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August 8 - August 24, 2023
Surprising as it sounds, the Christian worldview is so appealing that even those who reject it often borrow from it, whether consciously or unconsciously.
Moral relativism may claim to be about tolerance and humility, but in reality it often fosters a highly judgmental, condemning attitude.
Because humans are made in the image of God, they are hardwired with an intrinsic moral sense. Romans 2 says those who do not have God’s law in written form have the moral law “written on their hearts” (Rom. 2:15). They cannot help making moral claims—claims that have no basis in their own relativistic worldview, claims that make sense only on the basis of the biblical worldview they reject.
Hume wrote, skeptical doubts “vanish like smoke, and leave the most determined skeptic in the same condition as other mortals.”
Why do people hold ideas that are not supported by their own worldview? Scripture says all people are made in God’s image, live in God’s world, and experience God’s common grace. As a result, in practice they experience the living truths of general revelation, even if they selectively suppress that knowledge.
In making the case for a biblical worldview, a strategic place to start is by showing that it alone gives a basis for the ways we all have to function, no matter which worldview we hold.
So where did the idea of equal rights come from? The nineteenth-century political thinker Alexis de Tocqueville said the idea came from Christianity. “The most profound geniuses of Rome and Greece” never came up with the idea of equal rights, he wrote. “Jesus Christ had to come to earth to make it understood that all members of the human species are naturally alike and equal.”
A few intrepid atheists admit outright that they have to borrow the ideal of human rights from Christianity. Richard Rorty was a committed Darwinist; and in the Darwinian struggle for existence, the strong prevail while the weak are left behind. So evolution cannot be the source of universal human rights. Instead, Rorty says, the concept came from “religious claims that human beings are made in the image of God.” 7 He cheerfully admits that he reaches over and borrows the concept of universal rights from Christianity. He even calls himself a “free-loading” atheist: “This Jewish and Christian
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Atheists often denounce Christianity as harsh and negative. But in reality it offers a much more positive view of the human person than any competing religion or worldview.
Paul Davies makes the same point even more strongly. “All the early scientists, like Newton, were religious in one way or another,” he writes. “They saw their science as a means of uncovering traces of God’s handiwork in the universe.” What we now call the laws of nature they regarded as thoughts in the mind of God. “So in doing science, they supposed, one might be able to glimpse
the mind of God—an exhilarating and audacious claim.”
If the universe is the product of non-rational processes, why does it have a rational order? If the universe is not the product of a mind, why it is comprehensible to the human mind?
Science requires an “act of faith”? What is that “faith” based on? Davies draws this stunning conclusion: “So science can proceed only if the scientist adopts an essentially theological world view.” 11
What do we learn by eavesdropping on atheists? First, many of them recognize the limitations and failures of their own worldview. In fact, a compelling case can be made against atheism using their own words and arguments. Second, many atheists find elements of a Christian worldview so appealing that they keep borrowing them. They are free-loaders.
Philosophies have never been merely academic enterprises. They begin with a God replacement and develop an entire worldview, exhorting people how to make sense of life and to prepare for death. The difference is that today some atheists are actively seeking to “hijack the religious spirit,” as Terry Eagleton puts it. 23 They claim that secularism can nurture spirituality.
Not all atheists are aware how much they hijack from Christianity. The most common pattern is to claim that atheism is based strictly on facts and science. Yet even a commitment to science can function as an idol, an ultimate commitment. When science is treated as the sole source of truth, then it becomes scientism. Philosopher Wilfrid Sellars expressed a commitment to scientism when he said, “Science is the measure of all things.” Bertrand Russell tipped his hand in his remark, “What science cannot discover, mankind cannot know.”
Any claim that begins with “scientists now know” is likely to trump all competing claims.
Biologist Stuart Kauffman is well known for his theory of self-organization. But he does not regard it as merely another scientific theory: It is “a new world view” with “a new view of God, not as transcendent, not as an agent, but as the very creativity of the universe itself.” In other words, Kauffman treats God as a word for the ceaseless flux of the universe. That, he says, is “God enough for me.”
We create the world? We are the architects of the universe? Clearly, Rifkin is saying that if there is no transcendent God, then humans take his place. Humans become mini-gods. Rifkin ends with a hymn to evolved humanity: “We are responsible to nothing outside ourselves, for we are the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever and ever.”
Recognizing the religious nature of secular worldviews creates a level playing field. It undermines the pretensions of secularists to religious neutrality, which they use to claim superiority over religion. That is, they claim to be objective and fact-based, while discrediting religions as biased and “faith-based.” Yet no worldview is neutral—not even atheism or secularism.
In relation to the biblical God, secular people may claim to be skeptics. But in relation to their own god substitutes, they are true believers. To adapt an observation from C. S. Lewis, their skepticism is only on the surface. It is for use on other people’s beliefs. “They are not nearly skeptical enough” about their own beliefs.
As a Christian, I had known that the final reality behind all temporal realities is Love. The universe is the creation of a personal Agent, who thinks, feels, chooses, and acts. But if there is no personal God, then the final reality is blind mechanistic forces. There is no one “out there” who loves us or cares what happens to us.
William Provine, an evolutionary biologist at Cornell University, states the conclusion more bluntly: If no God exists, he says, then “no ultimate foundations for ethics exist, no ultimate meaning in life exists, and free will is merely a human myth.”
What’s the first step in equipping ourselves to press people to the logical conclusion of their worldview? Obviously, we must know their worldviews. We need to educate ourselves on the systems of thought widespread in our culture.
The more thoroughly we know our audience’s worldview, the better prepared we will be to speak to their questions, objections, and hidden assumptions.
Scripture calls us to an exquisitely balanced approach: “speaking the truth in love” (Eph. 4:15). That balance is spelled out in the flagship verse for apologetics: “Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you”—there’s the truth. “Yet do it with gentleness and respect”—there’s the love (1 Pet. 3:15).
In the original Greek, the word Peter uses for defense is apologia, from which we get the word apologetics. But he is not talking about giving answers to intellectual questions only. The verse appears toward the end of a letter dealing largely with the theme of unjust suffering. Peter has just admonished Christians not to take their own revenge but to be willing to suffer for the sake of righteousness. Why does he speak of apologetics in this context? It seems that Peter is saying the goal of apologetics is not just to present better arguments but to exhibit a better character, especially when
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Christians will be effective in reaching out to others only when they reflect biblical truth in their message, their method, and their manners.
Christians must become independent thinkers with the tools to think critically about diverse points of view—weighing the evidence and judging the validity of arguments. “The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him” (Prov. 18:17). Christians must learn to examine both sides in order to develop “sales resistance” to the many dubious ideas hawked in the media, politics, education, entertainment, and yes, churches.
Some Christians seem to think the way to avoid being “conformed to this world” (Rom. 12:2) is by avoiding “worldly” ideas. A better strategy is to learn the skills to critically evaluate them. G. K. Chesterton argued that ideas are actually more dangerous to the person who has not studied them. Because he has no mental filter, a new idea will “fly to his head like wine to the head of a teetotaler.”
Every nonbiblical worldview starts with an idol, a God substitute. Romans 1 says that if humans do not worship the Creator, they will make a deity out of something in the created order.
Reductionism is always dehumanizing. It exchanges a high view of humanity made in the image of God for the image of something in the created order.
Naturalism tries to appeal by posing as tough and realistic. But, ironically, its main weakness is that it is not realistic enough.
A “materialist and rationalist conception of human life” fails to take account of our full humanity; thus its consequences are inhumane. Because Christianity has a much richer view of human nature, its consequences are humane and life affirming.
Virtually every form of theology has been influenced to some degree by philosophy.
More recently, liberation theology redefined Christianity in terms of Marxism. Gustavo Gutiérrez, who coined the term, writes, “Liberation theology categorizes people not as believers or unbelievers, but as oppressors or oppressed.”
At its best, apologetics includes not only the critique of idols but also the creation of life-giving alternatives. Christians often have a habit of defining themselves by what they are against. Yet to oppose what is wrong, it is most effective to offer something better—to “overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12:21).
If science is often used to bolster arguments for materialism and determinism, then Christians should make it their goal to do better, more accurate science. If literature is used to glamorize sin and brokenness, then Christians should fire up their imaginations to create higher quality, more inspiring works of fiction. If movies and music are vehicles for emotionally “hooking” people into Hollywood worldviews, then the best countermeasure is to create more compelling, more beautiful forms of art that express a biblical worldview. And if philosophy can lead to atheism, the solution is to craft
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Scripture insists that all truth begins with God. The Bible relates the plot line of universal, cosmic history. All true knowledge finds a place within its story line.
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were
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Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? 5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
He will render to each one according to his works: 7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; 8 but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. 9 There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, 10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. 11 For God shows no partiality. 12 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and
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