What Is Your Worldview Series

Abortion. Euthanasia. Pornography. Same-sex marriage. Transgender rights. Embryonic research. Genetic enhancement. [You can add to this mix COVID, mandated vaccines, out of control government spending, etc.] Christians surveying the cultural landscape in the West have a clear sense that things are headed in a destructive direction. While most believers can easily identify the symptoms of decline, few feel competent to diagnose and address the root causes. There are many complex factors behind these developments, but one invaluable tool for better understanding and engaging with our culture is the concept of worldview.[1]

What is a worldview. The fact is, everyone has a worldview. It is how we see the world around us and interpret and react to events. A worldview is the core of what we truly believe (not just give lip service to). It answers the basic questions of life:

How did we get here (creation and the universe)?

Where are we going (the meaning of history)?

What is the nature of reality (physical or spiritual or both)?

What is the nature of God, or transcendent reality? (is there a higher power?)

What is the nature of truth (objective or subjective)?

What is the nature of human beings? (who are we and how did we get here?)

What happens to human beings when they die? (is there eternal life?)

What guidelines determine human behavior? (ethics and morals, who decides?)

Where did we (human kind) go wrong? (or have we gone wrong?)

Is there a fix? [2]

How these questions are answered determines our outlook on the world. These are just a few of the questions that define our worldview. For example, if we have a naturalist or humanistic worldview where we are just a comic accident and there is a natural explanation to all that there is, then humans are just highly developed, evolved animals. If that is the case then, so what is the big deal about abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality and the like? If we are here by accident, then who are you to tell me what my morals should be? You are you to tell me what is right and wrong?

The fact is, our worldview matters. It matter in how re react, in a God honoring way to the world around us. The worldviews of others in our culture explains why we as a people, a nation, a culture, is headed in a destructive direction. Over the next coming weeks, we will explore our worldview and the contrast it with the worldviews of our culture. We need to critically examine our own view of the world. Paul tells us:

2 Corinthians 13:5 Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?

Do we have a true Biblical Worldview? Notice I did not say a Christian worldview. I will be deliberately avoiding that term because the very word “Christian” has been so altered, misused, deliberately misapplied, and distorted over time. But I will use the term “Biblical Worldview” meaning, does our view of the world measure up to what the Word of God tells us, not someone’s concept of what a Christian ought to believe or ought to live.

The message this morning will start with warning from the Word about being influence by the world.

Colossians 2:8 and 1 Timothy 6:20–21

Here’s the problem. According to recent survey (May 2021) commissioned by the Family Research Council under the direction of George Barna:

* 80 percent of born-again Christians claim to have a biblical worldview, but only 19 percent have one.

* 74 percent of conservatives claim to have a biblical worldview, but only 16 percent do.

* 44 percent of millennials (ages 25-40) claim a biblical worldview; only 4 percent have one.

As I read the report of the statistics for mainline Protestant churches and evangelical churches, the numbers were just about as dire:

* 69% of adults who attend a mainline Protestant church (Presbyterian, Lutheran, Episcopal, etc.) claim they have a biblical worldview, but only 8% actually have one.

* 81% who attend an evangelical church (many non-denominational and most Baptist) claim they have a biblical worldview, but only 21% actually have one.[3]

No wonder the church is in trouble today. Most of the so-called “born-again” believers do not know what they believe, or they do not realize that their beliefs are corrupted by the world.

This corruption of beliefs didn’t happen by accident. We are exposed to the philosophies of the world every day, through the culture we live in, through TV shows piped into our living rooms, through our news sources, through the internet and let us not speak about social media and its effect on our world.

Very little of what we are exposed to in the world reflect the Judeo-Christian principles which formed and guided this nation for many years. Since WW2, we have seen a marked moral decline in our culture. America is quickly going the way of Europe, which has virtually been godless for many years, where now most churches and cathedrals there are merely museums of an era gone by.