Intellectuals Don't Need God and Other Modern Myths

By Alister E. McGrath, Zondervan Publishing House,
Grand Rapids, MI 49530, 1993, 241 pages

Alister McGrath is a research lecturer in theology at the University of Oxford. He is an excellent author who has a good mind and a wealth of illustrations to make his points. This book would appear to be a book challenging modern atheism and agnosticism, but while it does do that it is primarily a primer for Christians who want to help in their own personal debates with skeptics. The whole book is written with a "if this happens, here is what you do" type of atmosphere.

McGrath begins his discussion with a look at apologetics and what it can and cannot do. He then engages in an excellent discussion of those things which keep people from becoming Christians. He is very relevant in this section and does deal with the issues that skeptics raise--including suffering, hypocrisy, the resurrection, and relevancy. His insight is unique, and he offers good answers to tough questions. This section of the book is exceptional. He then explores different world views with attention to the question of why Christianity instead of some other philosophy or religion. Again, this section is handled in a unique and effective way. The last section of the book makes suggestions as to how to apply apologetics to preaching and teaching with some suggestions concerning how to handle confrontations and challenges.

This is an excellent book. Because of its style, it might not be good to just hand to a skeptical friend, but there is a gold mine of approaches and answers to skeptics that makes the book very useful and helpful. We recommend it highly.

Back to Contents Does God Exist?, MarApr99.