Worldviews collide.

Most of us never sat down to write the specifics of our worldview. Still, they say we all have one. Some are absolute, line-for-line duplicates of the prevailing philosophies of life and world concepts. Others are like much of American social thought today: a little of this and a little of that. Still, our worldview is the lens through which we decipher and interpret life. Much of the confusion about our perplexing times results from the inter-play of these broad components that help us define and practice life realities. Our varied responses to the death of George Floyd, and many others for that matter, derive from our understanding of basic rights, privileges, law, human decency, response to authority , and many everyday life functions.

Observers and research organizations typically identify six basic non-Christian worldviews. An article at Ligonier Ministries by James Anderson mentions these six:

naturalism; postmodernism; pantheism; pluralism; Islam; and moralistic therapeutic deism. If you would like to read the article for the broad specifics of each worldview click here. Please note that the definitions are simplified. You can Google them all for more detail.

Since around the fourth century the Western world has been dominated by a Christian worldview. Once again there are slight variations in what this biblical worldview means. But, most interpretations include thoughts about our Providential God, absolute truth, the sinless life of Jesus Christ, God's redemptive plan and purpose for life, the reality of evil in the person of Satan, the accuracy of Scripture, and Christian responsibility to share the biblical truth of salvation with others. Following the tenets of Scripture and faith are elemental to this view of life. The Apostle Paul wrote---

See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to

human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to

Christ.

Colossians 2:8, ESV

The instruction is to deny man-made philosophies and ideals because they change with human thought, the whims of man. The biblical, or Christian worldview, is believed to be unchanging and sure for all time.

If you've read this blog over time you know that I hold a Christian worldview. Several important issues in this worldview speak to the confusion of a nation in clash mode, the recent dynamics that have caused such troubling times. Very briefly they are---

1. The Sanctity of human life and the value of every human being.

2. The biblical commands that we submit to governing authorities and pray for those in governing leadership.

3. The biblical instruction about avoiding destructive behaviors resulting from hatred, anger, envy, vengeance, duplicity, unhealthy talk, and many other evidences of evil.

4. The biblical expectation that humans honor God in their actions and words.

5. The Scriptural duty of humans to obey God.

These are rudimentary considerations. Please forgive my exclusion of some matters that have either slipped through my memory systems or my estimation of what is most important. Most of these worldview thoughts and the items listed are the source of confusion about what has been happening in our nation in the aftermath of George Floyd's killing. It's way above my pay grade, as they say.

This Christian worldview compels me and all other Christians to address the human fallacies that have contributed to these perplexing times. We have been commissioned to influence our times. It is demanded by our Christian worldview. Jesus said---

You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be

restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under

people's feet. “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor

do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to

all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may

' see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

Matthew 5: 13-16, ESV

Christian friends, now is the time to let our salt season and our lights shine. May it be especially true as our worldviews collide.

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Stages.

Yes, my friends, there is the age thing. And, I am there, in that final stage of life one writer has described as "From 65 until...", death being the unmentionable. I'm not moaning and groaning about it but am realizing that I can't do what I could do in the earlier stages of life. It's true, I slog 5 miles every day. But, the ten minute mile was long ago. Truth is, my memory banks don't remember when. So, today, at age 70+ they are fourteen minute miles. I think.

All meaning that even our spiritual lives pass through life stages as well. The Christian experience is often defined in terms acknowledging those stages. The idea of "rebirth" is central to the Christian experience, the new person God creates in our spiritual heart. In this case maturity is our goal and we pass through the stages from spiritual infancy to become that mature, fully functioning Christian. That's what becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ is all about, spiritual growth. According to Scripture we're not supposed to remain in that child-like stage Simon Peter wrote about---

Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up into

salvation, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

1 Peter 2: 2, ESV

Even when that spiritual growth is real there's still the age thing. My spiritual heartbeat is as strong as ever, the desire to serve and minister more real than ever before, but with the limited capacities of geezerhood. Does that mean that us older Christians can no longer function as truly heart healthy Christians? Certainly not.

In the Apostle Paul's letter to the Roman church he wrote something about this very thing. The context of Romans 11: 29 is not about age. He was explaining to the Romans the acceptance of the Christian gospel among the Gentiles, that is, non-Jewish people. He was also reminding them of God's promise to restore Israel, even after their rejection of Christ as their promised Messiah. So, he wrote---

For the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable.

Romans 11: 29, ESV

It is a profound truth in many areas of the Christian experience. Right now, for me, it is the declaration that God does not revoke my spiritual gifts and calling because of age. Yes, of course, we humans can forfeit our gifts and calling in sinful living and immoral behaviors. But, his gifts and calling for ministry, remain sure and certain even when we pass through those life stages and reach old age. It's true. I cannot physically do the the things that were normative for me in earlier years. But, my gifts and calling are still functional. I must be the heart healthy Christian even in my advanced years.

It's another sad commentary on the spiritual landscape of our nation. Many older Christians are on the sidelines, or in the viewing stands, of Christian ministry today. They are either excluded from many church functions, or have taken themselves out of active mission because of their age. And, what the contemporary church needs today, among other things, is the wisdom, experience, discernment, and gifts and calling of their more mature believers. It doesn't mean that Christ's church needs to revert back to our old ways or in some way keep the body of Christ from effectively reaching younger generations with this life changing Gospel.

Being truly mature is beyond our calculation of years. The Apostle Paul wrote about Christian maturity often in his Epistles. To the Philippians he wrote---

Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting

what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal

for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature

think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you.

Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

Philippians 3: 13-16, ESV

The mature, heart healthy Christian should follow Paul's pattern: clearing the path of what is behind, straining forward to what lies ahead, and pressing toward the prize of the upward call of God.

Yes, again, there are life stages. We must remain heart healthy Christians as we navigate through each of them.

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Heart cath.

In our childhood we were given an envelop to submit in our Sunday School class each week. It contained our offering and calculated our church score based on several boxes that we checked: Present (20%), On time (10%), Bible (10%), Offering (10%), Lesson studied (30%), Preaching (20%), for a total score of 100%. There were also lines to record the number of visits and phone calls made in the previous week. Each metric was a means of communicating the disciplines expected in the Christian life. In many ways this envelop was a simple diagnostic of a Christian heart. Of course, later in our personal spiritual development we learned that there was much more to being a heart healthy Christian than these Sunday morning measures. Much, much more.

Truth is, many professing believers today score high in the doing department. Over the last generation or so, however, we've been confronted with a basic contrast of faith, the personal dynamics of doing and being. While demographers pose nominal Christianity, that is, Christian in name only, as the norm among many believers today, those of us who practice faith at some level still maintain a checklist of sorts as evidence of faith. The emphasis of doing certain things gives us at least the rudimentary proof of having a Christian heart. It makes us feel better about ourselves if nothing more.

Even so, ours is a culture of stress. Who among us can deny the unmentionables of life in the mean streets right now? The list is long--- crime on the rampage, violent resistance to authority, damaging language, racial bigotry, sexual abuse, family dysfunction, competing factions, political nastiness, and so many others. Recently, and please forgive my short memory, there have been video recordings of several horrible crimes involving numbers of people. Someone posted a reply to one such social media post. It read, "Sorry to say, most of the offenders were probably professing Christians". You see, we've mastered some of the Sunday doing things. But, the being elements seem to be woefully short. Maybe it's time for us to submit to a spiritual heart cath.

Physically, it's a revealing procedure, the heart catheterization. It's complicated and beyond my pay grade, as they say. In short, the heart cath explores the vessels and arteries that supply the human heart, the valves that move the blood, and other cardiac functions. A spiritual heart cath, used here merely as an illustrative metaphor, probes the inner regions of the spiritual heart, below the surface of our actions. It would explore the the deeper realities of spiritual identity. This cath is necessary because Scripture pictures the heart as the central operating system of all human behavior. In a segment about religious legalism, Jesus taught---

But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person.

For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft,

false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands

does not defile anyone.

Matthew 15: 18-20, ESV

The heart cath for me is Scriptural truth that exposes my naturally sinful systems. Yes, I am capable of doing all the right things by virtue of my free will. Those inner heart realities, however, control the being elements of my faith. I can check my doing lists for all the wrong reasons while my being self remains constantly egocentric. Meaning that I can sit in church and still harbor anger, prejudice, and evil in my heart.

King David's life always inspires and challenges me. He was by no means a sinless paragon of virtue. Scroll his life in the Old Testament and note the many times he strayed spiritually. Yet, Biblical history remembers him as "...a man after God's own heart" (see 1 Samuel 13:14, and Acts 13:22). No, he was not morally pure and without error. Beyond the doing elements of his life, however, there was a consistent desire to obey and please God. It was the consistent diagnostic procedure that kept him attuned to the will and blessings of his Heavenly Father even after dreadfully sinful acts.

The heart healthy Christian desires to be a person after God's own heart as well. This wish is the heart cath diagnostic that will give us the strength and desire to do what is right, and be the heart healthy Christian so needed in our confusing times.

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