“Worldviews are the most fundamental and encompassing views of reality shared by a people in a culture. The worldview incorporates assumptions about the nature of things—about the “givens” of reality. Challenges to these assumptions threaten the very foundation of their world” (Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues, Paul Hiebert, 38).Everyone’s worldview is tainted in one form or another. All of us have our own set of biases in how we perceive our world. Your sex (male or female), your parents, your country, your schools and teachers, your friends, the experiences you have had in life and the temperament that God created you with are all ways in which your worldview is tainted for either the bad or good. The only way to straighten out our worldview is to bring our current worldview into a Biblical Worldview through discipling. The question is then, “Is there a Biblical Worldview and if so how do we attain it?”
All cultures change to some degree, as none remain stagnant. If you were to pick any culture and look at their history for the past couple hundred years you would see a continuum among them in their customs and relationships that tend to stay for long periods of time, but there are several areas that always start to incorporate change within the culture and ultimately within the worldview of the culture. One aspect that changes the worldview is the education systems within villages, cities or rural communities, as children never learn perfectly and this will result in some change. Some of these mistakes become habitual among the younger generation as well, because they perceive them as being current, progressive, or it differentiates them from their past generation.
People are also naturally creative and will devise new ways in presenting their culture through art, music, novels, or invention. They may also visit other cultures and adopt their customs because they prefer them to their own. They may visit other market places, or social gatherings; and even wars change the customs of a culture’s worldview. Lastly, people may just outright choose a different alternative to their normal customs, as we generally see in the youth; whether it is how they dress for church, or whether or not they go to church at all anymore. The goal of ministries, churches and parents is to help direct our culture into a Biblical Worldview, which does not mean the entire culture has to change, but only those practices that are outside the will of God, which is seen in the infallible Word of God.
Dr. Hiebert, in Transforming Worldviews, says, “To say there is no biblical worldview is to deny that there is an underlying unity to the biblical story, to say that the God of Abraham, Moses, David, and Jesus are different gods, that the New Testament is discontinuous with the Old, and that Scripture is simply the record of individuals and ever-shifting beliefs shaped by history and sociocultural contexts” (Transforming Worldviews, Paul Hiebert, 256.)
Dr. Hiebert, in Transforming Worldviews, says, “To say there is no biblical worldview is to deny that there is an underlying unity to the biblical story, to say that the God of Abraham, Moses, David, and Jesus are different gods, that the New Testament is discontinuous with the Old, and that Scripture is simply the record of individuals and ever-shifting beliefs shaped by history and sociocultural contexts” (Transforming Worldviews, Paul Hiebert, 256.)
Dr. Hiebert is exactly right, in that, there is a Biblical Worldview that has been laid out for us in stages and completed in our Bible, and to say otherwise is to negate what God has been doing through the different dispensations throughout history. As leaders within the ministry of God we have led those under our tutelage into a Biblical Worldview, which means helping them line up their innermost being with the Word of God. Romans 12:2 says, “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” For the purpose of this article, I will be focusing on three different areas that will help in moving towards a Biblical Worldview: Wisdom, Discernment and Contextualizing the Gospel correctly.
“Wisdom, then, is the consistent outworking of belief, action, and discernment from worldview. It is the process of sanctification” (G. C. Berkouwer, Providence of God, 133). We first must remember the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. (Proverbs 1:7, 2:5, 9:10; 10:27, 14:26-27, 15:16, 33, 16:6, 19:23, 22:4, 23:17; 2 Chron. 19:7-9; Job 28:28; Psalm 19:9, 34:11, 111:10; Isaiah 11:2-3, 33:6; Acts 9:31; 2 Corinthians 5:11). We are to become mature believers and one of the most important disciplines is growing in wisdom. Just praying will not gain you wisdom, as this plays a different role in your relationship with God. We forget about the thinking aspect many times in our Christian walk and instead look for the warm, bubbly feeling. What I call the soup feeling, when you eat soup; you get the warm, bubbly feeling. Growing in wisdom should lead to changes in our worldview and in how we behave within our cultural system. We need to have a right belief that leads to right action, and cannot have right actions without right beliefs.
Wisdom is the person of Christ and all that He is and stands for. Wisdom is found in the Bible, and to look for truth in other places that do not line up with the truth of Scripture is following a false truth. How many of us pray to be more like Christ and then complain when we are persecuted or what seems like a tough time comes along? Your worldview is not truly lined up with Christ then. Wisdom is not about right and wrong, but about what God thinks. Right and wrong may fit into this at times, but our main concern should be Christ. Our thoughts must correspond to His in order for us to be wise. More than right and wrong it is seeing good from evil. This will help us figure out orthodoxy (what we should believe) and orthopraxy (what we should do). We must take responsibility for becoming wise. It is a matter of willing it and going after it, and it sometimes causes pain and it is a life journey with no end, but it is a journey with eternity in sight.
James 1:5-8, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all with out reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts are like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”
“Belief systems guide thought processes, and enable people to focus on experience and formulate theories to help them solve the problems of life and to pursue their goals” (Understanding Folk Religion, Hiebert, Shaw, Tienou, 40).
This leads to the second aspect of defining a Biblical Worldview, which is discernment. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus each year claim healing by their God and return to their temple of Venkateswara at Tirupathi, South India to fulfill the vows they made for their healing. 15,000 claim healing at Lourdes, and more then that at the Virgin of Guadalupe near Mexico City, (Louis J. Luzbetak, The Church and Cultures: New Perspectives in Missiological Anthropology, 375). All the “special” signs are used in almost all religions (tongues, miracles such as healing, exorcisms, and prophecies). Remember Satan can act as an Angel of Light. We must even test the experiences of people and test the spirits (1 Cor. 12:3; 1 Thess. 5:20-21; 1 John 4:1-6). We are to be careful not to be led astray, as Paul told Timothy quite often in the Timothy Epistles. In order not to be caught up in wrong cultural actions, we need to apply wisdom in discernment.
There are some tests for this: Does it give glory to God rather than humans (John 7:18, 8:50)? Does it recognize the Lordship of Christ (1 John 2:3-5; James 2:14-19). Is the power through the Holy Spirit emphasized, or the flesh? Does Scripture confirm it? Are the leaders making any claim accountable to the Church? Do the leaders manifest the fruits of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-25)? Does this lead to Spiritual Maturity (1 Cor. 12-14)? Does it lead to Unity in the body of Christ (John 17:11; 1 John 2:9-11)? (Ibid.). As Christians we must not take the beliefs of those we are trying to reach lightly. We must take them seriously, as we want to understand them so we can reach them. For many their beliefs declare the way things truly are. Why things happen the way they happen and for the reason they happen.
“Wisdom, then, is the consistent outworking of belief, action, and discernment from worldview. It is the process of sanctification” (G. C. Berkouwer, Providence of God, 133). We first must remember the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. (Proverbs 1:7, 2:5, 9:10; 10:27, 14:26-27, 15:16, 33, 16:6, 19:23, 22:4, 23:17; 2 Chron. 19:7-9; Job 28:28; Psalm 19:9, 34:11, 111:10; Isaiah 11:2-3, 33:6; Acts 9:31; 2 Corinthians 5:11). We are to become mature believers and one of the most important disciplines is growing in wisdom. Just praying will not gain you wisdom, as this plays a different role in your relationship with God. We forget about the thinking aspect many times in our Christian walk and instead look for the warm, bubbly feeling. What I call the soup feeling, when you eat soup; you get the warm, bubbly feeling. Growing in wisdom should lead to changes in our worldview and in how we behave within our cultural system. We need to have a right belief that leads to right action, and cannot have right actions without right beliefs.
Wisdom is the person of Christ and all that He is and stands for. Wisdom is found in the Bible, and to look for truth in other places that do not line up with the truth of Scripture is following a false truth. How many of us pray to be more like Christ and then complain when we are persecuted or what seems like a tough time comes along? Your worldview is not truly lined up with Christ then. Wisdom is not about right and wrong, but about what God thinks. Right and wrong may fit into this at times, but our main concern should be Christ. Our thoughts must correspond to His in order for us to be wise. More than right and wrong it is seeing good from evil. This will help us figure out orthodoxy (what we should believe) and orthopraxy (what we should do). We must take responsibility for becoming wise. It is a matter of willing it and going after it, and it sometimes causes pain and it is a life journey with no end, but it is a journey with eternity in sight.
James 1:5-8, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all with out reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts are like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”
“Belief systems guide thought processes, and enable people to focus on experience and formulate theories to help them solve the problems of life and to pursue their goals” (Understanding Folk Religion, Hiebert, Shaw, Tienou, 40).
This leads to the second aspect of defining a Biblical Worldview, which is discernment. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus each year claim healing by their God and return to their temple of Venkateswara at Tirupathi, South India to fulfill the vows they made for their healing. 15,000 claim healing at Lourdes, and more then that at the Virgin of Guadalupe near Mexico City, (Louis J. Luzbetak, The Church and Cultures: New Perspectives in Missiological Anthropology, 375). All the “special” signs are used in almost all religions (tongues, miracles such as healing, exorcisms, and prophecies). Remember Satan can act as an Angel of Light. We must even test the experiences of people and test the spirits (1 Cor. 12:3; 1 Thess. 5:20-21; 1 John 4:1-6). We are to be careful not to be led astray, as Paul told Timothy quite often in the Timothy Epistles. In order not to be caught up in wrong cultural actions, we need to apply wisdom in discernment.
There are some tests for this: Does it give glory to God rather than humans (John 7:18, 8:50)? Does it recognize the Lordship of Christ (1 John 2:3-5; James 2:14-19). Is the power through the Holy Spirit emphasized, or the flesh? Does Scripture confirm it? Are the leaders making any claim accountable to the Church? Do the leaders manifest the fruits of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-25)? Does this lead to Spiritual Maturity (1 Cor. 12-14)? Does it lead to Unity in the body of Christ (John 17:11; 1 John 2:9-11)? (Ibid.). As Christians we must not take the beliefs of those we are trying to reach lightly. We must take them seriously, as we want to understand them so we can reach them. For many their beliefs declare the way things truly are. Why things happen the way they happen and for the reason they happen.
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