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K99WARD · 10-11-2013, 19:11

"Engaging the Closed Minded" by Dan Story

In the late 1970s, while living in San Diego, my wife and I became good friends with neighbors across the street. We had a lot in common: we were about the same age, our kids got along well, and we enjoyed playing games and going backpacking together.
The wife, I’ll call her “Cindy,” was a third-generation Christian Scientist. Her husband, “Jeff,” I can best describe as an I-couldn’t-care-less-about-religion secular humanist. At the time, I was pretty much an “Easter Sunday Christian” (that’s normally when I attended church), and, as far as I knew, Christian Science was just another Christian denomination that liked science!
Eventually, both our families moved out of town. We moved to a rural community twenty-five miles away, and Jeff and Cindy moved to central California. A few years later, however, they returned to the San Diego area.
During the interim between our friends’ move to central California and their return to San Diego, I became a Christian and returned to college, eventually earning a Master of Arts degree in Christian apologetics. So by the time Jeff and Cindy returned to Southern California, I knew that Christian Science was a cult—and I was eager for a confrontation.
The opportunity came one evening when we invited them over for supper. After eating we went outside to sit on our deck. I immediately unsheathed my apologetic sword and plunged into battle. The result was disastrous.
It wasn’t that I failed to give a good account of myself. With little effort, I cut to shreds Cindy’s erroneous beliefs. I deftly pared her objections to Christianity while skillfully slicing away her defenses of Christian Science. She had no answers to my challenges, no rebuttal to my facts. I did my job, all right. In my mind’s eye, she had to admit that, at best, she was simply deceived by an inane cult, and, at worst, she was a naive buffoon.
She did neither. And we never heard from Cindy and Jeff again.

Story, D. (1999). Engaging the closed minded: presenting your faith to the confirmed unbeliever (pp. 7–8). Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications.

10-11-2013, 19:11	#93
K99WARD Full Member Join Date: Nov 2013 Posts: 209 Liked: 3 times Rep Power: 0	Re: Christian Science "Engaging the Closed Minded" by Dan Story In the late 1970s, while living in San Diego, my wife and I became good friends with neighbors across the street. We had a lot in common: we were about the same age, our kids got along well, and we enjoyed playing games and going backpacking together. The wife, I’ll call her “Cindy,” was a third-generation Christian Scientist. Her husband, “Jeff,” I can best describe as an I-couldn’t-care-less-about-religion secular humanist. At the time, I was pretty much an “Easter Sunday Christian” (that’s normally when I attended church), and, as far as I knew, Christian Science was just another Christian denomination that liked science! Eventually, both our families moved out of town. We moved to a rural community twenty-five miles away, and Jeff and Cindy moved to central California. A few years later, however, they returned to the San Diego area. During the interim between our friends’ move to central California and their return to San Diego, I became a Christian and returned to college, eventually earning a Master of Arts degree in Christian apologetics. So by the time Jeff and Cindy returned to Southern California, I knew that Christian Science was a cult—and I was eager for a confrontation. The opportunity came one evening when we invited them over for supper. After eating we went outside to sit on our deck. I immediately unsheathed my apologetic sword and plunged into battle. The result was disastrous. It wasn’t that I failed to give a good account of myself. With little effort, I cut to shreds Cindy’s erroneous beliefs. I deftly pared her objections to Christianity while skillfully slicing away her defenses of Christian Science. She had no answers to my challenges, no rebuttal to my facts. I did my job, all right. In my mind’s eye, she had to admit that, at best, she was simply deceived by an inane cult, and, at worst, she was a naive buffoon. She did neither. And we never heard from Cindy and Jeff again. Story, D. (1999). Engaging the closed minded: presenting your faith to the confirmed unbeliever (pp. 7–8). Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications.