Ask Them Why, by Jay Lucas [A Quick Book Review]
In 1981, Hershey’s produced a TV commercial featuring two people with no situational awareness walking down the street—one eating a chocolate bar, the other spooning peanut butter out of an obscenely-overfilled, open container with all the manners of Winnie the Pooh diving into a pot of honey. When the inevitable collision occurs, they exclaim nearly simultaneously:
“Hey, you got your chocolate in my peanut butter!”
“You got your peanut butter on my chocolate!”
With the damage already done, they simultaneously decide to sample the results of their poorly-acted accidental collision, leading to the perfectly synchronized proclamation, “Delicious!” The announcer then proclaims them, “Two great tastes that go great together.”
When I think of Ask Them Why, I can’t help but think of Greg Koukl and Greg Bahnsen running into each other and exclaiming simultaneously:
“Hey, you got your tactics in my presuppositional apologetic!”
“You got your presuppositional apologetic in my tactics!”
The late Greg Bahnsen was known for his mastery of the presuppositional apologetic that his mentor, Cornelius van Til, pioneered. As a friend of mine put it, “Bahnsen knew van Til better than van Til knew van Til.” But after reading Presuppositional Apologetics: Stated and Defended and Against All Opposition: Defending the Christian Worldview, I was left feeling like I needed a shower to get all the viscous philosophy out of my hair. It was good material, and biblically-based, but I was having a really hard time figuring out how I was going to teach it to “normal” people (like 6th graders) when I was struggling with it myself.
Greg Koukl’s book Tactics, on the other hand, is imminently practical and easy to use in everyday life...but it is not gospel-centered. As I noted in my review of Tactics, Koukl’s goal is never to get to the gospel, but rather to simply “put a stone in [the other person’s] shoe.”
Lucas, on the other hand, “gets it.” As he said on page 49 of Ask Them Why, “Of course, our goal will always be the proclamation of the gospel.” His approach not only has as its end the gospel, but he also recognizes and emphasizes that it’s not our job to convince, convict or to convert anyone—that is the Holy Spirit’s job—and He does that via His Word (Romans 10:17):
Before proceeding, an important truth needs to be stated. The power of salvation resides in the gospel message itself (Rom. 1:16; Heb. 4:12; 2 Tim. 3:15). Even as a timid high school student, I could have been an effective witness for Christ by sharing the gospel in spite of not being equipped to defend my beliefs. God changes hearts through His Word by the power of the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5). This transaction does not depend on our debating skills (1 Cor. 2:1-5). Therefore, this book does not proceed from the premise that the lost will remain unconverted unless we master certain logical arguments. (19)
I am still of the opinion that every Christian—and not just those interested in apologetics—should read Koukl’s Tactics, but I now recommend that he follow that up with a reading of Ask Them Why. If someone can’t be bothered to read both, then my strong recommendation would be to prefer Jay Lucas’ Ask Them Why.
I used to say that Tactics was the single most important book in my apologetics library, but after reading Ask Them Why, I now have a new #1.