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This article is found at http://www.logoscrc.ca/christianworldview
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This article was originally published in
Christian Educators Journal, February 2008. Reprinted with permission.
What is a Christian Worldview?
By Peter Schuurman
Educational Mission Leader, Christian Reformed Home Missions
Christian Reformed Church in North America
G. K. Chesterton
maintained that while it is important for a landlady to know the income of her
renter, it is more important for her to know his worldview. “The most practical
and important thing about a man,” he said, “is still his view of the universe.”
Everyone has a worldview--whether they
articulate it or not. The word can be a
helpful short-hand way of speaking of a
person’s “basic beliefs about reality”
or their “framing story through which
they see the universe.” The word itself
is not in the Bible, but the Bible certainly offers the believer a worldview.
To intentionally think about your worldview as a Christian can be a coherent and
consistent way to faithfully engage culture and avoid
the pitfall of anti-intellectualism. Because the Bible doesn’t directly
talk about every cultural reality we encounter today; but the Biblical
worldview certainly can be applied to every single letter of your life—and
every corner of the classroom.
Let me set up a
contrast to make it more vivid. Three short words can be used to describe the
culture of the university today: “publish or perish.” Life, in this picture, is
about scrambling after seductive but elusive goals with a calculating,
competitive eye cast towards others. Being crazy-busy is normal, suspicion is
cast on your neighbor, and your long-term security becomes a permanent anxiety.
The Christian
worldview is a universe
away from that pursuit. It, too, can be summarized in three short words: “love
or perish.” Life, in this picture, is about building a culture of love around
you, a culture that is conscientious about the needs of neighbours, seeks to
nurture beauty, and guards what is true.
To be brief, four notes on the basics of
Christian worldview thinking:
1. Your
worldview arises out of the core of your being, out of your deepest desires and
longings.
Worldviews always start in the heart. For some, their
desire is for money, power, or pleasure.
But when God becomes
your heart’s desire your life leaps
towards his dream for the world.
Everything changes. You change the way you treat
others, you change the way you consume things, and your change the way you see
reality. This is the Christian worldview: seeing life through Jesus
Christ.
2. Your worldview arises out of a
framing story. Every people have a story. For
Christians, the story comes through the rich and diverse voices of the Bible,
which gives us this plot: all things
were created good but because of the sin and brokenness that sully
the earth, all things need to be restored by God’s suffering,
covenant love in Jesus.
Think of it in four chapters: creation, fall,
redemption, and finally, still being written now,
our improvising participation in Christ’s
redemption project.
3. A Christian
worldview refuses the compartmentalization of “sacred” and “secular” things.
When your heart wants what God wants, you do not just add prayer and Bible study
to your life, although you will do that. You suddenly see everything with
Kingdom of God Glasses and your whole vision for life is radically altered. You
don’t just add a “God-view” and a “Church-view” to your “North American
Life-view.” Your whole “World-view” gets a new prescription: whether you are
looking at mutual funds, municipal elections, or marsupial survival,
the light of God’s desires illumines the
reality in a fresh way. The whole world is a
burning bush of God’s grandeur. Again, this is the
big picture of faith: God’s new world is
coming, and it restores every sad and broken thing—from polluted oceans to
pornographic art to the panicked
human heart—into his new ecosystem
of hope and healing. Everything is sacred. It is humans who twist
sacred things to serve secular purposes.
4. This
worldview is not only therapy for individuals; it’s a new framework for
culture-making together.
Jesus is not just Lord of Sunday
morning, not just Lord of the human heart, but Lord of the whole
universe—geology, dance, and surgery. Therefore Christians seek to be
co-workers with God in renewing all things towards God’s original
intention, and they do this as a community.
Rather than participate in the culture of competition, they pursue a culture of
communion, communion with God’s Spirit, his
planet, and his church. This shalom—a
new world where life flourishes--is our calling and destiny, and is visible to
those who have the eyes to see it. We nurture an alternative culture for
the common good.
God saves us, but not so we can die and fly
to heaven. He saves us to recruit us for his earthy mission of renewal. As one
Chinese professor said to me: “This is a theology of life, not a theology of
the knife!” Worldview is about imagining another world is possible--a planet
better than the one handed down to us.
Copyright © Peter Schuurman, 2006
This article was originally published in Christian Educators Journal,
February 2008. Reprinted with permission.
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