J.V. Fesko’s forthcoming book, “An Introduction to Reformed Apologetics: Warring with Idols” (Baker Academic, 2026), is a continuation of what he describes as his “efforts to ‘reform apologetics’” (xii). The need to reform apologetics, Fesko argues, is primarily due to missteps taken by some Reformed apologists in the 20th century, the primary culprit being Cornelius Van Til, founding professor of apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary. Fesko’s earlier book, “Reforming Apologetics: Retrieving the Classic Reformed Approach to Defending the Faith” (Baker Academic, 2019), provides a running critique of Van Til’s apologetic approach that readers will similarly find in this second book. 

However, his latest book, as the title suggests, is an introduction geared toward practice. Fesko continues stressing the need to correct course while presenting a framework for apologetics that he believes is true to the best of the Reformed tradition and providing basic directives for an apologetic approach built on this tradition. 

Hence, the book is broken into two main sections: Groundwork for Reformed Apologetics (chapters 1-5) and Basic Reformed Apologetics (chapters 6-12).

The subtitle of Fesko’s book is also significant: “Warring with Idols.” Fesko defines apologetics as “the art and discipline of engaging idolatry for the sake of promoting and defending the Christian faith” (3). Contrary to the so-called secularization thesis — which argues that our post-Enlightenment scientific age no longer has need of religion — humanity is, Fesko says, “hardwired for worship” (17). In Chapter 1 Fesko argues that “our task in apologetics is not about confronting unbelief but rather idolatry” (28). 

This focus stresses an essential feature of biblical anthropology. Despite what people may claim, we know they cannot escape their religious nature, because humanity is created in God’s image for fellowship with him. Those who deny him must find some substitute for him. 

The first section, “Groundwork for Reformed Apologetics,” focuses on what Fesko considers distinctives of a Reformed apologetic. The primary tools for the apologetic task, according to Fesko, are the book of nature and the book of Scripture coupled with confidence in the “basic reliability of the senses,” which he calls a “realistic epistemology” (44, cf. 55). Fesko claims these are the hallmarks of Christian apologetics reaching back to the early church. 

From the introduction forward, Fesko returns to this emphasis: “The chief tools for defending the faith are the books of nature and Scripture, or natural and supernatural theology” (3). God not only reveals himself in Scripture, which theologians refer to as God’s special revelation. As the Creator, God also reveals himself in nature, which theologians call general or natural revelation. Fesko describes the apologist as a conductor who coordinates “the truths of Scripture, creation, history, philosophy, literature, and science to defend the claims of Christianity” (43), all topics Fesko touches on to some degree in subsequent chapters. 

Fesko stresses both the book of nature and the book of Scripture because he believes that some Reformed apologists took a wrong turn in the 20th century. By focusing almost exclusively on Scripture while largely ignoring God’s revelation in creation, they removed one leg on which Christian apologetics stands, effectively crippling it. Fesko faults Van Til for this (5, 47-48, 98, 180). 

Natural theology draws conclusions from God’s natural revelation in creation, history, science, and so forth, before turning to truths taught in Scripture. According to Fesko, “for the sake of the unbeliever who does not accept the authority of Scripture, we can use natural theology to argue for God’s existence before we defend the claim that Jesus is God” (44). 

Fesko argues that the apostle Paul’s speech in Athens as recorded in Acts 17:22-31 (see Chapter 3, 63ff) contains the essential elements of a Reformed apologetic. Paul, in contrast to his apologetic in Jewish synagogues, “pivots to the book of nature rather than employ the book of Scripture as his opening argument” (66). He begins with God as Creator before moving to God as Redeemer. 

However, Fesko says that Paul “does not linger on the shores of general revelation. He moves to special revelation and discusses Christ, the final judgment, the need to repent of sin and unbelief, and the resurrection of the dead” (71). Thus, “In Paul’s hands, general and special revelation, natural and supernatural theology, work in tandem in the task of apologetics” (72). 

The second section, “Basic Reformed Apologetics,” applies the apologetic approach Fesko describes in the first section, highlighting various arguments and evidence drawn from the book of nature and relating these to what is found in the book of Scripture. 

Three chapters focus on the teleological argument, “how God has planted evidence of his being, wisdom, and power in the creation” (105). He briefly examines the biblical and historical foundations for this argument before turning to evidence that indicates that the universe did not come about by chance but instead exhibits design (128). This is not only evident at the macrocosmic scale of the universe with its perfect balance that allows for life, but also more narrowly in the intricacies of the human body (142-44). God is perceived in things both large and small, and the apologist’s arsenal must include them all.

In subsequent chapters, Fesko continues to use Acts 17 as a guide. One chapter addresses the use of non-Christian literature in apologetics, patterned on Paul who quotes pagan writers in his Areopagus speech (161ff). Literature and other products of popular culture evidence an “imagination informed by the image of God and the created world around them” (165). Like Paul, our apologetic should capitalize on this creative capacity that seeks to provide meaning and hope, looking for ways these artifacts of the human imagination connect with God’s truth in Scripture. 

In a following chapter, Fesko stresses the evidence for the resurrection, providing standard arguments for Christ as a historical figure, including testimony to his death and witnesses to his resurrection (179) from writings outside of Scripture together with accounts found in the Bible. Fesko also counters common non-Christian explanations for the empty tomb (199-201). Once again, he contrasts this emphasis on historical evidence with those who follow the apologetic method of Van Til, which Fesko claims tends to discourage the use of evidence and instead argues exclusively from Scripture (180).  

Fesko also addresses the problem of evil, a perennial challenge that Fesko frames through the books of nature and Scripture, speaking to human responsibility as well as God’s sovereignty. He gets into some detail in a discussion of divine concurrence (216-20), while pointing to the cross as God’s ultimate answer to evil (231). Fesko reminds us, what man means for evil, God means for good (221-23).

 Finally, in the last chapter, Fesko stresses the importance of love in apologetics, especially “in an age when rationalism has given way to irrationalism” (235). Fesko recognizes that the arguments he presents, grounded in the book of nature and read in conjunctions with the book of Scripture, may lack persuasive force in a culture that self-consciously rejects transcendence and asserts human autonomy (239). In such a setting, “Love is the Christian’s best response to the culture’s irrationality” (244). 

As noted above, this book should be read as part of Fesko’s effort to “reform apologetics” (xii). This reform, Fesko believes, requires reaching back beyond certain 20th century Reformed apologists and retrieving an earlier method to redeploy in our day. 

The primary criticism of Van Til and his heirs is that they supposedly downplay the role of general revelation — what Fesko refers to as the book of nature — and instead build their apologetic almost exclusively on Scripture (5). In such an approach, Fesko claims, the role of evidence is severely curtailed and may even be considered sinful (5, 180). However, as has been noted in an extensive review of Fesko’s earlier book on apologetics, this misrepresents Van Til’s position. 

Van Til does not diminish the role of general revelation in apologetics. If anything, as I have argued elsewhere, Van Til enhances the significance of general revelation for apologetics. According to Van Til, the “mark of God’s ownership was from the beginning writ large on all the facts of the universe.” God’s revelation in nature is clear and inescapable. Indeed, says Van Til, “God’s revelation in nature, together with God’s revelation in Scripture, form God’s one grand scheme of revelation of himself to man. The two forms of revelation must therefore be seen as presupposing and supplementing one another.” This relationship between natural and supernatural, or general and special, revelation as stressed in Reformed theology is foundational for Van Til’s apologetic method. 

The Reformed apologist aims to demonstrate the deep resonance between God’s Word and God’s world, between special revelation and general revelation, to show that the facts we find in the world fit with what God reveals in his word, and that they do not make sense otherwise. To suppress the truth about God evident in the facts of the universe and to seek an alternate explanation is to make nonsense of the world (Romans 1:18-23). 

Van Til’s apologetic method capitalizes on this relationship between general and special revelation. According to Van Til, the unbeliever “has consistently felt that there is something lacking in all his interpretations of the universe.” Thus, “he has misgivings.” This experience is clear evidence that “men cannot find final rest within the universe alone.” This is what the Reformed apologist must press.

In fact, Fesko himself stresses this inseparable relationship between general and special revelation. Following Calvin, and similar to Van Til, Fesko frequently speaks of the need for the “corrective lenses of Scripture” apart from which we look upon the world “with blurry eyes” (71). Fesko says, “We always give interpretive priority, of course, to special revelation — the corrective lenses of Scripture” (57; cf. 64, 94). He says, “The works and the word of God should never be dissociated in our thoughts” (58). He claims, “Uncoupled from the authority of Scripture, creation is no longer legible revelation” (59). All who value Van Til and his apologetic approach will heartily affirm these statements. 

This conviction concerning the indispensable role of God’s word to correctly interpret the world is what Van Til calls a “revelational epistemology.” Fesko advocates instead for what he calls a “realistic epistemology,” which he describes as a commitment to “the basic reliability of the senses” as sources through which we receive the truth (44, cf. 55, 59-61). 

However, the issue is not the basic reliability of the senses but how we interpret what the senses receive. Again, according to Paul, “what may be known about God is plain,” but the sinful response is to “suppress the truth” in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18-20). Yet, due to the constant pressure of God’s revelation that surrounds us, no one is able consistently to suppress the truth about God evident throughout the world, including that within our own constitution as those created in God’s image with consciences informed by God’s own character (Romans 1:32; 2:14-15).  

Van Til’s insight was to leverage this dynamic in his apologetic method. People know God through general revelation (Romans 1:21). But they become futile in their thinking as they suppress their knowledge of God and substitute something else in his place (Romans 1:21-23). Van Til’s apologetic aims to expose the futility of non-Christian thought, to demonstrate that they are darkened in their understanding due to their hardness of heart (Ephesians 4:18). 

Van Til states his method in two simple steps: the apologist “will first present the facts for what they really are, and then he will challenge the natural man by arguing that unless they are accepted for what they are according to the Christian interpretation of them, no facts mean anything at all.” In other words, only the Christian interpretation of the facts, as special revelation is related to general revelation, provides a coherent account of reality. The non-Christian’s attempt to account for the facts always comes up short, filled with tensions and contradictions, unable to ground the meaning, significance, and moral conviction he craves.

Fesko’s apologetic fails to press this challenge. This is evident, for instance, in his treatment of idolatry (3, 28, 66-67). Fesko is right to recognize that our apologetic does not address true atheism but rather idolatry. Indeed, as he states, humanity is hardwired for worship (17). However, this insight does not sufficiently inform Fesko’s apologetic method. Idols need to be identified but also exposed as poor substitutes for the living and true God. 

This is the polemic against idolatry found in Scripture. For instance, in Isaiah 41:21-24, God calls idols to, “Set forth your case . . . bring your proofs.” He calls them to explain past events and to foretell the future “that we may know that you are gods.” The conclusion: “Behold, you are nothing.” Only the living and true God can provide such an account. 

Jeremiah compares idols to “broken cisterns that can hold no water” in contrast to the God of Israel who is “the fountain of living waters” (Jeremiah 2:13). This is the contrast our apologetic must stress. No substitute for God can hold water. And this is precisely what Van Til’s apologetic aims to demonstrate. “Behold, they have rejected the word of the Lord, so what wisdom is in them?” (Jeremiah 8:9).

Although Fesko portrays Van Til as at odds with the Reformed tradition, careful readers who consider Fesko’s various references to Calvin, Kuyper, Bavinck, Vos, and Machen will find no true conflict. No doubt, Van Til sought to clarify the significance of Reformed theology for apologetics and developed a method that furthered its application. But his apologetic approach is not contrary to the truth they taught. In fact, Van Til’s apologetic more deeply appropriates that truth. Fesko himself is at his best when closest to Van Til, as when he notes the inseparable relationship between general and special revelation. It may be that in his continuing efforts to reform apologetics he will come closer still. 

Rob Edwards is associate professor of Apologetics and Pastoral Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary.