Welcome back, and we start now, our second session will begin to think about what it means to have a biblical Christian worldview. And in this session, I'm going to introduce you to some of the works of Francis Schaffer. Let's begin by just quickly reviewing what we've covered. We established in the last presentation that you have a worldview. And you took some time, I hope to write down some thoughts about this. In response to the four questions that were raised by Walsh and Middleton.

We discussed that our worldview was all encompassing. In other words, it covered everything. And it provides a very mental model of the world, which guides us as its adherence in the world. We went with Moshe Middleton when we talked about our worldview being a vision of life and a vision For life, in fact, everything that we do the arts, education, teaching, church, culture, politics. All of these arise out of an ad erected by our shared worldview, a communal worldview, which is which is dominated, and which orient us. We explored in that how our society influenced us.

And we explored how it creates a communal vision of our world as we take in all the communal meanings that surround us. And we ended our session with the notion from Washington Middleton's 1984 book, the transforming vision, that worldviews are in fact founded on an ultimate faith commitment. And that was, regardless of whether we were Christians or non Christians, because we know that all humans are in fact, faith beings. So if we were going to draw this worldview, we might imagine it's something like This there are a potential number of influences on us, that help us to shape our worldview. And conversely, that orient us towards the world. At the center is us, and immediately around us, our faith community, whether that's a church community, or other faith community, the things that we hold dear that we believe in, that we engage with on a regular basis.

If we're working in educational institutions, our educational community where we spend a lot of our time would be next. If you are working in the workforce, then that would be your next immediate community. A cultural community is the culture in which we live and partake of on a regular daily basis. As I said in session one, I live in Australia and Australia is my cultural community. It is, how I live and how I view my history. What the education system has given To me as being part of that community, how I view men and women is part of that cultural community, how I treat my family and my children, how I celebrate Christmas or other religious holidays, all of those form part of my cultural community.

And then beyond that is our experienced world. That is the broader world in which we live. And as you can see from the two arrows, have communal meaning influences us. And it gives us a communal vision that helps us to have a basic understanding, a shared understanding with those around us. But where does the Bible fit in? This isn't limited to the to the influence of our faith community, for those of us who are Christians.

What about those of other faiths or other beliefs? How does that fit in to this particular vision of a worldview. Going back to ocean Nelson, and the statement that it is our ultimate faith commitment which hits the contours of our worldview. We know that noticed that it should not be our faith community, no matter how firm that community is situated in the Christian ethos. So how do we understand what this may look like? And how do we determine or define our biblical worldview?

Especially considering that there have been tremendous shifts that have taken place in society. So it is really important to realize that we are engaging in the battle not merely over this or that point of Christian truth, but in fact, over entire competing worldview structures Many of these shifts are the result of new ideas which have been expounded for a number of centuries, but which have gained credits in the latter half of the 20th centuries, as people have moved away from a Christian reality and toward other realities. And it's trying to shape toward ideas have consequences. And it also reminded us that the crucial ideas at issue are the ultimate worldview debates in which we engage. In fact, these differences are based on presuppositional differences was at the beginning of the 20th century, Christian and non Christian alike were working from the same basic presuppositions strongly influenced by the Christian view of reality.

By the beginning of the 21st century, this had completely shifted as these other realities started to take place. And then dominance. And we find ourselves back with Paul in Acts 17 when he visited Athens, and he stood on that hill, and he recognized a plural and spoke to a pluralistic society. But before we go further, I want to just unpack that notion of presuppositions a little bit more. So what is the presupposition? Well, a presupposition is a thing that is tacitly shared beforehand, at the beginning of a line of argument or a course of action.

It's something really that's taken for granted in advance by all. With regard to a worldview, there is an implicit assumption about the world or background belief relating to an utterance whose truth is taken for granted in discourse, in our discussion of things in how we approach ally effect we can say That all worldviews have presuppositions which are foundational, and this is the truth whether they are Christian worldviews, or other Crampton bacon, stated the very first and absolutely essential presupposition is that the Bible alone is the word of God. And we read that in two Timothy three, verse 16, to 17, where it says that All scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God that is thoroughly equipped for every good work for every thing, and also in to pillar one, verse 20, to 21, which says that, above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophets own interpretation of things.

For prophecy never had its origin in the human will. That prophets, though human spoke from God as though They were carried along as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. So we see in these verses that absolute essential foundation is the word of God as it is being revealed in the Bible. effect Schaefer states that the necessity of biblical authority and air heresy is a watershed issue. Without a high view of Scripture, we deny what Scripture says about itself and undercut the foundation by which we may do theology, and answer all the basic questions of life. The doctrine of Scripture is so basic to the Christian worldview, and the God of the Scripture, for it is the God of the Bible.

The personal infinite Triune God is the transcendental necessity Meaning significance, values and truth. Without this high view of Scripture shaver was convinced the Christian worldview would completely begin to unravel, beginning with the doctrine of God. The doctrine of God was the first of the four basic presuppositions of the biblical Christian worldview that Francis Schaffer developed in his work. The first was God. The second was creation, the third was truth, and the fourth was humanity, as revealed in Scripture, and the foundation of each of this was that biblical accuracy and inerrancy. Let's have a look at this.

The first one was God. God is infinite and personal, for shave all the edges of life meaning morality. The significance and values are rooted and grounded in the personal, infinite Triune God of the Scripture, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and these three are one God. And we see this in the scriptures and Deuteronomy six, verse four. The first commandment here, O Israel, the Lord God, the Lord is one. And again we see this in Matthew 28, verse 19.

Therefore, this is an instruction from Jesus, Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. For it is only in God, only in him the personal, infinite God who is the creator, sustainer and providential Lord, the God who speaks that we can find the answers to the questions of life. It is God who is our portion. It is the God who is there it is the God who is known, is the God who is to be loved and adored. This is the first presuppositional foundational belief that Francis tries to select. The second one is the creation.

Crush It is objective and humans have the crown of his creation created in his image. And that's a finite and personal. The doctrine of creation begins with God as our Creator. And we as his creation include such crucial issues as the historicity of the first 11 chapters of Genesis. And in fact, it places as as the ultimate highest good of God's creation, made by Him in His image. In this we are finite beings, which is unlike God, and yet personal.

Like God, all persons have the best To think that it's the ability to engage in cognitive processes, we have the ability to feel our effective and emotional abilities that make us like God, and to choose. God created us as volitional beings to be self determining to have a will. God created us with these natural attributes for destiny of loving relationships with him and with each other. And these attributes are necessary elements which enable us to give and to receive love. So a proper understanding of oppression, according to Proverbs eight can only be derived from a study of the Scripture and a belief again in that foundational belief in se and the accuracy of the Bible. This does not mean that we should avoid a study of creation.

No, that's not what I'm saying is that we are compelled by special revelation to interact with it. God has given us dominion, the Dominion mandate of Genesis one verse 26 to 28 when God commanded us to rule of every living creature, and this includes scientific and historical investigations, however, we must enact remember that it is scripture line, not the study of science or history that gives us the truth. And that leads us to our next presupposition. Truth is a constant and novel. Christianity is not a series of truths in the plural, but rather truth belt with a capital T. Its truth about our total reality, and not just about religious things. biblical Christianity is truth concerning everything.

And the intellectual holdings of that truth of that total truth. And then the living in the light of that truth is Christianity. And God is the revealer of that truth in His Word. Which leads not only to knowledge, but also to wisdom. And we turn here to Paul's writing Colossians two verse three, because in God I hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. So finally, the fourth presupposition, foundational presupposition developed by Francis, was that humans are responsible, and therefore their choices in action, big consequences, both rewards and punishments.

Foundational to this is the notion that every human being is valuable, because we are created by God in His image and are loved by him, as we saw in Genesis one. We are God's image bearers, and so every individual has an estable worth. We are created with specific gifts and talents, which are to be discovered and developed for that in the Get your fullest potential for their destiny for their purpose to be realized. Every person is responsible for how they live their life, according to their level of ability and knowledge. We are, and this is echoed in our Westminster Confession, a spiritual, rational, moral, immortal being created with innate propositional knowledge, including knowledge of God, to have a spiritual relationship with his creator. And we read that in the scripture when we read that God has written it on our hearts.

He has written His laws in our hearts, he has written on his knowledge of Him on our hearts, and we say that in the Psalms, it is the ultimate destiny of humanity to belong to the family of God. Now, don't hear me incorrectly. I am with Schaffer this, that Christianity is not just involved with salvation. But with a title man in his title, the Christian message must begin with the existence of God forever. And then with creation. So it doesn't begin with salvation.

We must be thankful for salvation. But the Christian message is more than that. Man has a value, because he's made in the image of God. So, how do we explore a biblical Christian worldview? Schaffer wrote, this could be written by responding to philosophies for basic questions. ontology, teleology, axiology, and epistemology.

Let's unpack those very quickly. ontology. ontology is the branch of metaphysics dealing with the nature of being and the question we ask and respond to is where do we come from? teleology is the doctrine of design and purpose in the material world. And that leads us to the question, why are we here? Or where are we going?

Axiology is the study of values is the collective term for ethics. And we ask the question, what is valuable? What is good. And finally, we've seen this one before epistemology, which is the theory of knowledge. And we ask the question, how do we know? So we are back where we begin with the writings of Crampton bacon.

But now we need to think about how we would respond to these questions from a biblical perspective, not communal. So hopefully you've written these questions down, because now it's your turn. I want you to respond. To the four questions from that previous slide, and then compare with what you've wrote at the end of our last session. Then when you've done that, and then when you are ready, move on to the final presentation of this course, the transforming vision as you're writing and as you're comparing the two sets of world visions have a thought about what presuppositions you have, that you have written your worldview on. And I look forward to seeing you in the last session.