I really appreciated this book. Apologetics can often turn negative as it is the process of defending. And defending can often make a religion of love feel like a religion of war. Narrative Apologetics introduces the concept of using the gift of stories to defend the faith. I think this book serves a really unique purpose in the place of apologetics.

Apologists aim to affirm, defend, and explain Christian faith. Author Alister McGrath proposes that making apologetic cases using stories (narratives) creates a deeper and more meaningful case than a purely academic argument. And the Bible is full of such stories.

In Narrative Apologetics - Sharing The Relevance, Joy, and Wonder of The Christian Faith, Mr. McGrath takes the reader through many examples of narratives that can be used to make arguments, notably C. S. Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia. Most applicable are biblical cases that apologists can use to build bridges from our current culture to Christianity. Examples presented are the stories of Jesus, God’s Kingdom, the exodus from Eygpt, and captivity in Babylon.

Mr. McGrath lays the foundation of narrative apologetics. He calls upon apologists to out-narrate the dominant stories that currently shape our culture. Apologists can accomplish this by telling a better story than their rivals, using the concept he’s described in his book.

Narrative Apologetics is very academic and probably beyond usefulness for novices (like me). Even the section of “Practical Application” is not really applicable for newbies. Narrative Apologetics is well-written and organized. Even with the philosophical weight, the concept is made clear.

How this book affected me:
I wasn’t even familiar with the term apologetics until a few years ago and, quite honestly, it intimidated me. Having only a basic understanding that it was an academic exercise to make a case for Christianity to non-Christians, I knew I would be out of my element because I’m more of a touchy-feeler than a philosopher. But it intrigued me. When Baker Books presented Narrative Apologetics to me, I jumped at the chance to read it. Besides being a good reason to dip my toes into apologetics, I immediately related to the ‘narrative’ aspect. The subtitle of ‘Sharing The Relevance, Joy, and Wonder of The Christian Faith’ is my goal as a Christian, so it seemed to be a perfect fit.

This book proved my assumption to be correct that apologetics is quite academic and this book was not for novices.

Who would enjoy this book:
As stated in the book description, this book is intended for preachers and scholars. Apologists who are interested to understand the ‘emerging field’ of narrative apologetics would find this book to be very helpful due to the many examples presented.

Our Christian Book Reviews:
The book reviews at Finding God Among Us focus on Christian books - adult and children, fiction and nonfiction. We're proud to be included in the Top 50 Christian Book Review Bloggers. I chose to read an ARC from Baker Books, a division of Baker Publishing Group. This review is my honest opinion.

​I am not the biggest fan of apologetics (the defense of the Christian faith), because I don’t believe we can argue people into faith. God is more than capable of bringing people to redemption without humans arguing over complex ideas. I am however a fan of stories or narratives. Scripture is a large story that is interconnected, Jesus taught using stories, and our lives are stories that fit into God’s much larger story. This book does a nice job introducing the idea of stories as a defense for Christianity. It tells of the importance, the process, and the way that people sharing can feel connected to the process. A quote from Alister that I find profound is, “humans are storytellers and story-dwellers” (107). This book is worth it just to realize the gravity of that quote alone.

I once had a lecturer who said that if God intended us to be saved merely by intellectual assent, he wouldn't have given us a story. The pages of Scripture are not simply the laying out of truth as connected pieces of information, but rather the unfolding narrative of redemptive history and the revealing of God himself through remembering what he has done and promising what he will do.
Alister McGrath has once again written something which is wonderful and engaging. Narrative Apologetics won't simply increase your understanding of Scripture and (more specifically) apologetics, but will stir in you a joy that will motivate you to dig deeper into the Grand Story, transforming the way that you engage with the text; not only for yourself but in how you go about make disciples wherever God has placed you.

I had hoped this book would be for laypeople, helping them be able to share their faith through their story. It is not. It is an academic look at the theology of using (fictional) story as a means of telling people about God. It might be suitable as a text book or resource for a creative writing class in a Christian college as literary strategies are included.

I found the initial comments by McGrath to be the most enlightening. The culture today is not very much interested in rational arguments for the Christian faith. Proving something true through logic or rational thought does not have the impact it did a generation ago. More people may be open to story than they are a mental proof. Story engages more aspects of a person than just the mind. There has been encouragement recently to share one's faith in the context of their personal story, hence my hope this book would help the layperson do just that.

Potential Christian novelists who would like to have their writing be a means for readers to better understand or experience Christian belief will find much to think about in this book. Exploration of the works of Lewis, Sayers, and Tolkien, for example, will provide models to follow. McGrath identifies how these authors developed narratives to communicate aspects of the Christian faith. One example is the concept of sin in Lewis' Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

If you are interested in the theology of using story for apologetics, this book is for you. If you want to know how to use your own story as a means of sharing your faith, this book will not help.

I received a complimentary egalley of this book from the publisher. My comments are an independent and honest review.