Session 1 began with ‘Name That Tune’. The first song was John Lennon’s “Imagine.” The second was Josh Bales rendition of Maltbie Davenport Babcock’ “This Is My Father’s World.”

Notice the songs (lyrics) come from two different worldviews. One is secular and the other distinctly Christian.

Lyrics:
> Imagine
> This Is My Father’s World

OUR worldview shapes how we think, what we believe and how we live. Marriage, family, work, community, education, politics, communication, entertainment, art, music, media, church, life, death, immigration, etc. are all worldview issues.

As thinking and concerned Christians, we must understand that “Deeper questions won’t be answered by shallow arguments.” (unknown).

Pithy Christian slogans and thin responses to questions among believers and non-believers alike do more to hurt our witness than help it. People are searching for answers to their deepest needs and greatest fears.

Tarrant County Court House (Ft. Worth, Texas) was built in 1894 of pink Texas granite. As the sun moves through the sky, the building changes color. 

Why don’t we build buildings like this any more?
The answer is ‘worldview’. The worldview of the generation who build this court house was very different than today…

You’ll never see the Tarrant County Courthouse the same ever again!

Horse-drawn carriages have given way to automobiles. One worldview gives way to another….

[Above] Old Tarrant County Civil Courthouse (Fort Worth, Texas). The modern façade is an attempt to make this building resemble the 1894 Tarrant County Courthouse.

The 1895 courthouse retained its original appearance until the 1950s when a Civil Courts Building, designed by Fort Worth architect Wyatt C. Hedrick, was completed in 1958, attaching it to the west side of the courthouse, destroying much of the stonework and entry stairs. The white, limestone addition with louvered windows and four bas-relief sculptures of a winged Lady Justice, was considered one of the ugliest buildings in downtown Fort Worth, referred to as the “hemorrhoid to the west” and “a space age refrigerator.” In 1983, the 1895 courthouse received a $9 million renovation which removed false ceilings, restored floors, courtrooms and stairwells and re-opened the rotunda. A 1988 remodeling of the 1958 Civil Courts Building, by architect George C.T. Woo, covered the structure in synthetic stucco that was painted to match the stone of the 1895 courthouse. (Texasscapes.com)

The postmodern worldview creates very different looking buildings than the Christian worldview.

Buildings, like songs are “cultural goods.” They are ways humans make something of the their world. Buildings and songs are not just ideas, although they once were just ideas. Buildings and songs are transferred from the mind of the artist into the real world of human socieities.  (See Andy Crouch – “Culture Making – Recovering Our Creative Calling” for more)

Worldview shapes all areas of life…

[above] The Cathedral in Cologne, Germany

Why don’t we build CHURCHES like this anymore?

The Answer: Worlview

Utilitarian Postmodern church buildings…

We build church buildings for different reasons than Christians hundreds of years ago. Today, we want amenities, plenty of parking, nurseries, classrooms, coffee shops, gyms, big sound systems, light shows, and of course, more parking. 

Generally speaking, the secularized (postmodern) Christian worldview creates buildings that are efficient and primarily utilitarian. Aesthetics are (generally) an afterthought. In other words, usefulness comes before beauty. Utility, not beauty is the hallmark of church buildings in America.

The Cologne Cathedral points to a beauty beyond itself – to something good, true and beautiful. God embodies goodness, truth and beauty. 

Modernity, with its focus on the utility of things has lost the rich meaning embedded in creation and man’s creative power to create beautiful things (cultural goods).

You can see how the “Christian” worldview has been shaped by postmodernism… 

[abstract stained-glass windows]

Earlier generations of Christian built beautiful church buildings for the sake of building something beautiful unto the Lord. The awe-inspiring arches, buttresses, and stained-glass pointed themselves to a beautiful, awe-inspiring God.

I’m afraid our forbearers would not recognize our modern version or definition of ‘beauty.”

The worldview that created the Cologne Cathedral believed that there was a God in Heaven. So, they designed the cathedral in such a way, that God could look down from Heaven and see the Cross where victory was won by his only Son.

Again, the entire enterprise points beyond itself…

I have never been to the Cologne Cathedral. I can only imagine what it is like walking up to it, seeing its spires reaching toward the heavens. Passing through it’s threshold into the sanctuary filled with the shattered light patterns from God’s sun passing through man’s meager, yet exquisite stained-glass. I think I would find the experience worshipful indeed.

Generations point beyond themselves…

The Cologne Cathedral took nearly 600 years to compete.  In other words, it took 20 GENERATIONS to finish it.

Imagine I’m a stone mason in 1248. It would be like me saying to my son, “Son, I will build the foundation. You will continue the work and build the first floor. Your son (my grandson) will build the second floor… Long after our names are forgotten by history, your great-great-great-great grandson will place the cross on the highest steeple.”

OUR worldview shapes how we think, what we believe and how we live.

“When the those who bear the light retreats inside the walls of the church, the world becomes a very dark place.” – Unknown

8 years on staff at Christ Chapel Bible Church as Local Outreach Director and Pastor. 

I was minding my own business (literally). I owned a wealth management firm and an insurance marketing company. I was leading our ForLife Initiative and leading some small apologetics classes on my own… When Executive Pastor, Dr. Bill Egner called and basically said, “Jesus loves you and I have a plan for your life!” (Just kidding). However, Bill perceived God’s calling on my life… and I said, yes. Now, I’m here with you all.

Worldview matters to me because these people matter to me…

[Faces blocked because I don’t allow photos of my children on the internet]

“Culture and the Christian Worldview” course is designed to help you develop a full-orbed Kingdom vision of total reality.

We should wake up every day and proclaim, “He is Risen!” Because it’s as true today as it was 2000 years ago. There will never be a time in history when “He is risen!” will not be true.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the counterpoint of all creation, reality, and history. We ought to live lives that reflect this reality for the world to see – it is, in fact, Good News!

We will purposefully shift from a privatized faith to a public theology that goes beyond just ‘thinking Christianly’ to acting (obeying) Christianly. Jesus did ministry in public… in the highways and byways, in the places and spaces where people dwell.

Over the next 8 weeks, we’ll take a journey together.
Click here to view COURSE CURRICULUM FOR CULTURE AND THE CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW

HANDOUTS:

1. Intro to Culture and the Christian worldview
2. Curriculum 
3. 4X4 (4 discipleship questions, 4 worldview questions, 4 chapters (the STORY), 4 cultural responses (the MOMENT), and 4 Prayer points.
4. Take Time to Pray – Prayer Devotional by Dr. Ben McWilliams (Life Stage 6 Pastor)
5. Reflections (Questions) Name, Why are you taking this course?, What do you hope to get out of this course?

Suggested Home Study and Refection:
– Daily reading of one proverb per day for 31 days beginning May 1st, followed by Ecclesiastes.
– Live webinars and articles (TBA)
– Take Time to Pray – Dr. Ben McWilliams
– Reflect on 4×4 (Handout)

Focus Passage: Acts 17:26

There is a lot of theological richness packed into this one verse.

God made you for this time and place.

Focus Passage: Ephesians 2:10

We all are very familiar with Ephesians 2:8-9
“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
But, we fail to see the significance or the power God packs into verse 10. 

VERSE 10: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them…”

We are saved for something… a telos, a purpose.

God made you and called you to this time and place… Make the most over every opportunity – cultivate courage, bear witness to the truth.

God made you and called you to this time and place… Make the most over every opportunity!

These are photos of normal Christians just being Christians in the time an place God put them. They demonstrate that a small thing done faithfully, is a big thing in God’s hands.

Each took responsibility or initiative for the crisis or opportunity right in front of them.

Ross Douthat said, “The example of a single extraordinary worman, Mother Teresa, did more for the Christian witness in the 20th century than every theology department and political action committee put together.”

An understanding the times requires a knowledge of the history that has led up to the present.

I also refer to “understanding of the times” as “this cultural moment.”

“If we get the diagnosis wrong, we will get the cure wrong. If we get the cure wrong, we end up harming the people we are trying to help!”(paraphrasing Thaddeus Williams – Confronting Injustice without Compromising Truth)

Recommended Book: Carl Trueman – Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self – Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution

All of these Christians above understood the times in which they lived… their cultural moment.

Each, in their own way, took responsibility or initiative for the crisis (problem) or opportunity right in front of them.

 Without Wilberforce or Lincoln or Douglass, we would not have Jackie Robinson or Rosa Parks.

These people represent part of our Christian heritage going back to the original 12 disciples…

We live in a cultural moment but we are ALL part of God’s Story…. 

All of these Christians above understood the times in which they lived… their cultural moment.

Each, in their own way, took responsibility or initiative for the crisis (problem) or opportunity right in front of them.

 Without Wilberforce or Lincoln or Douglass, we would not have Jackie Robinson or Rosa Parks.

These people represent part of our Christian heritage going back to the original 12 disciples…

We live in a cultural moment but we are ALL part of God’s Story…. 

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