"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made that was made." That quote from John should reveal a great deal to us, about the man in whom we place our faith and in, whom we are identified in the Fathers sight. So the question I had to ask myself is, why do I find myself still so influenced by the world, if I am identified with the Man who created it? It could only be in how I view and understand this place where I dwell ,and its influence on me, "my world view".
I remember very well, in the first blush of my born again experience 37 years ago, in my reading of the Bible and the daily answers to prayer and the miracle of a changed life; I became aware of the need for a very different outlook on the definition of my life, over that which I had previously held. Early on I came across a book on discipleship and was so thrilled to discover the bible teaching of devoted service to Christ and The Word of God. Shortly there after attending church and Bible study with great regularity I began to look around, and in the light of what I had learned, about being a Christian, I started to wonder with a very disillusioned heart, where are all the Christians hiding? It was not to be for many years until after reading Francis Schaeffer's books on Christian world view and later Nacey Pearcey's Total Truth, did I realize the importance of having a defined understanding of how I looked at life and how that definition must be found , as a Christian in my intellectual/ spiritual understanding, as reveled in His Word. A Christian world view.
A world view can be defined as a framework from which we view reality and make sense of life and the world. For the Christian this would be our approach to understanding God the world and mans relationship to God and the world. According to studies I found on line, only 4% of the nation hold a Biblical worldview, and among born again believers just 9%. Those numbers for the world I am not surprised at, but is it possible that the host of Christians surrounding us at church, Bible studies etc. harbour a view of life not clearly defined by the Bible? Well my friends, if you have been following the theme of these blogs, you now are at least aware in the view of positional/identification doctrine studies, the Bible very clearly revels a presence of duality in redeemed Christians;the natural man, always with us, and the new man, found in Christ. So it should not surprise us that if we occupy our Christian life in the natural state and mind, not being renewed in Christs mind by the Word, our world view might be compromised by that which surrounds us, the world.
I will not go into a long rant as to what is wrong with the church, which if you read the Bible, always has been highly influenced by the world system,sin and evil. After all many of the Epistles were written by Paul to Correct worldliness among the people of God. The simple truth the church has failed as a institution, not only are most Christians unaware of who they are in Christ but the light we are called to shed upon the world is very dim indeed, as basic Christian truth is virtually unknown to a majority of our society, and I dare say ,if taking myself as a example in past understanding, a Biblical world view is indeed a very small part of Christian life. According to studies Ive found, 35% of Christians almost never read the Bible and most that do , do so only in Church. These figures do not offer much hope for our family's in a society dominated by a worldly culture. This leaves the question, how then shall we live and where will we find the power to develop a personal world view pleasing to God?
In looking back at my studies and attempt to adopt a Christian world view, even in the light of the great works on the subject by Schaeffer and Pearcey, I still failed in grasping a firm commitment of mind, as to living and seeing the world from a true Biblical perspective. Why? I think, the answer can be found in the fact that my Christian concepts were firmly anchored in admiration, and not appropriation!
Again I am here influenced by the incite of J. B. Stoney. As I look at my understanding of scripture I now am struck at how much I thought of the word of God as simply communications from Him, rather than as revelations of Himself to us. We might see them as beautiful concepts or picture which His grace has given us the privilege of seeing , rather than a truth of what we have to appropriate and adopt, in acquiring a Christian world view.
If I am seeing myself in the Lord Jesus as to identification, I see and admire everything that is of Him, not as apart from myself;I admire it with all the consciousness that is mine, because I am of Him therefore my view is adopted and appropriated by the will of my faith in that truth. I have in my mind understood that I have possession of all that He is, now and forever. You see my friends I now see that we can acquire what we admire in a practical world view sense. This view can be ours if we see ourselves in the new divine order in which the Father, by grace has positioned you before Himself seen only in His Son in His Sight. To appropriate that position involves the refusal and the renunciation of the old nature and world view, which Jesus died unto on the cross, and under which it was never possible to appropriate a new view of anything divine, even though we might rest in the mercies of justification , as saved ones.
You see my friends, the Bible clearly teaches there cannot be appropriation and hence a Christian world view unless the very thing [our old nature] which distanced us from it is consciously seen as gone at the Cross. It is this realization which opens the door to a new view. We do not even have the right to find who we are to the Father until we appropriate who we are in the Son. Stoney said it like this; You may admire truth like little children who are taken through a museum, but not allowed to touch anything, much less to take anything away.
Oh what a great joy to know of the establishment of our new world view as found in the understanding of ourselves as heirs of Christ with the full assurance that that this view is His, and we find it in ourselves. Yes we can admire truth but in adopting it we really possess it in a practical way. You may ask; how do we begin? By a serious , preserving and constant effort,and with a broken heart, you will appropriate what you admire!
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