle writes to motivate his readers to serve God. What does he appeal to? Reason and logic. The Apostle wants us to think and reason about what God has done for us (as explained in Romans 1-11), knowing that if we do so properly, we will decide to live for Him. Reasoning here supplies a major motivation for sanctification.

Secondly, when the Apostle commanded, “be transformed by the renewing of your mind (nous; understanding, reason)” he was not describing some mystical process that bypasses our reason. On the contrary, life transformation is essentially a process of replacing the lies we believe with the truth of God, and our reasoning faculties, the very place God created for us to discern truth from falsehood is where this life transformation occurs. Accordingly, the NLT translates Romans 12:2 as “let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think,” and the NCV has it, “be changed within by a new way of thinking.” Again, while it is popular to disparage merely cognitive methods for life transformation, the Scriptures emphasize them.

Accordingly, the Apostle describes the process by which one becomes consecrated to God. Simply put, we must exchange the worldly lies we believe with the truth of God to form new beliefs, all of which is the domain of our reason. Our life is “transformed” when the beliefs that are processed, evaluated, accepted, and stored by reason are renewed to conform to Scripture, rather than the world. ^[11]

Thirdly, the Apostle relates that one result of this renewing of our beliefs will be the improved ability of our reason to analyze, recognize, and accept as true, what God’s will is, as revealed in the divine revelation of Scripture.

Finally, the Apostle tells us how such a process of renewal begins: self-evaluation. He encourages us to use our reason to objectively evaluate ourselves based on the “measure of faith” God has given them.

In summary it can simply be said that the instructions in Scripture assume and demand a great deal of reasoning.

A.2) The Enemies of Reason in the Church: Postmodernism, charismaticism, & anti-intellectualism

In view of the biblical perspective on our reason, it is both ironic and unfortunate to note the contemporary and consistent slander against it in the Church today. While thinking is often thought to be unspiritual, God deems it as one of the most valuable potential virtues. Despite the fact that God gave us reason, His people are constantly encouraged in much of contemporary Christianity to distrust it or neglect it. We are in great need of being reminded that everything God does to or through us He does to or through our reason. ^[12]

Our view of the philosophical and psychological centrality of human reason is growing increasingly unpopular in our postmodern, emotional age. Perhaps the greatest error being made is ignoring the great difference between what we call devil-darkened reason which all spiritually dead humans possess, and the Spirit-liberated reason that all spiritually alive humans possess. The former is darkened by demonic forces, while the former has been “fixed” through the regeneration of the Holy Spirit to operate as God intended. ^[13] Accordingly, as discussed at length elsewhere, the difference, particularly in spiritual matters, is “like night and day.” ^[14] Along these lines, Martin Luther (1483–1546) recognized this when he wrote:

Before faith and the knowledge of God, reason is mere darkness; but in the hands of those who believe, it is an excellent instrument. All faculties and gifts [including reason and logic] are pernicious, exercised by the impious; but most salutary when possessed by godly persons. ^[15]

Nonetheless, many Christians today ignore this difference and continue to indiscriminately disparage something as biblical, God-ordained, and essential as human reason. For example, Daniel Taylor, Professor of English at Bethel College writes:

While a very powerful tool, reason is not nearly as dominant in our thinking, feeling, reflecting lives as many assume. It is only one part of a tangled complex of forces, idiosyncrasies of personality, and experience, to general cultural and historical conditioning-that help shape what we believe. ^[16]

 

It would seem Dr. Taylor is confusing sources of data (e.g. “experience,” “cultural conditioning”) with the means by which we process data to make decisions. Contrary to Dr. Taylor, “reason” is the only means God has ordained for “our thinking . . . reflecting lives,” and it receives, evaluates, and makes judgments on all sources of data, including divine revelation. Let us simply say here that he seems to be ignoring the way things are, and how God Himself has ordained us and the place of human reason. ^[17]

Accordingly, in several places throughout KOG, we describe the harmful philosophical consequences of neglecting the place of reason in the Christian life. Such a neglect results in a hoard of threats upon authentic Christianity including emotionalism, ^[18] fideism, ^[19] mysticism, ^[20] and general anti-intellectualism. ^[21] Emotionalism is experience without reason, fideism is faith without reason, mysticism is revelation without reason, and the foundation of all these is the bias against reason in anti-intellectualism.

Muddled thinking about thinking in the Christian life was demonstrated long ago by the fifth century leader of the Syrian Church, Bishop Rabbula of Eddessa (d. 435) when he concluded a sermon on the text “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,” (Matt 22:37) as follows: “He therefore that loves does not investigate but obeys, he does not scrutinize but believes.” ^[22] One wonders if the good Bishop had simply forgotten that Christ had immediately added you are also to love God, “with all your mind [dianoia: “reasoning”].”

Rabbula’s contemporary, St. Augustine (354-430), better reflected a biblical perspective when he said:

God forbid that He [or we!] should hate in us that faculty by which He made us superior to all other beings. . . . Man’s excellence consists in the fact that God made him to His own image by giving him an intellectual soul, which raises him above the beasts of the field. . . . We could not believe at all if we did not have rational souls. ^[23]

Indeed, when we neglect the reasoning faculty God created us with, we are in danger of becoming “like unreasoning [aloga] animals, born as creatures of instinct” (2 Pet 2:12 NASB). It is our God-given ability to reason that separates us from the animals of instinct and impulse. And this is precisely how those who ignore or devalue the place of reason, would seem to want us to live—more like animals, by instinct or emotion. It is simply sin to disparage the God-given place of human reason.

In fact, those who would disparage our reason, disparage the very thing they use to do so. Some years ago, A. W. Tozer (1897-1963) wrote something that has application today:

The Bible has a great deal to say about our thoughts; current evangelicalism has practically nothing to say about them. The reason the Bible says so much is that our thoughts are so vitally important to us; the reason evangelicalism says so little is that we are over-reacting from the “thought” cults, such as New Thought, Unity, Christian Science and their like. These cults make our thoughts to be very nearly everything and we counter by making them very nearly nothing. Both positions are wrong. ^[24]

Christian philosopher J. P. Moreland reminds us of the importance of reason in the Christian life when he writes:

What a contrast the God of the Bible is with the god of Islam, who is so transcendent that his ways are inscrutable (beyond understanding)! How different He is from the irrational, fickle, finite deities of the Greek pantheon or other polytheistic religions! These mythological “gods” exhibit the folly of human emotion and the danger of ignoring revelation.

The God of the Bible requires teachers who diligently study His Word and handle it accurately (compare 2 Timothy 2:15 and I Timothy 4:15-16). . . . On one occasion His chief Apostle, Paul, emphasized that his gospel preaching was by way of “words of truth and rationality” (Acts 26:25, NASB) when Festus charged that his great learning was driving him mad (Acts 26:24, NASB). No anti-intellectualism here!

By contrast, the monistic religions of the East promote gurus who offer paradoxes, like the sound of one hand clapping, upon which to meditate in order to free the devotee from dependence on reason and enable him to escape the laws of logic. The Buddhist is to leave his mind behind, but the Christian God requires transformation by way of its renewal (Romans 12:1-2). ^[25]

The New Age movement promotes a similar disparagement of reason. Norm Geisler writes of one of its foremost leaders:

Shirley MacLaine, pop theologian of the New Age movement, was surely out on a limb when she wrote: “Don’t evaluate and don’t let your left brain judge what you are thinking. Give your left brain more space. As a matter of fact, don’t think.” ^[26]

Unfortunately, it is not only the pagan religions who disparage the place of reason in the spiritual life, but charismaticism ^[27] does as well. For example, Kenneth Hagin (1917-2003), a well known leader in this movement says that the Christian must, “by-pass the brain to get into the things of God.” ^[28] Such is a relatively common mindset, teaching, and practice in the emotionalism ^[29] that, as its label suggests, promotes emotion, feeling, and impulses, above and at the expense of rational thought in worship and even prayer (i.e. tongues).

Along these lines, K. L. Sarles writes:

[John] Wimber [virtual founder of the “third wave” of charismaticism] has phrased the question this way: “Could it be that many Western evangelicals have subconsciously developed a theology that excludes the possibility of supernaturally inspired dreams and visions, harmonizing ‘Christian doctrine’ with Western rationalism?”

However, the question could just as plausibly be phrased another way: Since Christianity has had such an enormous impact on the history of Western civilization, could it not be that Western rationalism is an appropriate philosophical expression of “Christian doctrine”? ^[30]

Indeed, it is because authentic Christianity promotes the use of Spirit-liberated reason that Western culture has been so influenced by this. It is those who would fall short of authentic, biblical Christianity like John Wimber who disparage this and promote Eastern mysticism.

Along these lines, John MacArthur writes:

Mysticism is a system of belief that attempts to perceive spiritual reality apart from objective, verifiable facts. It seeks truth through feelings, intuition, and other internal senses. Objective data is usually discounted, so mysticism derives its authority from within. Spontaneous feeling becomes more significant than objective fact. Intuition outweighs reason. An internal awareness supercedes external reality . . . mysticism is at the heart of modern existentialism, humanism, and even many forms of paganism—most notably Hinduism and its close ally, New Age philosophy. Irrational mysticism is also at the heart of the Charismatic experience . . .

The entire [Charismatic] movement has absorbed the erroneous notion that whatever is truly spiritual must transcend or bypass people’s rational senses. Spiritual gifts supposedly operate by suspending the faculties of human reason. One might think that the strongest evidence of the Holy Spirit’s power is when someone lapses into a stupor. And so the lore of the Charismatic movement is filled with outrageous accounts of behavior that resembles trances, seizures, subliminal messaging, hypnosis, suspended animation, frenzy, hysteria, even dementia. These are often cited as proof that God is at work in the movement. ^[31]

Charismaticism points to Scriptures like 2 Corinthians 3:6 to justify this abandonment of reason. “The letter kills,” they warn, “but the Spirit gives life!” The entire original context of that saying has nothing whatever to do with reason-versus-revelation, but rather lawkeeping-versus-faith. Faith is not an alternative to reason, as they would have us believe. Rather, faith is supposed to result from Spirit led reasoning from the Scriptures (cf. Isaiah 1:18, Acts 17:2, 18:4). ^[32] Yet charismaticism has taught many to dismiss reason as “a hindrance to the spirit.”

Providing evidence for Dr. MacArthur’s critique, the historian of charismaticism, Richard Quebedeaux, thinks he is saying something praiseworthy about the movement when he writes:

Charismatic Renewal rejects the liberal, nonsupernatural god who really isn’t there anyhow, but it also rejects the rational evangelical god of the intellect-the great giver of propositional truth -in favor of the God you can feel, respond to, and love, the God who cares about our present and our future. It is the knowledge of this God, given through the experience of his Holy Spirit, that binds Charismatics together. ^[33]

Why do we have to choose between what Quebedeaux calls, “the rational evangelical god of the intellect-the great giver of propositional truth -in favor of the God you can feel, respond to, and love?” Isn’t God both? And why would such emotionalists accuse Evangelicals of rejecting “the God you can feel, respond to, and love?” We haven’t.

However, while many Evangelicals have held on to both aspects of God, emotionalists have largely let go of the rational side of God and even gloat about it. As usual, when our brothers in charismaticism attempt to describe their uniqueness they rarely avoid error, arrogance, and offense. Any Christian is right to avoid the rationalism ^[34] of unregenerated humanity, and the fideism ^[35] of liberal Christianity, ^[36] but charismaticism has fallen into the equally harmful error of emotionalism—an unbiblical overemphasis on emotions as a mark of spirituality. They simply have no biblical or experiential ground to claim that their God is superior to the “rational evangelical god,” or that they “respond to and love” God more than others.

The quality of a person’s relationship with God is demonstrated by virtue, not emotion, and while emotionalists may have more of the latter, none of them (hopefully) would claim they have more of the former. If emotionalists are not more loving, honest, and holy than “rational evangelicals” then they have no business claiming any kind of superiority in their relationship with God. And experience demonstrates that their emotionalism gives them no such superiority.

Along these lines, Donald Lewis, a Professor at Regent Seminary, wrote about his experience at a conference of the emotionalist Vineyard Association of Churches several years ago. He reports that John Wimber, the founder of the Association, said, “At some point critical thinking must be laid aside.” To that comment Dr. Lewis replied in the following manner:

Wimber several times equated critical thinking with unbelief, and his apparent inability to distinguish the two is most disturbing. At one point he (Wimber) asked: “When are we going to see a generation who doesn’t try to understand this book (the Bible), but just believes it?” In effect, this is saying, “When are we going to see a generation that believes my interpretation of this book without question?”

This strongly anti-intellectual strain which shows through in Wimber is typical of 19th century American Revivalism and is just the sort of thing that Evangelicalism has been trying to live down in the 20th century. It disparages God’s gracious gift of our mind and reflects ill on a Creator who chose to endow us with the ability to think critically. ^[37]

Mega mysticism is another danger of ignoring the God-ordained place of reason. It is essentially a belief in the authority of intuitions and impulses apart from reason. Mega mystics uncritically assume that whatever apparently good thought comes into their head must be from God. While we discuss this popular, unbiblical, and dangerous error elsewhere, ^[38] we will illustrate it here in a critique of the popular Chinese author Watchman Nee (1903-1972):

Watchman Nee . . . elevates the intuitive capacity to the highest “part” of a human being (the spirit) and demotes the reasoning capacity to a lower “part” (the soul). On this analysis, direct intuitions (“word of knowledge,” “prophecies,” etc.) are often believed to constitute a higher, “spiritual knowledge” than knowledge that comes through a reasoned exegesis of Scripture. ^[39]

Such is the outcome of mega mysticism.

We doubt any emotionalist or postmodern theologian would want to claim a more intimate and fruitful relationship with God than Jonathan Edwards. Yet, few, if any, Christians have demonstrated what it means to love God with your mind more than he. In fact, a foremost expert on Edwards’ theological perspective has accurately labeled it a “rational biblical theology,” reflecting its two most important attributes. ^[40] Accordingly, Edwards’ writings are full of examples of, and exhortations to, loving God with our reasoning faculties. For example, he wrote:

There is no other way by which any means of grace whatsoever can be of any benefit, but by knowledge. . . . Men . . . receive nothing, when they understand nothing; and are not at all edified, unless some knowledge be conveyed. ^[41]

While anti-intellectualism is promoted within emotionalism, it is widely allowed in even more conservative Evangelicalism. The following comment from John Frame, Professor of Theology at Westminster, concerning Reformed theology in particular, would seem to reflect the current state of most of Christendom as well:

Reformed theology was once famous for its rigorously logical character. . . . Today, however, it is hard to imagine [Reformed Christians] being accused of overconfidence in logic. . . . It is difficult now, in fact, to find any positive words about logic in Reformed theology and easy to find warnings against its misuse. . . . I am not sure where this suspicion of logic comes from. . . . However, the result of this development is that many Reformed people are confused and uncertain about the role that logic should play in their theology. ^[42]

Here again, we need a good dose of Edwards who believed:

It must be a great part of man’s principal business to improve his understanding by acquiring knowledge. If so, then it will follow, that it should be a main part of his business to improve his understanding in acquiring divine knowledge, or the knowledge of the things of divinity; for the knowledge of these things is the principal end of this faculty. God gave man the faculty of understanding, chiefly, that he might understand divine things. . . .

It becomes one who is called to be a soldier, to excel in the art of war. It becomes a mariner to excel in the art of navigation. It becomes a physician to excel in the knowledge of those things which pertain to the art of physic. So it becomes all such as profess to be Christians, and to devote themselves to the practice of Christianity, to endeavor to excel in the knowledge of divinity. ^[43]

Contrary to those who suppose that we only love God with our emotions or actions, Edwards understood that it was just as important that we love Him with our reason as well. God is not only pleased with our obedience to His commands, but also with the passionate pursuit of understanding His doctrines, many of which require a great deal of thinking. Accordingly, theologian Thomas Oden writes:

The Apostle spoke to his Corinthian audience as persons “of good sense” (1 Cor. 10:15, “of discernment,”). He protested against the opponents of faith as those who were “unreasonable” or “wrongheaded” (2 Thess. 3:2, KJV, NEB). . . . Jesus himself reasoned by analogy through parables, and often reasoned from pragmatic evidence.

Biblical faith has been poorly described as contrary to reason or inaccessible to any kind of rational analysis or critical judgment. This has encouraged obscurantism to parade as faith, and fideism to refuse to give or seek any reasons for faith. . . .

Classical Christian exegetes sought to communicate both the importance and the limits of reason. They tried to avoid the rationalist exaggeration that reason is omnicompetent, thereby leaving no role for revelation (Tertullian, Apol. xlvi, xlvil). They also resisted the opposite exaggeration, that reason is completely undone and incompetent in the presence of the mysteries of religion (Justin Martyr, Dialogue, 11). . . . Classical Christian teaching asked for more than feeling . . . It asked for rigorous, critical reflection. ^[44]

Contrary to popular opinion, it is not humble, nor spiritual to demean or bypass the powers of human reason. That is precisely what the devil wants because his primary weapon is lies, and it is with our reason that we possess and use the truth to defend ourselves. ^[45] God created our reasoning faculty and expects it to be used, and it should not automatically be labeled sinful or unspiritual just because many have abused it. Most people don’t think about how much of our daily existence and basic functioning depends on human reasoning. It is popularly claimed that logic, reason, and thinking have little to do with the spiritual side of our life and our relationship with God. This is not the teaching of Scripture and there is no verse in the Bible that devalues the use of reason for the Christian. If one still doubts the importance of reasoning in the Christian life, try to imagine any kind of life without it. ^[46]

Nevertheless, more mystically minded folk have distorted the following statement in their favor: “At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children” (Matt 11:25). The claim, of course, is that the King was an anti-intellectual and real spirituality is found in child-like reasoning and impulses rather than serious thinking. One notices that this is often shared for the purpose of deceiving people into thinking that the ridiculous, ecstatic, childish, or mystical is actually spiritual.

The Apostle Paul answered such a notion in Corinth when he wrote: “When I was a child, I used to speak as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things” (1 Cor 13:11). Reasoning like a child is not the height of Christian spirituality, and the Apostle clearly advocated reasoning like an adult.

We could hardly do better in correctly interpreting Jesus and answering Christian anti-intellectualism than to quote a very spiritual intellectual, C. S. Lewis:

Christ never meant that we were to remain children in intelligence: on the contrary. He told us to be not only ‘as harmless as doves’, but also ‘as wise as serpents’. He wants a child’s heart, but a grown-up’s head. He wants us to be simple, singleminded, affectionate, and teachable, as good children are; but He also wants every bit of intelligence we have to be alert at its job, and in first-class fighting trim. . . .

God is no fonder of intellectual slackers than of any other slackers. If you are thinking of becoming a Christian, I warn you, you are embarking on something which is going to take the whole of you, brains and all. But, fortunately, it works the other way round. Anyone who is honestly trying to be a Christian will soon find his intelligence being sharpened. ^[47]

Others claim that original sin or “the Fall” of the human race have diminished the God-ordained place of human reason. To the contrary, God still holds humanity, believers and unbelievers alike, responsible for using their God-given reasoning faculties. Accordingly, Christian philosophers William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland comment:

[T]he claim is made that human depravity has made the mind so darkened that the noetic effects of sin, that is, sin’s effect on the mind, render the human intellect incapable of knowing truth. However, this claim is an exaggeration. The Fall brought about the perversion of human faculties, but it did not destroy those faculties. Human reasoning abilities are affected but not eliminated. ^[48]

Likewise, Jonathan Edwards, who studied and wrote a great deal about human reason, said:

[T]he faculty of understanding with which God has endowed man is wholly good and right. It is that wherein the natural image of God consists, and is the excellency of man’s nature; and if the faculty of reason be duly improved, it will lead men right. . . . [The real problem is that] Their lusts have a far greater hand in the judgments that they make of things, and by which they govern themselves, than their reason. ^[49]

More recently, the eminent NT scholar John Stott, in his classic book Your Mind Matters, corrects the notion that the Fall should lead us to trust our feelings more, as so many contend today:

[T]he fact that man’s mind is fallen is no excuse for a retreat from thought into emotion, for the emotional side of man’s nature is equally fallen. Indeed, sin has more dangerous effects on our faculty of feeling than on our faculty of thinking, because our opinions are more easily checked and regulated by revealed truth than our experiences. ^[50]

It is not thinking that Scripture warns us about, but the wrong kind of thinking. No doubt, a good many of the personal and corporate problems in the Church today would be remedied by more and deeper thinking, instead of more and deeper feeling.

Nevertheless, because the place of reason is consistently disparaged in Christianity today, we will demonstrate its centrality to the authentic Christian life in a number of ways.

B) Reason & God

B.1) God Reasons: Isa 1:18

The Scriptures tell us that God Himself reasons. He scrutinizes, probes, and weighs (zarah, takan, chaqar; cf. Ps 17:3; 139:3; Prov 24:12; Jer 17:10), examines, evaluates, and tests (chaqar, paqad, bachan, palas, raah; cf. Gen 6:5; 11:5; Job 7:18; Ps 5:21; 11:4-5; 139:23; Jer 17:10; 20:12); considers and discerns (yada, bin cf. Exod 33:13; Ps 5:1; Prov 24:12), judges and rewards (shapat, krinō; cf. Gen 16:5; Exod 5:21; Acts 17:31; Rom 2:16; 2 Cor 5:10); chooses, plans, and purposes (machashebeth, boulē, eklegō, proorizō; cf. Jer 29:11; Eph 1:4, 11).

All of these divine actions require reasoning and they are not meant to be merely metaphors or accommodation of language. God reasons like us who are made in His image. More than that, He invited the Jews to reason with Him in that famous passage where God says, “Come now, let us reason [yākach: decide] together says the LORD” (Isa 1:18).

Because logic is an essential characteristic of God, and the essence of a lie is contradiction, we understand precisely why, “it is impossible for God to lie” (Heb 6:18; cf. Tit 1:2). There is no contradiction in God or His ways because of His logic. Because of God’s logic, reason, and consistency, (all ideas expressed in the word logos), the Apostle can say that, “God is not a God of disorder [akatastasia: confusion]” (1 Cor 14:33).

Admittedly it is very difficult to equate divine mental functions, like reasoning, with human ones. ^[51] For example, unlike humans, God does not reason in order to gain knowledge (contra open theism ^[52]), but rather to use His knowledge. While our reasoning is a God-given model of how He reasons, He reminds us that His ways are not our ways and are higher than ours (cf. Isa 55:8-9). Leading the Apostle to exclaim after three chapters of describing God’s plan of salvation:

Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and His paths beyond tracing out! (Rom 11:33)

B.2) God is Logic: John 1:1

It is not only God in general Who is spoken of in Scripture as possessing and using reason. In the opening sentence of the Gospel of John we read, “In the beginning was the Logos [“Word”], and the Logos [“Word”] was with God, and the Logos [“Word”] was God” (John 1:1). The Greek word logos here obviously refers directly to Christ (cf. v. 14) and it has many meanings that served well to describe God the Son to the Apostle John’s audience. NT scholar C. K. Barrett writes: “Logos is a Greek word of many meanings, most of which can be summarized under the two heads of inward thought, and the outward expression of thought in speech.” ^[53] Indeed, Christ was the outward expression of God, but this expression derived from the inward thought of God- which certainly included His reasoning.

Accordingly, reason was a very common understanding of the Greek word logos, expecially among Greek Jews and the Greek culture in general. No doubt John was referring to this common understanding. Most scholars believe John wrote his Gospel in the mid 90’s A. D., a time by which many, if not most Christians were Greek rather than Jewish. In addition, early Church history places the authorship of the Gospel of John in Ephesus, a very Greek city in Greek Asia Minor. ^[54] And a common understanding of logos at this time in that region was reason. ^[55]

There should be little doubt then that when the Apostle John uses this word to describe Christ to his Greek audience, that he is applying its Greek meaning to God. ^[56] Whereas in his first epistle the Apostle John will say that “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16), in his Gospel, John says God is logic. ^[57]

The fact that Scripture describes God as reasoning with a mind and logic has led several theologians to note this divine characteristic. Reformed theologian Cornelius Van Til (1895-1987) wrote: “The law of contradiction, as we know it, is but the expression on a created level of the internal coherence of God’s nature.” ^[58] Gordon Clark was more to the point when he said, “The law [of noncontradiction] is God thinking.” ^[59] J. Oliver Buswell (1895-1977), former President of Wheaton College wrote:

I believe that the laws of reason [logic] are derived from the character of God. I have already pointed out that the writers of the Bible constantly assume and frequently assert that it is impossible for God to lie. I have shown that their meaning is not the mere tautology that whatever God might say would be true because He said it. ^[60]

While love is the essence of God’s morality, logic is the essence of His thinking. Anyone fighting against logic is fighting against the character of God and ultimately God Himself. Denouncing logic is just as immoral as denouncing love for both are a reflection of the “heart” of God. Therefore it should not surprise us that those who rail against the God given value of human reason, are often prone to immorality and a lack of love as well.

Obviously, we are not saying that our thinking is in every way like God’s thinking. However, because love and logic are such essential characteristics of God, they are both great virtues in humans, and to impugn either one is immoral. As theologians Bruce Demarest and Gordon Lewis put it:

Logical principles, like moral principles, are rooted ultimately in the mind and nature of the Creator. . . . Logic is not an invention of unbelieving philosophers, but a reflection of God’s mind in minds made in his image. ^[61]

Along these lines, R. C. Sproul, John Gerstner, and Arthur Lindsey write:

In certain Christian circles there is a persistent allergy to rationality. It is often motivated by what [Alvin] Plantinga calls a “pious and commendable concern for God’s greatness and majesty and augustness.” The fear is that reason makes God subject to a law which is greater than Himself, making God answerable to Aristotle [384–322 B.C.], rather than Aristotle to God.

But Aristotle did not invent logic or reason . . . Aristotle defined the logical relationships of propositions which had been functioning since the origin of human speech . . . When the laws of logic are violated, intelligible communication ceases. The Christian faith affirms logic not as a law above God but as an aspect built into Creation which flows from His own character. ^[62]

Like the love of the Creator, the logic of the Creator has existed from eternity past. Logic is an aspect of the eternal Wisdom of God by which He acts and creates. Commenting on Proverbs 8:22-30, Dr. Barclay wrote:

When we read that passage there is echo after echo of what John says of the “word” in Jn. 1. “Wisdom” had that eternal existence, that light-giving function, that creative power which John attributed to the “word,” the “Logos”, with which he identified as Jesus Christ. ^[63]

Finally, if logic is a foundational attribute of God, we would expect its opposite to be a characteristic of satan. And indeed, no one in the Universe is more illogical than he. As John Frame writes:

[T]he paradigm of irrationality is satan himself. satan knows more about God than any of us. He is not stupid; certainly, he knows that rebels against God are doomed. Yet he persists in his rebellion anyway. So, intelligent as he may be, he is the very paradigm of foolishness. ^[64]

It is because logical and reasonable thinking is so much a part of God, that being illogical and rejecting reason is so much a part of the devil. Accordingly, disparaging the place of a Christian’s reasoning faculties is demonic.

Pastoral Practices

• Never, in your teaching or example, describe God-pleasing faith as illogical or unreasonable. If this is how you understand the faith that God desires, or what obeying God in faith looks like, we would especially encourage you to study our discussion of faith in Book 6 of Knowing Our God. As discussed there, biblical faith is never foolish, but rather, the most reasonable thing in the world. ^[65]

C) Reason & Humans: A computer of beliefs

While “heart” is a biblical term used to refer to the faculty of reason, other words are used to refer to the process of reasoning as well. This process is often referred to in the Hebrew as hāšab and in the Greek as dokeō (think), phronēsis (thought) or logizomai (reason). Concerning the latter, the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (NIDNTT) says, “The concept implies an activity of the reason which, starting with ascertainable facts, draws a conclusion.” ^[66] Webster’s defines reasoning as: “the power of comprehending, inferring, or thinking especially in orderly rational ways.” ^[67] The seventeenth century English philosopher John Locke (1632–1704), in his famous and very influential Essay Concerning Human Understanding defined reasoning as:

[T]he discovery of the certainty or probability of such propositions or truths, which the mind arrives at by deduction made from such ideas, which it has got by the use of its natural faculties; viz. by sensation or reflection. ^[68]

Along these lines, Yandall Woodfin, former Professor of Philosophy of Religion at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary wrote:

All knowing, regardless of its sphere or point of reference, comes as one . . . organizes his sense impressions [or memory] into patterns of meaning and understanding. . . . Though reason is as elusive as the structure of personality itself, it may be described as that mental faculty which possesses a degree of spontaneous, self-evident power of comprehension. It is capable of receiving and projecting various relationships between ideas and thus extending knowledge beyond the conditions of possible experience. ^[69]

Reasoning is what you are doing even now as you contemplate what kind of name is Yandall Woodfin. Reasoning is what we have discussed elsewhere as human research, ^[70] and private judgment. ^[71] Reasoning is what every human being does every time they make a decision about anything, whether it is to include anchovies on your pizza (which would be bad reasoning), or to receive Jesus Christ as your Savior. Reason is what you are using right now to understand, interpret, and evaluate the value and accuracy of what you are reading here. While so many dismiss or depreciate it, reasoning is something no human can escape, or at least should not strive to do so.

While we continue to demonstrate the epistemological importance of reason in the sections below and elsewhere, ^[72] we need only to remember that it is the God-given faculty by which we process information into knowledge which becomes beliefs which in turn are the foundation of everything else we do. As we have discussed in the previous chapter, knowledge is what we understand and belief is the knowledge we think is true with various levels of certainty. ^[73] Accordingly, Webster’s defines belief as: “Conviction of the truth of some statement . . . based on examination of evidence.” ^[74] Therefore, reasoning is how our mind operates in order to produce our beliefs.

How does this process work? First of all, it needs to be said that the operation of our reasoning is just as mysterious as how the brain itself works. ^[75] While our suggested explanation will necessarily be rather simplistic, we think it might be helpful to enlist computers as an analogy. ^[76] Along these lines, psychologist David Myers writes:

Since the brain is composed primarily of neurons, and since neurons seem to function primarily as dynamic conveyors of information, it seems to follow that we must understand the activities of the mind primarily in terms of information processing. ^[77]

Likewise, theologian Gregory Peterson has written: “[T]he history of cognitive science has shown that computational models have been enormously fruitful for thinking about the mind and brain.” ^[78]

Therefore, it can be simply suggested that we receive “data” through various sources including divine revelation, memory, experiences, research, and our senses including sight, hearing, and touch. This data is processed by the God-given system software imbedded in our reason by the Creator, which contains rules, laws, and constructs of logic and morality. ^[79] With these imbedded paradigms humans are enabled to process data into beliefs which result in desires and decisions. ^[80]

Accordingly, even infants automatically process the data they are exposed to, transforming it into moral and logical beliefs, and demonstrating a built-in “system software” which enables them to interpret, evaluate, categorize, and synthesize information from the day they are born and even before. ^[81]

Specifically concerning the logical reasoning of the mind, the imbedded “processing code” used has been described as rules of logic. ^[82] Dr. Buswell wrote: “Logic is the study of how we ought to think if we think correctly.” ^[83] The innate rules of logic are demonstrated in what are called syllogisms, which metaphorically speaking, are the binary computer code for our reasoning. ^[84]

An example of this is: 1) All men are mortal, 2) John is a man, therefore, 3) John is mortal. This is the essence of how we think, and the basic process by which we gain all of our knowledge. ^[85] These laws of logic include the laws of identity, contradiction, the excluded middle, and causality.

Gordon Lewis and Bruce Demarest demonstrate some of these laws in the following comment:

Paul, arguing that Israel’s election was by grace, not works, says, “If it were [by works], grace would no longer be grace” (Rom. 11:6). Here Paul presupposes classical logic’s three laws of thought: (1) the principle of identity: A is A, grace is (unmerited) grace; (2) the principle of the excluded middle: A is not non-A, (unmerited) grace is not nongrace (or works with merit); and (3) the principle of noncontradiction: a thing cannot be both A and non-A at the same time, God’s choice cannot be according to both grace and nongrace (works). ^[86]

The beliefs that reason processes is then stored in our memory. In other words, after we have processed something in our reason, we need not do so in the future, but simply extract the previous result from our memory. For example, if we have ever been burned by a hot stove, we no longer need to enter a long process of reasoning in the future of whether or not to do so, but rather, need only to remember the result we had reasoned to before. Remembering is a very important part of our relationship with God, particularly in the areas of Scripture memorization and meditating on the past acts of God in order to bolster our faith in Him. ^[87]

D) Reason & Creation

The logic and reason that is inherent in the Creator has given rise to the “Christian Logos doctrine” which recognizes the logic and reason inherent in the Creation, with human reason being the most important reflection of God’s reason. As early as Clement of Alexandria (c. 155-220) this idea was described when he wrote: “God has bestowed upon man a rational principle which was an imitation of his own image, the Logos.” ^[88] Accordingly, we read in Job:

[I]t is the spirit in a man, the breath of the Almighty, that gives him understanding. . . . Who endowed the heart with wisdom or gave understanding to the mind?” (Job 32:8; 38:36).

Along the same lines, Christian theologian Ronald Nash explains the logos doctrine in his important book, The Word of God and the Mind of Man:

Reason has an intrinsic relationship to God, it has cosmic significance. Christians believe the rational world is the projection of a rational God who objectifies His eternal thoughts in the creation and who endows the human creature, the apex of His creation, with the image of God which includes a structure of reason similar to God’s own reason. . . .

As the Logos of God, Jesus guarantees human rationality and certifies the ability of humans to understand the Word of God. The correspondence between the mind of God and the human mind (that is grounded in the Logos) makes possible a human understanding of the divine communication of truth. ^[89]

Theologians have debated for centuries about what human characteristics reflect our being made in the image of God. There is no doubt that our reason is at least a very important part of our divine image. This suggestion has a long history, beginning with such early Church leaders as Irenaeus (c. 180), Athanasius (c. 295–373), and Augustine (354-430). In the Middle Ages, Thomas Aquinas (1225-1275) asserted the same. We believe John Calvin (1509-1564) alluded to the same when he wrote: “The mind of man is His [God’s] true image.” ^[90] Likewise, Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) believed that, “the understanding is the major aspect of the natural image of God.” ^[91] Along the same lines, one of the founding fathers of Evangelical theology, Carl F. H. Henry (1913-2003), asserted:

Christianity affirms that this world is a rational universe, that it is God’s world; knowability of the universe is grounded in God’s creation of man as a rational creature whose forms of thought correspond to the laws of logic subsisting in the mind of God, as well as to the rational character of the world as God’s creation. ^[92]

More recently, the Oxford theologian Alister McGrath has stated:

The image of the creator is to be found in the rational or intellectual soul of humanity. . . . Although reason and intellect may at times be dormant, or may appear to be weak at some times, and strong at others, the human soul cannot be anything other than rational and intellectual. It has been created according to the image of God in order that it may use reason and intellect in order to apprehend and behold God. ^[93]

It is because the Creator is logical, that humans are logical. And to be human is to be logical. Along these lines Christian philosopher James Emery White remarks:

Deep within the worldview of the biblical authors and equally within the minds of the earliest church fathers was the understanding that to be fully human is to think. To this day we call ourselves a race of Homo sapiens, which means “thinking beings.” This is not simply a scientific classification- it is a spiritual one. ^[94]

Accordingly, against the influential philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) ^[95] and other epistemological skeptics, we believe God made us in His image with reason so that we could have a relationship with Him through our reason.

However, humans are not the only aspect of Creation that reflects God’s rationality. It is because the Creator functions with reason and order that the planets and atoms reflect and depend on the same. Along these lines, Baptist theologian Millard Erickson writes:

We may detect clues about what God is like by observing the behavior of the created universe. For example, a definite pattern of logic seems to apply within the creation. There is an orderliness, a regularity, about it. Moreover, it has been found that we can come to understand nature better through rational methods of inquiry. While there will be differences to be sure, there is a compelling basis here for assuming that God also is orderly and that we may come to understand him better through a judicious use of logic.

Those who believe that God is sporadic, arbitrary, or whimsical by nature and that his actions are characterized by paradox and even contradiction either have not taken a close look at the behavior of the world or have assumed that God is in no sense operating there. ^[96]

E) Reason & Reality: vs. contradictions, fideism, & postmodernism

If we are to understand the importance of our reason, we need only ask how important is truth in our lives? As noted in the previous chapter, we get some indication of this when we read that the King, “came from the Father full of grace and truth” and that “grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” What did Christ come to bring? “Grace and truth,” because we needed both so badly. And how do we receive, experience, comprehend, and benefit from either of these? With our reason.

Our reason is the place in our “heart” that we deal with truth, and whatever truth we possess is processed, produced, applied, and protected there. This includes the most important truths including the Gospel and any knowledge of God. There is nothing we know of God either abstractly or personally that we do not know and keep in our reason. Likewise, God does nothing to us or through us that He does not do through our reason—a statement we will have occasion to repeat throughout Knowing Our God. Accordingly, we have written elsewhere:

The relationship between beliefs, desires, and emotions is a hierarchical one, with beliefs being at the bottom, supporting all else. Desires are the result of beliefs, and emotions stem from desires. In other words, our beliefs are the beginning point for everything we do as human beings. What are desires other than decisions based on what we believe? And what are emotions except our response to the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of our desires? Therefore, we suggest that the processing and production of our beliefs is the dominant function of the “heart” that directs and determines all else.

Many writers today, as noted below, attempt to limit human reason to the task of collecting data. In reality, however, human reason is the source of desires and ultimately emotions, and is superior and prior to both. It is our reason which not only seeks, researches, and receives data, but also evaluates and makes judgments upon it in order to produce what we believe, which is the foundation of what we desire and will feel—all occurring in our reason. . . .

This then points to the foundational function of human reason. Everything human comes from it. It is the reason of the “heart” that processes and produces beliefs, which in turn dictate our desires and decisions, all of which determine our emotions based on our circumstances. Our reasoning is at the bottom and in first place of it all, and therefore the essence of our “heart.” Accordingly, we have defined the human “heart” above as the reasoning functions of our inner life that direct our outer life. ^[97]

We have argued above that logic is an essential characteristic of both the Creator and His Creation. Therefore, it should not surprise us that it is essential to our very life. What water is to our physical life, logic is to our mental life. It is impossible to function as healthy human beings without functioning according to the laws of logic and reason. Accordingly, we deem irrational people as mentally dysfunctional.

It would seem to be this very truth that the Apostle was alluding to when he told Timothy, ““O Timothy, guard the deposit [of truth] entrusted to you. Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions [Gr. antithesis] of what is falsely called “knowledge,” for by professing it some have swerved from the faith” (1 Tim 6:20 ESV). Clearly, the Apostle believed “contradictions” were incompatible with “knowledge.” While the Apostle was probably referring to the pagan theories that contradicted the faith, there is no reason to believe that he did not also have in mind pagan theories that contradicted each other, thereby making them false knowledge, and not really knowledge at all. Two contradictory things are not only untrue, but are not even real. Likewise, only that which conforms to human logic is real to the human, because this is how God has made us.

Therefore, Timothy could only do what Paul asked if he recognized statements that contradicted Scripture. And how could he do this if he had to admit that there are apparent contradictions in Scripture itself, all of which must be accepted as truth? If we accept the postmodern approach to interpreting Scripture, why would we strive to reconcile any of its statements? How can we know which apparent contradictions are to be accepted as truth and which ones are not? How could we know the difference between only an apparent contradiction and a real one? Especially if we cannot trust God-ordained laws of logic!

Accordingly the tenth century philosopher Avicenna (980-1037) wrote:

Those who deny a first principle [of logic] should be beaten or exposed to fire until they concede that to burn and not to burn, or to be beaten and not to be beaten, are not identical. ^[98]

 

More recently, C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) wrote:

All possible knowledge, then, depends on the validity of reasoning. If the feeling of certainty which we express by words like must be and therefore and since is a real perception of how things outside our own minds really ‘must’ be, well and good. But if this certainty is merely a feeling in our own minds and not a genuine insight into realities beyond them; if it merely represents the way our minds happen to work, then we can have no knowledge. Unless human reasoning is valid no science can be true. . . . We must believe in the validity of rational thought, and we must not believe in anything inconsistent with its validity. ^[99]

Along the same lines, Lewis wrote elsewhere:

These first principles of Practical Reason are fundamental to all knowledge and argument. To deny them is to deny knowledge itself-, it is no use trying to see through first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ all things is the same as not to see. ^[100]

Likewise, Christian philosopher Arthur Holmes has written, “Human reasoning is after all a part of how human nature and existence are geared to the demands and the purposes of life.” ^[101] Accordingly, Jonathan Edwards points to both the unique function of reason and its importance when he writes:

Such is the nature of man, that no object can come at the heart but through the door of the understanding; and there can be no spiritual knowledge of that of which there is not first a rational knowledge. . . . The faculty of reason and understanding was given for actual understanding and knowledge. ^[102]

Along the same lines, B. B. Warfield (1851-1921) wrote:

Not only is this standard [of reason] certainly in the possession of every man and instinctively employed by him; but no one can by any means rid himself of it. Do what we will, we cannot help knowing that the world is either one or not one; that three times three are nine; and the like; that is to say the principles which underlie, say for example, logic and mathematics. ^[103]

Likewise, Dr. Buswell wrote:

In epistemology, we believe that God, the supreme personal Intelligence, has created us to be in some measure capable of intelligent apprehension of truth. We regard the basic laws of logic as derived from the character of God’s intelligence. . . .

I believe the first step in any knowledge process must be faith in reason. It can be shown that faith is necessary in abstract mathematics, in formal logic, and in the physical and biological sciences just as truly as faith is necessary in the acceptance of Christianity. ^[104]

Carl F. H. Henry wrote:

Since God is the source and stipulator of truth, all human knowledge is dependent upon Him. Divine revelation is the source of truth and the human mind a created instrument for recognizing it. Human knowledge of the cosmos, as well as of other selves, rests on the ontological significance of reason. The Creator has fashioned a Logos [logically]-ordered and nomos [law based]-structured universe, one meshed to the categories of understanding implanted in mankind at creation. ^[105]

Nonetheless, more liberal theologians have doubted whether or not our minds are really capable of knowing anything about God. This idea has traditionally been known as David “Hume’s Gap,” and has been more recently supported by such neoorthodox theologians as Thomas Torrance (1913-2007). For example, Ronald Nash writes:

Torrance certainly appears to claim that there is a difference between God’s logic and human logic, and, further, that the forms of “human logic” cannot be extended to a transcendent God. . . . He writes that human “Ideas and conceptions and analogies and words are too limited and narrow and poor for knowledge of God.” His suspicions about purely “human” logic are evident in such statements as: “Real theological thinking” should be freed from “imprisonment in timeless logical connections.” Knowledge of eternal truth, he suggests, is hindered by insisting on “fixed categories of thought.” What Torrance seems to give us is a statement that human knowledge about God is impossible and that human forms of reasoning are completely incapable of understanding truth and reason as it exists in the mind of God.

Several objections quickly come to mind. For one thing, if the principles of logic are as tentative and mutable as Torrance suggests, how can any reader have any confidence in the validity of Torrance’s own reasoning? If God Himself cannot reveal timeless truths or universally valid information to us, what leads Torrance to think that he can? . . . If a transcendent God really does have a logic all His own, no criteria can exist in the realm of the transcendent to distinguish between Yahweh and Satan. (The Word of God and the Mind of Man [Zondervan, 1982], 94, 95).

Likewise, Carl Henry responds to Torrance when he writes:

Torrance seems to be privy to objective propositional knowledge about God which his methodology pointedly disallows to other human beings. . . . The insistence on a logical gulf between human conceptions and God as the object of religious knowledge is erosive of knowledge and cannot escape a reduction to skepticism. (God, Revelation and Authority, 6 Vols. [Word, 1979], 3:223, 3:229, 2:60).

Apart from reason and logic there is not even a recognition of reality for humans. ^[106] As one Christian thinker put it: “Freedom from contradiction is a characteristic that belongs to everything that is real . . . and we may therefore use it as a test or criterion of reality.” ^[107] Likewise, Douglas Groothuis, in his book, Truth Decay, states what should be obvious when he writes: “Even if we could knowingly believe contradictory things, they could not both be true.” ^[108] Regarding the law of non-contradiction, for example, Gordon H. Clark (1902-1985) comments:

If contradictory statements are true of the same subject at the same time [in violation of the law of non-contradiction], evidently all things will be the same thing. . . . In fact, everything will be everything. Therefore everything will be the same thing. All differences among things will vanish and all will be one. ^[109]

Christian philosopher Ronald Nash comments accordingly, “This is only a sample of the nonsense that follows from any denial of the law of noncontradiction.” ^[110] Dr. Nash further notes:

This is why the person who attempts to argue against the law of noncontradiction must make use of the very law he is trying to deny. In the now famous words of McTaggart, “No one ever tried to break logic but what logic broke him.” ^[111]

Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias put it this way when he remarked, “The more you try to hammer the law of non-contradiction, the more it hammers you.” ^[112] In other words, without logic, the world makes no sense and therefore ceases to exist for us in any meaningful way. As Christian philosophers Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli put it: “The essential rules of reason . . . are not rules of a game that we invented and can change. They are rules of reality.” ^[113]

Logical consistency is the basis of all we believe. ^[114] Accordingly, Bruce Demarest and Gordon Lewis, Professors of Theology at Denver Seminary note that:

Many allege that ‘consistency is the mark of a small mind.’ But as one scholar aptly replied, ‘Better a small mind than none at all!’” ^[115]

In addition, one increasingly reads in philosophical circles both the distinction and superiority of a so called “Eastern” mind as opposed to a “Western” one. Accordingly, William Lane Craig writes:

Now under the influence of Eastern mysticism, many people today would deny that systematic consistency is a test for truth. They affirm that reality is ultimately illogical or that logical contradictions correspond to reality. . . .

In our politically correct age, there is a tendency to vilify all that is Western and to exalt Eastern modes of thinking as at least equally valid if not superior to Western modes of thought. To assert that Eastern thought is seriously deficient in making such claims is to be a sort of epistemological bigot, blinkered by the constraints of the logic-chopping Western mind. . . .^[116]

However, it should not surprise us that such a perspective is only in the minds of philosophers and has no place in reality. Dr. Craig notes:

[The idea of] “the Eastern mind” has been greatly exaggerated. In the East the common man-and the philosopher too-lives by the Laws of Contradiction and Excluded Middle throughout everyday life. He affirms them every time he walks through a doorway rather than into the wall. It is only at an extremely theoretical level of philosophical speculation that such laws are denied. . . .

We in the West should not therefore be embarrassed or apologetic about our heritage; on the contrary, it is one of the glories of ancient Greece that its thinkers came to enunciate clearly the principles of logical reasoning, and the triumph of logical reasoning over competing modes of thought in the West has been one of the West’s greatest strengths and proudest achievements. ^[117]

If logic is a greater part of the West then the East, it is because this is just one more great benefit of it also being more Christian. Christianity promotes reason on which many of the advancements of humankind have come. Accordingly, the commitment to reason found in the West is no doubt a substantial reason that it far exceeds the East in technological development, and therefore, in some aspects of our quality of life. However, the East is increasingly discovering the benefits of that technology, and therefore the logic that undergirds it. And in such a world-wide technological age we have a universal proof of the foundational nature of reason because logic is the universal and necessary language of all technology.

Accordingly, the very influential philosopher, Mortimer Adler (1902-2001) noted:

That there is an independent reality with which the propositions we assert can correspond or fail to correspond [logically] is assured by the way in which technologically contrived devices work or fail to work.” ^[118]

In other words, if you want to be a society that wishes to ignore or deny reason and logic, you will not have technology.

Nonetheless, there are several contemporary influences that seek to deny the relationship between reason and reality. These include Reformed epistemology and fideism, which we discuss elsewhere. ^[119] Another contemporary influence that questions the relationship between reason and reality is, of course, postmodernism. While we discuss this philosophical perspective further below and elsewhere, ^[120] we will repeat here that it is not nearly as influential as many claim, essentially because its irrational nature is self-destructive. Gene Veith puts it succinctly when he writes, “Postmodernism is a worldview that denies all worldviews” ^[121] and therefore denies itself. Postmodernism is also very hypocritical in its attack on reason, as Pauline Marie Rosenau remarks:

Although stressing the importance of the irrational and expressing grave doubts about the Enlightenment’s intellectual tools of reason, logic, and rationality, postmodernists employ these latter instruments in their own analysis. Deconstruction [i.e. assessment of a text from a postmodern perspective], for example, is a highly logical, reasoned, and analytical process. ^[122]

Finally, the denial of postmodern philosophers that reality rests on reason is even humorous. Dennis McCallum shares in his book, The Death of Truth:

A friend of mine told me that when Christian apologist and author Ravi Zacharias visited Columbus to speak at Ohio State University, his hosts took him to visit the Wexner Center for the Arts. The Wexner Center is a citadel of postmodern architecture. It has stairways leading nowhere, columns that come down but never touch the floor, beams and galleries going everywhere, and a crazy-looking exposed girder system over most of the outside. Like most of postmodernism, it defies every canon of common sense and every law of rationality.

Zacharias looked at the building and cocked his head. With a grin he asked, “I wonder if they used the same techniques when they laid the foundation?”

His point is very good. It’s one thing to declare independence from reality when building a monument. It’s another thing when we have to come into contact with the real world. ^[123]

Reason is essential to the proper functioning of our mind and our mind is essential to the proper functioning of our life because all knowledge and beliefs are processed there.

Not only are communication and subsequently relationships dependent on our logical faculties, but the Apostle Peter pointed out long ago that even meaningful action becomes impossible without it when he simply wrote: “prepare your minds for action” (1 Pet 1:13). This is because reasoning precedes all action. Accordingly, in a rather famous statement demonstrating the importance of logic, the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle asked:

For why does a man walk to Megara [a Greek city] and not stay at home thinking he is walking? Why does he not walk early some morning into a well or over a precipice, if one happens to be in his way? Why do we observe him guarding against this, evidently not thinking that falling in is alike good and not good? Evidently he judges one thing to be better and another worse. And if this is so, he must judge one thing to be man and another to be non-man, one thing to be sweet and another to be not-sweet. ^[124]

And it is the logical reasoning of our mind that enables us to know that critical difference. The King Himself recognized the mind as the place, and reasoning as the process, in which beliefs are formed and stored when He characteristically asked people, “What do you think?” (Matt 17:25; cf. Matt 18:12; 22:17; Luke 10:36). The Apostle as well understood the centrality of the mind for our beliefs when he said, “One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind” (Rom 14:5).

Likewise, the Apostle defended his beliefs by appealing to logic when he said, “I am not insane, most excellent Festus,” Paul replied. “What I am saying is true and reasonable [sophrosunes: “of sound mind”]” (Acts 26:25). Accordingly, Charles Hodge (1797-1878), in commenting on 1 Corinthians 11:13 (“Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered?”), wrote:

This is an appeal to their own sense of propriety. The Apostle often recognizes the intuitive judgments of the mind as authoritative. The constitution of our nature being derived from God, the laws which He has impressed upon it, are as much a revelation from Him as any other possible communication of His will. And to deny this, is to deny the possibility of all knowledge. ^[125]

Along these lines, the respected theologian Bernard Ramm (1916-1992) writes of the use of logic by the King and the Apostle:

(1) He [Christ] appealed to the OT as being on His side rather than that of His opponents; (2) He argued from logic, e.g., when He demonstrated the logical absurdity in saying that He was in league with the devil in casting out demons (Mt. 12:22-25); (3) He argued from analogy in His parables and in various sayings; once, e.g., He argued that if it is right for a man to rescue a sheep on the Sabbath, it ought to be more than right to heal a man on the Sabbath (Mt. 12:9-12); (4) He appealed to the verifying function of signs (cf. Jn. 2:18-22; Lk. 7:18-23) . . . .

The elaborate emphasis of the NT on truth is not to be overlooked. It is referred to more than 170 times in the NT. Many traditional forms of logic were employed by Jesus and Paul. In the debates of Jesus with His contemporaries He made repeated appeals to the rational powers of His hearers. Paul carries on profound discourses in his Epistles, leading one to conclude that he expected his readers to use their minds to the fullest. Writing to the Corinthians he says: “I speak as to sensible men; judge for yourselves what I say” (I Cor. 10: 15). ^[126]

The Oxford NT scholar William Sanday (1843-1920) not only describes how human reason works, but affirmed its authority when he wrote:

The human mind will in the end accept that theory [or interpretation] which covers the greatest number of particular facts and harmonizes best with the sum total of knowledge. . . . But when the mind is made up, not to a single conclusion here or a single conclusion there, but to a whole network of conclusions which hang together and form a coherent body of thought, it would be an act of violence to the intellectual conscience to arrest the process and suppress its results even at the bidding of the highest authority. ^[127]

Not even God expects us to believe something without reasons and apart from reasoning. Many have suggested that there is some kind of conflict between faith and reason, or believing in God and reasoning (i.e. fideism ^[128]). To the contrary, Dr. Sproul comments: “Faith without reason is superstition. Faith against logic is irrationality.” ^[129]

Reasoning is in fact an essential part of getting saved. ^[130] It is not that God bypasses our reason in order to give us saving faith, but rather He liberates our reason so that believing in Christ as our Lord and Savior is the most reasonable thing of all.

F) Reason & Communication: Everyone speaks through propositions- including God

Christians believe that our knowledge of God is based on revelation, the act of God communicating with us. The importance of our reason is especially demonstrated in the fact that, contrary to modern mystics, human communication with God always requires our reason. Accordingly, NT scholar John Stott writes:

The simple and glorious facts that God is a self-revealing God and that he has revealed himself to man indicate the importance of our minds. For all God’s revelation is rational revelation, both his general revelation in nature and his special revelation in Scripture and in Christ. . . .

The Christian doctrine of revelation, far from making the human mind unnecessary, actually makes it indispensable and assigns to it its proper place. God has revealed himself in words to minds. His revelation is a rational revelation to rational creatures. ^[131]

Likewise, Charles Hodge (1797-1878) explained:

Reason is necessarily presupposed in every revelation. Revelation is the communication of truth to the mind. But the communication of truth supposes the capacity to receive it. Revelations cannot be made to brutes or idiots. Truths, to be received as objects of faith, must be intellectually apprehended. A proposition to which we attach no meaning, however important the truth it may contain, cannot be an object of faith. In other words, knowledge is essential to faith. . . . The first and indispensable office of reason, therefore, in matters of faith, is the cognition or intelligent apprehension of the truths proposed for our reception. . . .

It is the prerogative of reason to judge of the credibility of a revelation. . . . Christians, therefore, concede to reason all the prerogatives it can rightfully claim. God requires nothing irrational of His rational creatures. He does not require faith without knowledge, or faith in the impossible, or faith without evidence. Christianity is equally opposed to superstition and rationalism. The one [superstition] is faith without appropriate evidence; the other [rationalism] refuses to believe what it does not understand, despite of evidence which should command belief. ^[132]

Likewise, Jonathan Edwards believed:

Man was made in the divine image so that God could communicate with him not confuse him. The most perfect harmony exists between right reason and the Bible. All that God reveals, therefore, is agreeable to reason and suited to man’s finite capacities. Men are reasonable . . . The Bible does not ask [them] to believe things against reason. It calls for no crucifying of the intellect or believing something demonstrably absurd. It merely requires an intelligent use of the intelligence; a reasonable use of reason. The way to the heart is only through the door of the understanding. ^[133]

Along the same lines, the respected Christian apologists Alan Richardson wrote:

In this life our knowledge of God must remain rational knowledge in this sense; no wordless knowledge of God, or immediate apprehension of Him, is claimed as a result of Christian faith. Faith is not a mystical but a rational activity, and to seek “religious experiences” as an evidence for, or as a consequence of Christian faith, is the first false step in our religious life. ^[134]

God created us with reason in order to effectively communicate with us in Scripture. Those more familiar with epistemological issues will notice the importance of this statement. Accordingly, the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy states:

We affirm that God who made mankind in His image has used language as a means of revelation.

We deny that human language is so limited by our creatureliness that it is rendered inadequate as a vehicle for divine revelation. We further deny that the corruption of human culture and language through sin has thwarted God’s work of inspiration. ^[135]

Nonetheless, Postmodern philosophers deny the God-given ability of reason to fulfill the function God intended. On the other hand, Reformed theologians prefer to speak of the bond between “the Word and the Spirit” as the connection between us and Scripture. On the contrary, the biblical emphasis is between the Word and the regenerated mind. We suggest that while the Reformed “illumination of the Spirit” approach sounds more spiritual, it also ignores the God-ordained place of Spirit-liberated reason and it has no Scripture to clearly support it. ^[136]

Not only does communication between God and humans depend on reason and logic, but communication between humans does as well. It is no coincidence that inherent in the meaning of the important biblical word logos (reason) is not only logic, but “word” and “expression.” Accordingly, Dr. Nash explains:

Logic is as indispensable to language as it is to reality. Significant speech is impossible apart from an acceptance of the law of noncontradiction. If one is to speak intelligibly, contrary meanings may not be attributed to the same word at the same time and in the same sense. ^[137]

It is the fact that humans share logic in common, that enables them to still communicate regardless of the vast differences in culture and language. Drs. Demarest and Lewis remark:

Common intellectual grids enable people from vastly different cultures to overcome initial difficulties and eventually communicate with each other. Logic is as indispensable to meaningful thought as grammar is to understandable language. . . . The languages in which the assertion is expressed may be as diverse as English, Sanskrit, or Chinese, but the logical content affirmed can in essence be the same. ^[138]

While postmodern philosophers in particular wish to deny this universal logical basis for human language, it is undeniable. For example, a foremost leader of postmodern thought, Richard Rorty (1931-2007) wrote:

For the pragmatist [postmodernist], true sentences are not true because they correspond to reality, and so there is no need to worry what sort of reality, if any, a given sentence corresponds to; no need to worry about what ‘makes’ it true. ^[139]

Likewise, Jacques Derrida (1930-2004), a leading postmodern literary critic, dispenses with the reality or need for objective human reason in understanding any communication when he claims that the meaning of a text is made, not found, by the act of reading. ^[140] Ironically, and not surprisingly, Derrida cannot even live with his nonsense himself. Accordingly, Millard Erickson relates:

John Searle wrote a response to an article of Derrida’s, challenging and criticizing several of his conceptions. . . . In his ninety-three page reply, Derrida objected that Searle’s statement had been unfair to him, and had at several points misunderstood and misstated his position. He even asserted at one point that what he had meant should have been clear and obvious to Searle. I consider that an incredibly nondeconstructionist, nonpostmodern response for someone who maintains that the meaning of a text is not in the author’s intention, but in what the reader finds it saying to him or her. ^[141]

Along the same lines, Dr. Nash rebuts a common postmodern argument that words can be ambiguous by noting:

The fact that many words are ambiguous is irrelevant to this argument. As long as the possible meanings of a word are limited in number, one can always eliminate the ambiguity by assigning a different set of symbols to each meaning. ^[142]

In other words, no one is saying that communication is never difficult, and it is admitted that good communication requires the hard work of discussion, clarification, and dialogue. Still, human reason and language is the Creator’s ordained means of communication, whether with Him, or other humans. It should not be forgotten that when God said in reference to our ancestors, “Come let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other” (Gen 11:7) that it was a means of divine judgment. Language is in fact, the first recorded experience of the human race. Commenting on Genesis 2:17 where we read: “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying . . .,” the nineteenth century Bible scholar Albert Barnes (1798-1870) wrote long before postmodern philosophy:

This is a pregnant sentence. . . . First, the power of understanding language is called forth. The command here addressed to him by his Maker is totally different from the blessings addressed to the animals in the preceding chapter. It was not necessary that these blessings [to the animals] should be understood in order to be carried into effect. . . . But this command addressed to man in words must be understood in order to be obeyed. The capacity for understanding language, then, was originally lodged in the constitution of man, and only required to be called out by the articulate voice of God. ^[143]

As even the first recorded example demonstrates, human communication, whether it be with God or other humans, is achieved through propositions or statements. The Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion defines a proposition as: “an assertion which proposes or denies something, and is capable of being judged true or false.” ^[144] Such statements require logical thought, and therefore we say again that human communication with God or other humans depends on logic. Contrary to neoorthodox theology, God has ordained to speak to us through “logical” propositions in His written word. In fact, Christ consistently employed logical speech forms in propositions in His communication. ^[145]

Likewise, contrary to charismaticism, when the King taught the disciples how to communicate with God, He told them to use logically based propositional statements like, “Our Father Who is in Heaven” (Matt 6:9), which require logical and reasonable thought to formulate, understand, and express. ^[146] By saying that human communication depends on logic, we can easily go a step further and say that all human relationships, whether with God or other humans, depends on logic as well. We cannot understand each other, whether it be through speech, sign language, or even body language without using the reasoning faculties of our mind.

Extras & Endnotes

A Devotion to Dad

Father, we express our thanks to You for giving us a “sound mind” through Your Spirit (2 Tim 1:7 KJV). Let us not forget how tragic it would be in our life, and even in our relationship with You, if we suffered from mental disease. Protect our mind, helping us to “be clear-minded . . . so that [we] can pray” (1 Pet 4:7) and do everything else you want us to do.

Gauging Your Grasp

1. What are some verses of Scripture that demonstrate the centrality of our reason to the Christian life?
2. Why do we claim that the consistent disparagement of the mind in the modern Church is unfortunate, unbiblical, and even harmful? Do you agree or disagree?
3. What biblical evidence do we give for the claim that logic is a characteristic of the Creator?
4. Do you agree or disagree with our claim that logic is an important aspect of humans being made in the image of God?
5. What is the relationship between logic and reality?
6. What is the relationship between logic and communication?

Recommended Reading

• Book 4: Biblical Psychology: Understanding & Appreciating the Human “Heart”—Here we attempt to explain further how human reason works in relation to our desires and emotions, and the God-given practical and spiritual importance of human reason for the Christian life, worship, and prayer.
• The best introduction to the issues involving reason and faith that we have found are in the first two chapters of Handbook of Christian Apologetics, by Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli (InterVarsity Press, 1994).

Publications & Particulars

1. For further discussion of the psychological centrality of reason see chapters 4.1 and 4.3-4. ↑

2. For further discussion of private judgment see section 3.1.C and chapter 3.3. ↑

3. For further discussion on the centrality of reason for the Christian life see chapters 4.1 and 4.3-4. ↑

4. For further discussion of our conscience see chapter 3.2. ↑

5. Regarding reason’s essential relationship to faith see chapters 6.12-14. ↑

6. James Emery White, A Mind for God (Intervarsity, 2006), 15. ↑

7. G. Harder, “Reason, Mind, Understanding,” NIDNTT, III: 122. ↑

8. Unfortunately, the NIV and many modern translations do not reflect the perfect tense of the Greek here and give the inaccurate impression that Paul is praying that the Ephesians would yet be enlightened. On the contrary, the literal Greek reads, “the eyes of your heart having been enlightened” which reflects the fact that Paul sees the Ephesians as already possessing this enlightenment. For further discussion of Ephesians 1:17-19 see section 14.18.A.4. ↑

9. W. E. Vine, Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words (Nelson, 1996), 337. ↑

10. Regarding Rom 12:1, Douglas Moo admits that, “The meaning of logikēn is notoriously difficult to pin down” (The Epistle to the Romans [Eerdmans, 1996], 751). In classical Greek logikos meant intellectual, rational, reasonable. Most modern translations (e.g. NIV, NASB) have chosen to translate it “spiritual.” However, the KJV renders it “reasonable” and we think this is the best meaning.

    First of all, it was the universal meaning of the word in Greek. Schreiner points out that at times pneumatikos (“spiritual”) was placed alongside logikos, but the meaning of the latter was not to be confused with the former (Romans [Baker, 1998], 645). Schreiner notes as well that if the Apostle had meant “spiritual” he certainly would have used pneumatikos as he had many times elsewhere.

    Schreiner suggests one reason why some have shied away from the Greek usage:

    Some scholars hesitate to endorse the meaning “rational” since the term was common in Greek philosophy, fearing (I think) that they would impose foreign categories on Paul. Using the term with the meaning “rational,” however, does not yield the conclusion that Paul was Aristotelian or Stoic. All that needs to be said is that Paul used the term with the meaning “rational” or “reasonable,” as was common in the Greek language. (Ibid.)

    This being the case, Philo’s use of this term in his Special Laws becomes significant where we read:

    That which is precious in the sight of God is not the number of the [sacrificial animal] victims immolated but the true purity of a rational spirit [pneuma logikon] in him who makes the sacrifice.” (Moo, 752).

    In conclusion, we would suggest that the modern translations miss the fact that the Apostle is intentionally focusing on human reason here as the place where such a decision will be made. He is making a logical argument in Romans 12:1-2. Schreiner (in agreement with Barnes, Cranfield, Fitzmyer, MacArthur, Mounce, and Murray; and against Moo and Barclay) puts it well when he comments:

    Paul is not merely saying that sacrifices are spiritual in nature. His point is that it is eminently reasonable, given the mercies of God, for believers to dedicate themselves wholly to God. . . . Since God has been so merciful, failure to dedicate one’s life to him is the height of folly and irrationality. (Romans, 645). ↑

11. Concerning the important place that reason plays in the Apostle’s statement in Romans 12:2, NT scholar Douglas Moo writes:

    Paul’s teaching about the Christian’s source for finding the moral will of God in this verse deserves attention. Paul has made clear earlier in the letter that the Christian no longer is to look to the OT law as a complete and authoritative guide for conduct (see Rom. 5:20; 6:14, 15; 7:4). What, Paul’s first readers and we ourselves today might ask, is to be put in its place? Paul answers: the renewed mind of the believer. Paul’s confidence in the mind of the Christian is the result of his understanding of the work of the Spirit, who is actively working to affect the renewal in thinking that Paul here assumes (cf. Rom. 8:4-9). (757)

    Unfortunately, neither a growing number of conservative Evangelicals, nor postmoderns share “Paul’s confidence in the [Spirit-liberated] mind of the Christian.” ↑

12. The disparagement of the mind is especially true in charismaticism, examples of which we discuss in chapters 4.9-11. ↑

13. The term devil-darkened reason reflects the Apostle’s description of unregenerated humans as “darkened in their understanding” (Eph 4:18) by “the god of this age [who] has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the Gospel of the glory of Christ, Who is the image of God” (2 Cor 4:4). Christians however have been “made new in the spirit of [our] mind” (Eph 4:20), giving us alone the ability to receive and understand spiritual truth (cf. 1 Cor 2:12-14). For further discussion of the epistemological differences between these human states see chapters 4.12-16. ↑

14. See endnote above. ↑

15. Quoted by Donald Bloesch in The Ground of Certainty (Eerdmans, 1971), 179. This quote from Luther should be considered by those who imply that Luther was opposed to Christian reason. It was devil-darkened reason that he rightly abhorred, not Spirit-liberated reason. Along these lines, the Catholic theologian Avery Dulles remarks:

    In some of his writings, Luther extols faith as a sacrifice by which believers perform a most pleasing act of worship, “for by this sacrifice they slay reason, which is the greatest and most invincible enemy of God.”‘ Yet this and other negative statements about reason do not represent Luther’s full position. He made extensive use of reason as the handmaid of faith in interpreting the Scriptures and defending his positions. (The Assurance of Things Hoped For [Oxford University Press, 1994], 45).

    Likewise, McClintock & Strong report that during the Reformation, Greek philosophy concerning logic was initially condemned. However:

    As time passed on, it became apparent that the work of the Reformers had largely to be done through the agency of that same Aristotelian logic. Melancthon was not slow to perceive this, and subsequently became an acknowledged follower of Aristotle as to dialectics, and even influenced Luther to retract some of his severer utterances. (John McClintock and James Strong, “Logos Doctrine” in Cyclopaedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature [Harper & Brothers, 1891]). ↑

16. Daniel Taylor, The Myth of Certainty (Intervarsity, 1992), 68. ↑

17. For discussion of the practical value of reasoning in the Christian life, including the virtues of holiness and love see chapter 4.3. For an argument that reason and reasons is the foundation and essence of faith, contrary to Dr. Taylor and other fideist, see chapters 6.12-14. For a critique of the fideism Dr. Taylor is promoting see chapter 2.10. ↑

18. Emotionalism refers to the unbiblical overemphasis on emotion in charismaticism. For further discussion see chapters 4.8-11. ↑

19. Fideism is the unbiblical separation of faith from reason. For further discussion see sections chapter 2.10 and 6.12. ↑

20. Mega mysticism is the unbiblical expectation of, and dependence on, extrabiblical impulses, intuitions, and signs for divine guidance. For further discussion see Book 14. ↑

21. Anti-intellectualism is the unbiblical disparagement of the God-ordained place of human reason, study, and knowledge. For further discussion see section 2.4.A. ↑

22. Quoted by Henry E. W. Turner in The Pattern of Christian Truth (A. R. Mowbray, 1954), 394. ↑

23. Augustine, Letter 120, (online at http://www.ccel.org). ↑

24. A. W. Tozer, The Best of A. W. Tozer, comp. by Warren Wiersbe (Baker, 1978), 43. ↑

25. J. P. Moreland, Love Your God With All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul (NavPress, 1997), 44. ↑

26. Quoted by Norm Geisler, in Come, Let Us Reason: An Introduction to Logical Thinking (Bakers, 1992), 7. ↑

27. By modern charismaticism we are primarily referring to what is commonly labeled the “charismatic” movement that began with the Pentecostals in the early 1900’s, spread into denominational churches in the 1960’s and 70’s, and has merged with what is referred to as the Third Wave churches today. Pentecostal churches include Assembly of God, Church of God, Open Bible, Apostolic, Foursquare Gospel, and Full Gospel. Third Wave churches include Vineyard and a variety of independent congregations.

    We thank God for all He has done through the “charismatic” movement, and for the dear Christian brothers and sisters who would claim membership in it. However, throughout Knowing Our God (KOG) we refrain from referring to this movement as “charismatic,” because this erroneously implies a uniqueness and even superiority in Christian grace (charis), and by further implication, a superior possession or experience of the Holy Spirit.

    Surely no right-minded “charismatic” would desire to claim such a superiority over their Christian brothers and sisters, especially since they cannot demonstrate one. Biblically speaking, being “led by the Spirit,” experiencing His power, and living “not under law” but by “grace [charis]” is most clearly manifested in the “fruit of the Spirit” which the Apostle Paul describes as “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Gal 5:4, 18, 22-3). “Charismatic” Christians in general are not superior in these virtues of love and holiness compared to other Christians, and these virtues are the real essence of Christian charisma, making all obedient Christians true “charismatics,” not just a particular sect.

    In fact, the greatest and most important uniqueness of charismatic churches over other authentic Christian churches is not their love or holiness, but rather an emphasis on, and practice of: 1) emotional worship, 2) speaking and/or praying in an incoherent tongue, 3) claims to direct divine revelation through spiritual gifts such as prophecy, and 4) claims to a greater abundance of miracles in general through the gifts of healing and miracle working.

    Therefore, throughout KOG we use the terms emotionalism (see chapters 4.8-11), glossaism (Gr. glossa: “tongue,” see Book 12: The Truth About Tongues), prophetism (see Book 9: God’s Prophets), and super-supernaturalism (see chapters 10.14-16) to refer to these distinctives respectively, while recognizing that they may exist elsewhere as well. Accordingly, we believe this allows us to address the areas of concern we have regarding the movement, and avoid speaking critically of the movement as a whole, which has many good, although not unique, attributes as well.

    Likewise, we refrain from referring to those Christians who would differ from “charismatics” as “non-charismatics,” erroneously implying again that the latter is somehow lacking in grace. Rather, those who oppose the sometimes bizarre worship of emotionalism, the obscure utterances of Glossaism, the extra-biblical revelations of prophetism, and the miracle-a-minute mindset of super-supernaturalism are better labeled as historicists. This reflects the fact that for at least 1600 years of Church history, the great majority belief and practice of God’s people was opposed to all of the uniquenesses that the “charismatic” movement claims today.

    It is a historical fact that miraculous gifts such as healing, tongues, and prophecy ceased functioning in the church in the fourth century. Accordingly, the very few people since then who have promoted bizarre forms of worship, obscure utterances in prayer, claims to extra-biblical revelation, and miracle working abilities, were always thought to be deceived and dangerous, and not accepted as biblical Christians. What those in charismaticism also refuse to admit, or take seriously enough, is that the modern versions of the miraculous gifts being claimed do not match the attributes of their biblical counterparts. For a great deal of discussion on these matters see the books in Volume 2 of KOG. ↑

28. Quoted by D. R. McConnell, A Different Gospel (Hendrickson, 1988), 111. ↑

29. Emotionalism refers to the unbiblical overemphasis on emotion in charismaticism. For further discussion see chapters 4.6 and 4.8-11. ↑

30. K. L. Sarles, An Appraisal of the Signs and Wonders Movement (Bsac 145), 68. ↑

31. John MacArthur, Charismatic Chaos (Zondervan, 1992), 36, 185. ↑

32. For further discussion on the biblical relationship between faith and reason see chapters 6.12-14. ↑

33. Richard Quebedeaux, The New Charismatics: The Origins, Development, and Significance of Neo-Pentecostalism (Doubleday, 1976), 2. ↑

34. Rationalism is the exclusive dependence on human reason while denying the authority of divine revelation. For further discussion see chapter 2.9. ↑

35. Fideism is the unbiblical separation of faith from reason. For further discussion see chapters 2.10 and 6.12. ↑

36. Critics of biblical inerrancy support their view by trying to disparage the common sense meaning of truth and logic. For example, liberal Bible scholars such as Jack B. Rogers and Donald McKim slander Christian rationality throughout their book, The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible: An Historical Approach, by referring to it with such labels as “Scottish realist assumptions” ([Harper & Row, 1979], 341). Such a remark might lead one to believe that logic originated with the Scots instead of God. For further discussion of McKim and Roger’s view see section 2.10.B. ↑

37. Excerpted from John H. Armstrong, “In Search of Spiritual Power” in Power Religion: The Selling Out of the Evangelical Church? (Moody, 1992), 79. ↑

38. For further discussion of mega mysticism and its popularity, unbiblical nature, and dangers see Book 14. ↑

39. Quoted in Demarest and Lewis, I:39. The authors are remarking on Nee’s book, The Spiritual Man, (Christian Fellowship Publications, 1968). ↑

40. See John Gerstner, The Rational Biblical Theology of Jonathan Edwards, 3 vols. (Berea, 1991). ↑

41. Ibid., I:223. ↑

42. Frame, Doctrine, 242-3. ↑

43. Jonathan Edwards, “Christian Knowledge” in The Necessity of Systematic Theology, ed. John J. Davis (University Press of America, 1978), 86, 91. ↑

44. Thomas C. Oden, The Living God: Systematic Theology: Volume One (Harper, 1994), 380-1. ↑

45. For further discussion of how satan distorts our reasoning in temptation see sections 4.6.C.2; ↑

46. For more discussion concerning the place of reason in the life of the Christian see chapters 4.1 and 4.3-4. ↑

47. C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Harper Collins, 2001), 77-8. ↑

48. William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland, Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (Inter Varsity, 2002), 18. ↑

49. Gerstner, II.143. However, we would disagree with the “faculty psychology” of Edwards as discussed in chapter 4.2. ↑

50. Stott, 16. ↑

51. For further discussion of comparing God’s reasoning with ours see John Frame, The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1987), 22-40. Also see Aquinas, I.85.5. ↑

52. For further discussion of the heretical idea of open theism that God does not know the future perfectly see Bruce Ware, God’s Lesser Glory: The Diminished God of Open Theism (Crossway, 2000); John Frame, No Other God: A Response to Open Theism (P & R, 2001); and Beyond the Bounds: Open Theism and the Undermining of Biblical Christianity, John Piper, Justin Taylor, Paul Kjoss Helseth, eds. (Crossway, 2003).

    ↑

53. C. K. Barrett, The Gospel According to St. John (SPCK, 2009), 152. Accordingly, the Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Early Christian Literature (BDAG) gives the dual meanings of: 1) a communication whereby the mind finds expression, word; 2) computation, reckoning, reason [2.d, cf. Acts 10:9; 18:14; 1 Pet 3:15]. A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Early Christian Literature (BDAG), F. W. Danker, ed., 3^rd ed. (University Of Chicago Press, 2001). ↑

54. William Barclay, in particular, makes a good case for this (Daily Study Bible, John 1:1). ↑

55. NT scholar William Barclay explains that as far back as the sixth century B. C. the Greek philosopher Heraclitus had used the word Logos to describe, “What gave a man reason and knowledge of the truth and the ability to judge between right and wrong.” (John 1:1). Some centuries later, the Greek Stoic philosophers taught the same, using the term Logos to refer to, “the power which puts sense into the world, the power which makes the world an order instead of a chaos.” (Daily Study Bible, CD-ROM [Liguori Publications, 1996], in loc.) ↑

56. However, it is admitted that our view of logos is a minority opinion. The Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels states that:

    The use of logos in John 1:1, 14 has been the focus of much scholarly investigation, giving rise to as much literature and debate as any other single word occurring in the Bible. . . . [Roman Catholic NT scholar Raymond] Brown exemplifies the opinion of most recent scholars regarding the background to the Johannine logos when he says, “it seems that the Prologue’s description of the Word is far closer to biblical and Jewish strains of thought than it is to anything purely Hellenistic” (“Logos,” Joel Green and Scot McKnight eds. CD-ROM version, Parsons Technology, 1997. Print ed. [InterVarsity, 1992]).

    While this may be the view of most recent scholars, it was not the view of the early Church in which such leaders as Justin Martyr (c. 150) and Clement of Alexandria (c. 155-220) made much use of the logos idea in their apologetics. Likewise, NT scholar George Salmon writes of even the Church Father Tertullian (160-225) who was supposedly adverse to Greek ideas of logic and reason:

    [Tertullian found] fault with the [then] current Latin rendering of the first verse of St. John’s Gospel, in which the word ‘ Logos’ was translated by ‘ Sermo.’ [discourse, language]. Tertullian would have preferred ‘Ratio.’ [reason, reasoning]. I may say in passing that the difficulty here found by Tertullian-that of adequately rendering the Greek word ‘Logos’—has been experienced by every translator of the New Testament. For ‘Logos’ not only means the spoken word—the only sense suggested by our English version—but still more, as Tertullian renders it, Reason. And so the early Greek Fathers give the double sense to the term in the Prologue of St. John. (Introduction to the New Testament (Dublin: University Press, 1894), IV, 7).

    However, many commentators, going all the way back to Calvin, want to suggest that the Apostle John exclusively intended some Jewish idea of logos, or at least to severely downplay its Greek philosophical significance. For example, Norm Geisler writes:

    The Old Testament, not Greek ideas, is the root of New Testament ideas. John, as all New Testament writers (except maybe Luke) were Jews. The root of their thought was in Judaism. They cite the Old Testament hundreds of times. Hence, it is contrary to the Jewish background and thought of the New Testament writers to use Greek sources for their theological ideas. (Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics [Baker, 1999], 430).

    When logos is given a Jewish meaning in John 1:1 it is normally related to the idea of Wisdom as described in Proverbs 8 (see especially Herman Ridderbos, The Gospel of John [Eerdmans, 1997], 24, 31-36). As Dr. Barrett explains: “Already in Proverbs (see 8.22) the Wisdom of God has ceased to be merely the quality of being wise; Wisdom has an independent existence in the presence of God” (153). However, there are several problems with this popular view of logos in John 1. First, the reference to Wisdom in Proverbs 8 may only be intended in merely a metaphorical, poetic way, with no intention of making a theological statement at all- especially about the nature of the pre-incarnate Christ. But secondly, and more seriously, equating Christ with Wisdom in Proverbs 8 implies that Christ is created too- something that must be denied. Accordingly, we have written in defense of the cults who use this line of reasoning to deny the deity of Christ:

    The phrase, “The Lord brought me forth as the first of his works” (Proverbs 8:22) cannot be referring to the creation of Christ. Such a notion, again, contradicts all the other Scriptural truth regarding the deity of Christ. Solomon is simply personifying wisdom, just as he does in the first chapter of Proverbs, referring to wisdom as a woman who cries out in the streets (1:20-21) (KOG 19.4.E.1.b).

    Nonetheless, another problem with Dr. Geisler’s perspective is that there is no clear “Jewish background” for the use of logos. The NIDNTT points out:

    1) Several Greek words are used to translate the Hebrew dābār (“word”) in the LXX, and that rhēma is used eight times as much as logos in the Prophets (B. Klappert, “Word,” IV:1087), and 2) “The attempt to derive the Logos-concept from the OT pure and simple founders [fails] . . . the Johanine concept transcends the OT concept of the word.” (Ibid., 1116. See full refutation here of various Jewish options commonly suggested).

    In the end, we would agree with Klappert’s conclusion in his NIDNTT entry that: “In the question of the origin of the Logos concept, pre-eminent significance is therefore to be attributed to Hellenistic Judaism (i.e. Philo)” (Ibid., 1117). Likewise, C. K. Barrett concludes after a very knowledgeable discussion on the topic: “That John was familiar with the Old Testament and with Judaism seems clear; yet it is highly probable that . . . he intentionally chose for employment those aspects of Jewish thought which had Hellenistic [Greek] parallels . . . [approvingly according to Jeremias] the source of the term [logos in John 1:1] is to be sought in Hellenistic Judaism” (154-5).

    And the thought and meaning of Greek words in Greek Judaism is practically synonymous with the very influential Jewish Greek philosopher Philo (c. 25 B. C. to c. 40 A. D.), who was a near contemporary of the Apostle John, and had an important place for the meaning of logos in his philosophy. NT scholar William Barclay (1907-1978) writes:

    He [Philo] too knew and used and loved this idea of the “Logos,” the word, the reason of God. . . . He said that man’s mind was stamped also with the “Logos,” that the “Logos” was what gave a man reason, the power to think and the power to know.

    In fact, it seems rather ridiculous and needless to insist that a Christian document like the Gospel of John, written ca. 95 A.D., was interested in appealing to only one race of Christians, especially Jewish ones. Early Church history places the authorship of the Gospel of John in Ephesus, a very Greek city in Greek Asia Minor. There is no reason to deny that John wanted to emphasize in the word logos what the Hellenistic Jews emphasized in the word, and which we have emphasized here. Barclay, in particular, makes a good case for this (Daily Study Bible, John 1:1). In terms of the great influence that Greek language and culture had on the early Christians, we would note the fact that the vast majority of early Christians read their Bible (the OT) in its Greek translation (the Septuagint or LXX).

    Even Leon Morris who wants to insist that the “Jewish background” of logos is “more important for our understanding of this Gospel in general and of its use of this term in particular,” admits in a footnote:

    Yet it is surely going too far to say, as J. Burnet does, “the Johannine doctrine of the logos has nothing to do with Heraclitus or with anything at all in Greek philosophy.” [Morris replies] It would be impossible to use a term so widely known in Greek philosophy in a writing in the Greek language, probably published in a center of Greek culture, without being mindful of the associations the term would arouse. (The Gospel According to John [Eerdmans, 1995], 103, n. 140).

    Additionally, Dr. Morris notes that “This Gospel makes good use of terms intelligible in the Hellenistic world” (33).

    Bruce Demarest & Gordon Lewis, Professors of Theology at Denver Seminary, rightly make the point that the Apostle John probably had both Hebrew and Greek ideas in mind:

    John’s use of the Logos represents the synthesis of the Old Testament Word of the Lord (debār Yahweh) and Hellenistic (Stoic) usage that finds many parallels in the Wisdom motif in late Judaism. The Stoics saw in the Logos the divine power that pervades all things and that undergirds rational and moral life. (Integrative Theology, 3 Vols. [Zondervan, 1987, 1990, 1994], I:71).

    A bias against Greek ideas often hinders NT interpretation. Scholars such as Dr. Geisler are well intentioned in desiring to separate Christ from heretical Greek views, but the Apostle John does this very thing in his statements. He simultaneously uses the useful meanings of the word logos for his audience, but at the same time differentiates it. The Apostle makes it clear that the logos is a Person, while the Greeks thought of it more as a power. Finally, the Apostle says that “the Logos became flesh” (1:14) which would have been both contrary and astounding to Greek thought, which was precisely one of the Apostle’s intentions. ↑

57. R. C. Sproul et. al. notes that the Christian philosopher Gordon H. Clark referred to Christ as logic as well, and remarks: “Clark expects Christians to be shocked by this paraphrase, but says, “Why it is offensive to call Christ Logic, when it does not offend to call him a word [i.e. “logos” (John 1:1)], is hard to explain.” (Classical Apologetics: A Rational Defense of the Christian Faith and a Critique of Presuppositional Apologetics [Academie Books, 1984], 76). ↑

58. Cornelius Van Til, An Introduction to Systematic Theology (Unpublished syllabus, 1955), 11, 12. ↑

59. Quoted by Sproul et. al., 12. ↑

60. J. Oliver Buswell, A Christian View of Being and Knowing: An Introduction to Philosophy (Zondervan, 1960), 193. ↑

61. Demarest and Lewis, I:33. ↑

62. Sproul et. al., 12. ↑

63. Barclay, John 1:1. ↑

64. John Frame in Five Views on Apologetics, Steven Cowan ed., (Zondervan, 2000), 212. ↑

65. For further discussion of the relationship between biblical faith and reason and risk see section 2.6.C and chapters 6.12-14.. ↑

66. J. Eichler, “Think,” New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (NIDNTT), Colin Brown ed., 4 vols. (Zondervan, 1986), III:823. ↑

67. Webster’s Dictionary online at http://www.webstersdictionary.org. ↑

68. John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, A. S. Pringle-Pattison ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967), iv. 18. 2. John Locke was a champion of the use of regenerated reason in the Christian life, whose teachings had a remarkable effect on such theologians as Jonathan Edwards, Charles Hodge, and B. B. Warfield. ↑

69. Yandall Woodfin, With All Your Mind: A Christian Philosophy (Abingdon, 1980), 22, 25. ↑

70. For further discussion on the important epistemological concept of human research see the next section 2.4.D and chapter 2.5. ↑

71. For further discussion of the vital concept of private judgment see section 3.1.C and chapter 3.3. ↑

72. Regarding the epistemological centrality of human reason see section 2.3.D. ↑

73. For further discussion of belief see section chapter 2.3. ↑

74. Webster’s. ↑

75. James Sire even takes the mystery a step further when he comments, “The major mystery of the mind is not how reasoning is conducted by the conscious mind; it is rather how the brain [even] has a mind, how consciousness arises.” (Habits of the Mind, [InterVarsity, 2000], 234). ↑

76. Admittedly, enlisting a computer to describe how the human brain operates has its limitations. For example, while a computer will rather automatically act upon the knowledge it has processed, humans will not. Therefore, it should be noticed that our model of learning relates to how we gain knowledge, not how we make decisions. This is because we do not always act according to our knowledge because other parts of our “heart” including our desires and feelings can influence our decisions and beliefs in spite of what we know.

    Theologian Gregory R. Peterson has a lengthy discussion of the comparison between our reason and computers and comments:

    The second problem arose within Al [artificial intelligence] research itself. Known as the “frame problem,” it became increasingly apparent that for a computer to perform many of the most basic human actions, such as going to a restaurant and ordering from a menu, requires the writing of programs so complex as to be impossible to put into practice. Too frequently, the computer would come to a situation that the programmer did not (and in many cases could not) anticipate, and it would simply stop running. . . .

    But the history of cognitive science has shown that computational models have been enormously fruitful for thinking about the mind and brain and for inspiring research programs and ideas, even though the models themselves are flawed and sometimes misleading. Philosopher Barbara Von Eckardt has argued that, while some have taken and do take computational models literally, such models have been most beneficial as inspirational metaphors.

    The brain can be understood as an information processor, and to realize that this is a major function of the brain is an important insight. Nevertheless, it is a mistake to limit our understanding of the brain and mind by the still modest computers of our day. (Gregory R. Peterson, Minding God (Theology and the Sciences) [Augsburg Fortress, 2002], 38, 41.

    Therefore, while there are limitations to comparing human reason with human-made computers, there are some helpful similarities, partly because computers were designed and invented by human reason itself. Computers are made in our image, although not nearly as well as we are made in God’s image. ↑

77. David Myers, Intuition: Its Power and Perils, Yale University Press, 2002), 4. ↑

78. Peterson, 41. ↑

79. Norm Geisler writes a good summary and a potential apologetic for human reasoning when he summarizes the view of Aquinas:

    Aquinas makes a significant contribution to epistemology. By a unique synthesis, he unites both the a priori and a posteriori elements of knowledge. Humans have an innate, natural capacity or form for the truth of first principles [i.e. laws of logic] that is ingrained into their very nature by God. They have first principles in a kind of virtual and natural way as a precondition of all cognitive activity. And when this innate capacity is filled with the content of sense experience, we are able by conscious reflection to come to a knowledge of the very first principles, which as a fundamental part of our nature, enable us to have a consciousness of them.

    That is to say, we can only know first principles if we are exercising first principles to know them, otherwise, we would have no means by which they could be known. We have them by way of operation before we know them by way of consciousness. (Thomas Aquinas: An Evangelical Appraisal [Baker, 1991], 90)

    Elsewhere we argue that while logical laws are “preprogrammed” by the Creator, enabling us to distinguish true from false (see chapter 2.8 and section 4.3.B); moral laws are programmed by our culture and life experience (see section 2.5.C). ↑

80. We do not claim to be able to accurately specify what data may be “preprogrammed” software and “preprogrammed” data because 1) We cannot know, and 2) It is not important. Still, there has been a great deal of debate in recent years over positions such as foundationalism, empiricism, and Reformed epistemology, all of which concern what beliefs or belief constructing mechanisms God has created us with. As usual, there is probably some truth to many of these positions. Our analogy of a computer with built in system software reflects our own understanding of the issues and others can label this perspective in various ways. For a brief discussion of the various philosophical views of how we know what we know see Norm Geisler and Paul Feinberg, Introduction to Christian Philosophy (Baker, 1980), 103-118. For a fuller discussion see Gordon R. Lewis, Testing Christianity’s Truth Claims (Moody, 1976). For a defense of our view against Reformed epistemology see chapter 2.8. ↑

81. For further discussion on the process of developing human morals see section 2.5.C. ↑

82. For a test of your logic you can visit http://www.begriffslogik.de/ logiktest_en.html. ↑

83. Buswell, 21. ↑

84. For more discussion on the particular importance of logic, see especially sections 2.11.B-C. Also, John Frame, Professor of Theology at WTS recommends Introduction to Logic by I. M. Copi, (Macmillan, 1961). ↑

85. Not surprisingly, there are much more involved descriptions of the reasoning process. Yandal Woodfin writes:

    The path toward reason therefore appears to follow this pattern: Sense impressions provide the initial spatial and temporal occasions or points of contact through which the mystery of thought begins to become tangible and take shape in one’s awareness, or apprehension. When this consciousness of some confrontation emerges in greater intensity and becomes increasingly distinguishable from other shades of apprehension, it may be designated as a recognizable perception. Once a perception is clear enough to be imaged or verbalized it can be considered a concept, or idea.

    The process of consciously relating ideas coherently and consistently is called reasoning. Rational thinking therefore consists in drawing inferences that correspond appropriately to given data, or premises, and developing purposeful, legitimate conclusions. (26).

    Stephen Davis describes the process of reasoning as follows:

    When a proposition is suggested and we must determine how much credence to place in it, (1) we first determine what kind of proposition it is and the context in which it is stated. (2) We then take into consideration the criteria of adequacy of evidence conventionally accepted for that sort of proposition in that context, that is, we consider what type, amount, and weight of evidence are required. (3) We then consider the actual evidence at hand for or against the proposition and measure it against the arrived-at standards of adequacy. (4) Finally, on the basis of the first three steps, we assign a degree of belief or unbelief to the proposition. (Faith, Skepticism, and Evidence: An Essay in Religious Epistemology [Associated University Press, 1978], 21).

    Finally, Peter Kreeft & Ronald Tacelli explain:

    The inherent structure of human reason manifests itself in three acts of the mind: (1) understanding, (2) judging and (3) reasoning. These three acts of the mind are expressed in (1) terms, (2) propositions and (3) arguments. Terms are either clear or unclear. Propositions are either true or untrue. Arguments are either logically valid or invalid.

    A term is clear if it is intelligible and unambiguous. A proposition is true if it corresponds to reality, if it says what is. An argument is valid if the conclusion follows necessarily from the premises. If all the terms in an argument are clear, and if all the premises are true, and if the argument is free from logical fallacy, then the conclusion must be true. These are the essential rules of reason, in apologetics and in any other field of argument. (Handbook of Christian Apologetics [InterVarsity Press, 1994], 17).

    In addition, human reasoning has been categorized as either deductive or inductive. Norm Geisler explains:

    Simply put, deductive reasoning is arguing from the general to the particular. If all horses are four-legged animals (the general), and Black Beauty is a horse (the particular), then it follows that Black Beauty is also a four-legged animal. This series of propositions is called a syllogism, the standard form of deductive argument. . . . Inductive reasoning is just the reverse, that is, arguing from the particular (for instance, all observable elements of a wall are stone) to the general (the whole wall is stone). (Introduction to Christian Philosophy [Baker, 1980], 40-41.

    Elsewhere, Dr. Geisler further explains:

    Deductive logic starts with the cause and reasons to the effect, while inductive logic starts with the effects and attempts to find the cause. That is why deductive reasoning is called a priori (prior to looking at the facts) and inductive reasoning is called a posteriori (after seeing the evidence). [Deductions] are more philosophical, and inductive arguments are more scientific. The biggest difference, though, is that deductive arguments yield necessary conclusions (that is, the conclusions are necessarily true if the premises are true and the inferences are valid), but inductive reasoning yields only probable conclusions. (Logical Thinking, 22-3). ↑

86. Demarest and Lewis, I:32. ↑

87. For further discussion of the importance of remembering in relation to faith see section 6.12.C.3. ↑

88. Quoted by Ronald Nash, Mind, 68. ↑

89. Ibid. ↑

90. Calvin, Commentaries, Act 17:22. ↑

91. John Gerstner, The Rational Biblical Theology of Jonathan Edwards, 3 vols. (Berea, 1991), II.137. ↑

92. Quoted by Nash, Mind, 69. ↑

93. Alister McGrath, The Science of God, (T & T Clark, 2004), 61. ↑

94. James Emery White, A Mind for God (Intervarsity, 2006), 15. ↑

95. Gordon Spykman explains about as simply as one can, the perspective and importance of Kant’s epistemology:

    It is Kant’s definition of the age-old problem which controls most of modern thought. Few theologians have succeeded in extricating themselves from his dilemma as set forth in his Conflict of the Faculties. He states his case something like this: there are but two universes of rational discourse, that of pure reason (science) and that of practical reason (religion understood as morality).

    God, and theology as a study of the things of God, must therefore belong to the one realm or the other. If God is thought of as belonging to the world of verifiable factuality, then he is not the God of Christian faith. For, as Spirit, he is not subject to empirical research. If, on the other hand, we conceive of God as existing outside this world of scientific reality, then too, quite obviously, he cannot be the object of theoretical reflection. He belongs to the realm of noumenal things. This is the quandary of modern theology. . . .

    Kant’s dualist restatement of the traditional philosophy/theology, prolegomena/dogmatics problem remains the formative backdrop for all modern theologizing. (Reformational Theology: A New Paradigm for Doing Dogmatics [Eerdmans, 1992], 41-2.)

    In our opinion, acknowledging that God created us in His own image with reason, in order to both understand and relate to Him, goes a long way to solving Kant’s “dilemma.” God is both Spirit and Reason, just as we are, and therefore a vital connection between the two can be made on both objective and subjective grounds. Accordingly, Auguste Lecerf writes:

    We cannot comprehend the harmony which exists between the reason which thinks and the world which is the object of thought [including God], except on the condition of realizing that both reason and the world have their common principle in an original and creative intelligence. (An Introduction to Reformed Dogmatics [Lutterworth Press, 1949], 97).

    In addition, our claim that a correspondence between the logic of God and human logic exists in order for any true human knowledge to exist is debated by both presuppositional and neoorthodox theologians. What such views can lead to is full blown skepticism in which we can know nothing for certain, including the Gospel. ↑

96. Millard Erickson, Christian Theology 2nd ed., (Baker, 1998), 338. ↑

97. Quoted from section 4.1.B.4. ↑

98. Quoted by Duns Scotus in Philosophical Writing, trans. Allan Wolter (Bobbs-Merrill, 1962). ↑

99. Lewis, Mere Christianity, 26. ↑

100. C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man (Macmillan, 1947), 87. ↑

101. Arthur Holmes, All Truth is God’s Truth (InterVarsity, 1983), 100. ↑

102. Jonathan Edwards, “Christian Knowledge,” 84. ↑

103. The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield reprint (Baker, 2000), IV: 138. ↑

104. Buswell, 8-9, 198. Elsewhere, Dr. Buswell supported the value of logic when he wrote:

     I have discussed at length elsewhere the logic of John Dewey and the instrumentalists, commonly called pragmatists. Briefly, the pragmatic criterion is the solution of problems for the time being. It is Dewey’s view that the laws of logic and of mathematics are not eternal immutable principles of reason, but are products of the social inquiry process. There is abroad a popular notion to the effect that Einstein’s theory of relativity destroyed the previously assumed validity of mathematical laws and therefore destroyed the permanent validity of the basic laws of reason. Many have gone so far as to use mathematical relativity as an excuse for giving up the Ten Commandments and all the essential principles of truth and ethics. This error is, in large part, traceable to Dewey’s enormous influence.

     In discussing Dewey’s epistemology, I have shown that the great authority on the mathematics of relativity, Albert Einstein, has explicitly declared that his system of mathematics is not at all contrary to the logic of Euclidean geometry. It is based on somewhat different definitions, and it takes into account more complicated situations in the physical world. But the laws of Euclid are perfectly logical and have not been repealed or modified. “Relativity” in logic and ethics, abandoning the eternal verities, has no basis in genuine science or mathematics. I do not know who said it first, but it is a saying worth emphatic repetiton, “whoever seeks to destroy the laws of logic, logic destroys him.” (189-90) ↑

105. Carl F. H. Henry, “Know, Knowledge,” International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE), Geoffrey W. Bromiley, ed., 4 vols., (Eerdmans, 1988), III:48. ↑

106. There is no recognition of reality for humans apart from logic. This is why even philosophers such as Schleiermacher (1768-1834) and Kierkegaard (1813-1855) logically reasoned to their conclusion about the primacy of feelings, even though they disparaged the use of this very faculty in their philosophies. William Abraham even tries to suggest that Descartes (1596-1650) did not depend on reasoning for the foundation of his philosophies, yet Descartes himself describes it as follows:

     I had persuaded myself [which involved reason] that there was nothing at all in the world: no sky, no earth, no minds or bodies; was I not, therefore, also persuaded that I did not exist? No indeed; I existed without doubt, by the fact that I was persuaded [reasoned], or indeed by the mere fact that I thought [reasoned] at all. (The Meditations [Penguin, 1968], 103).

     Abraham comments, “Descartes’ discovery was unearthed by intuition, not by inference; hence it did not depend on the reliability of his reasoning faculties.” (Canon and Criterion in Christian Theology : From the Fathers to Feminism [Clarendon Press, 1998], 171). Such a statement seems inexplicable coming from such an expert Christian epistemologists, as Descartes surely used his reason to arrive at even his most basic conclusions. Human “intuition” does not bypass human reasoning. ↑

107. Quoted by T. Rees, “Authority in Religion” International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, James Orr, ed. Electronic Edition STEP Files (Parsons Technology, 1998). ↑

108. Douglas Groothuis, Truth Decay: Defending Christianity Against the Challenges of Postmodernism (InterVarsity, 2000), 121. ↑

109. Ronald Nash, The Word of God and the Mind of Man (Zondervan, 1982), 106. Nash adds elsewhere that:

     [Gordon] Clark objects to the position so popular in much contemporary philosophy that regards the law of contradiction as a purely formal law or as an arbitrary stipulation useful for constructing symbolic systems. He argues instead that the principle has an ontological basis in reality. It is a law of thought because it is first of all a law of being. Logic “is not a merely formal science of thinking; but rather, since truth requires a relation to reality, the laws of logic must be, not only the laws of thought, but the laws of reality as well. (The Philosophy of Gordon H. Clark, Ronald Nash, ed. [Philadelphia, PA: Presbyterians and Reformed, 1968], 127) ↑

110. Nash, Clark, 127. While the indispensability of logic is undeniable, Arthur Holmes points out what may be to most a rather insignificant point of clarification, but one that some may find some value in:

     According to the law of noncontradiction, A is A and not non-A at the same time and in the same respect. The principle applies in other words to that which does not change, so that deduction is a logic of the unchanging. The German philosopher Hegel argued that since all finite existence is historical and constantly subject to change, the law of non-contradiction is therefore trivial. In time, A becomes non-A, even though at any one point in time A is not non-A. A baby is not an adult, but in the course of time he becomes one . . . Hegel’s point is not that the traditional laws of logic are mistaken and that no distinction between true and false remains (as some writers have wrongly assumed), but that deductive logic has limited use. It is a logic of the eternal, not the temporal. (89).

     Hegel’s point is valid, but it needs to be added that our reason will detect a change in the subjects which are being considered and will rather automatically adjust to make an accurate conclusion, making the value of reason more consistent than what Holmes and Hegel seem to imply. In addition, the most important function for our God-given reason is recognizing and interpreting divine revelation, neither of which is effected by Hegel’s critique, because, for example, Scripture does not change. ↑

111. Nash, Mind, 107. ↑

112. Ravi Zacharias, Can Man Live Without God? (Word, 1994). ↑

113. Kreeft and Tacelli, 17. Nash adds:

     Aristotle’s position is clearly at odds with the position, so popular in much recent philosophy, that regards the law of noncontradiction as a purely formal law or as an arbitrary stipulation useful for constructing symbolic systems. Aristotle argued that the law has an ontological basis in reality. The law of noncontradiction is not simply a law of thought. It is a law of thought because it is first a law of being. Nor is the law something someone can take or leave. The denial of the law of noncontradiction leads to absurdity. It is impossible meaningfully to deny the laws of logic. If the law of noncontradiction is denied, nothing has meaning. If the laws of logic do not first mean what they say, nothing else can have meaning, including the denial of the laws. (Mind, 104).

     Nash is no doubt thinking of those who ascribe to what is called logical positivism of which Gordon H. Clark says:

     It not only repudiates divine revelation but all nonempirical metaphysics as well. In particular it denies any innate or a priori forms of the mind, traditionally regarded as necessarily true. Logic and mathematics are explained as linguistic conventions that have been arbitrarily selected; or if not altogether arbitrarily, they have been selected as useful tools to do a job. (Religion, Reason, and Revelation [Presbyterian & Reformed, 1961], 148)

     Sproul et al. adds:

     While theology was going irrational [in the 19^th century], positivist philosophy was questioning all knowledge. C. I. [not C. S.] Lewis, for example, the positivist philosopher of Harvard, once wrote that “not even the law of noncontradiction is necessarily true of the real world.” Of course, apart from the law of non-contradiction, Lewis cannot even think that, much less say it. (14). ↑

114. Some will wish to deny our claim that, “logical consistency is the basis of all we believe,” based on the fact that in their experience they feel they have believed two contradictory things. We would question this. First of all, we would wonder if they really do believe something that they view as contradictory to something else they think they believe. God simply did not make us like this.

     However, we can note here the place of the subconscious part of our mind. In other words, there are beliefs lodged in parts of our mind that we are not consciously aware of and that may dictate a great deal of our life. We may, for example, grasp with some certainty in our conscious mind that God loves us. But negative experiences and false messages about God’s love that have been stuffed into the recesses of our subconscious mind will keep us from really believing it wholeheartedly. This is why when we speak of the human mind and heart we must take into consideration both its conscious and subconscious aspects in order to really understand our God-given design and how to help people change. For further discussion of the subconscious mind see section 4.B.2.

     Finally, if we act or decide contrary to what we think we believe, we need to recognize the influence that corrupting feelings or desires can have in overriding our true beliefs. For further discussion of influences on our reason see sections 4.1.B; 4.4.C; 4.5.C; 4.6.C. ↑

115. Bruce Demarest and Gordon Lewis, I:33. ↑

116. William Lane Craig, “Politically Incorrect Salvation” in Christian Apologetics in the Postmodern World, Timothy R. Phillips and Dennis L. Okholm eds. (Intervarsity, 1995), 78-81. ↑

117. Ibid. ↑

118. Mortimer Adler, Truth and Religion (Macmillan, 1990), 74. ↑

119. For further discussion of Reformed epistemology which claims we are born with a belief in God apart from reasoning see chapter 2.8. For further discussion of fideism, the belief that reason is contrary to belief, see chapters 2.10 and 6.12. ↑

120. For further discussion of postmodernism in which objective reason is denied see sections 2.4.A.2; 2.4.E-F; 2.6.A; chapters 2.10-11; section 3.C.4.f; and section 5.14.I. ↑

121. Gene Veith, Postmodern Times (Crossway, 1994), 49. ↑

122. Pauline Marie Rosenau, Postmodernism and the Social Sciences (Princeton University Press, 1992) 176. ↑

123. Quoted by Josh McDowell, The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict (Josh McDowell, 1999), 620. ↑

124. Quoted by Nash, Mind, 105 (underlining added). ↑

125. Charles Hodge, An Exposition of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, Electronic Edition STEP Files CD-ROM (Findex.Com, 2003),1 Cor. 11:13. ↑

126. Bernard Ramm, “Apologetic, Biblical” in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Geoffrey W. Bromiley, ed., 4 vols., (Eerdmans, 1988), I:190-1. ↑

127. William Sanday, Inspiration, (Longmans, Green & Co., 1903), 215, 414. Unfortunately, in our opinion, Sanday made this statement in reference to his rejection of the authenticity of the book of Daniel. ↑

128. For further discussion of fideism, the belief that real faith is not based on evidence, see chapters 2.10 and 6.12. ↑

129. Sproul, et. al., 124. The actual distinction that needs to be made is not between faith and reason, but rather research and revelation, for both these sources of knowledge are received, evaluated, interpreted, and otherwise processed by reason. For further discussion see section 6.1.B. ↑

130. For further discussion on reason’s part in salvation see section 4.16.D. ↑

131. John Stott, Your Mind Matters (InterVarsity, 1973), 18, 20. ↑

132. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, Edward N. Gross ed., Abridged version, (Presbyterians & Reformed Publishing, 1992), 54-55, 57. ↑

133. Gerstner, Edwards, I.112-13. ↑

134. Alan Richardson, Christian Apologetics (Harper, 1948), 244. ↑

135. 1978 Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, Article IV; online at http://www.reformed.org/documents/index.html?mainframe=http://www.reformed.org/documents/icbi.html. ↑

136. For further discussion of the “illumination of the Spirit” in regards to understanding Scripture see chapter 3.5. ↑

137. Nash, Mind, 106. ↑

138. Demarest and Lewis, I:33, 73. ↑

139. Richard Rorty, Consequences of Pragmatism (University of Minnesota Press, 1982), xvi. ↑

140. McDowell, 618. ↑

141. Millard Erickson, Postmodernizing the Faith (Baker, 1991), 156. ↑

142. Nash, Mind, 107. ↑

143. Albert Barnes, Barnes’ Notes on the New Testament, Electronic Edition STEP Files CD-ROM (Findex.Com, 1999), Gen 2:17. ↑

144. William Reese, Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion Eastern and Western (Humanities, 1980), 462. ↑

145. The laws of logic used by Christ included the law of non-contradiction (cf. Luke 6:39), analogy (cf. Luke 11:13), and in Matthew 12, a fortiori (cf. vs. 1-8), reductio ad absurdum (cf. v. 26), implication (cf. v. 28), and the excluded middle (cf. v. 30). ↑

146. Christ’s instruction regarding the place of the mind in prayer should cause some concern for our Charismatic friends who insist that a “super prayer language” in tongues doesn’t engage the mind at all. For further discussion of both the unbiblical and mindless nature of praying in tongues see chapter 4.9. For an indepth biblical study of the tongues phenomena in general see Book 12: The Truth About Tongues. ↑