Worldview: One's Perspective of the World

Worldview Lesson

One's perspective on life. A person's understanding of the world from a specific standpoint.

An individual's worldview is his "big picture," a medley of all his beliefs about the world. It is his way of understanding reality.

A worldview is the basis for daily decisions and is therefore extremely important.

Example: An apple sitting on a table is seen by several people. A botanist looking at the apple sees an "angiospermous pome" and classifies it. An artist sees a still-life and draws it. A grocer sees an asset and inventories it. A child sees lunch and eats it. How we look at any situation is influenced by how we look at the world at large.

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Every worldview deals with at least four questions:

1) Where did we come from?
2) And, why are we here?)
3) What is wrong with the world?
4) How can we fix it?

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TWO COMPETING WORLDVIEWS:

NATURALIST
1) We are the product of random acts of nature
2) We have no real purpose, we create our purpose in life.
3) We do not respect nature as we should.
4) We can save the world through helping the earth and one another.

This worldview generates many related philosophies such as moral relativism, existentialism, pragmatism, and utopianism.

CHRISTIAN

A Christian worldview is formed by the bible. It answers the four questions this way:
1) We were made by God.
2) We are designed to govern the world and fellowship with Him.
3) Adam sinned and passed the sin nature on to all human beings. Sin is what is wrong with the world.
4) We cannot fix sin since we are part of the problem. God will fix it. The only thing God asks us to do is put our trust in him and his plan to restore the world through his Son, Jesus Christ.

This worldview leads us to believe in moral absolutes, miracles, human dignity, and the possibility of redemption.

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A worldview affects every area of life, from money to morality, from politics to art. Christianity is more than a set of ideas to use at church. Christianity as taught in the Bible is itself a worldview. The Bible never distinguishes between a "religious" and a "secular" life; the Christian life is the only life there is. Jesus proclaimed Himself "the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6) and, in doing so, became our worldview.