Any Ol’ World View Won’t Do

by  Chuck Colson                                                                                                                                   Vol. IX, No. 8, September 1996

           Divorce is America's most devastating social problem," says James Schall of Georgetown University. Children of divorce are statistically more likely to be involved in drug abuse, teen pregnancy, crime. As adults, they're also more prone to divorce -- creating an escalating cycle of despair.

           What about Christians? Are we presenting a healthy alternative? Surprisingly, no. Pollster George Barna discovered that born-again Christians actually have a higher rate of divorce (27 percent) than nonbelievers (23 percent). Fundamentalists top them all (30 percent). And 87 percent divorced after accepting Christ, presumably aware of the biblical teaching on divorce.

           These shocking statistics result from a shallow understanding of biblical morality. We know the sexual do's and don'ts, but often we don't connect those rules to real life. Effective discipleship depends on teaching people to see all of life from a biblical perspective -- a Christian world view. It's not enough to know our Bibles, to cite chapter and verse. We also need a broader framework connecting our spiritual beliefs to our overall vision of reality.

           For example, a Christian world-view perspective on divorce asks what God's purpose was in creating marriage. Marriage is not primarily a means of meeting personal emotional needs. It is fundamentally a social institution, providing a structure for spouses to take care of each other and their children. It draws isolated individuals into a "wider network of relatives and kin. It nurtures concern for the future. This world-view understanding of marriage provides the plausibility structure for specific scriptural commands regarding sexual morality. Without it, biblical sexual morality may appear arbitrary and negative, and even Christians begin quietly ignoring it in their daily lives.

           As Barna puts it, the church has "tons of teachers," yet it "doesn't seem to be making a difference." Why not? Because the vast majority of believers have no biblical world view, and as a result "all the great teaching goes in one ear and out the other. There are no intellectual pegs ... in the mind of the individual to hang those truths on." Even when Barna focused his research on highly dedicated Christians, he discovered that only about one-eighth have a biblical world view.

           Without such a world view, we simply absorb many of our opinions from the surrounding culture. Take the very idea of moral truth. We believe that God has revealed His word in Scripture, which means humans have access to a truth that transcends our own limited, mistaken perspective -- a truth that applies to all people in all times. In short, an absolute truth. But for the secularist, there is no God; all we humans have is our own limited ideas. In a 1994 Barna survey, 77 percent of non-Christians said, "There are no absolute standards for morals and ethics."

           Yet, shockingly, the majority of born-again Christians -- 64 percent -- agreed with the secular culture that morality is relative. No wonder our lives are often indistinguishable from the surrounding culture.

           Christians are called to bring every thought captive to the lordship of Christ; this means we are to develop a biblical world view on all of life -- on work and worship, law and morality, popular culture. Otherwise our faith becomes privatized and powerless. Christian sociologist James Davison Hunter believes we are losing the culture war, and he's right. The reason is that we've poured immense effort into fighting social evils like crime, abortion, and pornography, without understanding the deeper issues that move a culture. We've been fighting battles without knowing what the war is all about: It is a clash between competing world views. ...

           The clash between world views is a perennial battle between truth and falsehood, and informed, thinking Christians must take their place on the front lines.

[Reprinted from Jubilee, the newsletter of Prison Fellowship Ministries, P.O. Box 17500, Washington, DC 20041-0500. Chuck Colson is president of Prison Fellowship.]