Cross posted at Notes from a Small Place.
It started with a quote posted on Peter Leithart's blog. If memory serves, it came from the pen of Collin Farrar in an essay on the apologetics of C.S. Lewis. Apologetics, Farrar argued, do not create conviction. In that sense, they are not essential to the Christian faith, for it is conviction and the repentance which attends it that form the heart of our confession. But that is not enough, Farrar continued. While apologetics does not create conviction, it can create an atmosphere in which conviction is more plausible and natural. Proving John Piper's aphorism that books don't change people, sentences do, that quote of Farrar's has been buzzing around in my brain for the past month.
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Jake Meador
Jake Meador is the editor-in-chief of Mere Orthodoxy. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Commonweal, First Things, Books & Culture, National Review, Comment, Books & Culture, and Christianity Today. He is a contributing editor with Plough and a contributing writer at the Dispatch. He lives in his hometown of Lincoln, NE with his wife and four children.
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