Schaeffer's Final Apologetic

Since Christian love seems to be the theme of the last few posts...

For class I read a biography on Francis Schaeffer, the man most known for putting forth a reasoned, coherent Christian worldview as an alternative to the existentialism of the 1960s and 70s. Many thousands of Christians have since been influence by him and persuaded to pursue a more intellectual form of Christianity that engages culture around them and speaks its language in an attempt to show that Christians do have something to say about cultural trends and can offer reasoned justifications for God's way of living life.

I've seen Schaeffer's philosophy play out particularly in the Christian circles I form part of, and I agree that Christians need to take their God-given responsibility as culture-shapers seriously and not dishonor our faith by treating it as anti-intellectual or something that can only be felt and not thought through seriously. However, I would also call us Christian scholars back from our deep preoccupation with being taken seriously by a world that denies the very presuppositions we must embrace if we are to live Christianly. After all the reasoned arguments have been proffered by Christians, ultimately we must return to Schaeffer's final apologetic––Christian love.

In his book Francis Schaeffer and the Shaping of Evangelical America, Barry Hankins makes the observation that for all the intellectual answers Schaeffer provided for nihilistic and despairing college students, they were less convinced by his arguments than they were by the love they felt at L'Abri where Schaeffer and his wife welcomed all with Christlike hospitality. They could see the love Christians had for each other, God, and outsiders and this tenderness stood in stark contrast to both the existentialism and the "free love" advocated in the Cold War decades.

Let us not forget, in our intellectual Christianity, to keep as our highest priority the love Christ calls us to, love for God, love for our brethren, and especially love for the unloveable. Not everyone can debate the merits of Christianity in a reasoned fashion, but all of us can love––and this is what God calls us to. The world cannot be reasoned into heaven, especially because many today are abandoning reason and making their peace with a universe they cannot comprehend. People become convinced of the effectiveness of God's way when they see Christians living in love as God has called us to. Our love for God gives us a foundation. Our love for other Christians gives us a family. Our love for the lost gives us a function (or mission for life). The final apologetic for the Christian faith is God-given love.