Faith, Work, and Economics
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 59, No. 2 - Spring 2017
Managing Editor: W. Madison Grace II
Finding Truth: 5 Principles for Unmasking Atheism, Secularism, and Other God Substitutes. By Nancy Pearcey. Colorado Springs: David C. Cook, 2015. 384 pages. Hardcover, $22.99.
Nancy Pearcey is Professor and Scholar in Residence at Houston Baptist University, the Founder and Director of the Francis Schaeffer Institute and a fellow with the Seattle-based Discovery Institute. She teaches and writes as an apologist—affirming a biblical worldview. The main theme contained within Finding Truth is that mankind cannot suppress general revelation, with the implication being that a Christian worldview is proper because God’s image means man is both rational and responsible (1 Cor 2:16). Pearcey’s purpose is to claim that tough-minded realism, rationality, and a careful weighing of the evidence proves that the Christian worldview is robust enough to withstand all challenges and illuminates every area of life that is worthy of captivating both mankind’s heart and mind. She concludes that all non-Christian worldviews are deficient and amount to nothing more than idol worship (Rom 1:18–32).
Pearcey identifies five principles in which to deal with non-biblical worldviews, those which she classifies as idolatry. These principles are as follows: 1) identify the idol, 2) identify the idol’s reductionism, 3) test the idol in order to see whether it contradicts what we know about the world, 4) test the idol in order to ascertain if it contradicts itself, and 5) replace the idol by making a case for Christianity.
Pearcey states that God is divine; the self-existent, eternal reality, reality that is the origin of everything (66). Those who reject God as the first principle of being end up making an idol of matter and material (70). Human nature is always defined by its relationship to the ultimate reality, so whether one believes it is a transcendent God or matter makes all the difference.
Believing only in inductive empiricism (science) makes an idol of the human senses, expresses Pearcey. The resurrection, factual evidence of the claims of the New Testament, manuscript evidence, and archeology are all evidence that support a biblical worldview (John 1:1). Human consciousness is not an illusion and is the Achilles heel of Darwinism. Reducing mankind to a machine is reductionistic and has negative ethical implications.
Pearcey declares that any rejection of the personal and divine God, leading people to believe that they are now free of God, leads one to deny human freedom. Any rejection of human free will dehumanizes humanity and is a claim that in their essence humans are simply robots (142). This statement cannot be accepted as true based upon human experience across time. The Bible teaches that human beings exercise moral responsibility (Duet 30:15, 19).
Human rationality is adequate for understanding reality because the universe is a reflection of the mind of God, in whose image man was made (Gen 1:26–28) (189). If man is simply an evolutionary animal, his rationality cannot be trusted since it would not be guaranteed to align with the truth. Inductive empirical investigation (science) requires God; otherwise, there is no way to ascertain truth or meaning. The truth of Christianity best accounts for the reality that we observe in the world.
Pearcey is a student of Francis Schaeffer (1912–1984). Emphasizing Schaeffer’s recognition that the world and the church has largely lost its way in being committed to the reality of objective truth, Pearcey properly argues against the divorce of faith and reason. Rejecting any two-tracked approach to truth, she believes truth is best understood as unified based upon a biblical worldview. She argues persuasively that Christian truth can take on any secular and non-religious truth claims. She maintains that God’s communication to man via the words of Scripture provides an essential connection between the truth of history, the natural realm, and the Creator God.
Pearcey astutely points out that materialists fail logically to come to grips with the implications of their worldview. Pearcey recognizes that evolutionary materialists are guilty of compartmentalized thinking and must admit that their own worldview fails. Accusing materialists of Orwellian doublethink, Pearcey rightly diagnoses that atheists, secularists, and materialists suppress the truth (Rom 1:18). Pearcey is troubled that society has lost its conception of a total and unified truth—one that provides a foundation for morality, freedom, and human dignity.
This book is a fantastic work for the lay audience who wishes to take advantage of Schaeffer’s engaging approach to apologetics. I recommend this book for college and seminary students and interested lay apologists that desire to defend the biblical worldview.
