Bill, one of our chapter directors, he wrote,

why debating atheists can yield a return which would justify the effort.

And this is a response to Dr. Ryan Berg of the Gospel Coalition that Jeremy takes issue

with here.

It's a March article.

Should we bother debating atheists on the Gospel Coalition's website?

And Dr. Berg, he argues that the answer to this is no.

He thinks that doing so does not result in a good return on the time that we invest

in it, especially if we're trying to fulfill the great commission and get some things done.

It starts the article talking about some of the debates on internet message boards and

some of the stats that show 9 and 10 atheists claim to never darken the door of a church

and 95% of them say that religion is not important in their lives at all.

Now, that drops down a little bit with agnostics.

They're a little more interested in they attend church a little more often, not too much

more often. Then it gets to the nuns, which identified the NONES, nothing in particular.

And he says, they seem to be a little more open to the Gospel and we ought to really be

concentrating our efforts on them.

Well, I think it's really important to understand Dr. Berg's definition of what a debate is.

When I first saw the headline, I thought, wow, he must think that these public debates that I

engage in are not worth the effort, which I am absolutely convinced would be mistaken.

The debates have a profound effect upon people in making them more open to the Gospel

and all you have to do is read the testimonial page of our reasonable faith website to see

...