Deeper Waters Podcast 11/25/2017: Brett Kunkle

What’s coming up? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

First off, your prayers are appreciated today. Earlier this morning, we took our little cat Shiro to the vet. He has some dental problems and likely will have one tooth extracted. We hope that all of his issues right now are dental. That’s all I think it is as well as other people familiar with cats we’ve talked to, but Allie is scared about it. We pick him up this afternoon.

Now on to the information about the show. I know the date is for tomorrow, but we’re actually going to be recording this on Wednesday so it could be a little bit longer before you get to hear it. Still, the content will be the same.

Getting apologetics out has always been important and today, it’s especially important to get it out to the young. Our youth need apologetics more than ever and the good news is, it’s out there more than ever. There are several great programs out there that are helping to introduce Christian apologetics to youth.

Someone told me about one of these organizations called Maven. It’s run by my guest this time. Maven focuses on the youth and gives them three of Mortimer Adler’s six great ideas. The three it works on are truth, goodness, and beauty.

Why do we need these? Because the opposite messages are being given to our youth every day. If we don’t give them a message, they’ll only receive one message and it won’t be the right one. Maven focuses on reaching the youth so they can be prepared to engage with the culture. The person behind it is my guest, Brett Kunkle.

So who is he?

According to his bio:

Brett Kunkle is the founder and president of MAVEN (www.maventruth.com), a movement to equip the next generation know truth, pursue goodness and create beauty. He has more than 25 years of experience working with junior high, high school, and college students. Brett has developed a groundbreaking approach to mission trips, creating a one-of-a-kind experience that immerses participants in real-life engagement in apologetics, theology, worldview and evangelism in Berkeley, California, and Salt Lake City, Utah. In addition, Brett is a Teaching Fellow at the Impact 360 Institute.  He was an associate editor for the Apologetics Study Bible for Students and co-authored A Practical Guide to Culture: Helping the Next Generation Navigate Today’s World. He received his Masters in philosophy of religion and ethics from Talbot School of Theology. Brett lives with his wife and kids in Southern California.

I look forward to talking to Brett about these topics. As readers of this blog and listeners of my podcast know, I am quite passionate about making sure that the youth have apologetics. Please be watching your podcast feed for this upcoming episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast. If you haven’t yet also, please go on iTunes and leave a positive review of the Deeper Waters Podcast. It means a lot to me to see them.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

 

Deeper Waters Podcast 5/6/2017: Greg Koukl

What’s coming up? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

On the next episode, I plan to have my guest sit down for story time. We’re going to tell the greatest story there is. We’re going to tell the Story of Reality. We might think fictional stories could be the most exciting stories of all, but we’re going to be told something different. We’re going to be told His story and how our story interacts with His story and we’re going to see if it’s even better.

The writer of the book is someone who has a great mind but also a great way of speaking and telling a story. Many of his books are very conversational in nature in that you think he really is talking to you and not just giving a talk and you’re sitting in the audience. This could be because he has his own radio show and regularly has to engage in topics with people from all persuasions live. That person is Greg Koukl.

So who is he?

According to his bio:

Greg Koukl holds MA degrees in both apologetics and philosophy. He’s spoken on over 70 university campuses and hosted his own radio talk show for 27 years defending “Christianity worth thinking about.” Greg is founder and president of Stand to Reason (str.org) and serves as adjunct professor of Christian apologetics at Biola University

Koukl says the story is about the beginning, the end, and everything in between. That’s quite a claim and we will be putting it to the test. What is this great story that Koukl wants to share? Why should we even call it a story? Couldn’t we say it’s just a story, much like a fairy tale and perhaps it would bring us some comfort, but it is again, just a story? What would it mean if the story was true? Is there any reason to think that the story is true?

How do we best communicate this story as well? Again, if we say that it is a story, then people will consider it like a fairy tale. How do we tell them that this isn’t a fairy tale but more in the language of Lewis and Tolkien, that this is true myth? This is the story that we have all longed for but has in the end turned out to be true?

Koukl is a talented writer who speaks to the everyday man on the street. I know Greg Koukl well and one thing I’ve always noticed about him is that he’s in many ways very ordinary in his life. One of my first memories of being with him involved being at a conference and wearing a hat and posing for a picture and just before it went off, he did a joke move and turned it to the side on me. When we lived in Knoxville and Charlotte and Greg came to both places, Allie and I made a point of seeing him.

I hope you’ll be looking for the next episode. We did have some technical difficulties last week and will have to reschedule, but we hope this week will go better. Please also go on ITunes and leave a positive review of the Deeper Waters Podcast.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

 

Deeper Waters Podcast 7/6/2013

What’s coming up on this week’s podcast? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

Our boys in blue have always been known for putting away the bad guys behind bars and protecting the populace. While most of them go after physical crimes, there was one that decided to also take his skills of investigation and go after intellectual crimes, that is, false ideas floating around concerning Christianity. This was as a result of his using his detective skills to answer the greatest cold-case of all time. Did Jesus rise from the dead?

That should be enough to tell you who my guest is this week. If you don’t already know and you’re enthused about Christian apologetics, then this is someone that you definitely need to know. He is the newest member of the Stand To Reason Family. He is the producer of the Please Convince Me web site and podcast. He is the author of Cold-Case Christianity.

That’s right, my guest is Mr. J. Warner Wallace.

I’m quite excited to have him as a guest on the show as I’ve found him to not only be a great defender of the faith, but a good friend as well. J. Warner Wallace is a really down to Earth guy who has a passion for what he does and that passion extends especially to the youth of today.

As many of you know, the youth of today concern me greatly. So many of our Christians are falling away by following just one click. A young man can be on YouTube listening to his favorite Christian video and see a link to an atheist video in the related links and there gets that objection he’s never been told about in school.

All it takes is just one click.

It’s for reasons like this that J. Warner Wallace wrote his excellent book “Cold-Case Christianity” which we’ll be spending a good deal of time talking about. Cold-Case Christianity is one of those entry level books that is going to be for this generation what Case for Christ was for an earlier generation.

Cold-Case Christianity has the advantage of not only giving you good information, but also about giving you proper thinking tools when examining evidence. In other words, you don’t just get the answers, but you get told how it is that one is supposed to be able to reach those answers and what mistakes to avoid.

The book is so good that when I begin teaching through Skype for a church up north this month, it’s going to be the textbook that I’ll be using.

The Deeper Waters Podcast, as I hope you know, airs from 3-5 PM EST on Saturday. Our show will be live so we welcome your calls. The call-in number for our show is 714-242-5180. I urge you to listen live to the show, but keep in mind that you can always download a podcast and listen to it later on.

So please join me this Saturday as I welcome on my fellow apologist, and even more importantly, my friend, J. Warner Wallace.

The link can be found here.

In Christ,
Nick Peters