CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW

Module 7 presents the concept of a worldview. A disciple of Jesus has a way of thinking and processing experiences in life that sees the Lord’s impact in everyday events.

Jesus often taught His followers using parables.

Module Bible Reading Assignment

John - Chapters 9 & 10

 As a preface to this module, there are many different assessment questions that may determine a person’s world view.

THIS MODULE IS SIGNIFICANT BECAUSE ACTIONS FOLLOW BELIEFS. A PERSON’S WORLDVIEW IS BASED UPON THEIR BELIEF STRUCTURE WHICH FORMS THEIR VALUES AND DICTATES MANY OF THEIR ACTIONS.

“I submit that the most important issue in any person’s life is not his or her education, career, finances, family, or friendships. Rather the most important issue in any person’s life is that person’s worldview because that person’s worldview guides and directs everything else, including one’s education, career, finances, family, and friendships. Worldview is the basic cause, all else is effect or result.”

“Worldview: Definitions, History, and Importance of a Concept”

Dr. David Naugle, Professor of Philosophy - Dallas Baptist University, Dallas, Texas, USA

We live in the Information Age.

T.S. Eliot said, “we should not confuse information with knowledge or knowledge with wisdom.”

The Worldview Endeavor

What is a Worldview?

5 minutes

Consider this question: “What is the meaning of life?”

This question must be answered through a framework containing your basic assumptions that help explain and interpret your observations in life. The answer is derived from your worldview. Your world view is a set of lenses through which a person has established a paradigm. All of us have “belief glasses.” Your answers fit within this paradigm. It is a way of looking at something.

Taken from christianacademiamagazine.com

“How is a worldview formed?”

A worldview is formed and influenced during childhood and redefined during the young adult years, making it the decision-making outlook through adulthood.

Worldviews are influenced by childhood upbringing, including family, religion, friends and location. The Worldview is typically developed by age 13. It is influenced and confirmed by the “outlets” one consumes. The Barna Group (a Christian Research Organization) found that “people generally adopt worldview beliefs and behaviors that they encounter in arts and entertainment vehicles, news reports, political statements made by public leaders, and through conversations and experiences with people they trust.”

Our worldview affects the way we interpret reality. Two people can view the same event and arrive at two very different meanings.

Seven (7) Cornerstones of a Biblical Worldview

  1. God is eternal, omniscient, omnipotent and just Creator.

  2. Humans are sinful by nature.

  3. Jesus Christ grants forgiveness of sin and eternal life when sinners repent and profess their faith in Him alone.

  4. The Bible is true, reliable and always relevant.

  5. Absolute moral truth exits.

  6. Success is defined as consistent obedience to God.

  7. Life’s purpose is to know, love and serve God with all one’s heart, mind, strength, and soul.

    Taken from George Barna’s Worldview Study

James Anderson

What is your worldview?

20 minutes

At least three questions that determine a person’s world view

  • Is there a higher power in the Universe?

    This question may not seem like a difficult or probing one. In fact, it can be answered with a one word response: “yes” or “no.” However, the implications are immense regarding which side of the fence you are on. If the answer is “no” then what is the ultimate authority? Who, if anyone, are you ultimately responsible to? In reality, the logical answer is that there is no one to whom the individual is responsible. Typically, this person sees themselves as completely autonomous. They must use their own reason to determine truth and meaning in this world.

  • Where did our world come from?

    For some, the ideas of Darwinian Evolution, Alien Seed Theories, and the Big Bang are prevalent. There is usually a reliance upon empirical data and observable facts that explain the origins of life. Many will also admit to apathy toward the answer. It’s not an important question for them to answer.

  • What is the purpose of man?

    This is the one that illuminates much of the inconsistencies present within people’s individual worldviews. Religious sects can’t really come to terms with this across their spectrum. Christians have trouble agreeing between the Westminster Confession’s assertion of “glorifying God and enjoying Him forever” and the megachurch seeker model that emphasizes the Great Commission as the primary purpose of man. This is most assuredly not exclusive to those who believe in a higher power. Arguably, those who do not have even more wide ranging definitions for the purpose of man. Typically, there is a humanistic aspect, although nihilism – the rejection of all moral and religious principles, even to the point of believing life is meaningless - is always there in the background. Purpose can practically range from furthering the race to removing oneself from this world in order to avoid meaninglessness. While this has the most iterations thus far, it also has the most inconsistencies as well.

More from Veritas Academy

A WORLDVIEW

The way we “see” the world around us.

In order for a person to be able to function in their environment, they need some form of a guiding philosophy that allows them to make sense of their world and to interact with it. All intelligent beings naturally have questions about the world and seek answers to these questions in order to live an adequate life. The set of high-level answers that a person has to the philosophical questions that are essential to life constitutes the person’s worldview.

taken from The Enlightened Worldview Project

  • Sees the universe as God-created, and finds truth and knowledge in traditions, conventions, and scripture as presented in the Bible. They emphasize the group, community, and family, as well as the need for social roles and rules, law and order. Christians rely on faith in Christ alone for salvation. They should have a Biblical worldview.

  • The Islamic worldview is grounded in Allah (God), Mohammad (the ultimate and final prophet of Allah), and the Qur’an (the Word of Allah delivered through Mohammad beginning in about 610 AD). Islam means submission to Allah and a Muslim is one submitted to Allah. About 1/5th of the world’s population is Muslim, about three-quarters of which are non-Arabs.

    The Islamic worldview is more than a religion. Islam covers all aspects of life for its followers. While many religious scholars treat the Islamic worldview as a monotheistic religion following five simple “pillars” of faith, the concept of Islamic State actually goes much deeper.

  • Pantheism (pan = all; theos = God) is the world view which understands there to be an intimate connection or outright identification of God and all there is: God is all; all is God. Everything that exists constitutes a unity and this unity is divine. The apparent infinity and eternity of the universe have been seen as the qualities that entail its divinity. Pantheism has a source in a widespread capacity of and for awe and wonder in the face of the grandeur of the universe and of the apparent unity of things (from the theistic perspective, of course, this is nothing other than old fashioned idolatry). A pantheistic world view (or metaphysics) provides a grammar or logical explanation of these human emotions, and has therefore found numerous exponents and survived over a lengthy period of time. It is a doctrine that usually occurs in religions and philosophies in which there are already tolerably clear conceptions of God and of the universe and the question becomes how to connect them.

  • Naturalism is the belief that the natural world as we know and experience it is all that exists. To put this in religious terms, we could say that Naturalism teaches that ultimate truth does not depend on supernatural experiences, supernatural beings or divine revelation; instead it can be derived from the natural world. Perhaps Carl Sagan expressed this most clearly in his Cosmos series which he prefaced with the statement “The universe is all that is or ever was or ever will be.”

  • The postmodern worldview emphasizes that truth and reality are subjective and shaped by individual experiences, culture, and social context. It challenges the idea of absolute truths and grand narratives, promoting a perspective that values diversity, pluralism, and personal interpretation. description

 

Impact 360 Institute 4 minutes

What’s your Worldview?

Consider a person that makes a decision to follow Christ later in life.

Does the Holy Spirit create a new worldview within the person?

Taken from

Watermark Community Church

What is a Christian Worldview?

 

Got Questions Ministries

GotQuestions.org

3 minutes

Elements of a Worldview

  • Anthropology: Refers to the history of humankind in various environments.

    Ask yourself, “Who are my ancestors and what does this say about me?”

    “What is the origin, nature and destiny of human beings?”

  • Cosmology: Studies the universe as a whole.

    Ask yourself, “Why there is something instead of nothing?”

  • Epistemology: The study of knowledge and truth.

    Attempt to answer the question, “How do we know the things we know?”

    “What is truth?”

  • Ethics: Ethics is the forest and morals are the trees. A framework of right and wrong / good and bad.

    Ask yourself, “What makes a particular action morally good or morally wrong?”

  • Metaphysics: A branch of philosophy that refers to basic beliefs about the nature of ultimate reality.

    Ask yourself, “Do human beings have souls?” or “Does the world truly exist or is everyone in a simulation?”

  • Theology: The study of matters related to God.

    “Who or what is God?”

    “Is God involved in the life of humans?”

  • Teleology: A set of presuppositions that may indicate your innate purpose.

    “What do you believe is the meaning of life?”

If you wish to determine a person’s worldview, ask good questions.

  • What does that mean? Have the person define the terms that they use.

  • Is that true? If so, how do you know? How do you determine truth?

  • What happens if your conclusion is incorrect?

 MODULE 7 ASSESSMENT - QUESTIONS