Hi, I'm Glenn from Speak Life. We like to see all things through the lens of Jesus. Do you ever get into conversations with friends about God and faith and you're not really sure what to say, you feel a little bit out of your depth? Well, spare a thought for Ayan Hersey Ali, who recently went head-to-head with the world's most famous atheist, Richard Dawkins. And even though she was a very young Christian, I think she did brilliantly well. If you want to go deeper about the debate itself, I actually talked to Ayan Hercy Ali. It's on our channel. I get to ask her firsthand how she found it when she went toe-to-toe with Richard Dawkins. It's a fascinating conversation. Please go and check out my conversation with Ayan Hercy Ali.
SPEAKER_00That is episode number 520 of the Speak Life Podcast.
SPEAKER_05I've also done a deep dive on the dialogue, going play by play and showing all the ways that Ayan has interacted with Richard Dawkins in that format. Please do check that out.
SPEAKER_00That is episode number 517 of the Speak Life Podcast.
SPEAKER_05What I'm doing here is just teasing out 25 top tips, not about really how she dealt with Dawkins, but about how you can dialogue really fruitfully with your friends. And we're going to begin with number one, your life preachers. Whatever else we say, actually, our life will speak louder, and the courage that Ion Hersey Ali has shown over the years has preached to Richard Dawkins. Listen to the way that Richard speaks about Aion. I adore Aion. Her life of integrity has won the admiration of Richard Dawkins. And clearly she is an exceptional kind of a person, but all of us are called to live with integrity. And in the verse that most commends personal evangelism in the New Testament, that paragraph, 1 Peter 3, verse 8, it begins like this. Finally, all of you be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble. And that is the paragraph that ends up saying, In your hearts revere Christ as Lord, always being prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect. Notice how character and message go hand in hand. So that's the first point. Your life preaches. But then, point number two, love your friend. I loved the way that this dialogue began and ended with a hug. And notice that very early on, Richard wants to pin down Aion Hersielli on do you believe in the resurrection? Do you believe in the virgin birth? And one of the very first things Aion wants to do is to express her love and admiration for Richard.
SPEAKER_03I mean, do you really take it seriously? That Jesus is the Son of God, Jesus rose from the dead, Jesus was born of a virgin. And that's part of Christianity.
SPEAKER_01So I think because you, and I know you very well, we've been friends for a long time, and in fact, in some ways, I think of you as a mentor.
SPEAKER_05Isn't that fascinating? He wants an answer to something, and the first thing she gives is actually admiration and respect and love back to Richard. That is point number two. Having lived with integrity, we are to love our friends. Point number three, tell your story. And this is really the way that Ayan led with this dialogue. People were expecting fireworks, they were expecting a debate. She brought personal testimony.
SPEAKER_01I had uh a personal crisis. Um I lived for about a decade with intense depression and anxiety, self-loathing. Um I hit rock bottom. I went to a place where I actually didn't want to live anymore, but wasn't brave enough to take my own life.
SPEAKER_05This is what absolutely wrong-footed Richard Dawkins. He came wanting to know whether Ayan was just a political Christian, and she comes with an intensely personal story. So tell your story. But number four, tell your story with vulnerability. Have you noticed how deep Ayan is going in order to tell her story?
SPEAKER_01I was trying to understand my condition and trying to treat it with the help of pure evidence-based science. And in January, February of um last year, I saw one therapist who said, perhaps it's something else that you have, and she described it as spiritual bankruptcy. And that resonated with me, and having reached a place where I had absolutely nothing to lose, um, I prayed.
SPEAKER_05I'm always telling people that in evangelism, just complete this line. I couldn't have gotten through X without Jesus. I don't know what X is for you. It might be uh anxiety and depression, it might be redundancy, it might be family breakdown, it might be health issues, it might be lockdown, who knows what it might have been. But I couldn't have gotten through X without Jesus. Be vulnerable, be in that place where you need the God of heaven to come and turn your life around, the way that I Anne speaks about. And having opened up with that vulnerable story, number five, be confident and humble. I love at the end of telling her story, there is this little shrug.
SPEAKER_01That's you know the shortest story that I can tell.
SPEAKER_04Um Let's go to Richard Dawkins' reaction.
SPEAKER_05Don't you love that from Ion? She's like, Well, this is what I got. I this is this is what I brought to the table. And she's confident in her own story, but also incredibly humble with her own story, and she just lays it out on the table. Whether Richard Dawkins is ready to hear it or not, she's like, I've got this story, I'm gonna give you this story, and she shrugs. I think it's a perfect embodiment of being confident and humble in our evangelism. But after having shrugged, Richard Dawkins comes in with all sorts of questions about, you know, do you believe in the virgin birth? Do you believe in the resurrection from the dead? And at that point we can think about point number six: speak simply. Get a load of how Ion answers Richard.
SPEAKER_01I would say you're coming at this from a place um there is nothing. And what has happened to me is I think I have accepted there is something. And when you accept that there is something and there is a powerful um entity, for me, the the god that that turned me around.
SPEAKER_05Do you notice how simply she is speaking? She is a very high-powered woman who's written many best-selling books. She's talking to a pre-eminent scientist on a stage in which everybody is expecting intellectual discourse. And she comes, and and it's a profound thought, it's a deep thought. We'll get into why it's a deep thought in a second, but she phrases it so simply. You don't believe there is something. I believe there is something. Try and find as simple a way of speaking as possible. And then point seven, reframe the issue. Because what she's doing with that very simple language is reframing everything in Richard Dawkins's world. Richard Dawkins thinks that the only kind of truth is scientific truth. And what she's doing is reframing things. You know what you do when you reframe? My wife is brilliant at it. She'll go to a charity shop and she'll find like a portrait and she'll buy a portrait, and I'll think, I don't even like that portrait. And then she's like, No, Glenn, it's not about the picture, it's about the frame. Frames are really expensive, actually. And so she'll take the picture that's there out of the frame and she'll put a different picture in, and all of a sudden, ah, you've just reframed that picture. And you see things in a totally different light. And what Ion Herssielli is doing is saying, Richard Dawkins, you're looking at a very narrow issue. I want to reframe this issue and recognize that the reason why you aren't open to believing in the resurrection or the virgin birth or Christianity in general is because you only think that scientific truth is the only truth there is. You think there is nothing beyond this world. I think there is something beyond this world. I'm going to reframe the issue and help you to look through a a different pair of spectacles, right? It's a it's about pointing to the feet that you're both standing on. It's about naming the assumptions that you both have in the conversation. It's about recognizing where you're both coming from. Ayan does this again and again in the dialogue. She talks about there are different planes of perception. Richard, you're very good at this plane of perception, the scientific plane of perception, but there are other planes of perception, right? She says this again and again. And so when Freddie Sayers, the moderator of the dialogue, asks her a question, she's again going to return to this issue of reframing and of these planes of perception. Listen.
SPEAKER_04What is your response to those specific questions of Richard? When the vicar is saying that Jesus is the Son of God literally, not figuratively, how do you square that with your highly trained rational mind?
SPEAKER_01Well, it is again different planes of perception. So I I choose to accept Jesus Christ, the teachings of Jesus Christ, the story of Jesus Christ. I choose to accept that.
SPEAKER_05You see, it's about these planes of perception. And if Richard is just looking at the scientific realm, well it's no wonder that he's not seeing the supernatural. It's about these planes of perception. And she chooses to open herself up to the possibility of something supernatural. And so, Richard, it's not surprising that you don't see the things that I see because we're dealing with different planes of perception. She's trying to reframe the issue again and again. She she does it again later in the debate.
SPEAKER_01It has to go back to is there something or is there nothing? And I think you start with there is nothing. And yes, for years I agreed with you that there's nothing. But if you come round to the idea that there might be something much more powerful than we are, something that caused everything else, then something like Jesus rising out of the dead or these other miracles, Jesus being born out of a virgin, for that higher power is not a big deal.
SPEAKER_05Go to 30,000 feet. Have a look down on the issue that you're talking about from a greater perspective. This is what Ayan is doing all the time. She's pointing to where both she and Richard are standing. She's naming the assumptions, she's identifying the terrain, she's recognizing where the both of them are coming from by going up to 30,000 feet. And she keeps on saying things like, Richard, you believe there is nothing. I believe there is something. Let's remember that. And then let's recognize that the reason, Richard, why you think X is because, well, you are where you are. And the reason I think why is because I am where I am. Let's go to 30,000 feet. And she's constantly, constantly reminding Richard that we disagree about the God question. So no wonder we disagree about these various moral questions, or did Jesus rise from the dead? Of course we disagree about that stuff. Go to 30,000 feet and just recognize where we both stand. And I find this really helpful in evangelism to at times say, Well, of course we're going to disagree on this, my friend. Um, I think that there's God and you don't think that there's God, and so of course we're gonna come to different views on morality or the meaning of life or what happens after you die, or whether Jesus rose from the dead. Like if you think there's God and if you don't think there's God, then you're gonna come to different views on this. Let's constantly remind our friends of where we're coming from. Go to 30,000 feet. But just because you're clear doesn't mean you won't be misunderstood, and that's point number eight. Expect to be misunderstood. Ayan is constantly telling Richard that she's coming from a different perspective on these questions and that he has a different plane of perception, but he doesn't quite understand it. And so he misunderstands her again at this point in the debate.
SPEAKER_03Faith offers you something, obviously. That's very, very, very clear. But it doesn't make it true. It doesn't make the existence claims of Christianity true. Um there is a difference from saying that that um being in a certain psychological place is consoling and comforting and offers you a meaningful life of meaning of life and and gives you a purpose in life, all those things which are wonderful. And I have them too. They're a bit different, but I too have a purpose in life. I have a meaning in life. But just simply because something gives you a meaning and a purpose in life, it doesn't make the existential claims true. And Christianity, like any other religion, makes claims about the world, about the universe, which are either true or not true. And I may be wrong and you may be may be right, they may they may be true, but the mere fact that they're comforting doesn't make them true. That's an important point.
SPEAKER_05So Richard is misunderstanding because he is hearing Ion speak about existential issues, about issues of meaning, right? And he says, Well, that's all fine, that's very comforting, but that has nothing to do with whether something is true. But remember, for Richard, something is true only on the scientific plane. And all those existential issues are ruled out of court because if you go to 30,000 feet, Richard doesn't think there is something. And so all he thinks is that there is only scientific truth. And so Richard keeps on insisting that every truth that is brought to him is a scientific truth. And every time Ayan says there are other planes of perception, Richard Dawkins is like, well, that's fine, that's fluff. But what about the truth? And so he he keeps on misunderstanding Ayan, but she keeps patiently explaining her position.
SPEAKER_01But I agree with you on that point. The mere fact that they are comforting doesn't make them true, make them true. Um, but the hypothesis that um there is something rather than nothing is something you can't disprove, as much as I can't prove uh materially that Jesus was born out of a virgin.
SPEAKER_05Notice she patiently explains not only that they disagree, but why they disagree. They disagree because of their starting point. She goes to 30,000 feet and she shows it to him again. And she's constantly, patiently explaining her position. She's expecting to be misunderstood, and she's just patiently coming back with a further explanation of her position. Well done. And then tip number nine, I think Ayan does this really well. She stands with the church. I think we should stand with the church. Richard Dawkins had said at one point in the conversation that vicars talk a lot of nonsense. Do you ever notice the nonsense that vicars talk? And Ayan doesn't let that slide. She actually says this.
SPEAKER_01I think what the vicar is saying no longer sounds nonsensical. It makes a great deal of sense. And not only does it make a great deal of sense, it's also layered with the wisdom of millennia.
SPEAKER_05I think it's so important to stand with the church. It's not just you and your buddy in the pub as though you are the defender of Christianity and you're up against the world. Okay? It's actually you stand together with Team Jesus, and Team Jesus is a very large team. Okay, there are billions of us on the planet now and down through history. We should never feel alone when we're trying to talk about faith. We should actually do it as a team sport, and actually inviting people to church is a brilliant thing to do, but also just bigging up church and talking talking well of church is a very good thing to do. And it's a great reminder because even Richard Dawkins, a little bit later in the dialogue, he actually admits that he's never met a vicar he doesn't like.
SPEAKER_03Well, I must say I've never met a vicar that I didn't like. I mean, they're always very, very nice people.
SPEAKER_05Isn't that interesting? We do need to get our friends in contact with actual church people rather than just to live with a caricature of the bad old church, okay? Everyone lives with a caricature, even Christians live with a caricature of institutional Christianity. Ooh, yuck, nobody likes that. But what about the Christians that you know in your life? And Richard can have all sorts of sneering hostility towards Christianity at large, but he's never met a vicar he doesn't like. That should give him pause for thought. I don't think it gives him much pause for thought, but it should give him some pause for thought. And it should give us encouragement. Let's stand together with church, it's a team sport. And then tip number 10, we should use the word we wherever we can. A number of times Ayan speaks some hard truths, truths that are difficult for Richard to listen to, but she actually uses the plural, the first-person plural. And uh, like this example here.
SPEAKER_01I'll give you an example. When I was an atheist and I was going all over uh both the United States and all over Europe mocking Christians, making fun of them, making fun of faith, as you're doing now, dear Richard.
SPEAKER_05As you're doing so so, Richard, you're going around mocking Christians. Um, I was once one of you. We are not so different after all. Uh we, Richard. The use of the word we is really, really important, especially if you're trying to make somebody face a a hard truth. And so not only does she use the word we, she also admits her mistakes. That's tip number eleven. Admit your mistakes. She does talk about the ways that she has regretted her former life. If you're gonna get your friend to admit to sin, um, you go first, right? You you admit your own errors first, and you'll actually find your friend might open up a lot more if you do tip number eleven, admit mistakes. Tip number twelve, don't get riled. Richard Dawkins deliberately talks about the nonsense that Christians believe, and sometimes he uses even uh richer language than that, salty sailor language, uh, about the things that Christians believe. And Ayan is not riled by that. She laughs, like on this occasion.
SPEAKER_03I think you are a Christian, and I think Christianity is nonsense. Um get riled.
SPEAKER_05Jesus can handle anything that's thrown at him, okay? Our God is big enough to handle whatever is said about him. We don't need to get riled on his behalf. We can laugh it off.
SPEAKER_02Hi folks, it's Thomas Thorogood here, media producer at Speak Life. You might recognise my voice as the guy who does the filler bits on the podcast. It's part of my job to think of how we can include you more in the work of Speak Life and bring you behind the scenes, if you will. And so we have a very exciting thing called the Speak Life Discord server. It's an online platform where you can interact with other Speak Life supporters and the Speak Life team. We have bonus content, creative theological discussion, and lots of fun along the way. So if you want to join that, you can just go to speaklife.org.uk forward slash give. Okay, back to the podcast.
SPEAKER_05Tip number 13, set your expectations. Okay, Ayan is very clear that she's not going to see Richard Dawkins converted that day. I think she does have hope for Richard Dawkins in the future. I think we should all have hope for Richard Dawkins in the future, but she sets her expectations and she has a real let's agree to disagree um posture at times when she feels like she's not getting any further in the dialogue, like here.
SPEAKER_01I choose to believe in God, and I think there we might say, let's agree to disagree.
SPEAKER_05Always leave room for God to change minds and even to change a Richard Dawkins' mind. Ayan is very aware of why she's there. She is there to explain why she's a Christian, and she's to let Richard and everybody else listening in do with that information what they want to do with that information. And I think that's a very helpful thing in evangelism. Your job is not to gain converts, your job is to offer Christ. If you think your job is to gain converts, then you will do all in your power to try and manipulate people, right? And you'll be absolutely devastated when they don't give their lives to Christ in the moment. Okay, but people very rarely change their minds in the moment. People don't change their minds about anything in the moment. It takes time. You might put a stone in their shoe, they walk away, and maybe six months later they change their minds. And that might be about little things, it might be about big things, but very rarely do people actually change their minds in the middle of the conversation. So set your expectations accordingly. Do not try to gain converts in the moment, just offer Christ in the moment and let the Spirit do his work. Tip number 14. Disagree respectfully. Richard Dawkins has this long rant about Christianity being all about sin and how horrible that is.
SPEAKER_03And when you think about Christianity, Christianity is obsessed with sin.
SPEAKER_05How will I respond to that? Richard Dawkins says Christianity is all about sin. What's she gonna say? Actually, she disagrees respectfully by reframing things and saying this.
SPEAKER_01I find that Christianity is actually obsessed with love.
SPEAKER_05I love that, and I love that language of I find that. What I'm finding, what I'm getting from my faith, what I'm getting from the scriptures, what I'm getting from church, what I'm getting from Jesus is this. And it's different to what you're saying. And isn't that a really respectful way of disagreeing with somebody? You say it's all about sin. What I find is that Christianity is actually all about love. And so she goes on and talks about how Christianity is all about love. But then we get to tip number 15. Don't ignore their challenge. Richard Dawkins has talked about how Christianity speaks about sin. Okay, so he's put that on the table, and Ayan Hersy Ellie has said, no, it's actually about love, and that's a really good point. And I think she should have led with that point, and she did lead with that point. Well done. But that sin thing is still on the table. Richard has brought a point to be dealt with. Is Ayan going to deal with that point? Yes, she is, and here's how she does it.
SPEAKER_01The recognition of um what you call sin, but perhaps the character defects that both good and evil are there, but that both good and evil are in us. I think those teachings in Christianity are far far more powerful and have led to I I think the flourishing of Western civilization.
SPEAKER_05She doesn't ignore Richard Dawkins' challenge. She does talk about sin, but then when she does talk about sin, she says, Well, but isn't it a good thing that Christianity talks about sin? Don't we need to name this problem that all of us share? So she disagrees respectfully. That Christianity is all about sin, no, it's actually all about love, but she doesn't ignore the challenge, and she says, no, I'm glad that Christianity mentions sin because this is a label that is really helpful to us in modern life. So that's tip number 15. Don't ignore their challenge. Tip number 16, center on Jesus. Now, when Ayan says that Christianity is all about love, where is she going to go as her source on that truth? Well, Jesus. Here's what she says.
SPEAKER_01The teaching of Christ, as I see it, and again, I'm a brand new Christian, but what I'm finding out, which is the opposite of growing up as a Muslim, the message of Islam, but the message of Christianity I get is that it's a message of love, it's a message of redemption. And it's a story of renewal and rebirth. And so Jesus dying and rising again for me symbolizes that story. And in a small way, I felt like I had died and I was reborn. And that story of redemption and uh rebirth uh I think makes Christianity actually a very, very powerful story for the human condition and human existence.
SPEAKER_05She senses things back to Jesus, and actually Richard Dawkins acknowledges that Jesus is in fact very attractive.
SPEAKER_03Jesus, I think, was a very, very great character, a very loving character.
SPEAKER_05It is very hard to disagree with Jesus. Center on Jesus. Bring Jesus to the fore of the conversation. That is tip number 16. Also, tip number 17 is similar. Don't focus on religion per se. Ayan is not there to defend religion per se, and she doesn't want to defend religion per se. She's very specific about the Jesus story. She's very specific about narrowing it down to Christianity, and we'll see why here.
SPEAKER_01Richard, the statement you made about uh the holy books of Christianity and Islam being the same is absolutely untrue. And in fact, maybe a follow-up to this discussion would be to actually read these books to see what's in them and how different they are. And another mega, mega difference is the the um the characters of Jesus and the characters of Muhammad are absolutely radically different.
SPEAKER_03I totally agree with that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but that and that is why the holy books are not the same. The story is absolutely not the same. They are different.
SPEAKER_05You can get lost in the long weeds talking about God until the cows come home. Uh what we really need to do is to narrow down to Jesus and let's let's be talking about who he is. And constantly, when people say to me, I don't believe in God, I'm always saying, Well, which God don't you believe in? And they end up describing a God who is very, very, very, very dislikable, right? Uh a fundamentally unlovable God. And I end up saying, I don't believe in that God either. Let me talk about Jesus. We need to tip 16, center on Jesus. Tip 17, center on Christianity. Do not defend religion per se. Center on the God of Jesus. And then tip number 18, use analogies. Ayan has been toiling away, toiling away, trying to get Richard to go to 30,000 feet and to understand where she stands and where he stands, and that it's a planes of perception issue. It's the fact that Richard Dawkins is just constantly looking at the world in one kind of a way, and he's not open to actually perceiving the world in a different kind of a way. And she's made that point again and again and again, and he hasn't really got it, and so she uses an analogy from art.
SPEAKER_01I will look at a painting by Pollock, and I will think my six-year-old must have spilled all the paint on the canvas and run around. And people are crazy enough to pay millions of dollars and hang it on walls. But I've actually seen people be moved to tears staring at a Pollock. That is a plane of perception that is real, but that's also very, very difficult to measure. And it's the same the way you're moved by certain pieces of music. So the fact that I have faith and I choose to have faith because of what I've experienced is just as real for me as it is for the millions of people who believe.
SPEAKER_05Have you seen Annie Jackson Pollock? It's just like paint splashed against the canvas. And she asks her to think yourself into an art gallery and to imagine yourself stood before the canvas and you just think it's a mess. And then someone who really understands Pollock opens your mind to seeing it in a different way, and the canvas hasn't changed. Your perceptions haven't changed, but your way of receiving what's there changes. And all of a sudden, you might find yourself crying in front of a piece of art that previously hadn't moved you at all. It's about planes of perception, it's about ways of seeing. The painting itself doesn't change. There's no new information going in through your eyeballs, but there's a different way of seeing. And Ayana is using that as an analogy to say, look, you're we're both looking at the same world, Richard, but we're looking from completely different perspectives. And maybe you need to be like the person who finally appreciates the artwork, and there are tears rolling down the cheek. And that's not because the artwork has changed, but because you have changed, and because the way you have looked at the art has changed. She uses that analogy. Analogies are dynamite in these kind of dialogues. Use analogies a lot. That's tip number 18. The next two tips are questions that you can ask of your friends. Ask, what are you standing on? It's not just you as a Christian that needs to answer the questions that other people are asking. Your friend needs to answer questions too. So here's one question. For instance, the issue of thinking comes up. And I've got a question for Richard Dawkins. Okay, think let's think about thinking. Where does thinking come from on your view of the world, Richard? When you don't think there is anything beyond what we can see, touch, taste, and feel. Do you have a place for thinking? Do you have a place for consciousness? Where does consciousness come from on a naturalistic worldview? That's a question that she kind of tentatively puts towards Richard. You have to get to that from thinking.
SPEAKER_01And that brings us to consciousness. Where did all this come from?
SPEAKER_05It's not just the Christian that needs to be able to feel the questions from the non-Christian. The Christian can ask the non-Christian, what are you standing on? You are doing a lot of thinking, you prize rationality, so where has that come from? What are you standing on? And then the second question, tip number 20, what's your alternative? Like, if somebody is asking the Christian questions about morality or questions about the afterlife or questions about the Bible, um there is always a version of that question that the non-Christian has to answer. Like it's it's not just the Christian that is in the dock the whole time having to answer questions. If you don't like what Christianity is offering to the world, what does atheism offer to the world? Ayan makes that point again and again.
SPEAKER_01As an atheist, um you don't really offer an answer, you don't offer uh uh uh uh a prescription for this is um this is a way of life, this is uh the path to happiness, this is how you can deal with the challenges of existence. And atheism is an attitude, it basically says um as of now there is no evidence to show that God exists or that a higher power exists, full stop. And you figure the rest of it out. And it's very, very difficult to figure the rest of it out starting from scratch. And I think faith then gives meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_05Faith gives meaning and purpose. Richard, what does atheism offer? This is a question that we can ask. What is your alternative to Christianity? It clearly bugs Richard because later in the debate, a couple of different times, Richard says, No, this is what atheism offers. It offers rational secular humanism. Here's what he says.
SPEAKER_01What do we then have to offer to these young people who are seeking something?
SPEAKER_03Rational secular humanism.
SPEAKER_05Or later in the debate, he says this.
SPEAKER_03We have secular humanism, we have rationality, we have moral philosophy. Moral philosophy is is how we is how we decide which bits of Christianity we like and bit which bits we don't, which bits of the Bible we t we take as being moral and which ones we don't. We cherry pick. And the the basis for our cherry-picking is modern secular moral philosophy.
SPEAKER_05So atheism can offer rational secular humanism, moral philosophy, enlightenment values, those sorts of things. Um Ion is constantly saying, yeah, but that is not actually giving people a sense of meaning, significance, and direction and purpose and hope in life, is it? And Richard just keeps on saying, Well, we just have to try harder, we just have to try harder. But it's it's right for Ion to keep on pressing and to keep on saying, what's your alternative? What are you offering? Don't just look at what Christianity is offering or its deficiencies. What is the fullness of atheism and what it's offering to the world? Tip number 20, ask them what's your alternative. And then tip number 21, this is really vital. If you don't know the answer to a question, say, I don't know. It's transformative.
SPEAKER_01But then what happens to the soul, consciousness, etc. That again, I don't know.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, Ayan is a new Christian. She's thinking these sorts of things through. Um, she doesn't know the answer to these questions, and so she just says, I don't know. It's transformative, isn't it? You can you you know you can do that in evangelism. You can just say, I don't know. But none of that changes the fact that God reached down into my life and turned me around, and none of that changes the fact that the church has been this thing for like thousands of years, giving meaning and purpose and significance and hope. And the fact that I can't answer uh a question about does our consciousness survive our deaths. Um, yeah, I need to look into that, and I'll look into that. I don't know. Christendom is not about to crumble because you don't know the answer to a question. Tip number 21, say I don't know. I say it all the time, I don't know. Uh tip number 22, encourage the good. Get people to follow through on the things they already believe in. And Ion Hersyelli has this thing about civilizational Christianity is a bulwark against, you know, something worse like Islam, right? And actually, Richard Dawkins believes in that at the same time. And so what she's trying to do with that is it's not just a cultural war thing, it might it might be a culture war thing, but in this environment and in this encounter, what she's trying to do with that is to say, Richard, you are on team Christianity when it comes to the future of life on planet Earth. And if it if it comes down to a choice between Islam and Christianity, you're on team Christianity every time, aren't you? And what she wants to do with that is once he owns the fact that he's on team Christianity, and in that sense he is, then Ion wants to say, Oh well, you you can't be on team Christianity and actually kind of hack away at Christian foundations. That doesn't make any sense if you're on the team. Are you on the team or are you not? And what she's trying to do is encourage the good, get people to follow through on the beliefs that they already have. I'm constantly trying to do this with if people believe in human rights. I'm like, pull at that thread. I think you'll find God the human, Christ, at the other end of it. If you if you believe in compassion, pull at the thread of compassion. I think you'll find compassion incarnate, you'll find Jesus Christ at the other end of this. I want to encourage the things that you already believe that will lead you to the truth. And let's keep pulling at those threads. Tip number 22, encourage the good. Tip number 23, read Dominion by Tom Holland. Uh Ion Hessi clearly has. And his thesis comes out in her speaking again and again. Jesus said, by their fruits you shall know them, talking about false prophets and how you determine the message by actually the fruit that the messenger bears. And is there a way that we can do that culturally? That that a culture that has sat with the Jesus story for thousands of years, has it borne a peculiar fruit? It has, actually. And has it borne a prosperous fruit? Like in many ways it kind of has. And does that recommend the vine that might have produced the fruit? Um, I think it can. I on her CLE certainly thinks it can. And so she is pointing to the civilization-building power of the gospel, and she has found that to be transformative in her own life, and now in her own evangelism, she's using the Tom Holland Dominion thesis in her evangelism. That's tip number 23. You can use it too. Um you can read Tom Holland's Dominion, you can read my my book, which is basically the Tom Holland um thesis from a Christian point of view, The Air We Breathe, and you can use it in evangelism. I've found it fruitful, she finds it fruitful, but you need to do that together with tip number 24, which is be ready for the usual dominion critiques. Okay? Richard Dawkins brings one of them here.
SPEAKER_04Enlightenment humanism doesn't seem to have resisted that advance very successfully. Well, let's press it harder then.
SPEAKER_05But then Ayan is ready for that Dominion critique, and so she says.
SPEAKER_03I don't buy that.
SPEAKER_01It starts with the admission that national secular humanism. Um the enlightenment was able to take place within that Christian context, and it is a product of Christian civilization. It didn't happen in China, it didn't happen in the Middle East, it didn't happen anywhere else. It happened in these disputes between Christians. And I think part of that story and that whole history is one that needs to be celebrated and told and given to these young minds.
SPEAKER_05So many of our friends in the West they live with the myth that the church is this kind of mustache-twisting villain, right, of the piece, and it's just it's just the bad guy. It just is the bad guy, and we're better off without it, and we've we've just left the dark ages behind. We're ascending into the land of enlightenment, and that's that's where we're going. Um and we need to undercut that. I think we genuinely need to undercut that myth, because it is a myth. We need to bust the myth. And when people say that, you know, progress has only happened when we have left the church. I think we need to point out that um all the critiques that we have for the church are thoroughly Christian critiques. We we accuse the church of being unequal, cruel, coercive, unenlightened, anti-science, and restrictive and regressive. And that that is because it is the revolution of Jesus Christ that has taught us to be equal and compassionate and and consensual and and enlightened and pro-science and and pro-freedom and progressive. Like it's Christianity that has taught us these things. And therefore, we shouldn't be surprised by the critiques that come the way of Christians. And we should be ready to handle them. I think I did a good job of being ready to handle those those kinds of critiques. Um tip number 24, be ready for the usual dominion critiques. And then final tip, tip number twenty-five, be holistic. Okay. Richard Dawkins always wants to talk about scientific truth. And your friend might not be like Richard Dawkins, they might always want to talk about sexual freedom or identity politics, or they might always want to talk about um Old Testament narratives, or I I don't know what the one issue is that your friend might want to have, but Ayan is always wanting to go and and preach more holistically about what Christianity offers, and at the same time wants to point out that the narrowness of the non-Christian view is not really that livable. And so she says this about Richard's view of enlightenment rationalism.
SPEAKER_01The assumption was reason and enlightenment and humanism is simply going to emerge from education. The higher your level of education, the more reasonable you are. Now, what we see on display in our universities is the very opposite. That is a moral crisis.
SPEAKER_03Do you accept that? Well, it it it you're you seem to be saying that the organization isn't there. I mean, we need a a church of humanism or something like that. I I've never been in favour of that kind of thing, but um Do you accept the observation that I am is making?
SPEAKER_04Do you think that's true? That having expected enlightened humanism to take the space if religion receded, that didn't happen.
SPEAKER_03I was never that optimistic. I mean, I I never thought we were going to have a sort of brave new world of of enlightened humanism. I just I was just interested in the truth. And and um uh the the the idea that that somehow we were on a we were on a mission to found a new church or something like that. We just never were. So you didn't think about what would happen afterwards. No, I mean I I I can't speak for my colleagues, but but um for as far as I I was concerned, what I what I was interested in is what is true. And it's and I believe that all religions are false. And um I'm interested in what is scientifically true.
SPEAKER_05I'm interested in what is true, and then he says, that's what's scientifically true. And so we come full circle to this whole issue of these planes of perception, and Richard Dawkins just thinks that the truth is what is whatever is scientifically true. And I am beautifully, using tip number 25, as we're now gonna call it, um, she is being holistic and she's saying, Look, what you offer to the world is so narrow, it's so thin, it's it's so uh insubstantial, it will not sustain our culture and our civilization. And we need the good and the beautiful and the meaningful, right? We need purpose and hope and direction, don't we, Richard? Of course we of course we need these things in addition to the scientific truth that you're so keen on. And so, tip number 25, be holistic. And listen, if you want to investigate Christianity for yourself, or if you want to share your faith with other people, 321course.com is the place to go. You'll get a Christianity 101 that assumes no prior knowledge, and uh, we'd love you to go there. It takes you just seconds to start an account, and then you're in, and you can watch the material yourself, you can join the chat community, you can download all the other extra bonus content, you can sign up for Ask Glenn Anything events, and we can keep this conversation going. Uh, but why don't you go to 321course.com, check it all out, and why don't you subscribe to this channel so we can catch you on the next one? We'll see you then.