Sharing the Faith with Friends Response

      There are three fundamental things the Christian needs to be an outstanding witness for Christ. The first is knowledge, the second is wisdom, and the third is character. How one uses these three traits to show Christ to the world is crucial, as he or she may be the only example of a "living Bible" seen by non-believers.
     "Knowledge" refers to an accurately informed mind. Colossians 2:8 warns the believer, "See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ" (NIV). In order to build up his or her spiritual defenses against the "human tradition and basic principles of this world", it is important for him or her to understand why he or she believes what he or she believes. God answers all of these questions in His Word; however, the mistake many believers make in educating themselves about Christian doctrines is reading a single verse addressed to someone else, and trying to twist its meaning to apply to his or her life. For example, a believer may incorrectly interpret the story of the salvation of the Philippian jailer in Acts 16:31 as a promise of salvation for every member of his or her family. Rather, it is much more important to read the entire paragraph, or better yet, the whole chapter, surrounding that one verse to establish a strong  knowledge of Biblical context, such as authorial intent. Taking account of the background of a Biblical passage in order to discover its true meaning is known as a "literal, historical-grammatical" approach to reading the Bible. Next, after firmly rooting oneself in the knowledge of the Bible, the Christian witness must go out and verbally share the Gospel with others. However, it is important to remember to do so without sounding like some loquacious bag of emotions; rather, the faith must be defended with logical and well thought-out statements. Even Jesus and Paul, when they argued for the sake of Christianity, would do so logically. For example, many of Jesus' teachings were in the forms of parables, which nearly anybody could relate to and understand. Before witnessing, figures such as Jesus and Paul also knew what their listeners believed, and why. For example, in Acts 17:23, Paul made sure to understand the religious nature of the people of Athens before telling them the truth about their "unknown God". Finally, Christian witnesses must never ridicule any ignorance or disbelief held by their listeners, even if they are close friends. Part of using theological knowledge correctly is knowing how to explain it in a respectful manner.
     Learning how to communicate God's truth in a respectful manner is a major component of both wisdom and character, the two other most important aspects of being a good witness for Christ. "Wisdom" is an artful method. This entails understanding how to use knowledge by maneuvering quickly in a conversation, asking important questions and adapting one's message to best fit the person being witnessed to or the circumstances under which the conversation is taking place. This shows the "witness-ee" that they are cared for and important. However, the most important aspect of wisdom is probably presenting the truth in a compelling way, without any specialized Christian diction. There are not many Christians who totally understand every word they hear coming from the pulpit. If they do not comprehend all of the various theological terms, there is no reason why an unbeliever would. For instance, most Christian witnesses will not approach an average heathen and ask, "Do you hold an allegorical or literal hermaneutic in regards to John's visions in Revelation? And while we are on the subject of Revelation, do you hold to a Premillennialist or Amillennialist view?" Thirdly, "Character" means an attractive manner. Christian witnesses typically fall into two extremes, neither of which is an "attractive manner" in sharing the Gospel. The first is being so polite that it breeds a fear of offending one's listeners. The other extreme occurs when one has no regard for what anybody else believe; therefore, this leads to all listeners being offended by the witness's dogmatism. Rather than falling into either of these extremes, the Bible tells Christ's witnesses to be gentle and reverent (1 Peter 3:15), and to be patient and not quarrelsome (2 Timothy 2:24-25). While God does want His followers to help bring more people into His Kingdom, He would like them to do so without being religious "bullies". Christian witnesses can avoid being such "bullies" by using specific, rather than trite, verbal methods of sharing God's Word. As well, it is important for witnesses to act approachable, friendly and caring human being, not some priest stepping down from a pedestal to mercifully proselytize someone. Rather, it is much more efficacious to speak respectfully to one's listeners about their own worldviews before introducing Christianity. This way, the listener will not feel like he or she is being bombarded by harsh dogmas and erect their inner defenses against the truth of God's Word. By instead actively conversing about others' worldviews, the Christian witness will be able to better grasp how to adapt the method of sharing the Gospel to each unbeliever's own ideas and flaws. This is known as "giving the bad news before the good news"; that is, heathens must understand why they need God's salvation after realizing their fallen and sinful position, not the other way around. In conclusion, it is important for a Christian witness to admit that an unbeliever may have a valid, logical point, or how to say "I could be wrong." By admitting one's own imperfections, the Christian witness will give his or her listener a sense of genuine intellect in the conversation, not just a mutually defensive, emotional debate. The most important point is this: at no time during the course of His Ministry did Jesus ever obnoxiously try to force the Word of God into His listeners' hearts; therefore, Christians have no right to do so either.

"Worldviews Intro #1" Response

    

     One of the founding principles of Understanding the Times class is, "Ideas have consequences". However, astute readers will simply see such a statement as a precursor to the deeper question, "From where do these ideas originate?" The answer is quite simple--people's ideas come from their worldview. Norman Geisler and William Watkins define a worldview as "a way of viewing or interpreting all of reality. It is an interpretive framework through which or by which one makes sense of the data of life and the world" (qtd. in Nobel). Every person who has lived, is living now, or will ever live in the future will eventually develop their own worldview that reflects their personality and life experiences. Because of this, a worldview can be likened to a pair of glasses (Noebel 16). In other words, if one attempts to see through someone else's worldview, that is; their "reality glasses", then his or her vision of the real world will fade in clarity. Images become distorted and one must resort to guessing what is in front of his or herself without any clear idea of what the real world looks like. Noebel states that each person's worldview takes into consideration one's opinions of ten fundamental categories. These categories are theology, philosophy, ethics, biology, psychology, sociology, law, politics, economics, and history (16). Worldviews also answer questions such as the origin of Man and the human condition, the source of good and evil/suffering, and how to "fix" the world's darkness. With this in mind, then, the next important question to answer is, "What are the major worldviews, and how do they respond to the 'big questions'?" In response to this question, David Noebel declares that in terms of worldviews, "On one side is clearly the Christian worldview. On the other side are Secular Humanism, Marxism-Leninism, Cosmic Humanism (the New Age movement) and Postmodernism... [As well as] Islam" (14). Each person's worldview will generally coincide with the beliefs of one of these worldviews more than the others. For this reason, one might ask, "Which worldview is best? How do I choose the right one?" While worldviews such as both forms of Humanism, Marxism and Postmodernism either deny the existence of God (Marxism) or make the concept of God esoteric and unnecessarily mysterious. In addition, these theories have beliefs that devalue human life (Islam), as well as moral absolutes that everyone knows deep in their conscience to be correct (Postmodernism). This leaves only the Christian worldview as the most logical worldview to have. It explains the origin of Man as the Creative Will of God, and shows that the more depressing facets of the human condition, such as evil, come from the Fall. However, it does explain the solution by declaring God's eternal covenant of protection for Man, and that He has made reconciliation possible through the death of Jesus Christ. The Christian worldview not only shows a person that he or she has value and is loved by God, but can successfully compete against other worldviews, if thoroughly studied and understood by Christians.

     The key to developing a Christian worldview is to acknowledge how Christianity plays into the questions of origin, the human condition/evil, and the remedy. The first step to gaining a Christian worldview is, obviously, to become a Christian. Ephesians 2:8-9 states that “...it is by grace you have been saved, through faith [in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior]— and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast”. While this concept of salvation may seem simple, the truth is that coming to salvation in Christ requires onself to throw off all of his or her pride, and acknowledge that without God, he or she cannot hope to win against the sinful nature of Man that defines the human condition. Submitting to God's sovereignty in this way creates in oneself a divine humility that will allow God to reveal His Person to oneself, strengthening his or her Christian worldview. The next step to immerse onself in Christian knowledge is to read the Word of God, the Bible. Furthermore, while reading the Bible, one must not simply read one verse and then go on with his or her day. Without looking at the "paragraph" in which the verse is located, one can possibly misinterpret the verse and come up with a meaning or application for it that is inconsistent with its author's intent. For example, Proverbs 22:6 states, "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he shall not depart from it". This is neither a promise to parents, nor a piece of ignorable advice on child-raising, as some people interpret the verse. Rather, it is a command to Christian parents to raise their child like a plant--that is, in a way that he receives the exact amount of "sunlight" and "water" that he needs as an individual. Finally, the last step to forming a strong Christian worldview is to actually live out Christ's commands in Scripture and pray to Him at every opportunity. While these two "semi-steps" may seem too different to be grouped as a full step, in reality they build upon one another. For instance, in John 14:15, Jesus says, "If you love me, you will obey what I command”. By learning to obey the Will of God in everyday life, one learns how challenging it can be to walk the disciplined life of a Christian. As a result, one's prayer life will expand dramatically through one's efforts to ask Jesus for strength and submission to allow Him to make him or her into the Christian He wants him or her to be. By giving His followers strength to resist the Devil's temptations, Christ also bestows upon His children the Counsel of the Holy Spirit, Who acts through ways such as the human conscience to convict one's heart of wrongdoing. The Holy Spirit fills one's body with the same spiritual life that God possesses; therefore, a true Christian has no excuse to not see the world the way God sees it. In conclusion, the Christian worldview is truly the best worldview to adhere to because of the ways God uses it to "train up" His followers "in the way they should go, so when they are old they may not depart from it". By granting one access to the real God, the Christian worldview is truly the only worldview that allows a person to see the universe as it really is.

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