It's a Small World After All

"Christian  worldview (also called a Biblical Worldview) refers to the framework of ideas and beliefs through which a Christian individual, group or culture interprets the world and interacts with it...There are varieties of particulars, but certain thematic elements are common in the Christian worldview."  Wikipedia

In a Chamber of Commerce breakfast recently, an administrator of a local Christian university spoke of the Biblical worldview of the students in the college.  She stated that most enter the college without such a worldview, but nearly all leave with a Biblical  worldview.

I  was thinking and I still am thinking, "Where do you draw the line between education and indoctrination? What is the distinction between mind-expanding and brain washing?"  I'm also thinking since by definition "there are a variety of particulars" , who gets to decide which worldview is the correct "Christian worldview"? If a student attended another Christian college with the same goal in mind, isn't it reasonable to assume that s/he will graduate with a different worldview?

This speaker said that all students must write an essay at the beginning of their degree program explaining their worldview. Before they graduate, they then must write another essay.  She said that in every case their worldview has shifted dramatically to a Biblical worldview (their Biblical worldview).

I graduated from a Southern Baptist university and a Southern Baptist seminary.  I may be biased, but I feel that in both cases I received an excellent Christian education that  was not Biblical indoctrination This was back in the 70s when the SBC was, as a convention, mostly moderate Baptists.  At least the agencies, institutions and many churches were moderate in belief and disposition. The professors of the Old and New Testaments I sat under certainly dramatically affected my worldview, but I left both institutions with a much larger world of the Bible and not a much more narrow view.

My college, Samford University,  though still loosely associated with Southern Baptists, has managed to distance itself from the radical religious right who took over the SBC in the late 70s and early 80s. This takeover is not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of recent Southern Baptist history.

My seminary, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, went the other direction.  The board of directors, the trustees and the faculty embraced the worldview of the literal Bible.  Instead of being one of the most respected schools of seminary education in the world,  the SBTS is now little more than a  fundamentalist Bible college.  The world-renowned music school where I graduated doesn't even exist. At the time I was so proud of that graduate degree from that prestigious religious institution. Now  I seldom refer to the fact that I'm a graduate for fear that someone thinks I adhere to the present doctrine. Cujo may have looked the same, but he was radically different after being bitten by a rabid bat.

The speaker that morning said something else.  She said to this group of business men and women, "I'm very thankful that I'm a believer.  And I'm quite confident that all of you are believers." She said "believer" as if there's only one thing to believe and that you believe it or you don't.  As a recovering Southern Baptist I know what she meant.  "Believe" means that you have "accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior."  In that sense, it's take it or leave it.  That belief may be a popular Christian worldview, but is it a Biblical worldview?  Jews believe the Bible too, but they don't accept that particular Biblical worldview.  So are sixteen million people, who the Bible call "God's chosen people",  just wrong?

Yesterday I drove by the exit to the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky.  This museum's Biblical worldview includes that the world was created in six twenty-four hour days and that the universe is about 6,000 years old. This theology is known as Young Earth Creationism.  I would assume that they hope to substantially influence my Biblical worldview in a two hour visit.  Just last week scientists confirmed the existence of gravitational waves in the universe.  This is a cosmic phenomenon that Albert Einstein predicted 100 years ago. They claim that these sounds originated in the collision of two black holes over a billion years ago.  So which worldview is correct?  We all have to read, study and pray to decide for ourselves.  Gravitation waves?  Take it or leave it. And for the record if you're interested, membership to the Flat Earth Society is still free.