WORLDVIEWS IN CONFLICT
Some years back we began to hear a lot about “worldviews.” However, I can remember when I was a child in the “Bible Belt” of the southern US, that there was only one worldview. We were Bible-believing Christians and we felt strongly that Christianity was the only valid viewpoint.
All that has changed, even for a lot of the people in the Bible Belt. Actually it was changing rapidly for much of the recent twentieth century without our realizing it. In fact, since the Renaissance (beginning in the fourteenth century) and especially since the Enlightenment (seventeenth century), the Christian orientation inherited from Medieval times has been slowly eroded.
Dr. David Noebel is an expert on the subject of worldviews and he continues to instruct hundreds and thousands of young people at his Summit Ministries in the mountains of Colorado. According to Dr. Noebel, a worldview is defined as: “…any ideology, philosophy, theology, movement, or religion that provides an overarching approach to understanding God, the world, and man’s relations to God and the world.” * He states that a proper worldview should encompass the areas of theology, philosophy, ethics, biology, psychology, sociology, law, politics, economics and history. In short, a worldview is a way of looking at and interpreting all of reality.
In his book, Understanding the Times, Dr. Noebel reveals how the Christian worldview has been gradually replaced in recent years by other worldviews. He primarily focuses upon the most popular and pervasive one known as Secular Humanism. He also deals in great detail with Marxism/Leninism, and even Cosmic Humanism.
A QUICK LOOK AT THE POPULAR WORLDVIEWS
Secular Humanism sprang from early Greek humanistic ideas and concepts. It has a strong emphasis upon man and his ability to manage himself and all that is around him. Like most of the other major worldviews, Secular Humanism is based upon the theory of evolution. Since things have simply evolved, there is no room or need for God. This worldview is thus atheistic in its theology. It holds to a relativism in its ethics. Secular Humanism is an extremely aggressive religion and has today virtually taken over the educational institutions and power centers in much of the world.
Marxism/Leninism is a philosophy that still holds sway over multiplied millions of people. It too is atheistic and strongly based upon evolution. It has a proletariat morality, supposedly to be formulated by the working class, and of course, it has no use for the Bible, for God or for his laws.
Dr. Noebel also lists another worldview that has come into great prominence since the 1960s. He labels it as Cosmic Humanism. We probably know it better as the New Age Movement. Many of the same things apply to it as to these other pagan worldviews. It is also based upon a form of evolution, but while the other worldviews are uniformly atheistic, this one is Pantheistic. Like the previously mentioned views, Cosmic Humanism has absolutely no room for either Judaism or Christianity.
RECOVERING THE CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW
These various worldviews have not worked. They have already caused the deaths of multiplied millions of people and have wrecked untold millions of other lives. It is estimated that Communism alone killed 80 million people in the last century.* The combined figures for Nazism and other godless systems of the twentieth century are much higher. The collapse of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union is additional testimony of the failure of the these worldviews.
However, it should be noted that in spite of its failure on many fronts, Marxism still seems to be gaining popularity on college campuses. All these worldviews stand directly or indirectly on Darwin’s theory of evolution. Unfortunately, for all these philosophies, numerous cracks are now beginning to show in the foundation of evolution. Should it break asunder, these popular theories are all doomed.
It is interesting today that more and more thinking people are beginning to question the evolutionary concept. Among these are a good number of well-known scientists listed in Noebel’s book. They are beginning to prove that evolution is unscientific in its approach and is based upon unproven theory and myth. Some obvious and glaring problem areas are the spotty fossil record; the emerging incredible complexity of DNA; plus adverse conclusions presented from the first and second laws of thermodynamics.
Also, the results of the ethical relativism taught by these worldviews is coming into question. It too, seems unscientific. While these worldviews continue to promote a godless and lawless morality, the emerging scientific facts are proving that such a morality simply does not work. For instance, loose sexual mores have contributed to an estimated forty million people worldwide becoming infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It is also now being proven that the much-touted live-in relationships and pre-marital sex are having a very adverse effect upon later marriage stability.
The only worldview that still seems to be intact and with firm foundations is the Judeo/Christian one. The proof positive of this worldview’s validity is that when it is seriously put into practice, it still works! This too can also be verified scientifically. So perhaps we are entering into an era when the popular worldviews are about to topple. We Christians need to gird up our loins and be ready to gather the spoils should these worldviews come tumbling down. Of course, it would help us immensely to understand what is involved in our own Christian worldview. We need to be as sharp as possible when we confront the pagans. For this, we need Dr. Noebel’s book, as well as our Bibles.
GETTING ISRAEL BACK INTO OUR WORLDVIEW
And while we are getting our own worldview straightened out, there is something else we need to do. We need to correct a serious error of the past and get Israel back into our Christian worldview. This was not a problem for our early American ancestors. It is emerging that they were very Israel-centered in their biblical understandings. Actually, there is simply not a way for us to be truly Bible-oriented without placing Israel in a very high position. After all, the God whom we worship, in over 200 instances in scripture, insists upon being called by his proper name, “The God of Israel.” We seriously need to recover the biblical understanding of Israel. In fact, we have allowed Humanism and other theories to steal away and obscure our precious Israel heritage.
Perhaps the true biblical worldview is presented most clearly in the Book of Daniel, and particularly in Daniel 2:1-49. Daniel shares with us what must be described as a most unusual view of history. This man was close to God and was especially gifted to see things otherwise hidden. He was often called upon to interpret dreams and spiritual phenomenon to the kings of Babylon and Persia.
In this section of scripture Daniel interprets a dream for King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. The king had dreamed about an enormous, dazzling statue. The statue had a head of gold. Its chest and arms were of silver, and its belly and thighs of bronze. The legs were of iron, with its feet and toes of iron mixed with baked clay. The king then saw in his dream that a rock hewn out of the mountain without human hands crashed into the image with great force, turning it into dust. The rock then grew and filled the earth.
Daniel interpreted the vision as a picture of the Gentile Age in which we are now living. He pictured its coming collapse. The Gentile Age apparently began as the sovereign kingdom of Israel was ended by the Babylonians in 586 BC. Daniel saw the rise of four world empires in the long and painful Gentile era, and he realized that all four would continue spiritually intact until the present day. Daniel saw that the image represented the empires of Babylon, Media-Persia, Greece, and Rome.
Later in the book (7:8), Daniel saw that from the horns of the vision, a king of fierce countenance would arise and bring a brief age of terror and persecution unlike anything ever seen before. That would come just prior to the collapse of the age. This man is generally conceded to be the Antichrist or the Beast of the Bible.
Daniel also saw that the kingdoms represented by the image would all fall at the same time (2:35). Thus, their insidious influences would continue to this present day. That is, their underlying philosophies, such as Greek Humanism, will still continue to influence nations and peoples. At the time of their fall, they will be demolished by a rock hewn out of the mountain without hands. When we look at Daniel and also compare the book with Revelation 11:15 & 14:1, there is little doubt left that the mountain is Mt. Zion, and the rock is the Messiah and his supernatural government from Jerusalem. After that, the kingdom will return to Israel and to the triumphant saints of the Most High God (7:18).
The prophet Daniel saw that the fall of Israel would begin the Gentile age, and it appears that the restoration of Israel will bring that age to an end. In Luke 21:24, Jesus says of the Jewish people: “They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.” Jesus seems to echo the words spoken long before by Daniel.
What an unusual view of history! What an unusual worldview! Unfortunately, because of humanistic and other influences in our society, such a worldview could not be taught in most schools today, even in some religious ones. Yet, it seems to be the proper and biblical view. Someday everyone will most likely understand history in just the way Daniel interpreted it. Someday the history of the whole world may be taught and interpreted, from the standpoint of Israel.
-Jim Gerrish
Published, October 2002
*Understanding The Times” by David A. Noebel, Harvest House Publishers, p.8, &
p. 613.
Photo credit Wikimedia Commons. Hubble ultra deep field, 2014.
Later note: After a tour of American churches George Barna reported that according to one survey 90% of church and lay leaders have no understanding of worldview. Reported in Christianity Today, Dec. 2003.