World view
From CreationWiki, the encyclopedia of creation science
Worldview may be defined as an outlook on life, or a philosophical basis of interpretation. It’s how we see things. There are two basic worldviews, each with its own underlying assumptions. One system of thought has evolution as its basis, the other, creation. These worldviews are becoming increasingly polarized due to the increased emphasis on teaching evolution in school with the exclusion of any opposing viewpoint. Also contributing is the generally one-sided approach taken by the popular media, which marginalizes other viewpoints.
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Creation Worldviews
- Main Article: Creationism
Biblical worldview
From the earliest chapters of Genesis the Bible defines a worldview, which includes what can be called several fundamental and many derived points. Some of these are:
Fundamental Points
- A personal Creator who is distinct from the creation. In other words God is a person, not an impersonal cosmic force. God and His creation are not one and the same in essence.
- There was a historical fall in Eden, leading to everlasting death. The New Testament contains the Gospel, which describes Christ's sacrificial work that opened the only way out of this damnation.
Islamic worldview
Evolutionist Worldview
Evolutionism, by its very nature, requires a worldview in opposition to Biblical Christianity. If evolution is true, then the Christian faith is worthless! This is because then:
- Adam and Eve were only mythological;
- They didn’t disobey God and introduce sin into the world;
- Sin is then just undesirable traits left over from the lower stages of evolution, which humankind will eventually outgrow;
- Therefore, if there’s really no such thing as sin, we don’t need a Savior to pay for them;
- Jesus, if he existed, then becomes merely a good man, highly evolved ahead of his time, rather than the Savior and cornerstone of our faith. Therefore Genesis isn’t really literally true. This casts doubt on the accuracy of the whole Bible, such as the passages where Jesus indicated that He believed in Adam and Eve and the creation.
Worldviews in Contention
The creation vs. evolution debate highlights the two basic worldviews or belief systems: one in which God is at the center of the picture, and one that places man at the center.
The liberal / humanist view is that man’s nature is essentially good, and that if given enough time we will eventually outgrow the problems that society faces. This view states that we need to throw off past restraints (especially religious and moral restraints) so that we are free to explore and develop toward a higher state of being.
The conservative / Christian view on the other hand, is that man is a fallen creature—essentially flawed, selfish, and in need of a Savior. Without God prominently in the picture, culture and society inevitably degenerate to a state of disorder and decay (de-evolution).
These two views are the basis of today’s culture clash. Generally on the liberal / humanist / evolutionist side are the news and entertainment media, government schools and universities, government institutions, and other liberal groups. On the conservative / Christian / creationist side are the evangelical and fundamentalist churches, and conservative, pro-family groups. The clash is becoming more vocal as liberal groups demand ever more freedom from traditional moral values. Evolution is the rallying point of liberal / humanist groups. If, as they claim, we’re just accidents in space, then we can set the rules and don’t have to be accountable to any God.
The Culture War
These two trends of thought may be plainly seen in our society today, resulting in a war between the two cultures when they clash. The liberal viewpoint has successfully challenged the accepted standards of behavior in virtually every aspect of life today.
One of the ways the humanist viewpoint has made itself manifest in today’s culture is the concept of “moral relativism” or relative morality. This is the notion that there are no absolute standards of behavior, because what’s wrong for you may be perfectly normal for someone else. Moral relativism says that it’s okay to do anything you want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone.
The fact that there is a battle at all is only because traditional values groups are fighting to hold on to a vanishing concept of morality in public life.
Code Words
Christians are routinely accused of seeing things in black and white because we subscribe to rules given to us by the Lawgiver, which clearly define standards of right and wrong. In contradistinction to those laws, some trendy terms have been adopted by liberals and subsequently become associated with modern pop culture. Here are some of the most prominent:
- Tolerance = don’t judge anyone’s moral behavior, no matter what it is, because there are no absolute standards of behavior. Christians are viewed as intolerant because we believe that God has given us certain laws, which if not followed will lead to moral chaos and decay of society.
- Diversity = the fact that there’s biological diversity in God’s creation is extended to mean that every type of belief and morality is equally valid; we need to have every type of aberrant behavior or special interest group equally represented to avoid any hint of discrimination.
- Multiculturalism = all cultures and religions are equally valid; no one of these is better than any other; therefore there is no such thing as absolute truth, but all beliefs are subjective.
These terms are so widely used in the popular culture that, along with evolution, they’ve become accepted as absolute truth, not to be questioned. If anyone dares to challenge their validity they’re labeled as intolerant bigots.
Evolution: Existence of Life through Death and Struggle
Evolutionism says that through constant struggle, the fittest survive. The best are selected out to reproduce, and through this process beneficial traits accumulate to propel us to higher stages on the evolutionary ladder. Though not often stated, the goal of the evolutionary process is envisioned as a humanistic utopia, in which war, disease and poverty are vanquished.
Creation: Death Is a Result of Man’s Actions
The Bible teaches that because of our fallen nature we are separated from God. Our tendency to want to question what God has said started in the Garden of Eden, and has carried over to modern culture. Instead of trusting God, we’d rather have our own way, and find out what evil is all about by experiencing it:
Genesis 2:17 “but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”
Genesis 3:1b He [the serpent] said to the woman, "Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?"
Genesis 3:4-5 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
2Thessalonians 2:10b-11 They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie … [New International Version]
What is The Lie? “The lie” says, among other things, that we don’t want God to interfere in our lives, and we don’t need Him to explain our existence. This is manifest in statements such as this one by Harvard geneticist and Marxist Richard Lewontin:
“We [scientists] have … a prior commitment to materialism [and] we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations… Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.” - Lewontin, R., "Billions and Billions of Demons," The New York Review, Jan. 9, 1997, p. 31
Science Redefined
With the acceptance of Darwinism by the mainstream scientific community, the quest for an explanation of our world has been redefined in terms of materialism and naturalism. These are an attempt to explain origins without any supernatural intervention at all. Specifically:
- materialism —the view that the material world is all that there is; there is no existence beyond the present life.
- naturalism —the view that all things have a purely natural cause, especially the origin of the universe and nature.
These, of course are in direct opposition to Biblical teaching. If everything is viewed in materialistic or naturalistic terms, then who sets the rules?
- “If there is no God, then everything is permissible.” —Fyodor Dostoyevski
- “[I suppose the reason] we all jumped at the Origin [of Species] was because the idea of God interfered with our sexual mores.” —Sir Julian Huxley, evolutionary biologist, 1887-1975
This is in stark contrast to Biblical Christianity:
Romans 1:22-25 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator--who is forever praised.
“Science” vs. Religion
In the popular media the clash between worldviews, as embodied in the creation – evolution debate, has been characterized by portraying science as hard, objective facts, while religion, Biblical Christianity in particular, is just subjective, unprovable feelings. Religion teaches morality but otherwise has no relation to the real world.
Evolution is a Religion
We see that evolution is a worldview—a philosophy, a belief system better described as evolutionism. As mentioned earlier, secular humanism, which has been defined as a religion, has evolution as its foundation.
Some people defend evolution to the end, not because of its scientific merits, but because it’s their philosophical base: if they were to admit it’s wrong it would destroy their whole belief system. Changing one’s philosophical base involves a huge paradigm shift, which, without God’s help is well nigh impossible.
Proverbs 14:12 There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.
Evolution is not merely a biological theory of little significance. It is a world view—the world view diametrically opposing the Christian world view. Therefore Christians ignore it or compromise with it at great peril! — Dr. Henry Morris, The Long War Against God, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, MI, 1989, p. 23
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