Paul at Mars Hill (Part 2)

July 8, 12:15 PMMethodist ExaminerJames-Michael Smith

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The ancient steps leading to Mars Hill that Paul would've climbed

[Click HERE for part 1 of this article]

The second point of interest is found in the fact that Paul argued; and not only that, but he argued with the Jews in the synagogue as well as the people in the market place.

Many within the Church’s ranks today feel that arguing is not Christ-like and has no place in sharing the Gospel. This is unfortunately due to the fact that at times some Christians have wholly replaced the conviction of the Holy Spirit in regards to a person’s conversion experience with argument and reasoning. As a result, many Christians have taken the opposite path and abandoned the use of argumentation and reason altogether as unbiblical, or useful only when discoursing in the halls of academia.

This is in clear contrast with Scripture for here we see the apostle arguing not just with the “intellectual folk” (the Stoics and Epicureans) or the “religious folk” (in the synagogue), but also with the “everyday folk” (in the market place).

For Paul, despite the fact that the Gospel did not rest solely on “wise and persuasive words,” it could certainly be--and often was--proclaimed using reason and argumentation. In regards to the abandonment of rational argumentation, in a critique of Martin Luther's denunciation of reason, John Wesley rightly noted:

How does he...decry reason, right or wrong, as an irreconcilable enemy to the Gospel of Christ! Whereas, what is reason (the faculty so called) but the power of apprehending, judging, and discoursing? Which power is no more to be condemned in the gross, than seeing, hearing, or feeling.

Wesley, John, The Works of John Wesley (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998) p. 315. [This is part of Wesley’s entry from June 15, 1741 in a criticism of Luther’s “Commentation on the Epistle to the Galatians."]

With regards to their unbelief, many skeptics hide behind the wall of the Gospel’s apparent "unreasonableness."  If the Christian faith is intellectually bankrupt, then one really doesn't need to give it any further thought.  Of course this is a bogus claim popularized by many of the so-called "New Atheists" (Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, etc.), but so long as Christians refrain from engaging their culture intellectually, many who buy into this notion will remain behind this hollow wall of argumentation and never be exposed to the true Gospel.

Moving on in the text, we find another curios phenomenon. Though the Athenian philosophers considered Paul’s talk of Jesus and the resurrection “idle babbling” about “strange deities” they nevertheless took him to Mars Hill (the Areopagus) and asked if he would explain his “new teaching.”

Luke parenthetically tells us that the Athenians were always looking for opportunities to say something different or hear something new. This is interesting because Athens was considered the center of knowledge in the ancient world. And yet, despite being immersed in the various religions and philosophies of the day, the Athenian philosophers still had a craving for some kind of new truth. Amidst an extremely pluralistic society there was still something about the message of the Gospel that intrigued them.

This is very much the case within modern academia. One need only observe apologetic lectures (such as the Veritas Forum) or open-air preaching on college campuses to see how people, though they disagree with (and sometimes despise) them, will spend literally hours listening and debating with the apologist or preacher. In fact one could argue that the modern university is a sort of Areopagus of our time. 

Later in his sermon, Paul goes on to say that people everywhere are searching and even groping for God. In his mind, the Athenians’ temple to the unknown god no doubt provides an example of such searching. According to his letter to the church in Rome, God’s presence is a reality that even the most callous skeptic is aware of (Romans 1).  All of this should serve as a constant reminder to the Christian that no matter how much people ridicule or revile the message of the cross, there is still a yearning for truth in our culture that only the Gospel can fulfill.

It is also worth noting the beliefs of Paul’s listeners and their similarity to the ideals prevalent in our society. The Epicureans adhered to a naturalistic philosophy that deemed pleasure the ultimate goal. The Stoics, though also naturalistic, saw virtue as the highest good. The current philosophies of hedonism and humanism, "Hefner" and "Turner" if you will, have much in common with these philosophies of old.

[To be continued...]