Send North America

Send North America: Overview from North American Mission Board on Vimeo.

July 30th -31st
First Baptist Church of Woodstock
Woodstock, Georgia
REGISTRATION PAGE

The Send North America Conference is a two-day experience designed for church planters, pastors, leaders and others committed to penetrating lostness in North America. Learn and interact with relevant leaders and practitioners during general sessions and tailored breakouts, with plenty of time and space for connecting, communicating and finding your place in the mission. Here, under one roof, Southern Baptists come together with a shared vision and common goals to bring about remarkable change to the spiritual landscape of North America. The Send North America Conference will equip you for your next step in reaching North America through Church Planting.


I'll be leading breakout sessions.  There are scholarships available if needed.  How do Apologetics and Church Planting come together?  Register today and I'll show you how in Georgia :-)


MJ

Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: Hasty Generalization

“This is the best post on apologetics ever!”

While at first glance--or from intuition--you might brush my statement aside as ludicrous, there is actually a fallacy represented here by my hyperbolic enthusiasm for my own writing: a hasty generalization.

Hasty generalization: generalizing about a class based upon a small or poor sample.

In committing the hasty generalization fallacy, there are normally two problems involved:
#1.Too small of a sample
#2. Not a representative sample

Going back to my original statement, I am committing a hasty generalization because I do not have access to all the posts written on apologetics in order to know if the post I just wrote is the best post ever.  The sample size for my inference would be too small.

Let’s look at the first problem: too small of a sample size.

If the sample size is too small, we risk it not being representative of the broader class which we are referencing.  In our political campaign examples, a Democrat candidate might claim that because Republican Randy Presidential Hopeful demeans other candidates then all Republicans are demeaning to other people; therefore a democrat cannot vote for any Republican.  But Republican Randy doesn’t represent how all Republicans would treat Democrats (or other republicans, independents, etc).  The sample size here is too small to make an accurate judgment.  However, I’ve heard this kind of inference from members of both parties! 

Let’s look at the second problem: not a representative sample.

Perhaps the person making the generalization has a large sample size but it may not be a sample that aptly represents the class.

Example: All plumbers are rich.  I just went to the international plumbers convention and studied 3,000 plumbers there.  They all made over $100,000 a year.[1]

Lee Strobel!

 

Look who I finally met!  Check out the latest from Strobel:

"Christians should understand that being able to give reasons for their faith is not merely an option – it's biblically mandated, says apologetics author and speaker Lee Strobel.

To help Christians better explain and defend their faith, Strobel and ministry associate Mark Mittelberg have launched The Institute at Cherry Hills, an apologetics and evangelism ministry at Cherry Hills Community Church in Highlands Ranch, Colo. The institute is aimed at innovating new approaches to defending and sharing the faith.

Strobel and Mittelberg will kick off a series of national simulcasts to be hosted at churches starting in March with the event "The Questions Christians Hope No One Will Ask," based on Mittelberg's book by the same title.

While an atheist, Strobel began to write a book disproving the existence of Jesus...(click here to continue reading)."

MJ

Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: Focus On The Presidential Campaigns

The campaigning and debating for the 2012 presidential election is already underway, as are loads of advertisements seeking to persuade voters to vote for one candidate or another.

The campaigns in our current culture are largely focused on presentation and perception (imagery), rather than on actually making good arguments for their political platform (rationality). As Christian philosopher, J.P. Moreland stated, “In the political process, the makeup man is more important than the speech writer, and we approach the voting booth, not on the basis of a well-developed philosophy of what the state should be, but with a heart full of images, emotions, and slogans all packed into thirty-second sound bites.”[1] The American public is likely to see lots of negative and positive imagery utilizing many logical fallacies to “trick” the voter into favoring a candidate. These fallacies could include (but are not limited to): transfer, ad hominem, hasty generalization, red herrings, appeal to pity, appeal to the people, straw man, loaded questions, and faulty appeal to authority.

Here are links to the past six blog posts dealing with these topics:

1. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: Focus On The Presidential Campaigns (May 10th, 2011)
2. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: Ad Hominem (May 18th, 2011)
3. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: the Red Herring (May 31st, 2011)
4. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: the Straw Man (June 17th, 2011)
5. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: Appeal to Pity (August 29th, 2011)
6. Logic in an Age of Persuasive Imagery: the Loaded Question (October 25th, 2011)

MJ

Welcome, Amanda!

Confident Christianity Apologetics Ministry welcomes new Assistant To The Director, Amanda Boone!  Well, officially she's an uncompensated intern, but the other title sounds really cool...

Amanda enjoys long walks through the office, taking time to just sit and plan how to organize my clutter, and can sing an intense worship tune on Sundays at church.

Confident Christianity is excited to bring on board a friend who is passionate about apologetics and mission work to help our growing ministry.    Amanda is currently attending Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary pursuing an MA in Christian Education (Emphasis in Missions).  She and her husband plan to do overseas missionary work.  Welcome, Amanda!

MJ

Christian Apologetics - Who Needs It?

2012 Preview

January 2nd
Oklahoma Baptist University
Guest Lecturer for J-Term Session
Shawnee, Oklahoma


January 9th
Oklahoma Baptist University
Guest Lecturer for J-Term Session
Shawnee, Oklahoma

January 10th-11th
"Defend The Faith 2012"
New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary
New Orleans, Louisiana


January 16th
Oklahoma Baptist University
Guest Lecturer for J-Term Session
Shawnee, Oklahoma

January 20th
Homeschool Honors Society Meeting
Houston, Texas


January 21st
i31 Young Women's Ministry
Southern Hills Baptist Church
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma


January 30th - February 1st
Baptist Convention of New Mexico
State Evangelism Conference


February 3rd-4th
SBTC Women's Forum
Bellevue Baptist Church
Hurst, Texas


February 10th-12th
TBD
Texas


February 17th-19th
Youth "Collide" Weekend
Nassau Bay Baptist Church
Houston, Texas
Nate Jordan, Associate Pastor of Students


March 9th-10th
Apologetics Canada Conference
Surrey, B.C.


March 24th-27th
Michigan Baptists State Evangelism Conference


March 31st
FBC Bosque Farms
Bosque Farms, New Mexico


April - B&H Publishing Group: BOOK RELEASE!
"Come Let Us Reason" edited by Paul Copan & William Lane Craig


April 13th-14th
Greer-Heard Forum
Shermer-Habermas
New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary
New Orleans, Louisiana


May 8th
CONFIDENT CHRISTIANITY ANNUAL FUND RAISER


June 8th-9th
Smart Faith Student Conference
Arizona


Kregel Publications: BOOK RELEASE!
Title Forthcoming
Author: Mary Jo Sharp


September 13th-15th
SBTC Women's Leadership Team Meeting


September 28th-29th
W Conference - Keynote Speaker
Southern Seminary Baptist Theological Seminary
Louisville, Kentucky


October 1st-2nd
Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma
Missional Ministry Conference
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma


November 8th-10th
Lifeway Event
National Women's Ministry Leadership Forum
Keynote Speaker
Nashville, Tennessee


November 14th-18th
ETS/EPS Annual Meeting
Milwaukee, Wisconsin