HE IS THERE AND HE IS NOT SILENT: Part Five

Application in Evangelism and Apologetics

Understanding the authority and self-revelatory character of God as well as understanding the effects of sin on man is absolutely critical with respect to the unregenerate. We know that God is there and He is not silent. Man is, because God first spoke. When man was sinless God the Son could speak directly to him and the indwelt presence of God the Holy Spirit could discern the Son’s revelation. Thus, we can see by this that God is and always has been self-revelatory, and self-discerning. Man cannot discern the things of God unless God enables him to.

When man fell into sin God the Holy Spirit left man thereby leaving man unto himself. Man can no longer discern the things of God because he no longer has a sinless character even though he is surrounded by God’s revelation in nature. God also no longer speaks directly to man, but speaks through the Holy Scriptures. Van Til writes, “Before the fall of Adam, man walked and talked with God in intimate fellowship. Then no Bible was required. Man was not alienated from God. No Christ was needed for man’s redemption. But shall we add that therefore no supernatural authoritative revelation was necessary for him? Shall we say that man could originally identify himself and the facts of the universe without supernatural thought communication on the part of his Creator? The answer must be in the negative.”[1]

The fall of man necessitates the need for the Scriptures, and it is the Scriptures which reveal God’s other forms of revelation through nature and the incarnation. It is the incarnation which gives us the Christ. Christ’s birth, death, burial and resurrection atones for the sins of those whom God the Father has drawn unto Himself. Thus, God the Father sent the Christ to atone for the sins of His elect. The atonement is then a moral atonement. Then God the Son sends God the Holy Spirit to illumine the inspired written revelation of God so that the elect may know God in an experiential way. Thus, redeemed man may know God with certainty because it is God who is revealing Himself.

Man cannot know God apart from the way in which God has chosen to reveal Himself. God’s revelation through nature and through the incarnation are revealed through the Scriptures. Thus, man is utterly dependent upon the Scriptures. The unregenerate are dead in their sins and trespasses and there is nothing they can do save themselves from their state of depravity. They need the perfect blood of Christ applied to their account in order to be made right before the judgment seat of God. The only way the atonement can be rightly understood is through God’s revelation which we have in the Scriptures. It is then the Holy Spirit which uses the Scriptures to illumine the heart and mind of the dead sinner to reveal to them the nature of God which cannot be understood apart for God. Therefore, God the Father’s calling, God the Son’s redeeming, and God the Holy Spirit revealing illumines the nature and character of God to the dead sinner giving him the desire to repent of their sins thereby restoring them to a proper knowledge of God. Thus, redeemed man can again will the will of God because man is no longer the final point of predication. Man has decreased and Christ has increased.

What does this then mean for evangelism and apologetics?[2] Those who have had the blood of Christ applied to them, and the Holy Spirit remain in them are obligated to will the will of God by proclaiming His revelation through the incarnation (birth, death, burial, and resurrection) of the Christ. This can only be done through the Scriptures because only God can reveal and attest to Himself. Thus, it is God and God alone that can save lost sinners.

Why then share the Word at all? Because God works through means and redeemed man is the means whereby God has chosen to work thus re-instating man to his position as steward of creation. Because he has been enabled by God he is able to do God’s work. It is then the responsibility of the redeemed to share the Word with all men not knowing whom God has called and whom He hasn’t. It is regenerate man’s responsibility to plant the seed, but it is God the Holy Spirit who will germinate that seed. Thus, the work of creation and re-creation are entirely dependent upon the triune character of a self-sufficient God who is there and is not silent.