Apologetics Archives


The child, the puddle, and the palace

Thursday, July 18th, 2024

Setting out to improve on Christianity by recasting it as a science? Claiming the Bible’s real meaning is inaccessible unless unlocked by some hitherto unknown key?  What folly; yet I devoted the first half of my life to a little well-intentioned band engaged in that very project. (more…)

Forgiveness as a way of life

Friday, August 4th, 2023

Let’s think about becoming a people who don’t keep score on each other, serving a God who doesn’t keep score on us. Imagine a life of grace and love, acceptance and belonging, unshakable security and soulful serenity, joyous freedom and limitless possibilities. (more…)

If sin isn’t real, what’s to forgive?

Friday, April 14th, 2023

Two friends of mine, Ty who is a Christian Scientist and Vi who is a biblical Christian, were sparring over why forgiveness isn’t more prominently emphasized in the teachings of Christian Science. I wrote to Ty, remarking that it seems to me the differing perspectives on forgiveness stem from one’s view of what is or is not real, and thus whether we need a Savior or can save ourselves. (more…)

Agape love doesn’t keep score

Wednesday, September 21st, 2022

Forgiveness, so crucial in Christianity, receives little attention in the teachings of Christian Science. Why is that, and what are the consequences?  The Lord’s Prayer, along with outlining several things we affirm about God and several things we ask God to do, states just one thing that we are to do. (more…)

‘Lovest thou me more than these?’

Friday, September 3rd, 2021

Do you love God? Do you love Jesus? Do you love the Bible? Do you love the Church? Ask these questions of any Christian Scientist, and he will almost certainly answer yes. (more…)

My onetime Sunday School pupil, adrift

Thursday, July 15th, 2021

Josh and his family have been friends of ours for over 40 years. When he was a teenager, I taught his class at the Christian Science Sunday School. It’s always been heavy on my heart that when he and other impressionable kids were spiritually in my care, I fed them CS falsehood instead of Bible truth. (more…)

Science worship: Dr. Fauci and Mrs. Eddy

Sunday, June 20th, 2021

The magical mantra of our times, “It’s science,” echoes endlessly in the public arena these days. Both sides in the debate over climate change use it. Both sides in the fight over how to stem the coronavirus use it. (more…)

It all starts with ‘true truth’

Wednesday, April 14th, 2021

The great Francis Schaeffer coined the term “true truth” to describe that which simply is, always has been, and always will be, whether we like it or not. What a contrast to CS with its variable truth, simultaneously connoting one thing AND its opposite, depending how one looks at it. (more…)

Premises for prayer

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2021

My friend Hal is a lifelong Christian Scientist who is in the very early stages of questioning the Eddy doctrines and losing patience with some aspects of the CS culture. After reading my new book Discovering a Larger God and commenting favorably on it, Hal asked how I as a Bible Christian would go about praying for several situations that are troubling him at present.

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Shut that book

Monday, February 8th, 2021

C. S. Lewis invites us to imagine a man with a lizard attached to, or actually growing out of, his shoulder. Clinging there, it whispers lies in the man’s ear to keep him out of heaven. An angel, seeing that the poor soul is half-willing to be rid of the lizard, asks his permission to kill it. (more…)

MBE’s pride or Job’s humility?

Saturday, September 19th, 2020

Life is unfair. Bad things happen to good people. Prayer may receive answers we can’t make sense of. Suffering isn’t always explicable. The world is broken. To know all this, and still have faith that God loves us lavishly, is spiritual maturity. (more…)

Starting points for evangelism

Monday, May 4th, 2020

“You need Jesus. More than anything, you need Jesus. Your whole life depends on it, your whole world.” When I came to accept that this was true and began to make all the changes it would require of me, I was an earnest, fourth-generation Christian Scientist in my late 30s. (more…)

Mrs. Eddy vs. the Book of Acts: No Contest

Wednesday, April 15th, 2020

How did Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection utterly transform human experience and change the world forever? By convincing a few dozen of his followers, who then convinced billions down the centuries and around the world, that Jesus was God incarnate and that through his blood believers could enter into eternal life. (more…)

Not just a Principle, a real Father

Tuesday, November 12th, 2019

We have a friend who is a very devout Christian Scientist, getting into the practice. Sometimes along with her metaphysical vocabulary she uses a more biblical or traditional phrasing about “trusting the Father” or “listening to the Father,” that kind of thing. Then it’s back to Mrs. Eddy’s synonyms for God—Principle, Mind, Soul, etc. (more…)

Trinitarian prayer: My doorway out

Thursday, September 12th, 2019

“Behold, what manner of love.”  These words from the Epistle of John are etched on the memory of anyone who spent years attending the Christian Science church. (more…)

Rescued to be rescuers

Monday, August 5th, 2019

A hundred years ago in London, a drug addict named Francis Thompson escaped from the jaws of hell when he found Jesus Christ. Or to be more exact, when Jesus Christ found him. (more…)

Salvation prayer: What a privilege

Sunday, July 28th, 2019

Ten of us who serve as elders at my Presbyterian church were stationed around the sanctuary after today’s sermon to pray with anyone who wanted to accept or renew a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. (more…)

The shepherd didn’t fail you, an impostor did

Monday, July 23rd, 2018

“Do you ever get to church?” I’m talking with Chip, a young guy in his late 20s, son of a Christian Science family I’ve known forever. No, he says, he never does, since having decided several years ago CS is not for him — but lately he has felt there’s something spiritually missing in his life, maybe it’s time to look around.

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Self-salvation illustrated

Thursday, April 26th, 2018
Three times in Matthew 24, Jesus warns that many deceivers will come in his name. Come they have. Their medium is distorted thinking. As to their motives, he doesn’t say.

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Nothing to atone for?

Thursday, October 26th, 2017

Recently a friend asked me to attend her Christian Science church service. The Bible lesson was on “Doctrine of Atonement.” Twice a year for forty years, prior to leaving Science, (more…)