Dr. Francis Schaeffer, in “How Should We Then Live?”

Just when you think the economy is bad enough, forcing people out of work, a new danger emerges forcing people not only from their jobs but in some cases from their houses as well.

It has become an accepted belief around the world that the government–local, state and federal–can do whatever it likes. Unfortunately, it is not just a belief, but it happens in practice as well.

As a result people have been served condemnation notices on their properties in order that the properties might become available to other businesses in the community. Under the guise of better planning, people have had to give up the right to their land and home, and often their livelihood, as the law has been used to evict them off their property in order to make way for someone else.

Under the mistaken notion of eminent domain, authorities around the world treat property as if it were their own, thus making the idea of property ownership an impossible goal for many.

What is not often realized, however, is that the concept of eminent domain is an exercise of divine right by the political order. This ancient religious belief has returned after centuries of being held in check. It was held in check by another view of divinity, Christianity, which asserted that divine right was an attribute of God not the political order.

Wherever you turn in the world today you are faced with the claims of eminent domain by the political order. You are not free to use your property any way you choose; you need permits and approvals before you can open the doors, often at high cost.

Increasingly people are not free to enter certain professions without state approval, often controlled by university and and college intake criteria. While the ostensibly good reasons of protecting everyone sound plausible, they are a continuation of the claim of divine right by the political order. In this case, it is attempting to save people from some harm they might do to themselves if left to act without the guidance of the political order. Apparently people need to be saved from themselves.

No people can be free when eminent domain is claimed by the political order. To speak of freedom in such an environment is an oxymoron. But because we turn our backs on the Christian concept of divinity we have no way of redressing the pain and agony faced by many as the state exercises its version of eminent domain.

If you want to find out what’s wrong with the economy you have to look beyond the mismanagement of the economy by those in authority. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Below the surface, something else is going on. You need to find out what is driving this manifestation of eminent domain that is causing pain to many.

“The earth us the Lord’s,” said the Psalmist. This is the belief that denied the divine right of Caesars, czars, kings, dictators, presidents, parliaments and congresses. It is also the belief that gave real protection to property ownership, and thus denied the political order the power of eminent domain. A man’s home is his castle, but this is only true if he is protected by the law, rather than be seen as a tenant of the state who can remove him at will.

The power of eminent domain is a sign of real danger to individual freedom, property rights (without which freedom disappears), and the ability of the economy to build a sound and lasting future. The challenge is this: What can be done about it?

God bless you.

Limitations. This is how you can tell a fake worldview.

A worldview has answers to questions. Not vague answers, but very specific answers. Those answers are intimately tied into and connected to the questions and answers that establish the worldview. By that, I mean that the answers flow straight out of your idea about who you are, how you know things, and the moral standards you inherently aspire to. And the answers to these things are directly related to your idea about God. Not just god in general, but specifically the Triune God of the Bible.

Consider this question: How much of its citizens’ money is the government morally entitled to? There are possible answers:

a. As much as it likes
b. No more than 50% (or it might be even no more than 10%)
c. Nothing

Whatever the answer, you need to ask these questions:

1. What is the standard?
2. How do you know what the standard is?
3. Has that standard been communicated to you in some form?

You can read the Old Testament many times over and get some of the answers that are provided today as part of the biblical worldview. Why do I insist the Old Testament is the measuring rod? Because it was there first. And whatever was there first defines what comes thereafter.

Contemporary Christianity has reversed things because of it’s belief about the New Testament. Somewhere along the way, the Old Testament was dropped as the standard and the New Testament took its place.

The result? No worldview. Take again the example of taxation. You can read the Old Testament, especially the Torah, and you find there is no scope for civil taxation as we know it. Certainly no grounds for personal income tax. (This, by the way, explains why in the Western world, personal taxes almost disappeared after the collapse of the Roman high taxes.)

Here’s another question: Should the government operate radio stations? What standard says they should? How will they pay for it? Voluntary advertising or compulsory taxation?

What, by the way, is the real role of the government? Is it the government’s role to make law, or simply to administer someone else’s law.

What’s the standard?

Now there’s a question, the answer of which eludes many people. So instead of specific answers we get vague notions of morality about how if the government did not act, we we would be a menace to one another.

Now you cannot read the Old Testament, particularly the first five books containing the Law of God, without coming away with at least one impression. There is no national government. There are national rules of right living, but no national government to enforce the rules. Apparently God is quite capable of enforcing His rules without aid from the government. (Someone should tell them!)

With Christianity’s progressive abandonment of the Old Testament, there are no more comprehensive biblical answers to the questions. But there has been a rise of national governments attempting to enforce the rules of right living.

Until there is a united testimony from both Old and New Testaments, the cultural questions will remain unanswered because those who claim to have the answers are divided. And we all know the prophecy that a divided city cannot stand.

Neither can a divided religious group.

Now I am going to bring this series to a close. But I have one more e-zine to go. Part 7: The distinguishing mark of the Christian World View in the modern era.

God bless you this week.

Have I made it clear enough? There is only ONE worldview. That is the worldview based on the . . .

I was about to write “Bible” but I stopped myself. Here’s why.

This is the fifth (final?) article in this series “The Making of a Worldview.” And I’ve only quoted one verse of Scripture, and referred to one section of the Bible. Almost everything you need for a worldview is wrapped up in the first three chapters of Genesis. Now there are some important things that come later, but they are not the foundation.

So it is a worldview based on the Old Testament — the Hebrew Bible — that is the only worldview. It is the principles in the Old Testament that allow us to make comments about worldviews, even if we pretend that we have somehow decided our worldview without the Old Testament.

Thus the Old Testament is not true because you or I or someone else says it is. The Old Testament is true because without it we cannot even begin the process. Without it our minds and mouths are locked tight.

Without this worldview in place, you cannot even get to the New Testament and what it teaches. Therefore, the necessity in everything is to insist that the Old Testament is the first — the mountain peak — from which all things must be viewed. And that includes the New Testament.

“In the beginning, God created . . .” demands that we accept our limited nature. We are not “infinite, eternal and unchangeable”, to use the words of the Westminster Shorter Catechism. We are created. We are “finite, temporal, and changeable” — the latter, very much so.

The Catechism states that “God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal and unchangeable, in his being wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness and truth” (Q. 4).

These last four words — holiness, justice, goodness, and truth — declare there is a framework of opposites: Unholiness, injustice, badness, and lies. In other words, there are categories. Without this juxtaposition, the words themselves lose meaning.

Herein lies the foundation of morality — right and wrong. If nothing else is obvious, it is the way in which everyone insists their ideas are right — and most other people are wrong. I’ve made reference to some of these ideas through this series. “There’s no such thing as truth.?” Oh, yeah? Is that true? Because if it is true, then the statement itself is a nonsense. A stupid attempt to prove that someone has figured out the governing principle of the universe — there is no truth. And in so doing, he establishes the very thing he is trying to deny.

Herein lies the dilemma of all worldviews that are not based on the Old Testament. They have no foundation for determining the categories of truth and error, right and wrong. If someone decides it’s OK to shoot people on a Sunday afternoon with an AK47, leaving 33 people dead, why shouldn’t he — and thousands like him — do this. After all, this is his idea of rightness.

It is obvious to those who want to see, then, that the ability to answer three founding questions is critical to the development of a worldview.

1. How can I know things? How do I know that there is some connection between my senses and the external world, so that what I see, smell, touch and hear, is a reality and not just a figment of my imagination?

2. The answer to this question forces you to also make some choices about who you are and your place in the universe — metaphysics. Your knowledge is real and possible because of who you are — made in God’s image. Yet you are not God.

3. The ability to make judgments and use categories such as right and wrong, true and false, is only possible because of the answers we give to the first two issues. Deny either one and we have no basis for making statements about anything.

Now this Old Testament worldview is the one that gets people mad. This is the one they really hate. Why? Because of what those first three chapters of Genesis tell us. They tell us that man’s desire is to be his own god, making up the categories of good and evil, truth and error, right and wrong, for himself.

When we get that message through our thick skulls, maybe we’ll be willing to listen to what follows. What follows is a list of rules and regulations handed down from above.

You see, neither you nor I is capable of determining the categories. Only Someone who knows everything can do that, because He has the exhaustive knowledge with which to do it. There are no surprises for Him. There is nothing new to learn that causes Him to change His mind.

So when He speaks and commands and says, “Do this,” it is a prudent man or woman who will listen.

The battle of the universe is the battle of who will make the rules. Who will make the choice between what is right and what is wrong. This is a battle that involves all of mankind, from Adam forward.

When you grasp these things, you begin to understand the “logic” of the Bible. The law (or Torah) follows the story of man’s creation and fall because it is God telling the piddling little human gods, “You guys have it wrong. THESE are the rules. Obey them!” The Psalms of the Old Testament are songs of delight about God and His laws. The Proverbs are practical applications of the principles. The prophets and the writings are men of God calling Israel back to obedience.

Get to the New Testament, and the “Pharisee of the Pharisees” — Saul, renamed Paul — can remind us how the one true system of belief based on God and God’s dealings with Israel, provides him with enough evidence so that he and his friends “are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God” (II Cor. 10:5). How is this being done? By bringing “every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”

The obedience of whom? Come on now, no cheating. Think about St. Paul’s answer here. He didn’t say the obedience to some new addition to the Hebrew Bible called the New Testament. That didn’t exist when St. Paul wrote his words to the Corinthians.

He didn’t say obedience to Jesus of Nazareth. St. Paul deliberately selected the name that links Jesus of Nazareth with the Old Testament Messiah. This is the same person who said “I did not come to abolish the law or the prophets, but to fulfill.”

I don’t know about you, but I’ve never met so many people who have trouble with communications and understanding words. Christ did not come to abolish . . . but we are told we no longer have to keep the law of God. This is nuts. It’s the most ludicrous explanation of what is plain. “I did not come to abolish, to do away with.” What other words could be used to make this meaning clearer? None.

It’s not the words that are the problem, however. It’s our psychology. Mankind is so hell-bent on being his own god — that is making up his own rules — he will stop at nothing to eliminate any competition to that claim — even from Christ Himself.

Unless you understand Jesus’s commitment to the whole of the Old Testament, and Paul’s continuation of Judaism along with his acceptance of Jesus as the Messiah, you will never understand how Paul can construct his argument.

It quite simple. I mean that. It really is simple. You cannot destroy the stupidity of this world unless you hang on the the Old Testament. It’s the foundation, the cornerstone of our ability to follow Paul and do likewise to the vain philosophies of this world. Instead of hanging on to the OT, however, we prefer to “hold down” or “suppress” the truth and knowledge about God (see Romans chapter 1).

Epistemology — Metaphysics — and ethics. The moment you abandon the Old Testament — the Hebrew Bible — as providing the answer to these questions, you’ve cut yourself loose from the Scriptures as providing a worldview.

And without a worldview, you cannot destroy the silly ideas that are passed around as “competing” worldviews.

When we get that in our heads and turn back to the Old Testament as the real Bible, and hold an older view that the New Testament is commentary — albeit an inspired commentary — on the Old, then we might do like Paul — the Pharisee of the Pharisees — and destroy every “speculation[s] and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God bringing “every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”

The obedience of Whom? That’s Christ, the Messiah. The Second Person of the Trinity. The One who caused these words to be written . . . “In the beginning, God created. . . .” This is the same Person who “was behind” the Torah, the Psalms, and the prophets. The same Person who said, “I did not come to abolish the law. . .” You get the idea.

I guess now you need to figure out what you’re going to do with this?

God bless you as you serve Him this week.

Economic categories are no longer what they were. It is now common to hear government officials say that the revenue they did not receive was a “cost” to the government.

Imagine going to the company accounting system and entering an amount in the costs of the company for revenue that was not obtained. “Let me see, we should have had another $10 million this year. Let’s put that in as a cost to the business. Better still, make it $10 billion.”

And you think corporate fiscal accountability is bad. Yet it is government allowing the new definitions

Now, if Bernie Madoff or the executives of WorldCom only knew this, their outcome could have been more favorable for investors.

The same confusion, unfortunately, exists concerning assets and liabilities. Debt, many say, is an asset. Let’s have more debt. The fact that you might enter it into the liabilities section of your Balance Sheet is irrelevant. For debt is the way to wealth in the minds of many. And if you only had more debt then you could turn this economy around — and then some.

So thinks the average American citizen. So think many average citizens around the world. For this reliance on debt as the way to wealth is not restricted to America. It has its counterpart in many, many countries today.
This abuse of language comes from an abuse of logic. By what stretch of the imagination can you call revenue you did not get a cost just because you think you’re entitled to it? By the same imagination it is argued that debt is the way to wealth.

This is nuts . . .

It is also a problem of faulty definitions. At one time, not too long ago, creating spending power by either increases in the money supply or credit, was called inflation. Now it’s called saving the world — or something else. I’m an Australian and we have some unprintable words that describe this kind of silly reasoning.

But the definition — and the understanding that went with it — had to go so these new ideas could replace them.

Debt is a mechanism that brings future production into the present. If you buy now you don’t have to buy later. No waiting. And if you need a 25-year mortgage this year to finance your future purchases in the present, why not take a 45-year mortgage and bring even more purchases into the here and now. Maybe the Japanese had it right after all, when mortgages reached 100 years. But why stop there? Why not just create an obligation for the next 10 generations, about 700 years. Now we could really spend ourselves rich in this generation.

Right thinking is in short supply. So said John Knox to Queen Mary. And you know what happened to that crusty old Scotsman as a result of his audacity, telling the leading political figure of the day, who claimed conscience was her guide: “Conscience needs to governed by right reason. And right reason I see you have none.”

Perhaps you’ve been blinded by a host of bad predictions. The great depression that was to happen in the 1980s did not appear, nor did the promised meltdown of the 1990s. What is to happen in the twenty-first century?

The truth is, you don’t know. You are in unchartered waters. Governments have cut themselves off the reality of the market to put themselves into the position of expanding money and credit as they wish. And they wish a great deal at the moment, for this is the mechanism that will prevent all economic disasters. Or so they hope. Right reason is in short supply in the Congresses and Parliaments of this world. Things haven’t changed much in nearly 500 years.

The situation is clearly screwed up when you get advisers warning us against debt on the one hand, then suggesting you need to get into debt to buy a house, a business or anything else. It’s other people’s debt that’s the problem, never your own. Consumer debt might be out, but at the end of the debt discussions there is still debt. And who really cares whether the debt is for a house or a business vehicle. You need both now – not later.

Can this headlong rush to bring the future into the present continue, and if so, for how long? The pundits got it wrong in the ’80s, the ’90s, now they tell you to trust them a third time. But by now no one is listening. Pity.

It seems the only reliable guide you have is employment – or lack of it. Or more specifically, the number of $100 an hour jobs that are going to India or China where the pay is $20 or less an hour. And if you realize that this difference was caused, in part, by price increases at home, you might just begin to realize what debt has really done to everyone. It has made many people unemployable at $100 an hour. It has caused buyers to look for cheaper prices, and the buyers of labor have looked and found bargain prices.

It seems the lessons of economics remain to be learned. You cannot call missed revenue a cost any more than you can call debt an asset and therefore the way to wealth. You cannot bring future expenditure into the present without causing an increase in present prices, a mis-allocation of resources, and destroy the entrepreneur’s ability to forecast the future. Nor can you call a lie the truth and get it away with it forever.
Kiyosaki is right. If you’re serious about unemployment and the state of your country, you need to be serious about money and debts and make sure you understand the difference between assets and liabilities as well as revenue and costs. Your economic health — and those around you, family relative, friends neighbors and strangers — will depend on it.

This is an important question. And confusion over the answer results in some misunderstandings.

Those involved closely in the debate look at the canon from two perspectives. Both are needed.

The first perspective is that of an authority. It can be in either written or oral form. The Ten Commandments written in stone and the words of Moses were an oral and written tradition, and they were authoritative.

The second idea of canon is that it eventually “came to refer to a perpetual fixation or standardization” (McDonald, The Biblical Canon, p. 55).

A little consideration of these two ideas shows that they are not mutually exclusive. Again to quote McDonald, “the primary debate is over when this literature” took on the status as an authoritative-scriptural manner among the Jews and the Christians. In other words, when was a fixed collection of sacred writings formed, “and what writings were included or excluded by the believing communities” (p. 57)?

Why are these issues important? In my “Unequal Testaments” essay I suggest that the basis for the New Testament canon is crucial in determining what is the governing interpretative principle of the New Testament documents. Answering this question correctly provides the proper interpretive framework for accepting and understanding New Testament documents.

Was there a canon at the time of Jesus? Yes, there was a canon, but it does not appear to have been in the form of a fixed and standardized text as we have in our Bible. There were certainly writings and oral tradition.

So when Jesus says He did not come to abolish the law or the prophets, what was He referring to?

If you think this topic is going to be an easy one to deal with, consider this. Read Matt. 2:23 and you will see a quote that “was spoken by the prophets.” The words, alleged to come from the prophets, are “He shall be called a Nazarene.” In that form, according to F.F. Bruce, these words cannot be found in any prophetical book. (F.F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture, p. 51.) Bruce goes on to list NT passages John 7:38, I Cor. 2:9 and James 4:5 as other “quotations” falling into this category. The origin of the quotation cannot be found, and it is evidently not in the OT that we have today. This indicates that the idea of Scripture has a wider reference than just to the books we have in our 20th century Bible. What were those other references? Where did they go? Why don’t we have them in our Bible?

I know, an essays like this should answer questions not ask them. But this time, I’m going to leave you with these questions.

God bless you in your desire to serve Him.

A worldview, by definition, is the idea that all areas of life can be viewed from the mountain top of certain principles. In this series, I’ve concentrated on just one of those principles, But I have assumed — or presupposed — another two principles at all times. The reason they are presupposed? They are inescapable concepts; you can not do anything without including them in your assumptions.

Behind our theory of knowledge (epistemology – how do we know things, and how do we know that we know) is an underlying assumption about ourselves, other people, and the world that we comprehend around us. This is our theory of being – metaphysics, it often called. Now while we are using a word that appears to have originated with Aristotle, the concept itself is much older. It literally means “beyond physics” and its a useful concept if we think of metaphysics the study of things outside of science.

Science depends upon some assumptions that are not scientific. It assumes there is a physical world outside of ourselves that can be investigated and explored. It assumes that mankind is capable fo discovering things, and identifying those things when they are are discovered. It also assumes that the investigators themselves can make distinctions between useful and not-so-useful information, and chose the “right” information to advance their investigations.

Now where do those assumptions come from? Get out your Bible and read the first three chapters of Genesis. Yes, you are capable of reading Genesis and understanding what it says. You may, if you are not careful, make some wrong judgments as you read. But you are capable of recognizing those wrong judgments and correcting yourself to make the correct judgments.

“In the beginning, God created. . . .” There it is. Everything except the Creator had a beginning. He really did make trees. They exist. They are not a figment of your imagination. And yes, your senses of sight, sound and smell can be trusted to give you reliable information.

Man. . . made in the image of God. Not identical to God, but in His image. This is why there is such a thing as a worldview.

And when you get this part of the worldview concept straight, you will begin to understand why natives in Papua-New Guinea used to eat one another, kill one another, hate one another, yet they still liked to cover “that” part of the male anatomy with a penis gourd. Why?

The aboriginals in Australia never built a permanent home, never developed crop rotation. And in a land inhabited by millions of flies, they never invented the fly screen. Why not?

What allowed one part of mankind to go out and “take dominion” over the earth and move from two-field rotation to three-field rotation? This idea alone reduced the amount of plowing each year, while giving more land under crops and a wider variety of food.

Why did one part of mankind develop the crank – the ability to combine rotary with reciprocal motion at the same time — without which, we would not have our modern motor cars?

Get the idea? A worldview allowed the development of our civilization so that you’re reading this e-zine delivered electronically.

The idea of a uni-versity — as opposed to a multi-veristy — is an indication that a worldview provided the challenge of unifying knowledge. Things are not just abstractions (things in themselves) but actually exist in relationship to other things

So when you pick up a book — or receive an e-zine — you really can receive and give meaningful communication. And so it is with the Bible. You don’t have to become the ultimate skeptic or agnostic never finding truth because your worldview does not allow communication horizontally man to man, or vertically God to man. Rather, the biblical worldview provides a basis for real and meaningful communication person to person.

It is the metaphysics of our worldview that provides the epistemological answer. Without both of these mankind is sunk. Communication is impossible. It is the equivalent of locking every person on the planet in his or her own sealed room, with no doors, no windows, no communication with anyone outside the room.

Which is why there is no other worldview. Believe it.

“Everything is just a matter of opinion. You have your opinion. I have my opinion. Truth is whatever you perceive it to be.”

So said a young lady in my home recently. A Christian young lady educated in the best public schools and the best state universities.

And she attends a church that cannot tell her how to tell the difference between truth and error, right and wrong, good and evil.

This young lady cannot think clearly. If she possessed any analytical capacity she would see that her comment does not make sense. You can tell when people don’t understand. They say things that don’t make sense and actually believe what they say.

The background to her comment was my own disagreement with something she had said. I said she was wrong. Her response was an attempt to tell me that her opinion was right for her, if no one else, and I should not say she was wrong.

Well, I asked, “Isn’t that what you are doing to me now? I tell you you’re wrong, that’s my opinion. Why can’t I express it. Under your own logic, I am certainly entitled to hold this view.”

Silence.

Me: “So if someone says it is OK for them to beat up young ladies in the park, rape and steal, is it OK for them to do that, since they believe it is right?”

More silence.

And silence is an indication of an incoherent worldview. This is why there is only one worldview. Only one worldview allows you to hold a conversation. Only one worldview allows you to believe that when you speak, you are not just speaking your own thoughts, but you are speaking thoughts that can be understood by other people.

Unfortunately, a similar idea flows throughout the Christian community in another form. “Your interpretation of the Bible is valid for you. My interpretation of the Bible is valid for me.”

Now as soon as you begin telling these folk that their ideas are wrong, you begin to see their dilemma. It’s a knowledge problem. How do you know that you know things? How do you know what is right or what is wrong? How do you know what is true and what is false?

These are easy questions — unless you were educated in humanistic schools and colleges. And here’s the answer.

You don’t know you know anything at all unless someone who does know everything tells you something. That piece of information alone can be counted on, for it comes from the mind of the person for whom there can be no surprises.

You see, some of the philosophies that exist are true — given their basic premises. The mind of man alone cannot figure out the truth of anything, for tomorrow he might learn something new that changes today’s opinions. Skepicism is one of the results of this view.

But as soon as you ask the question, “Is that statement true” and they answer you affirmatively, you know they don’t really believe it.

Under their belief system, they cannot say anything is true — or false. Their worldview doesn’t allow it. They have a worldview with no categories but one: there are no categories.

But these denials are willing to adopt the biblical worldview about knowledge in order to be able to make their statements this is wrong or that is right.

And that is why there are no worldviews but one. And that view is dependent upon the fact that God has spoken and communicated truth to His creatures, and that truth is knowable, not just as a matter of opinion, but as a universal truth for all people of all times.

You cannot begin to comprehend the Fall until you realize that sin is the attempt by man to determine right and wrong, good and evil, truth and error, unaided by divine revelation. That’s they key: divine revelation.

There is no God, screams the atheist, all the time attesting to the truths of Scripture that make his statement meaningful. There is no truth, screams the atheist, except the truths he will allow. And the existence of God is not one of them.

As St. Paul said, “professing to be wise, they become fools.”

God bless you as you advance His kingdom.

There can only be one debate in the construction of a worldview. How do you have a discussion without assuming the implied truths of the Biblical worldview?

Imagine, for a moment – if you can – the idea of evolution. How did language begin? Perhaps it was something like this. The first form of life with vocal chords made a gesture towards an object and grunted something. And his or her mate replied, “Uh?” So the first grunter responded to that by repeating his first grunt, and again received another “Uh?” Oops! Sorry, in order to grunt a reply, there must have been two forms of life with vocal chords. Guess they evolved in pairs. Or, maybe they didn’t evolve. (But that’s another story.)

Now the important question is this one: Was the responding mate’s “Uh” a question (“Uh?”) or a statement (“Uh!”). Maybe it was a “Aha!” And were the different categories even known? If so, how? The world of thought and ideas? But we think with words! So how could you even think if there were no words to allow you to identify your thoughts?

We can be a little Kantian ourselves here and have some fun with our non-believing friends. Was the first “Uh?/!” (or was it really “Duh!”?) referring to a phenomenal or noumenal object? Since words (language) are merely sounds, how was the very first word explained when someone else didn’t understand it?

Here’s the difficulty of evolutionary ideas: to explain the beginning of language and thought.

If you are going to build a worldview that is unassailable, then you must begin with the presuppositions that form the foundation of thought and communication. You cannot begin with so-called empirical evidence, because you are already making an assumption that everyone, even non-believers in the Bible, view and interpret evidence the same way.

Nothing could be further from the truth. So, when one Christian writer states, “Objective empirical evidence for Jesus Christ and his message is the only truly valid Christian apologetic possible, for it alone is subject to the canons of evidence employed in other fields of endeavor,” he is surely begging the question. Canons of evidence?

St. Paul had something to say about this in the beginning of his letter to the Romans. Everything, all the empirical evidence you can muster, points to the God of the Old Testament. (Paul didn’t have the New Testament, so he must have been referring to the God of the Law and the Prophets that Jesus talked about.)

There are, then, some people who “hold down” or “suppress” the truth about creation. In other words, they do not interpret the empirical evidence the same way that other people do.

A worldview, then, is defined by its presuppositions, not by its empirical evidence. And this is why, in the formation of a worldview — and in defense of the biblical worldview — the establishment of that worldview must begin and end here.

This does not mean there is not a place for empirical evidence. By all means, use empirical evidence to get the discussion going about how the evidence will be interpreted. What are the principles of thought that even allow a disagreement over interpretation of the empirical evidence to take place?

When that question is insisted upon, then you will find there are no worldviews other than the one that originates with the Old Testament, is carried over to the New Testament, and forms the basis for a worldview that has taken mankind from paganism, poverty, and short life span to a world where jet airplanes, HD television, ski mobiles, guns and butter, and cheaper life insurance premiums are a regular part of the economy.

There are no other worldviews. There are only people who rebel against the truths of the Bible and suppress what they know in their heart to be true. Man is created. There was a beginning. And man is in the image of God. This is the basis of a worldview — a worldview that allows meaningful communication to take place.

These are the presuppositions that allow human thought and action to occur Anything else is just pretend.

The biblical account of the Fall identifies man’s desire to be his own god, knowing (i.e. determining, making the categories of) good and evil as the essence of sin. In his rebellion, man would like to think he can determine a coherent worldview without the Triune God of Scripture.

It is our task to show him this is man’s ultimate “impossible dream.”

But what does that word “worldview” mean to you?

And what does it mean to your neighbor, especially if that neighbor is not a Christian?

More importantly, how do you even begin to put a worldview together? What are the key principles? How do you even begin to assemble a worldview? What is the starting point of a worldview?

For more than two decades now, it is common to hear the phrase “Christian worldview”. This implies a worldview is governed by its religious foundations. Thus, a Christian worldview would be different from an Islamic worldview. Or is it?

This question needs to be asked: Is a worldview defined by its detail or by its starting points? Thus, a Christian worldview and an Islamic worldview could conceivably agree on many points, yet they are not the same thing. For example, both worldviews might think stealing is wrong. But does this make them ultimately the same — or very close to the same — thing?

In putting together a worldview, the most critical step is to define the starting point. Descartes understood this when he attempted the idea of a worldview, and came up with cogito ergo sum – I think, therefore I am. Now Descartes was grappling with answering the big question: How do I know God exists? Two corollary questions followed: How do I know I exist? And, How do I know other things exist?

Here is the jungle in which contemporary philosophy and theology finds itself ensnared. It is the epistemological attempt to see everything clearly when the horizon is studded with trees, short and tall, thick and thin, and undergrowth that obstructs or blurs the vision. Here and there are droplets of sunlight drifting through the dense undergrowth, but there is not enough light for those in the forest to be able to find their way out.

This was Descartes problem: trying to find a way out of the thick epistemological undergrowth. Instead, he got himself further into the thicket.

Thinking he had found the exit path, Descartes instead found another trail that led nowhere. Just because he was thinking was an insufficient reason for the conclusion: I think, therefore I must exist. How did he know that his thinking was even rational? Come to think of it, is there any such thing as rational? Are thoughts coherent, or are they just a sequence of unrelated . . . . I was going to say “thoughts” but I hope you see the problem. How do you know your thoughts are even thoughts?

So when you attempt a worldview, now you are faced with a similar problem. How do you know there is even a worldview to comprehend?

And if there are worldviews to comprehend, how will the worldview called “Christian” be different from one that might be labeled Islamic or Humanistic, Western or Eastern, Greek or Hebrew.

To have you read thus far in the e-zine I’ve assumed a worldview about myself and you. I’ve written on the assumption that my method of communication really communicates, even though it may not communicate perfectly. I’ve assumed that my thoughts are rational, and that you are sufficiently rational to understand them.

In order to communicate with another human being it’s necessary to assume — or presuppose — something about a worldview that incorporates Man and the way he thinks and acts. In so doing, you also assume that the mind receiving the communication thinks in similar categories. I’ve assumed that you might agree or disagree with these comments. I’m assuming you also have the ability to understand the communication and figure out if the ideas and images portrayed are true or false.

These are some of the key presuppositions that allow debate about a worldview to even begin. They are the prerequisite conditions that are accepted, even though they may not be thought about very much. My old piano teacher use to say, “There is no such thing as truth.” One day, I figured it out, and next time I heard the statement, I asked, “Is that true?” He smiled. He was willing to concede one contradiction to his generalization in order to make his point, but in so doing he admitted his view was a failure to explain anything meaningful.

That there are no truths is the mantra of the modern world. Similarly, there are no moral standards that all should adhere to. There are, it appears, only opinions. Opinions stated as if the person making the statement is like God on Mt. Sinai, insisting that his view of the world be carved in stone and accepted by all as divine revelation.

This is the worldview that the Bible — Old and New Testaments — challenges. In the beginning . . . . So there was beginning, was there? And who started this beginning?

The simple answer is God . . . and Man made in God’s image comes shortly thereafter.

There is no worldview, therefore, that does not begin with the Old Testament’s declaration found in the first three chapters of Genesis. Any other beginning leaves Man buried in the forest of dense trees, thick undergrowth, and pale streams of light casting shadows on imaginary exits. It leaves him buried deep within the Kantian jungle with its inability to establish a pathway or connection between the phenomenal world (objects of the senses), and the noumenal world (objects known to the imagination only, independent of the senses).

To the extent that any worldview adopts the Old Testament’s view of “the beginning” is the extent that worldview can begin to answer questions and make categories for discussion. It is the basis to be able to disagree with ideas that are not our own.

Thus in the very first instance, it is not a choice of worldviews. It is the acceptance that the Genesis account is the only framework for rational discussion so that you might disagree about worldviews.

Since only the biblical worldview allows the discussion to take place, it really is not proper to speak of alternative world views. There are none. Those that pretend to be worldviews are ideas borrowed from the Judaic/Christian scriptures without giving recognition to the origin.

It is in the clash of worldviews, then, that we see the real dilemma of contemporary Christian thought. It tries to play intellectual games predicated on their opponent’s view of the world. This is, that ideas are just a matter of intellectual debate. That mankind, unaided by divine revelation can determine the meaning about anything.

You and I, on the other hand, must insist that everything hinges on the presuppositions that make rational and meaningful discussion. Cogito ergo sum? Only if we are willing to put the Triune God of Scripture at the back of all things.

I have four sons and a daughter, the firstborn being Matthew. He’s a thinker. And he’s trying to give his father a hard time over some of my comments. Matt’s worried that I’m putting the Torah as a higher authority than the Person of Jesus Christ as revealed in the gospels. Here’s his question:

“What role does the person of Jesus Christ play in all of this?”

Now Matthew is concerned that his father might be going off in a wrong direction, so he’s checking up on his old man to make sure. He comments further,

” Shouldn’t it be Jesus Christ that we look to as the central revolving point of the Scriptures rather than the Torah?”

Good questions. Here’s my reply:

Dear Matt,

You know, Matt, nothing gives a father more joy than to know his son is trying to understand the mysteries of Scripture. And since your conception, you have been one blessed by God and it does not in the least surprise me that you, out of all your siblings, are the one to check up on your father’s theological ramblings.

You’re wondering if I’m trying to exalt the Torah over the person of Christ. You even question my commitment to orthodox Christology because you think I believe that the Torah holds more authority than the Jesus Christ revealed in the Gospels.

Now I’m certainly going up a path that may appear to be against “conventional” wisdom. But it is a path that we should not fear. Here’s why.

You might like to read again (Did you read it a first time?) Rushdoony’s book, The Foundations of Social Order: Studies in the Creeds and Councils of the Early Church. The early church councils were concerned about Jesus and who He was. At the center of those early controversies were the Christological and Trinitarian issues, with the Trinitarian topic reaching it’s culmination in the Athanasian Creed, while the Christology issues were systematized at Chalcedon in the year 451 A.D.

Now these early church councils were dealing with views about Jesus and about God. Marcionism, Sabellianism, Arianism, Manicheanism, Pelagianism — all these crazy -isms which confuse most people today — were wrong ideas about Jesus, his divinity, his humanity, and his relation to God. They were wrong on one or even more of these issues. The church fathers met to resolve the issues and determine what the orthodox faith ought to be.

Western Christianity determined itself to be thoroughly Trinitarian, and at the center of this idea is the equal ultimacy of the Three Persons of the Godhead. There can be no subordination of any of the persons of the Trinity. The Father is not superior to the Son or the Spirit; the Son is not superior to the Father or the Spirit; and the Spirit is not superior to the Father or the Son. The same can be said about their inferiority to one another. While there is an economic subordination (i.e. what they do), there can be no subordination in their essence. In terms of their transcendentalism and therefore their authority, there is equal ultimacy in the Three Persons.

Let’s put that another way. The Three Persons of the Trinity speak with One voice, and they don’t contradict each other.

What do you think this means when we read the Torah or our New Testament? Who was the ultimate author? If we say God, we are right. But what do we mean by the word “God”? Do we mean the THREE persons of the Trinity equally and ultimately authored the Torah? Because if we don’t, we’ve denied the Trinity at that point.

I have more than a sneaky suspicion that a large part of our problem today in Christianity is the heretical idea that the Jesus who appeared in history is superior to the God who wrote the Torah. Therefore, Jesus should be listened to as the ultimate authority, while the God who wrote the Old Testament can now take a subordinate role in the issue of revelation. Now I can use the word “heretical” here quite legitimately, because those early church councils anathematized any kind of subordinationism in theology.

My son, as an orthodox Trinitarian I find it challenging, if not impossible, to accept an idea that gives more authority to Jesus in the Gospels than to the Jesus who wrote the Old Testament. I happen to think they were written EQUALLY by the same God — Three Persons.

In which case, why would the equal and ultimate Three Persons of the Godhead contradict themselves? Why is it necessary to make a choice between Old Testament and New Testament? Am I choosing between the First and Second Persons of the Trinity? This is nuts, as my friend John would say.

What I am saying here is that if we want to hold to our orthodox Trinitarian view we must hold to the equal ultimacy of the Three Persons. Therefore, there are no contradictions in Scripture. The Three Persons did not at one time say the Old Testament law was forever (read Psalm 119, for example), then teach later that it was not forever, that it was just a temporary assignment and then for the Jews only.

This same Person who appeared on earth also wrote these words: “Blessed is the man . . . whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law does he meditate day and night.” The same Person who authored these words also said: “I did not come to destroy (do away with) the law, but to fulfill it.” Get the idea?

Now I know what I’m writing here cuts against what you probably get taught in your church and what I hear as I visit different churches in America. But we need to contend for the truths of Scripture as defined by our church fathers and handed down to us in our creeds.

Do you get the idea of Scripture here? One God, Three Persons, all speaking with One Voice. That puts the Torah in a very special position. Why wouldn’t we all hold to the priority of the law as the standard by which everything is measured?

You know, Matt, it’s fascinating to see how the Pharisees tried to trip Jesus. They kept accusing Him of not meeting the standards of the Law, the Torah. Now Jesus never once condemned them for their methodology. He did, however, condemn their wrongful interpretations of the Torah. In other words his response was along these lines: “If you guys just understood the Torah properly, you would not say nor would you do the crazy things that you say and do.”

So Matt, I’ve become convinced that the choices we are facing today in Christian theology are almost exactly the same ones our forefathers battled in the early church. The same errors are appearing in Christian circles, and being accepted as “orthodox” when in fact, they smell of one (or more) of the -isms that the early church fathers battled so successfully.

Perhaps I am being a little too provocative at times as I try to grapple with the issues of systematic theology that I see here. And there are legitimate questions on the NT canon that need to be addressed. Among them are these questions: “What are the correct criteria for selecting the documents to add to the Old Testament canon? And on what authority are those criteria known to be the correct criteria?”

I happen to think the real issue here is not so much a question of the New Testament canon and whether or not we have the right books. Let’s say we accept these 27 books as canon as they are. Now it’s going to be a matter of their interpretation, and any interpretation of them that is not in conformity with the Torah — the undisputed revelation of God within Christianity — needs to be challenged.

So this is my reply to you. I hope and pray it convinces you, and if not, causes you to dig deeper into your own thought processes and the pursuit of Truth. It’s worth the struggle.

I think I am on very safe ground here with my view of the Trinity and its implications for OT/NT interpretation. We should preserve, as much as we can, the historic Trinitarian faith of our fathers, or, as Rushdoony points out so well, join the heretics. There is no middle ground.

And so, my son, I’ll pray that you continue to work your way through these issues so that when my days on earth have run their course, there will be a next generation of Christians willing to uphold the faith that was handed down to us. Let neither you nor I be the ones that destroy that heritage in any form.

This is my prayer and legacy for you. I hope this helps.

I love you.

Dad.