How Do You Answer A Fool?

(Proverbs 26:4-5) "Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself.  Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes." (ESV)

First we must define what is meant by the term fool.  It is not name calling or a personal attack.  It speaks to a person's moral orientation and not to his intellectual orientation.  A fool is anyone who denies the existence of God and does not honor him.  We do not just mean someone who denies the existence of a god but anyone who denies the existence of the God of the Bible.  In other words all unbelievers are fools because they reject the truth of the Bible.  The God of the Bible is Trinity, he is the infinite, personal Creator.  

You should not answer a fool according to his folly or you will also be foolish.  You should not accept his presuppositions or basic assumptions about God, man, knowledge, and ethics.  Instead you must expose his worldview as false showing him his foolishness.  

The Christian must not compromise on the authority and truthfulness of Scripture.  He must presuppose the Bible as truth whenever he deals with the unbeliever.  The Bible defends itself, it is self attesting.  There is no neutral ground between the believer and the unbeliever.  The unbeliever rejects the authority of the Bible from the outset and instead assumes his own human reason or sense perception as authoritative.  He is worshiping false gods.

We should not set aside the Bible and try to provide evidence and make arguments for the existence of a god.  The unbeliever already has the evidence that God is there.  Creation itself and man's own constitution testify to the existence of God.  They testify not to the existence of a god but to the existence of the Christian God.  In their heart of hearts all people know that God exists,  unbelievers are simply suppressing the truth in unrighteousness.  They refuse to honor God as God, exchanging the truth for a lie.  Claiming to be wise they have become fools (See Romans 1:18-25).  

The Bible must be accepted as authoritative and true at our starting point.  Only the Christian worldview provides the necessary preconditions for intelligibility.  It is the only worldview that makes sense of your world.  Only the Christian worldview is livable and fits reality.  All other worldviews reduce down to absurdity.  Unbelievers cannot live out their worldview consistently.  They must borrow from the Christian worldview in order to live their lives.  

The unbeliever must be pressed to admit to what he already knows, namely that the God of the Bible exists.  The unbeliever needs to repent (have a change of mind) and place his faith in Christ alone for salvation.  Ultimately this can only be brought about by the work of the Holy Spirit.