Genesis 3:14-15 “So the Lord God said to the serpent, ‘Because you have done this, cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.’”
Romans 3:21 “But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.”
Every philosophy and worldview must have a solution to the problems that we face, or the mess that we are in. There must be an understanding of not only what the problem is, but also what the solution is.
In the biblical worldview we see that not only is God the Creator of our universe, but that He is also giving us the answer to why we are in such a mess. This is laid out by Paul in Ephesians 2 where he describes what the Ephesians were like before they came to Christ.
First, they were dead in the sense that they were incomplete, with something missing in their lives. This is why you find people who seem to have everything, yet they commit suicide. No amount of fame, wealth or success can compensate for a dead spirit.
Second, they were slaves led away by their own lusts and unable to break the chains that held them. Paul later on said that he was: “….sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do — this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.” Romans 7:14-20
What is the biblical worldview solution? Two words: BUT GOD. Paul was showing us in Ephesians that there is nothing that can deliver us – no education, money, fame, success, etc. Paul was showing that from man there is absolutely no hope. However, we read:
“But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us. Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (for by grace ye are saved).” Ephesians 2:4-5 KJV
“Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:9-10 KJV
What are some of the other worldview solutions?
Karl Marx, a German philospher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist and revolutionary socialist. For him the ‘original sin’ was ‘private property,’ therefore it stands to reason that the solution is ‘destroying the private ownership of property.’ And, ‘redeemer,’ as he believed, is the proletariat, the urban factory workers, who should rise up in revolution against their capitalist oppressors.
Nancy Pearcy: Total Truth – Rousseau: Rousseau’s work of The Social Contract, states “Man is born free, and ever is in chains.” In my later weekly letters we will know that for Rousseau oppressive relationships like marriage, family, church, and workplace was the problem. Redemption for Rousseau was the STATE. This is one of the reasons why the 20th century was one of the bloodiest ever because people adopted a worldview based on faulty ideas of creation, fall and redemption. Rousseau’s writings were centered around the individual.
Hannah Arendt points out in “The Origins of Totalitarianism,” that “disconnected, isolated individuals are actually the most vulnerable to totalitarian control because they have no competing identity or loyalties. That’s why one of the best ways to protect the rights of individuals is to protect the rights of groups such as: families, churches, schools, businesses, and voluntary associations. Contrary to Rousseau’s belief, that to protect moral, social, and kinship bonds actually protects individual freedom.”
Isn’t it interesting to see the spiritual battles being fought today over the family, the church, rule of law, etc.
Just to give one other example that is affecting us today in the West – is Margaret Sanger’s ‘Religion of Sex.’ She is the founder of Planned Parenthood, and like Nancy Pearcy describes Margaret Sanger: “She is a committed Darwinist, a champion of Social Darwinism and eugenics, which was very much in vogue in the early part of the twentieth century. Her goal was to construct a ‘scientific’ approach to sexuality based squarely on Darwinism.”
For Margaret Sanger, the problem for the mess that we are in is “the rise of Christian morality” and the solution is to free our bodies through sexual liberation. We saw this coming to its fruition in the sixties when sexual revolution became a moral crusade and Christian morality was the enemy. This is what is leading us into pornography, abortion, birth and death control, homosexuality, etc.
So when we look at these different solutions we need to ask ourselves: what is real and what is false?