As promised, below is my summary of J. Warner Wallace’s most recent Please Convince Me podcast, and my comments.

Details:

J. Warner continues examining the Christian life in light of God’s desire for all of us to become Christian Case Makers. Jim reads listener email highlighting some of the typical frustrations involved in starting an apologetics ministry and then provides a template to help you become the Case Maker you’ve always wanted to be. Jim also answers the question: Why Didn’t Jesus Reveal Scientific Facts to Demonstrate His Deity?

You can grab the MP3 file here.

This episode is probably one of the best episodes of the Please Convince Me podcast I’ve ever heard, because it’s practical. I like listening to the cold-case detective talk about practical things.

Summary:

• e-mail from someone trying to start an apologetics ministry for college students and facing difficulties
• the challenge of getting Christians to take an evidential approach to their faith
• tips for getting Christians exposed to apologetics materials
• there are a lot of Christians who are making a daily contribution to apologetics even with a full-time job
• Wallace himself started his apologetics ministry while working full-time
• Wallace, as an atheist, was initially skeptical of religion because he thought it was too focused on money
• His plan as an apologist was to take money right out of it – do it for free, and  be self-funded
• 1 Cor 9: “But I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision.”
• People in ministry deserve to be supported, but Paul dispensed with that right to raise support for his ministry
• Paul self-financed his ministry in order to avoid all appearance of doing his ministry for financial gain
• Similarly, Wallace’s goal of being self-financed was to avoid the appearance of doing ministry for money
• If you plan your life carefully enough in the first half, you’ll have the money you need to do ministry in the second half
• Wallace wanted the liberty to pursue things without any financial need, and he achieved this by working full-time
• The problem with money is that it often causes us to not cooperate well with other people
• Ministries and churches sometimes avoid working with other people, like scholars and apologists
• They do this because they are afraid of losing their own people to these scholars and apologists
• Wallace wants to get the money out of it and be able to serve anyone with a need
• Wallace: you need to work hard in the first half of life, in order to have freedom to serve in the second half
• First area: financial preparation – you need to escape financial needs so that it doesn’t restrict your passion
• Wallace married well, to a woman who was a good saver, very frugal, and not materialistic – he saved 30% of his income
• Second area: need to prepare yourself educationally for being able to teach apologetics materially
• That doesn’t always mean doing the MA in apologetics, but you do have master the material – continuous learning
• Third area: try to focus on the parts of your career that might have some connection to apologetics
• You want to have experiences in your work where you learn something that can be used in your ministry
• Wallace actually made career choices to focus on evidence, case-making and teaching
• It’s hard because men are naturally competitive – we focus on promotions, money and consumer goods
• It’s not always the right move in your career to get promoted if it takes you away from skills related to apologetics
• Christian apologists need to not neglect to develop leadership skills and to develop influence
• He recommends a book called “Platform” by Michael Hyatt, which Doug Groothuis also recommended to me
• If you are financially independent, then if an unpaid opportunity arises, you have the freedom to take it
• You can volunteer for positions that you want to have, instead having to take what pays
• Wallace writes for Breakpoint, and he is able to dispense with the 1000-word limit that gets a fee
• Money opens up the danger of corruption, so it’s another reason to just take it out of the picture
• You can be very effective in your apologetics ministry while still working full-time
• The second half is a good time to have even more freedom because your kids are grown up
• A good wife can really help you if she is picking up the slack so that you can work on your ministry
• Jane Pantig works for Ratio Christi, an organization that promotes apologetics on campus
• Jane’s model: she is in full-time ministry, with a BS in biology and an MA in apologetics (Biola)
• Jane is able to get many high-quality speakers to speak for free/cheap at San Jose State University

The rest of the podcast deals a question that was asked at the San Jose State University event that Wallace did for Ratio Christi. I blogged about it this morning. I  laughed my butt off while listening to that podcast, starting at around 62:50 and on. It’s pretty funny when he does the role-pay between Jesus and the people listening to him.

My comments:

The reason I wanted to post this is because I think that a lot of people feel obligated to quit their jobs and raise support because they think that you have to do apologetics full time. It’s not true. Wallace explains that he worked as a cold-case detective until just recently when he took his pension. His pension is now underwriting his ministry. Similarly with me, I work a full-time job and run the blog out of my income. In addition, I probably donate a few thousand dollars each year to people who are organizing apologetics lectures, debates and conferences – events featuring speakers I like best.

This blog gets about 1 million page views per year, depending on the year (election years are better), so that’s not an insignificant impact. In addition, I meet a lot of young Christians in university in different countries who want advice or mentoring, so I spend a few hours here and there mentoring them, and sometimes sending them rewards (books) for doing difficult degrees at good universities and getting good grades. My full-time job helps me to do all of these things. And before I could have a full-time job in information technology, I had to put in the time and effort to get the Bachelor and Masters degree in computer science.

So I think that Christian men especially need to be thinking about how much the apologetics enterprise of a one-dollar apologist relies on money. We really need to be thinking about that early on, in high school, and choosing to study hard things and to do well in those hard subjects. The higher-paying jobs that are more secure tend to be in fields like science, math, technology and engineering. We need to be thinking of doing these courses in high school – especially the men, but also the women – in order to be able to pay for our apologetics ministry. In addition, my decision to not marry (unless I meet a woman who can support me in my plan) gives me even more freedom to work on my ministry while working full time.

I fully approve of what Wallace said about self-financing your apologetics ministry – and supporting other apologetics ministries – in order to avoid all appearance of self-interest. In fact, I have long admired Wallace for his intentional, practical way of doing his ministry. He doesn’t take donations, and he gives away tons of materials for free. I like that.