manning5 Loc: Richmond, VA

Return to the Christian Ideal is Sorely Needed!

A Christian worldview has the virtue of revelations, guidance and direction from God and in the Bible. We Christians, in forming our personal worldview, study and incorporate the hierarchy of Christian ideas and thoughts throughout our lives.
The dominant elements of the Christian hierarchy of thought are: God; Theology; Philosophy; Ethics; Biology; Psychology; Sociology; Law; Politics; Economics; and History. Taken in large measure from "Understanding the Times" by Jeff Meyers and David Noebel , what follows is a very brief phrase and sentence-oriented outline of these major elements of a well-developed Christian worldview:

1. God is first in thought. His Infinite and complex universe: galaxies; stars; our sun and planets; is awesome to contemplate. Then, life itself is a miracle. Why is there something instead of nothing? Why does the universe, life and man exist? Is the universe formed deliberately to accommodate man, that is, as an Anthropic Universe? Do we apprehend the design? God is The Designer, The Architect of the Universe.

2. Then comes Theology; The Trinity, God's love for us, His general and special revelations, guidance, commandments, Bible references, mind-body-and-soul, prayer, and worship. Agape, which means love of God and love of neighbor, The Decalogue (The Ten Commandments), walking with God, the gift of Free Will, the fall of man, confession of sins, The crucifixion of Jesus for our sins, forgiveness through Jesus Christ, the resurrection, and the life ever after.

3. Followed immediately by one's personal Philosophy: mind before matter; God before people; design before creation; mind/body dualism; objective reality; faith; worship; and the power of sincere prayer; plus following the Golden Rule. We hold to a virtuous philosophy of life: faith; hope; charity; prudence; temperance; justice; fortitude; truth-telling and honesty, to name a key few. There is Unity in the Virtues; possess one and you partake of all.

4. And then, we must account for the Ethics of Christian life; We apply Agape! The Decalogue; and what is right versus wrong behavior. There are a number of additional ethical constraints on an individual's behavior, including: abiding by the law, etiquette, business rules, military rules, customs, traditions, institutional rules, and family rules.

5. Biology of Life comes next, Christianity affirms special creation, that at some point and at some level, life resulted from a creative act of God, The Designer, including birth, growing, old age, death, marriage, procreation, raising children, health and medical problems. Thus it must be that Biogenesis, or life comes from life, is true.

6. Christian Psychology follows. The truth about the nature of the Soul must be reckoned with in psychological situations. Christians believe in mind/body dualism, or the belief that human beings are composed of immaterial mind and material bodies. If anything immaterial exists, then matter is not all there is. If matter is not all there is, then materialism is false, and secularism, Marxism and postmodernism will have to start over from scratch. (Another immaterial thing is "number", which adds to the argument against scientific materialism.)

7. The applicable Sociology of the locale, the state and the nation must be accounted for. The basic institutions of society---the family; culture; worship; government; urbanization; agriculture and so on--- were given to us in Genesis 1, 2 and 4, as well as a common language to benefit all. Christians then apply Sphere Sovereignty, that is, society functions best when family, church and state are managing their own spheres of responsibility, which distances the state from family and church matters, yet permits Christian ideas to be assimilated into the state.

8. A key general revelation from God are these aspects of natural life: Natural Law, Natural Rights, and Natural Duties. The essence of natural law is Agape, and the Decalogue (with a host of major derivatives, such as: freedom, liberty, private property and the pursuit of happiness.) Natural Rights is where our freedoms and liberty originate from God. Then Natural Duties logically follow to ensure that our Laws and Rights are well supported, promulgated and defended. Then we discover that our Declaration of Independence and Constitution largely reflect Natural Law, Rights and Duties. For Christians, Common Law must not violate Natural Law, or the law is invalid.

9. And only then comes Politics, which must have results that are compatible with or non-interfering with Natural Law, and the common law that follows. In Christian political life, one must follow subsidiarity: the belief that decisions are best handled by the organizational or societal level closest to the issue or persons affected.
It is apparent that any thought process discussed within the subject of Politics must not due violence to any of the preceding thoughts stated above, or they do violence to Christianity. This is not to say one cannot discuss Politics, Law or any other subject at all, just that no harm should be done by a Christian to the Christian Worldview.

10. The subject of Economics then follows. Biblical Stewardship is the Christian act of managing and caring for the resources of the world and the nation that ultimately belong to God. "The Christian worldview embraces the peaceful and free exchange of goods and services without fraud, theft or breach of contract. Private property and stewardship are necessary and good. While not everyone possesses the same skills, interests, or connections, every human being does bear God's image and is capable of working hard to come up with good ideas to make life better for themselves and others. If we all take responsibility to do this, we will see abundance continue to grow and truth and rightness continue to spread throughout the world."

11. Finally, History: "Christianity is rooted in history. It makes specific claims about past events and ties its very claims to truth to the validity of these claims. The Bible practically invites scrutiny with its specific claims---historical claims---about what happened when and where. It is possible to
find evidence to prove or disprove them. In fact, the Bible itself claims that either Christ is a historical figure, the Bible is a historical document that describes God's communications with humanity and records events in the life of Christ, or that the Christian faith is bankrupt and our so-called faith is described as pathetic. (1 Cor. 15-14)"
Given these constraints, any discussion of political thought by a Christian must ultimately satisfy all of the prior conditions established by the Christian Religion. Thus Christians cannot substantially separate politics from religion, since it is a integral part of their Christian worldview.
This is also why true separation of church and state is, for Christians, not possible, and it is significant that it is not called for in our Constitution, because the founders were mainly either Theists or Christians, and they wanted their religious views to be taken into account in governing the nation.

bahmer

Amen and Amen Excellent thanks for posting this.

manning5 Loc: Richmond, VA

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