Before I was converted to the Lord Jesus Christ, I had a few friends who claimed to believe in Jesus but, for various reasons, had rejected any necessary urgency in following Him. At that time, the only thought I had was to agree with them. After I was converted to the Jesus of the Bible, I held to a commitment of following Him with the urgent conviction that He may return at any time as He promised with need to be ready to meet Him (1 Thessalonians 1:3; 2:4; 4:1, 7; 5:8-11).

Christianity is a religion founded in history. Its authoritative text, the New Testament, is a document likewise founded in history. Mythology is not history, and if Christianity were simply a compilation of mythological superstitions, then it would be abjectly divorced from the reality of history. But the very opposite is the case, as we shall see: Jesus Christ and His teaching and actions, including the miraculous, are grounded in human history and human relationship, and are neither explained nor defended in a vacuum outside the scope of literal, actual human experience. One may deny the meaning or purposes of the events recorded, but not the context of human experience in which they happened and are chronicled.

Brad Green, in Shaping a Christian Worldview, recounts the court case Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972) in which an Amish witness was being pressured to admit that the purpose of education was fundamentally secular. The prosecuting attorney asked Mr. Yoder, “The principal purpose to attend high school is to get education, is it not? Isn’t that the primary purpose?” The Amish gentleman replied, “Yes, but I think there is a great deal of difference what education means—education for what?” The attorney pressed his point, “To put it bluntly, education so the child can make his or her place in the world.” Mr. Yoder then astutely observed, “It depends which world” (89-90).