Being a Christian is not a religious ornament you tack onto your life. It encompasses every aspect of life (that’s why there’s a Christian worldview). Nor is that worldview simply a theoretical philosophy of life, but a lived one. If that worldview is fully adopted, it leads to a Christian mindset. A Reformed Christian worldview and mindset together provide clarity about what’s important. It helps you prioritize the essential and pare away the noise.
I want to be your guide through the turbulent waters of the Christian life. This may certainly sound like overreach, but I’ll explain below what I intend by this. But I desire to offer this guidance through the books I write and through this blog. Planned book projects are many, and I’ve found a platform (Scrivener) that allows me to work concurrently on several at a time. But since it will take some time to write those books and since I don’t even know in what order they’ll appear, the blog can be a medium that more immediately addresses important matters.
Whether you’re a newbie, a lifelong Christian (lifelong? – I sense a debate brewing already.), or a knowledgeable theologian; an overworked mom, or a stretched-too-thin businessman, you encounter issues for which you’re not prepared. It is this need that I seek to address.
A Christian mindset drives the Christian walk that should arise from it. A Christian worldview shapes that mindset. Reformed theology yields a truly Christian worldview and mindset. You will (eventually) find here theology that fleshes out a Christian worldview, various aspects of a Christian mindset, expositions of Scripture, and an emphasis on application that is driven by that mindset. I hope you will find it helpful.
What is this “Things Above” blog? I focus on aspects of a Reformed Christian worldview and mindset and its call to action. The name derives from Colossians 3:2, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.” This will provide both breadth and focus for my musings here. Here’s how.
What Is A Christian Worldview?
I first encountered the term worldview or world-view or world and life view while I was in seminary. I was then and still am fascinated by the idea. Also during seminary, I acquired a lifelong love for the Puritans. After later completing a doctorate and not finding a seminary teaching position, I was encouraged to start a Christian study center aimed at students and faculty at Clemson University. I did that, but I first needed to resolve a perceived conflict between my interests in Christian worldview (often thought of as the domain of the Dutch) and in the Puritans. That forced the realization that the Puritans were the ones who had worldview right. They saw that a worldview that is Biblical must prioritize the heavenly and the eternal over the things of this world.
Have you ever wondered about Daniel and his three friends? After three years of drinking from a fire hose at Babylon U (or Bab State?) when Nebuchadnezzar examined them, he found them ten times wiser that all their professors. How? Clearly God gave them this wisdom, but I assume it was not that he gave them a higher IQ, or that he zapped them with a wisdom ray, or that he sprinkled them with wisdom dust. God normally works through means rather than miracles. I believe that they had a biblical worldview. They may have learned it from their parents or even Jeremiah. Daniel later remembered that Jeremiah had predicted that the exile would last 70 years. But I think their worldview gave them a framework that organized all those bits of knowledge into a coherent whole.
Our worldview is the set of answers we give to some of the most basic questions of life. We use it as a filter for all of our thinking. So it’s our philosophy of life, answering the basic philosophical questions, but in a practical rather than a theoretical way. A person may claim a certain philosophy while applying a different set of views to everyday thought. That different set of views constitutes our worldview, and everyone has one!
The major worldview issues are reality, belief, ethics, and some sense of how the passage of time affects these, or more formally expressed: ontology, epistemology, axiology, and chronology. A Christian worldview views all of these major concerns from a Christian perspective.
Ontology
Our ontology expresses our understanding of what is real. For Plato, ideas expressed the ultimate reality. For Aristotle, and many today, individual things do. A Christian worldview will understand both the importance of ideas and the reality of the material realm. But it will also recognize (and prioritize) a spiritual and eternal realm. So for the Christian, reality includes the Triune God and all His creation, not just “things on the earth,” but also “things above.”
Epistemology
Our epistemology determines how we come to believe or know anything. It’s the filter we apply to decide the truths we accept. For many this can either be based on experience and science or on reason. But more and more today, people believe what they want to believe, even if those beliefs are illogical and self-contradictory. A truly Christian belief system will certainly include observation and logic. But it especially makes Scripture the grid through which it filters everything. We must appreciate here that Scripture alone shows us the heavenly and eternal realm. We know nothing about these things apart from the Bible. So “things above” are exclusively the domain of faith.
Axiology
Axiology deals with the question of values, including especially ethics. It is how we decide on right and wrong but also how we prioritize these and how we choose what really matters. For many, these simply reflect the culture around them, but for the Christian, Scripture is our guide by giving us goals, forming our character, and prescribing our duty.
Chronology
The final category is termed philosophy of history by many, but to be consistent with the -logy convention for the other categories, I choose to call it chronology. By this I mean that things change with time, and we need some way to evaluate this. What is our view of history? Is history cyclical or progressive? Is it so driven by the past that the future follows inevitably? Or is it independent of cause and effect? A Christian view will recognize God’s sovereign hand in history. We can see from the Scriptures that all history revolves around four major events: creation, fall, redemption, and consummation. These events impact the covenantal relationship we have with God and lead to a redemptive-historical interpretation of the Bible.
Everyone has a worldview. Does yours simply reflect the culture around you, or have you worked to develop a Christian worldview?
What Is A Christian Mindset?
For me, mindset is a concept that I’ve newly begun exploring, but it seems to be a derivative concept. Let me suggest what I think it is.
A Christian Mindset Is Active
First a Christian mindset seems to be active, rooted in the Scripture exhortation above. And it seems to be intentional, as a response to God’s command. I want to say it’s an orientation that springs from your worldview. Maybe that sounds like it’s spontaneous, but it’s not, at least a Christian mindset is not. So instead, let me say it’s an orientation that grows out of your worldview, or the attitudes derived from your worldview.
This orientation (or set of attitudes) hugely impacts the nature of our Christian walk. So the investment of intentional focus on our attitudes is productive. Interestingly, as with worldview, everyone has a mindset. And just as a worldview may be fuzzy, a mindset may be crappy. A worldview loosely absorbed from our culture (nothing’s real, nothing’s true, nothing’s wrong), can lead to a mindset (nothing matters) that produces a chaotic life.
A Christian Mindset Is a Commitment
It further seems to me that a Christian mindset is not only an active and intentional orientation, but that it is a commitment. Worldview, orientation, and commitment are all bound together in the wonderful children’s hymn, “I Belong to Jesus.” “I belong to Jesus. I am not my own. All I have and all I am shall be His alone.”
I think it deepens the concept of Christian mindset when we hear the words of Colossians 3:2 in the language of the King James version: “Set your affections on things above, not on things upon the earth.” I think of affections as Jonathan Edwards did. Affections are the stronger inclinations of the heart led by the understanding. For him will is just the affections made active, thus, commitment.
Does your mindset reflect your worldview?
What Is A Christian Walk?
A solidly worked-out Christian worldview and a carefully-cultivated Christian mindset seem to be the components of renewing the mind which transforms us from a life of conformity to the world (Romans 12:2: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.“) Living this life (our walk) will entail intentional application of our worldview and mindset. To say it differently, a Reformed Christian worldview and mindset will drive Christian action. Are we motivated by our worldview and our mindset?
How Can I guide you?
Yes, I think your pastor should be a main guide – if he’s even a Christian. I’m working on a book on how to discern things like that. And if you’re a wife, your husband should be a guide – if he’s a Christian. And if you’re a young person, your parents should be prime guides. But beware of the blind leading the blind.
Building a Christian worldview is a more focused endeavor than learning systematic theology. There are four main question. What is real? What is true? What is important? And how does time affect things. This is fewer that the loci (places) of systematic theology. Both Christian worldview and Christian theology are synthetic. They don’t arise organically from the Bible. Both address concerns of the Bible, and the loci of systematic theology clearly map to the questions of Christian worldview, and they won’t be ignored. But the practical relevance. of the worldview questions are more readily recognized.
Developing a Christian mindset out of a Christian worldview changes everything! Especially, adopting a “things above” mentality makes conformity to this world untenable and leads to the transformation that Scripture commands.
Reformed theology, worldview, mindset, and application will provide focus and limit the scope for posts here. As more articles are posted, you will find expositions of Scripture, reviews of books and movies, and explanations of various areas of theology, worldview, and mindset but with an intended relevance to Christian living in a chaotic world.