Against the backdrop of a strong secular culture and a pluralistic worldview
Demonstrate why Christianity is true with historical accuracy and rationality!
Global Training Director for Josh McDowell Ministries, a leading apologetics ministry organization,
Pastor Lee Young's Clear Apologetics Book

When asked, "Why do you believe in Christianity?" how do you answer? Can you explain the truth we believe in coherently, systematically, and clearly? Those of us who confess Jesus as Savior must have an answer to the question, "Why do I follow this faith?" so we can speak truthfully and confidently to others.
We must be able to articulate what the core of our faith is and why we believe it.

Apologetics also opens the way for those who are indifferent to the faith, seekers of truth, and those of other religions who desire to understand Christianity to come to God by presenting the rationality and historicity of the Christian faith.
In his youth, the author was obsessed with a naturalistic worldview and the theory of evolution.
I lived a life of faith, but I couldn't believe Genesis 1.
Then one day, while reading the Bible and other books, I realized that Christianity is true and that creation is a fact.
God used various methods of apologetics to lead the author to Himself.
Through conversion, the author came to realize the importance of apologetics.
Having worked as a senior researcher and executive at a leading telecommunications company, he currently teaches apologetics and spiritual leadership development training at Josh McDowell Ministries.

The postmodern era denies absolute truth.
What Christianity is required of in this age is ‘authenticity.’
This book introduces the practice of apologetics, from the historical foundations of Christian apologetics, to the incarnation and relational apologetics, to the existence of God and responses to postmodernism.
This makes it clear why Christianity is true.

Please answer the following questions:
When someone asks, "Why do you believe in Christianity?" what do you say? Can you explain the truth we believe in coherently, systematically, and clearly? I firmly believe that apologetics is, above all, for our own benefit.
Because we who confess Jesus as our Savior must have an answer to the question, “Why do I follow this faith?” so that we can speak truthfully and confidently to others.
What is desperately needed for Christians living in the 21st century is a clear awareness of what is at the core of our faith and why we believe in that truth.
This process must go beyond mere theoretical understanding and lead to 'living' the truth.
That is why I believe that apologetics is not simply argumentation, but a core process of discipleship.
--- p.11

According to the theory of evolution, I evolved by chance, and was a being that could rise high by winning the competition while living under the principle of the law of the jungle and survival of the fittest.
And when the given life ends, it is to return to nature.
The evolutionary proposition that 'death is the end of life' led me to conclude that 'life is meaningless and there is no meaning to living.'
…
Then my whole family immigrated to the United States, and this event became a turning point in my life.
--- p.18

Proof or evidence is the most comprehensively used function in dialectics.
This includes organizing scientific and historical evidence for the Christian faith, as well as philosophical arguments.
The goal of apologetics here is to present convincingly, based on sound evidence, that Christianity is an acceptable belief system.
Apologetics as proof or evidence shows that Christianity is rational.
Its purpose is to provide non-Christians with rational and reasonable reasons to accept the Christian faith.
Apologetics as evidence demonstrates that Christian standards of verification can be used as a tool to objectively evaluate other religious or philosophical claims.
--- p.55

The Greek word apologia and its verb form apologeomai appear 17 times in the New Testament and are used to convey an argument or rational explanation.
The term usually comes up in the context of 'defending' or 'proving' one's faith or beliefs.
Let's look at some of these.
1.
1 Peter 3:15
This is the main use of 'apologia' in the New Testament.
In this passage Peter wrote:
“But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give a defense to everyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that is in you. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15).
Here, the meaning of “answer” (justice) is the act of defending the gospel (see Phil. 1:7, 16).
In this context, we see that non-Christians were slandering Christians' actions and threatening them with persecution (see 1 Peter 3:13-17, 4:12-19).
--- p.65

Medieval dialectic began as an attempt to reconcile the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle with Christian doctrine.
Apologetics developed in the direction of defending faith with reason, emphasizing the harmony between reason and revelation.

The main purpose of medieval apologetics was, first, to refute Islamic, Jewish, and pagan ideas; second, to establish the church's doctrinal legitimacy against heresy; and third, to prove the truth of the Christian faith through rational explanation and establish a rational faith.
The greatest legacy of medieval apologetics is its development into a form of apologetic theology.
By discussing the relationship between reason and faith, philosophy and theology in a more sophisticated manner than in the patristic era, it provided the theoretical foundation for the subsequent Reformation and modern apologetics.
--- p.96

Twentieth-century apologetics did not remain confined to a single approach. Instead, it responded to the challenges of modernity and postmodernity through diverse methodologies such as rationality and historical evidence, presuppositional faith, a combination of various verifications, literary and aesthetic persuasion, revelation, and dogmatics, providing a rich resource for apologetics discussion to this day.
--- p.123

We rejected God's ways and love and sinned in a perfect world filled with His absolute goodness.
But Jesus came into this world to die for us “while we were enemies” (Romans 5:10).
Just as we don't deserve a pizza party for a soccer team that lost a game, we don't deserve God's salvation.
But God sent his Son into the world and gave the gift of salvation to everyone who believes in him.
This is the relational meaning of the incarnation of Jesus.
--- p.146

If everything that exists must have a cause, then the question can be asked, “What caused God to exist?”
But this is the wrong question.
God is not a being that has a cause from the beginning.
He has no beginning of existence.
According to the definition of God revealed in the Bible, He is an eternal, uncaused being who existed from the beginning.
The God of the Bible declares himself as “I AM WHO I AM.”
The phrase 'I AM' means 'I AM', which means that I am a being that cannot be bound by time, a being that exists above time.
--- p.189

Homer's Iliad is considered one of the most reliable ancient books, with over 1,900 extant manuscripts.
The table below compares the number of copies of Homer's Iliad and the New Testament.
By comparison, there are over 5,800 manuscripts of the Greek New Testament.
About 10,000 Latin manuscripts and 9,300 in other languages ​​have been discovered so far.
Even in terms of the number of copies, the New Testament is more reliable than Homer's Iliad, which enjoys the greatest historical credibility.
--- p.237

We have so far closely examined the abundant evidence supporting the truth that Jesus is the only way to salvation.
Through the statements of witnesses in the Bible and historical evidence revealed in historical documents outside the Bible, the existence, divinity, death on the cross, and resurrection of Jesus were confirmed as historical facts.
Furthermore, we can confirm that Jesus' own divinity statement is logically and philosophically consistent with the correspondence theory of truth through the evidence from his actions.
The totality of these evidences from biblical, historical, and philosophical perspectives leads us to the logical conclusion that the existence, divinity, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ Jesus are real, and that salvation is only through Him.
--- p.291

One might ask, “If naturalism is true or factual, where do moral values ​​come from?”
“If there is no God, everything is permitted,” said Dostoevsky.
If there is no God, there is no reason why each person should not do what he thinks is right.
It means that everything is permissible.
However, all cultures have common moral values.
For example, no culture tolerates child abuse.
Many people have a deep, intuitive sense that certain actions are objectively wrong (e.g., torturing innocent people, slavery, genocide, etc.).
Moral values ​​are not simply social or personal opinions, but are recognized as universally binding regardless of time, place, or cultural context.
Why is this so? Because God created moral values ​​in the human heart, all cultures possess them.
From this perspective, naturalism shows its limitations in effectively explaining the fact that moral values ​​are universally present in all cultures.
Naturalism cannot explain where human moral values ​​come from, nor can it explain the reality of morality that is inherent a priori in the human mind.

--- p.310