Book Review Beyond Opinion by Ravi Zacharias

Description from Ravi Zacharias International Ministries :

Respected apologist Ravi Zacharias was once sharing his faith with a Hindu when the man asked: "If the Christian faith is truly supernatural, why is it not more evident in the lives of so many Christians I know?" The question hit hard, and this book is an answer. Its purpose is to equip Christians everywhere to simultaneously defend the faith and be transformed by it into people of compassion.

Title:	Beyond Opinion: Living the Faith We Defend
Author:	Ravi Zacharias
Publisher:	Thomas Nelson
Date:	2007
ISBN:	9780849946530
Genre:	Non-Fiction
Format:	Trade Paperback, 338 pages
Rating:

Beyond Opinion: Living the Faith We Defend by Ravi Zacharias is a strong volume on the topic of apologetics. In Section One: Addressing the Difficult Questions, the author goes into great detail to address challenges against the Bible from five specific areas: atheism, youth, Islam, Eastern religions, and science. With the exception of youth, the majority of the groups included in this section have developed specific belief systems that are at odds with those of Christianity. For this reason, Challenges from Youth appears to be out of place in this section. I understand its inclusion in Part One: Giving an Answer. But since it talks about preparing Christian youth to defend their faith, I would expect to see it included in Section Two: Addressing the Questions Behind the Questions.

In Beyond Opinion, Zacharias assembles a team of eleven contributors and presents their views of various topics. Nine are workers in his global ministry: Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). This book was my introduction to RZIM.

When I read in the description that the focus of this book would be apologetics, I expected to read commentary that would prepare the reader to defend his faith. But the sub-title, Living the Faith We Defend, describes the true essence of the author's message. The examples a Christian sets as he lives the faith he defends can do so much more than any argument he could "win." My church's slogan lines up with this concept—and exhorts members to be "living proof of a loving God to a watching world." Having internalized this slogan, it was easy to grasp the concept behind the sub-title. Consequently, my favorite chapter is entitled The Church's Role in Apologetics and the Development of the Mind, written by the author.

• As we have noted in this book, the ultimate calling upon the Christian is to live a life reflecting the person of Christ. This involves a threefold process. First, we cannot take seriously the skeptic's difficult questions until we ourselves have also worked through them. Second, when such answers are known, they must then be internalized (the process of spiritual transformation) so that, third, these answers will be lived out before a hurting and hungry world.
  
• . . . The Irish evangelist Gypsy Smith once said, "There are five Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and the Christian, and some people will never read the first four." In other words, apologetics is seen before it is heard.

Beyond Opinion read like a textbook for me; and I struggled with the presentation. The reader with a strong background in theology is the one who will get the most from the discussions it presents. There is a lot of detail for the layman to absorb. As I read I was reminded of a pre-blog review I wrote of Building a Biblical Worldview Verse by Verse by Brannon Howse. In it I recall making a statement about apologetics—or what I thought it was. On a 0-to-10 scale, the ease of Howse's presentation places it in the 3 range while the complexity of Zacharias' book places it at about 9. The ideal book for me would be somewhere in the 5-to-7 range.

Though I've read many books on Christianity, I didn't recognize the names of his colleagues. And my preference leans not toward the contemporary evangelistic authors of this century and the latter part of the last. I'm comfortable with the more spiritual writings of Henry Drummond, Oswald Chambers, Brother Lawrence, and Andrew Murray. With Beyond Opinion, I was introduced to a league of apologists that my brother, a Baptist Minister, might read. I did, however, come away with a better understanding of what constitutes apologetics.

As a reviewer for Book Sneeze, I received a complimentary trade paperback edition of Beyond Opinion directly from the publisher. This has in no way influenced my review of the book. I have neither been offered nor received monetary compensation from the author, publisher, or other literary agents. I thank Thomas Nelson for allowing me the opportunity to write an impartial review. Similar versions of this review will be posted on LibraryThing and at the Barnes & Noble website.