Francis Schaeffer Trilogy blog series Pt 1

     Good old Amazon delivered Francis Schaeffer's Trilogy to my door yesterday and I began reading it last night. The God who is there, Escape from Reason, and He is there and He is not silent all in one volume. My goal for this series is to write quick summarizing reflections on what I'm reading.

     There has been a major shift over the last 200 years by 'a change in the concept of truth'. And this change has taken such a deep rootedness in our mindset that it has become the new prevailing
approach.

     There was a time when most people were working from the same basic approach. Namely, that there is a such a thing as an Absolute and a such a thing as an Antithesis.  So an Absolute, for example would be to say the stop light is red and to know that it is red for me, for you, and for everyone. Red is what it is for everyone. The reality of its redness transcends opinion, circumstances, etc. An example of Antithesis would be: the stop light is red therefore it is not blue. If A is true, then non-A cannot also be true.

     The major shift in the concept of truth that now prevails throws out Absolutes and Antithesis. So when I say the stop light is red the present mindset might reply, "Oh what is red really? How can anybody know for sure if there even is a such a thing as definitely red? Red is probably just a concept, not a reality." Ironically, the only absolute is that nothing is allowed to be absolute.

     Likewise, with Antithesis, if I say the stop light is red therefore it is not blue I might get replies like, "Well, maybe it's red to you, but maybe it's a little bit blue to me. What gives you the right to say what's not blue? Maybe what I see as blue is what you see as red."

     The result of all this is that the basic grounding principles of logic, reason, and truth have been re-worked so pervasively that our whole approach to life becomes one of instability, imprisonment to individual perception and distrust. We've been taught that the only truth is that you can't know what's true, that the only thing you can believe in is what you feel is true. That doubt is the only real source of identity.

     Schaeffer points out that as Christians we must not remain ignorant of this shift if we are to communicate truth into a society that no longer knows how to approach truth. How do we do this?