On Guard: by William Lane Criag ✝️

had become an atheist. But now by reading various Christian apologetic works,
which he was ordering on Amazon.com, he had come to believe in God and
was on the verge of making a commitment to Christ.
He was impressed with the evidence for Jesus’ resurrection and had called
me because he had several questions he still needed to settle. We talked for an
hour, and I sensed that in his heart he already believed; but he wanted to be
cautious and be sure he had the evidence in place before he consciously made
that step. He explained to me, “You understand that I cannot tell you my
real name. In my country I must lead a sort of double life because otherwise
I would be killed.” I prayed with him that God would continue to guide him
into truth, and then we said good-bye. You can imagine how full of thanks
my heart was to God for using these books—and the Internet!—in the life of
this man! Stories like this could be multiplied, and, of course, we never hear
of most of them.
When apologetics is persuasively presented and sensitively combined
with a gospel presentation and a personal testimony, the Spirit of God is
pleased to use it to bring people to Himself.
How to Get the Most out of This Book
This book is intended to be a sort of training manual to equip you to fulfill
the command of 1 Peter 3:15. So this is a book to be studied, not just read.
You’ll find several arguments that I’ve put into easily memorizable steps. In
discussing each argument, I’ll present a reason (or several reasons) to think
that each step in the argument is true. Then I’ll discuss the usual objections to
each step and show you how to answer them. In that way you’ll be prepared in
advance for possible questions you might meet in sharing your faith.
For example, suppose we have the following argument:
1. All men are mortal.
2. Socrates is a man.
3. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.
24 J On Guard