Here’s the fourth and final part of Mary Jo’s chapter in “A New Kind of Apologist,” a new book featuring various essays by renown apologists and edited by Sean McDowell. If you missed the first three parts, catch up here,  here and here.

The book is now available to order.

Change Lives

Over the years, when I’ve discussed apologetics with other women, they tend to put apologetics into a category of strictly intellectual inquiry. I’m asked, “How could arguments possibly relate to my spiritual life?” However, the study of apologetics is not strictly an intellectual endeavor; it’s also a part of being transformed into Christlikeness. For a woman to know what she believes and why she believes it can have a tremendous impact on her life. How so? The truth we are investigating is the truth about a person we are in relationship with, the person of Jesus Christ. Our engagement in apologetics always goes back to relationship with Christ. As I grow in my relationship with Christ, I am growing in my spiritual life.

Further, according to The Dragonfly Effect, a book on social movements, there are three basic human needs for establishing self-worth: competence, autonomy, and relatedness.   Apologetics serves all three needs by providing women with competency in handling the doctrines and arguments of their faith, giving women autonomy to discuss these beliefs in any situation, and providing a means of communicating with the community in the search for truth. All three of these effects of apologetics have the potential to change people’s lives. As women become more confident in handling their faith, they will become emboldened in sharing their faith. In my experience, people generally do not discuss topics in which they do not perceive they are competent. Yet discussions on belief in God with people in my community have been some of the most fruitful means of growing in my faith.

In conclusion, let’s return to the questions those women asked me at the end of my session on apologetics. Though the scenario I described is a combination of questions from multiple conferences, it accurately represents real questions I receive at any women’s ministry event. The reason more women should study apologetics is to answer the difficult questions they are holding on to right now. Doubts and difficulties about faith in God will not resolve on their own, they must be thoughtfully discussed. Left unattended, these doubts and difficulties can keep women from trusting God with all their heart, soul, and mind.

I have further found that though Christian women are already engaged in the cultural battle for truth, as evidenced by their questions, some don’t seem to recognize it. So we, as the church, have the responsibility to help Christian women recognize that apologetics serves as a great help for women in such a confusing culture by answering doubt, building confidence, and changing lives.