A Review: Christian Worldview and New Creation

Lately, we've been reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger (BGCO newspaper P.R. publication) on the concept of Christian worldview.  Five of the 6 commentaries are written by new (Whitlock-era) religion faculty and administrators.  Other posts in the series include:

• Will the Real Christian Worldview Please Stand Up? (Intro)
• "Christian Worldview and Divine Revelation" (Rev. Dr. Mark McClellan, Dean and Professor)
• "The Importance and Impact of Worldview" (Rev. Dr. Tawa Anderson, Assistant Professor)
• "The Creationist Worldview According to the Bible" (Rev. Dr. Ishwaran Mudliar, Associate Professor)
• "A Christian Worldview and Human Sinfulness" (Rev. Dr. Stan Norman, Provost and Executive Vice President for Campus Life)
• "The Center of a Christian Worldview" (Rev. Dr. Terry Wilder, Professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary)

The sixth and final scholar to comment on a/the Christian worldview is OBU Professor Alan Bandy.  For what its worth, this was my favorite essay in the series.  Bandy notes the urgency and difficulty of holding two seemingly contradictory ideas in tension in our theology: On the one hand, God's creation is good (Gen. 1:10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31).  Yet on the other hand, something is wrong.  Bandy's conception of what has gone wrong includes not only individual sinfulness, but also global brokenness -- a subtle but important acknowledgement that while individual sin is serious, there are pressing social and systemic problems that God cares about and that any biblical worldview calls us to engage.

Bandy argues that "the Christian worldview not only explains what is wrong, but it also tells us where we are headed."  Bandy is the only author in the series to invoke the idea of covenant, which seems to me to be an absolutely central (and unique) concept in any biblical worldview, though he veers closer to supersessionism than I would want to go.

Still, Bandy accomplishes a lot in his short essay.  While affirming that the Christian worldview offers an answer to the question "What is our destination?", Bandy steers clear of absolute pronouncements about what that destination looks like.  He introduces the scriptural concept of new creation in light of its relation to the Christ event and the idea of covenant.  Rather than presenting the Book of Revelation as a primer in dispensationalism, Bandy shows how it can and should comfort us, just as it comforted its original hearers.  Bandy sums it up well: "All of history is moving toward the new creation that God has planned."

Few conservative scholars of apocalyptic literature writing for a mostly lay and mostly fundamentalist audience could resist engaging in the eschatological debates that these people seem to find so interesting.  Bandy does not define "the end of the age," nor does he speculate about its timetable.  I interpret Bandy's restraint as a sign of both pastoral and scholarly maturity.  Instead, he reiterates original themes of Revelation that are almost always lost in fundamentalists' obsessive "end times" debates: comfort, redemption, and the sovereignty of God.

I'm confident that people learned a lot from Professor Bandy's essay.  I certainly appreciated it.

Now, let's be frank.  Bandy has been caught in the crossfire of Save OBU's pushing back against Stan Norman's agenda.  We feel OBU has unnecessarily put him in a difficult position.  But it's not his fault and he didn't do anything wrong.  Also, just because some faculty members think Bandy won the promising teacher award because of fundamentalist affirmative action, we have it on solid authority that he is a very fine teacher who goes out of his way to let his students know he cares about their flourishing and success -- both inside and outside the classroom.  I don't know whether Bandy was on the search committee that led to Prof. Mudliar's hire.  Either way, he will now be able to see firsthand the awkwardness, anger, disappointment and disillusionment that arises when faculty are either not consulted or overruled, and a new colleague is brought in primarily on the basis of ideological conformity.  (I'm assuming Provost Norman and/or Dean McClellan commandeered the process that brought Prof. Mudliar from SWBTS to OBU and that this could not have been the result of any normal search process that includes faculty input.  But that's a separate issue for another day.)

The rift at OBU is not between junior and senior faculty or between fundamentalist and moderate faculty.  The rift is between a few administrators and virtually all faculty -- between those seeking to restrict academic freedom and undermine OBU's great liberal arts tradition and those seeking to uphold, honor, and build upon that proud and noble heritage.

Reflections on the Baptist Messenger "Christian Worldview" Series

For those who know the OBU religion department, I'll leave it for you to contemplate why certain professors contributed essays to this series and not others.  I suspect these essays may have looked quite different had the relatively more senior (and relatively more moderate) professors participated in this exercise.  And those who knew the OBU religion department in a bygone era will have no trouble imagining how different this series would have looked had legendary faculty like James Timberlake, Rowena Strickland, and Don Wester written the essays.

Having endured many years where moderates comprised a majority in OBU's religion department, one can only imagine the elation Dr. Jordan must feel to be able to showcase the new OBU in the third-largest newspaper in Oklahoma.  OBU's provost, who was previously rejected for the School of Christian Service deanship, has now provided cover for the BGCO fundamentalists to get what they've always wanted at OBU.  The dean, an old friend, has loyally done his part to execute the plan.  A legitimate philosopher was terminated in order to make way for an eager apologetics specialist.  And now a relatively unaccomplished (but doctrinally pure) seminary professor is filling the slot recently occupied by a leading Baptist historian (the baseball equivalent of buying out the contract of a future Hall of Famer, then overpaying for a guy who's hitting under .200 in Triple-A).

While most of Bison Nation and the rest of the world alternates between laughter and tears, a select few are tickled pink that their worldview -- apparently "the Christian worldview" -- now prevails in OBU's administrative suite and in a growing number of classrooms.

Tomorrow, Veronica will provide more analysis on the Messenger's worldview series and its implications for Christian liberal arts education.

A Review: The Center of a Christian Worldview

This week, we are reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger (BGCO newspaper P.R. publication) on the concept of Christian worldview.  Five of the 6 commentaries are written by new (Whitlock-era) religion faculty and administrators.  Other posts in the series include:

• Will the Real Christian Worldview Please Stand Up? (Intro)
• "Christian Worldview and Divine Revelation" (Rev. Dr. Mark McClellan, Dean and Professor)
• "The Importance and Impact of Worldview" (Rev. Dr. Tawa Anderson, Assistant Professor)
• "The Creationist Worldview According to the Bible" (Rev. Dr. Ishwaran Mudliar, Associate Professor)
• "A Christian Worldview and Human Sinfulness" (Rev. Dr. Stan Norman, Provost and Executive Vice President for Campus Life)

This is the only article in the Baptist Messenger's worldview series not written by an OBU professor or administrator.  I don't know anything about Prof. Wilder or his work other than what can be gleaned from his online SWBTS profile.  As post-Takeover SBC seminary professors go, he's definitely one of the legitimate ones committed to scholarship over Baptist politics.  He is a member of the mainstream Society of Biblical Literature, which fundamentalist "scholars" regard as apostate.  But he hasn't been involved with the SBL in over a decade, instead aiming his scholarship mostly toward evangelical and fundamentalist publications and conferences.  On a personal note, Wilder's son will be attending Union University in the fall.  (Which brings up an interesting idea: Just as fewer OBU ministry and religion grads than you would expect go on to the post-Takeover SBC seminaries, I bet shockingly few SBC seminary professors send their children to OBU -- but that's another question for another day.)

After the absolutely shameful treatment Randall Lolley, Roy Honeycutt, Russell Dilday and other SBC seminary administrators and faculty received from fundamentalists in the Takeover years, I have a build-in prejudice against people who have chosen to affiliate themselves with these institutions in the post-Takeover era.  But Prof. Wilder was studying in the U.K. and teaching at Midwestern seminary (the "least bad" of the 6 SBC seminaries, I'm told) during those years.  He's only been at Southwestern since 2010.  Hey, everyone needs a job -- even Baptist academics whose careers unfortunately (and by no fault of their own) overlapped with the SBC's deliberate degradation of its own educational institutions.  I wouldn't work for (SWBTS President and original SBC Takeover architect) Paige Patterson for all the gold in China.  But I'm going to give Wilder the benefit of the doubt.  He's done significant service to Baptists and to his profession over many years.

His worldview essay is concise, clear, and about what you would expect.  Wilder refers back to essays by Tawa Anderson and Stan Norman to help bring some internal coherence to the series.  In opposition to previous essays that regard the Bible, not Christ, as God's supreme revelation, Wilder maintains that Christ is at the center of the Christian worldview.  Sensibly, he qualifies this by saying "a thoroughgoing view of the world must operate from a biblical standpoint."  At the end, however, Wilder ups the ante on Bible-as-revelation: "The will of God is grounded in and upon the written revelation of the Bible."  It seems like a lot of Baptist leaders today want to demote Christ from the Trinity and put the Bible in his place (ESV or HCSB translations preferred).  Still, I think Wilder finds a better balance between God, Christ, and Scripture than the others, who seem to say "God so loved the world that He gave us the Bible, and whosoever reads it the same way I do is a real Christian."

Another subtle but significant difference in Wilder's writing is his occasional use of the indefinite article: "A Christian worldview."  He lapses into "the Christian worldview" later on, but he seems willing to at least partially acknowledge that there is no one definitive "Christian worldview," and nowhere does he imply that he has a monopoly on how to define it.  So, that's refreshing.

Wilder contrasts "a Christian worldview" with a variety of other philosophies and -isms.  But he maintains that if we do not adopt a Christian worldview "we will follow whatever system or combination of beliefs are trendy, meet our needs or satisfy our desires or passions, and they are usually those which hold us least accountable for our actions and decisions."  This statement is pretty surprising and even insulting.  First of all, the prevalence of "cheap grace" in contemporary evangelicalism makes the idea that no one outside the Christian fold has any notion of moral or ethical accountability completely laughable.  Furthermore, this kind of holier-than-thou attitude is precisely the kind of thing that drives people away from Christianity.  Many (if not most) non-Christians live with a very deliberate and rigorous moral seriousness.  It's beyond insulting (and factually untrue) to imply that they are unaccountable hedonists living according to the whims of their desires and "trendy" belief systems.

To his credit, Wilder locates Christ at the center of the Christian worldview.  You'd think this would go without saying, but with today's en vogue Southern Baptist intellectuals, nothing surprises me anymore.  Yet Wilder emphasizes Jesus' death, apparently to the exclusion of his life and teachings (at least in this brief essay): "I would maintain that it is the person of Jesus Christ and what He has done on the cross that leads us to see the world from a Christian perspective."  Personally, I'd like a Christian worldview to at least acknowledge major emphases of Jesus' teachings: neighbor love, the kingdom of God, the Sermon on the Mount, etc.  But in today's SBC, if you have the audacity to insist on the teachings of Jesus, they just label you a liberal and cast you out.

Thank you, Professor Wilder, for contributing to the Baptist Messenger "worldview" series.  We're reviewing the series in the context of our ongoing concerns about OBU's troubling new direction, mutually draining relationship with the BGCO, and true mission and calling in the context of post-Takeover Baptist higher education.  Since you're only tangentially involved in our specific concerns, we trust you will take our comments with a grain of salt and hopefully some grace.  Best wishes to you in your life, teaching, and ministry.

A Review: A Christian Worldview and Human Sinfulness

This week, we are reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger (BGCO newspaper P.R. publication) on the concept of Christian worldview.  Five of the 6 commentaries are written by new (Whitlock-era) religion faculty and administrators.  Other posts in the series include:

• Will the Real Christian Worldview Please Stand Up? (Intro)
• "Christian Worldview and Divine Revelation" (Rev. Dr. Mark McClellan, Dean and Professor)
• "The Importance and Impact of Worldview" (Rev. Dr. Tawa Anderson, Assistant Professor)
• "The Creationist Worldview According to the Bible" (Rev. Dr. Ishwaran Mudliar, Associate Professor)

Anyone who's been paying attention to the Save OBU movement will know that we've been pretty hard on Rev. Dr. Stan Norman, OBU's Provost and Executive Vice President for Campus Life.  (He's also the new editor-in-chief of the alumni magazine, apparently... micromanage much?)  His fingerprints are all over every negative policy and personnel change we've protested.  Every indication is that he has been a one-man wrecking crew at OBU -- wasting no opportunity to undermine her reputation, academic standing and integrity, or authentic Baptist liberal arts heritage.  While I would have written an essay on Christian worldview differently, please understand that Dr. Norman's "worldview" essay is the absolute least of our concerns about his corrosive presence on Bison Hill.

If you came expecting fireworks like yesterday, you'll be disappointed.  Norman's contribution to the series is nowhere near as bizarre/wacky as Prof. Mudliar's.  In fact, it's not even an original essay for the Messenger.  Rather, it was excerpted from a 2007 edited volume to which Norman contributed.  While I wish Stan Norman spent his time writing commentaries for the Baptist Messenger, unfortunately he was probably too busy doing whatever he does to earn dismal evaluations from OBU faculty.

Norman takes up the topic of sin.  And holy total depravity, Batman!, Calvinism has come to Bison Hill!  So as to not make light of how extra bad and super serious sin actually is, I'll let you in on some psychological information about me.  For a variety of reasons including birth order, family dynamics, and a misguided internalization of religious indoctrination, I grew up taking sin very seriously.  In fact, my guilt complex has actually caused a lot of emotional problems for me.  I beat myself up for the littlest things, and when I make legitimate, consequential mistakes, it has been completely debilitating.  So it was pretty perplexing and actually kind of insulting to read the implication that anyone who doesn't agree with Norman "regard[s] the sinfulness of humanity lightly or glibly."

Like the previous three essays, Norman draws a strict dichotomy between "the Christian worldview" (which is perfectly, eternally, and self-evidently correct) and everything else.  But even though interpretations and nuances differ, Holy Scripture is indeed largely a story about, in the words of English clergyman Eric Milner-White, "the loving purposes of God from the first days of our disobedience unto the glorious Redemption brought us by this Holy Child."  Every Christian worldview takes sin seriously.  Ours is a redemption story.  But Norman wants us to believe that since he has gone to extremes to come up with long, wordy strings of hyperbolic phraseology to express how bad "the sin problem" really is, he must have some unique insight that other inferior worldviews (Christian and otherwise) lack.

Since I've already expressed (and taken heat for) my dissatisfaction with the logic of scapegoating and the doctrine of penal substitionary atonement elsewhere, I'll be brief in my theological critique.  Norman's claims, without scriptural support, that "the severity and depth of sin is nowhere more fully revealed, and its judgment nowhere more strongly depicted, than in the crucifixion of the Son of God."  I guess you could say that, but you could also point to a number of Old Testament passages where Israel's sin grieved the heart of God.

In addition to depending on the efficacy of scapegoating and penal substitution, Norman's worldview also demands belief in the historicity of the Genesis 1-11 narrative, namely "an actual historical Fall."  (If you have the audacity to think that some of the Genesis narrative may actually be mythical, maybe the website that Prof. Mudliar approvingly cited in his creationist essay will help convince you: Click here to see where logic goes to die.)

For Norman, sin is apparently exclusively an individual problem.  In spite of the overwhelming scriptural evidence that God relates to people not only individually, but also collectively (Exod. 6:7, Lev 26:12, Jer. 30:22, Rom. 11:26, etc), Norman not only fails to engage social sin, but actually scoffs at the notion.  Citing Marx and Jose Miranda, Norman inaccurately states that those who critique unjust social structures somehow believe that social justice would necessarily eliminate any possibility of conflict and wickedness.  Thus Norman's worldview conveniently absolves us of even caring about systemic oppression, for sin will persist even if social ills are addressed.  But letting one's politics dictate one's theology is by no means unique to Stan Norman.

Don't look for words like "love," "mercy," "grace," or "kindness" in Norman's essay -- you won't find them.  The emphasis here is on judgment.  Also, forget about the notion that Christ is the supreme revelation of God.  That is so 1963 according to today's fundamentalist Southern Baptist leaders.  The Bible is God's revelation now -- and don't you denigrate Scripture by saying that is merely a record of God's revelation!

As for the concept of worldview, we're starting to see a pattern here.  Using "Christian worldview" language, fundamentalists are able to cast aside not only those evil secular ideologies and pesky other religions, but also whatever parts of the diverse, ancient, and theologically rich Christian tradition they happen not to like.  Thankfully, I don't think anyone's falling for it.  The Christian -- and Baptist -- "worldview" is a lot broader than the new fundamentalists want to acknowledge.  They may have all the power now, but their attempt to co-opt "the Christian worldview" actually marginalizes them and confines their influence to a shrinking, insular sphere.  And they are pretty much antithetical to the project of higher education -- Christian or otherwise.  I think that explains why Dr. Norman has been such a flashpoint for criticism (from faculty, students, alumni, retirees, and now the Save OBU movement) of all that has gone wrong at OBU in recent years.  Nothing against him personally, he's just a terrible fit for OBU.

A Review: The Creationist Worldview According to the Bible

This week, we're reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger by OBU's Whitlock-era religion hires.  You may find the original article for this review here.

Can I be honest for a minute? I'm not even really sure where to begin speaking on this article.

The last two articles were not that bad. Honestly, I disagree with a lot of the implications of what they say and I'm not sure that those implications bode well for a liberal arts university-- but I wasn't grinding my teeth or anything to read them. At least, I understand where they're coming from. And having grown up in a pretty conservative church, I probably would've agreed with them for a lot of my life.

Actually, the most ironic part of the whole story is that if I hadn't gone to OBU, I would probably still agree with them! But I did go to OBU and found a safe place where I could open my mind to new ideas and see that God had created a much bigger world than I had once thought. And that is the freedom that I am trying to protect for future students. Some will still come out on the side of worldview and that's fine. But some will come out like me, and that needs to be fine too.

But when I saw this article, I cringed. The truth is, if this one had never been written, I'm not sure if this series would even exist. The underlying logical assumptions of the article are so flawed, I'm not even sure how to summarize it fairly as I did with the other two.

You'll have to just go read it yourself.

Probably the best thing I can say about this article is that the author chooses to quote the NASB-- which is at least not the sexist ESV. Did you know, the ESV was specifically made as a reaction against the NRSV in order to counter their effort to use gender inclusive language? Now you know. But the author does not choose this favorite version of Reformed thinkers everywhere (granted, he's not going for the gender inclusive NRSV either) to borrow his quotes.

However, since in this article not only God is male but also all humans, I think the point is moot and negated anyway. I just wanted to find maybe something that could be said for the positive.

The article begins by setting up a straw man of "the evolutionists" and explaining that all of "the evolutionists" believe the world came together randomly about 4.5 billion years ago. They say it came from dust, etc. without a creator, but maybe some aliens. In this process, humans came from "'ape' men" and without a maker have "no code of ethics and have no need of eternal salvation."

The author then contrasts this view with the "biblical" view that God made the world from nothing in six days and man [sic] was made from the dust of the earth in order to glorify God.

WOW.

First of all, not only does the author set up a straw man of evolutionists as though they are all godless heathens or something like that, but it also creates a false dichotomy between Young Earth Creationism and atheism. We'll get more to that later. But first, I want to comment on the use of the term "the evolutionists."

Probably the majority of the OBU science department should be offended that this man is using the term "evolutionist" to imply atheist-- or at least all of the ones I've talked to. Also, probably a fair portion of the Bible professors I had should be offended that he's implying the only "biblical" way to see the world is Young Earth Creationism. But honestly, the part that gets me the most is this lie that people who are not Christians have no sense of ethics. Let's not be ridiculous. Everyone who is not a sociopath knows the difference between right and wrong and I know plenty of people who worship no God and are quite fine to be nice and even to treat their neighbors as they would want to be treated.

If he's basing his "worldview" on the idea that if you're not a Christian you're a terrible person, he's going to be very disappointed when he meets some very kind people who are just not interested in church. -- But I guess, in fairness, I'll give him the point that they most often are not interested in eternal salvation.

So now the options are godless heathen or young earth creationist. And if you don't read the Bible (which, by the way, never says anything anywhere about 4004 BC) and think you know more about the age of the earth than, I don't know, anyone who has ever dedicated their entire life to scientific research, then I guess you are doing it wrong. So, six literal days it is, that's the only way to read it.

But it's time for me to move on.

The rest of the article is not much more than some strings of bible verses taken out of context to "prove" whatever he is saying. It's pretty bland stuff: man [sic] is made to worship God, plants and animals can't, don't worship them either, man [sic] is supposed to be holy, man [sic] is accountable to God. (I hope you're all seeing the pattern. If anyone could let me know what women are supposed to be doing at this point, I'd be pretty grateful.)

God is forever, unchanging, made the world from nothing-- using words and in six days. Man [sic] is made to glorify God. We've all sinned, etc. Thanks to Adam and Eve we can all look forward to a lake of fire... But Jesus came to save us (now we are all called simply, sinners-- at least it's gender neutral?) if we believe in his death and resurrection.

The author then goes back to creation to mention again that all people are made in the image of God, which means reason enough to submit to God. Thus, there is right and wrong (interesting move, his prooftext for that is the 10 commandments. No thoughts, it's just interesting.). So man [sic] is not a "higher animal" and also genocide is wrong.

Finally, since all people are sinful and all people are in God's image (capacity to follow God), we should do missions and proclaim the way of salvation throughout the earth.

Mostly, I end the article confused, wondering how in this brief span of words-- most of which are quoted proof texts-- we managed to hit missions and genocide and also the sinfulness of all humanity. Also, I guess the implication is that everyone who believes in a literal six day creation believes all of this and anyone who doesn't, doesn't believe any of it.

Well, that sort of false dichotomy has no place at a university.

And if that's not enough, at the end of the page he suggests further reading material including a Young Earth Creationist apologetics book where "theologians" talk about "scientific evidence."

Oh, and answersingenesis.org -- which is the website run by the people who made the Creation museum.

I'm kind of surprised he didn't try to argue it like this. (Oh, it's real.)

Ok. I've been rude, and I'm sorry, but I'm just not sure if there is another appropriate way to respond to such an article.

But on a serious note, I am not saying that you shouldn't be a Young Earth Creationist. I'm saying you should be able to explore the options and decide for yourself which is the most convincing-- that's called learning. If you, like the author of this article, come out with 6 day creation in 4004 BC, then that's great.

But don't say that there's only one way to read that story. And don't think if people disagree with you that they are all godless. That's ridiculous-- and that attitude definitely has no place at a Christian university.

A Review: The Importance and Impact of Worldview

This week, we're reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger by OBU's Whitlock-era religion hires.  You may find the original article for this review here.


Again, this article is a basic introduction to the concept of "Worldview" with a bit more explanation as to what areas a "worldview" covers-- and what material will be covered through the rest of the series. The author begins with a story of three friends on a Safari. Upon seeing the same safari animals, each comes to a different conclusion about the meaning of such a sight. This difference, the author suggests, is due to "worldview." A "worldview" then, is the conceptual lens by which each person makes meaning in her/his world. The author determines the four core questions answered by "worldview" to be: "What is our nature? What is our world? What is our problem? What is our destination?" The author continues to suggest that "worldview" is thus important because it provides the frame by which we all make meaning out of the events of our lives. The author concludes by mentioning that there are many different kinds of worldview, "Christian, Muslim, Atheist, Buddhist, Hindu, Existentialist, New Age, etc.," and gives some criteria for determining if "someone’s worldview is true—that is, if they see the world the way the world really is?" His suggested criteria include internal consistency, external consistency, and liveability. After reiterating the importance of a worldview which answers fundamental questions, he ends by saying, "It is, therefore, crucial that we examine our worldview, to ensure that we see the world the way God does."


First, the author is quite right to suggest that every person has a "worldview" and that it is the way we all make meaning of our world. I, perhaps, would not use the word "worldview" but the way he defines it, it does the trick. This is very similar to the idea of "thinking theologically" about all things which I introduced yesterday. The point is interesting, then, that the author admits that meaning is created by each person and not picked up objectively from the outside world. This is a very astute observation and bears remembering.


So then, perhaps I do not take issue with the idea of worldview but with the way it is being appropriated. One of our commenters (Thanks, Chris!) astutely pointed out that calling our own particular frame with which we view the world the "Christian Worldview" is simply taking the authority of Christianity and stamping it onto our own set of meaning-making presuppositions. Surely, we derive our worldview in great part from religion-- I'm not saying that the author's worldview is unchristian. But is it the Christian worldview? Are there not many things on which Christians disagree? 


Especially in light of the way the author of the last article insisted that worldview is adopted from the bible, it makes me cautious when anyone speaks of "The Christian worldview" or "The Biblical worldview." Case in point, let us take the example of the animals on the safari. Sure, Christians might all agree that those animals are created by God. But then what? Should we protect them as God's creatures? Or should we care nothing for them because as soon as the earth is destroyed Jesus is coming back?-- Both options come from people with "Christian worldviews" and find their backing in scripture.


So my problem with worldview, with the way it is being used by the authors of these articles, is the way that they turn to worldview to solve all of their problems. It is as if we could just teach everyone the right answers to the four questions of the article, "What is our nature? What is our world? What is our problem? What is our destination?," then we would all know the right answers to everything all the time. (Also, look for the suggested answers to these questions provided by the series in the upcoming articles. Thus far we really only have hints-- but we're getting there.)


But that doesn't really work. First, Christians don't know everything (remember Paul's looking into a mirror dimly), and second, that which we do know, we disagree on. So even if we had all of the completely correct answers to those important questions (we don't), we still probably wouldn't know what to do with them.


The other major problematic implication of this use of worldview is the divisions which it draws between "us and them." There are the people with the "Christian worldview" and there are those with other kinds of worldviews. Ours is true and theirs isn't. End of story.


That is a shockingly different affirmation than the one which I received at OBU which was to "seek God's truth wherever it may be found" and that "all truth is God's truth." Rather, this use of "worldview" presupposes that Christians have the monopoly on truth. I am not saying that we should believe everything we hear-- but I am saying that people who are not Christians are not stupid. And they don't believe what they believe for no good reason.


Again, take the author's example of the animals on the safari. I may not agree with the new age persona he crafts to say there is a "spark of the divine" in the animals just as there is in human beings. But, probably I could learn a lot more about caring for the creation of God in real ways from someone who does believe that than from many Evangelicals. 


And what about the picture he gives of the atheist response, supposed to be characteristic of Richard Dawkins? Fundamentalists might be surprised to find how much they have in common with Dawkins worldview-- i.e. the need for absolute truth based on hard evidence. Granted, they come out on different sides of the equation. But believing there is proof that there is a God and believing that there is proof that there is no God requires many of the same underlying presuppositions.


I guess what I am trying to say is that reducing someone to a "______ worldview" be it Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Atheist, New Age, etc. means we cannot take them seriously as people. Because believe it or not, there is as much diversity in each of those movements as there is within Christianity. And each of those people probably has something to teach you.


If we are going to affirm that all people are made in the image of God-- then there is something to learn about God from all people, no matter their worldview.


If OBU really wants to "equip students to engage a diverse world" the way to do it is not to teach them why they are already right and already have all the answers while everyone else is wrong. 


And finally, once they leave Bison Hill and begin to meet people who are different from them, they may find that many different "worldviews" are "liveable." I'm not saying that makes them all worth the same. But I think it's pretty offensive to say that no one can live a bearable life without Christianity. It's the straw-man fallacy. People all over the world spend their whole lives unchristian all the time. And if you think that they are all miserable, what will it do to your faith when you find out that they're not?


So I agree with the author that "worldview" is important. But I am unsure if it can be taught as a definitive set of answers. First, those are answers that we don't have-- and they are answers that are incomplete anyway. If we are truly seeking to be a Liberal Arts University which integrates faith and learning-- that probably means my faith is going to be shaped by that which I learn-- and hopefully I will never stop learning. 


The purpose of education is not to create students with all the answers. The point is to teach students how to learn-- and that God is faithful to us when we seek to find God in the truth. But all of us must be willing to change, because this side of glory, we will never have it figured out completely.

A Review: Christian Worldview and Divine Revelation

This week, we're reviewing a series of essays in the Baptist Messenger by OBU's Whitlock-era religion hires.  You may find the original article for this review here.

Unsurprisingly, this article is a pretty straightforward introduction to the concept of a Christian worldview. The author argues that worldview is something which comes from God-- by means of revelation, which he defines as the Bible. A worldview, the author continues to say, is like a pair of glasses. It does not change our surroundings but allows us to see other things clearly, as they really are. Thus, it is important to stand on the truth of scripture as the foundation for our lives. The author gives another image, that of a puzzle. The Bible is like the picture on the box and everyday we put in more pieces as we put together the puzzle. But we have to be careful not to get mixed up with pieces from other puzzles. The author finishes by concluding that our theology determines our worldview and the Bible determines our theology.

As a student of theology, I am encouraged endlessly to "think theologically" about all aspects of life. (It's even something of a joke at Brite, how much of a catchphrase that is.) So that aspect of worldview, I understand. And quite right, as Christians, our theology determines much of how we see the world.

What is interesting to me in this article is that there seems to be only one way to understand scripture, and one type of Christian worldview.

I began to understand more of the author's theology when the second word of the article reminded me that God is indeed male. (For those of you keeping score at home, a masculine pronoun was used for God 10 times in this short 950 word piece.)

For those of you who are convinced that I am a feminist nit-picking because I am left with little else to quibble with, I assure you, that is not the case. First, the implied "worldview" the author seems to be advocating for all Christians follows the usual post-Takeover route to being oppressive to women. (Oh, and look for that pattern throughout the series.) 

Secondly, the use of the masculine pronoun emphasizes something I said yesterday; this is evidence of the echo chamber. Again, as a student of theology, I can tell you that no one is going to publish anything that uses masculine pronouns for God unless they are evangelical. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being evangelical (although I maintain the language is oppressive), I'm just saying that maybe the author is talking only to an increasingly insular subset of Christians.

Further, the author proves to have continued the trend of the post-Takeover 2000 Baptist Faith and Message. In 1963, the BF&M maintained that "The criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted is Jesus Christ." But this sentence was removed in the fundamentalist-inspired 2000 revision. Thus, Jesus is no longer the fullness of God's revelation, but God is found in the words on a page.

Don't get me wrong. I have dedicated my entire life to understanding those words on the page. But the Word of God (capital W intended) is Jesus Christ, the Word became flesh. I am not saying that the author would not affirm that Jesus is indeed the fullness of God's self revelation. I am only saying that he presents the only necessary revelation for a worldview to be the Bible.

Suddenly, it is no longer sufficient for Jesus to be the Truth (John 14.6) but we can only stand on the "inspiration, authority, and total truthfulness" of scripture. Now, I'm not disagreeing with any of those things, I'm simply pointing out that pragmatically, it makes a huge difference whether one is standing on Jesus as the Truth or upon affirmation of the words on the page.

The problem with saying there is one Christian worldview and that it is based on scripture is that scripture has been understood so variously throughout our history, that statement is impossible. When someone says, "The bible says...(x, y, z)..." what they really mean is, "My interpretation of the bible is... (x, y, z)..." There is no such thing as objectivity. And so even though the Bible may be inspired and authoritative and totally truthful -- none of us know what it means. 

200 years ago, people (even Southern Baptists) held up the Bible and proclaimed that God did not intend for the races to mix in marriage.

At some point we need to acknowledge that that was our action based on words in our holy book-- and that we messed up. We read it wrong. All of us did. And certainly we haven't figured it out between now and then.

We all see in a mirror dimly, we all know only in part (1 Cor. 13:12).

If the Bible was easy to understand, why would we have seminaries? And why would we have so many denominations? All of those splits have come from different ways of understanding the same words on the page.

So, I am skeptical of an author who claims that the Bible is like glasses that make us see everything else more clearly. Surely, that is my experience sometimes. But so often, I read the Bible and it makes everything more complicated.

I am 100% agreed that all aspects of my life and thought life ought to be put under the lordship of Christ. But I am not sure what that means all of the time, and I don't think that anyone else does either. Last time I checked, all of us had a really old book that didn't come with any other instructions than read it, try your best, and trust God -- because God is faithful.

Claiming that one way of reading that book is authoritative is not the firm foundation we need. 

I like the metaphor of the puzzle. But if the image on the box is God -- that's a box I'm not going to see this side of glory. So I'll just trust that the pieces that fit belong in the picture.

Will the Real Christian Worldview Please Stand Up?

Oftentimes I feel like we talk about the dangers of fundamentalism at our school, but it feels a little like railing against an amoeba. It's hard to find definite things which point to the very real dangers. That's why we try to highlight schools like Shorter University, where no one could say anything until it was much too late.

That's part of the problem! We would like to get our school through the perilous waters of post-Takeover Baptist education unscathed and definitely still accredited. We can't afford to wait until 50+ faculty are stomping away indignantly, and watch as the rest of the school inevitably burns to the ground.

So we continue to try and give this amorphous blob a shape, and continue to proclaim its danger.

But finally, here is a solid glimpse.

Last week, there was an incredibly interesting series in the Baptist Messenger which, for us, was lucky in many ways. There are a few things about this particular Baptist Messenger series I would like to highlight.

This series was a series on Christian worldview, written by 6 guest writers -- 5 of whom are recent additions to the OBU College of Theology and Ministry. It is interesting to me that the ones who are writing essays about Christian worldview are all people who've made it through the new litmus test of hiring questions which has been instituted since the new administration has come to OBU.

Please find the entire series of Baptist Messenger "worldview" essays here.

In the days to come, we will go through these articles and show our readership exactly what kind of education OBU will give in our new post-Takeover fundamentalist world.

But why bother with an obscure series in a statewide Baptist newspaper?

First, it is interesting to me that this series is coming out after Save OBU has recently made more and more contacts with Oklahoma Baptist clergy. What better way to counter anything we've said to them than to show them that the REAL OBU is teaching this fundamentalist diatribe. Coincidence? Probably. But as always, we will continue to show that fundamentalism is not the only version of Christianity, and certainly not the version which makes for a good university.

Second, I have always had a particular problem with the idea of worldview.

I have already mentioned that the descent into fundamentalism is moving OBU further and further out of the realm of relevance and into a smaller and smaller echo-chamber where the only voices all mirror each other. This obsession with worldview is the perfect demonstration of that point. I have only ever heard conservative, evangelical Christians use the language of "worldview." I avoid saying fundamentalists, because I don't know if that is a fair assessment. But it is definitely my experience that the concept is only talked about in circles with extreme familiarity with fundamentalism. It's not a real thing worthy of an academic classroom.

Further, worldview is a sneaky word which allows for the obsession with doctrinal purity to be enforced. Talking about a Christian worldview is to say that there is some normative model for the way that every Christian should think. It means taking non-essentials of the faith and then making them essentials. By saying that it is part of a Christian worldview, one can now take any doctrine, highlight and treasure it, and suddenly those who do not affirm it are not Christians-- or at least do not "view the world" as a good Christian should.

The prevalence of talk about worldview at OBU did not arise until the new administration came. Honestly, I'm not sure I had ever heard the word until they instituted a new Christian worldview class into the curriculum. Granted, I was too old for the changes to affect me, so I don't remember everything perfectly. Long story short, J-term became required for freshmen again my senior year. There were a few classes which were offered for free -- and one of them was a new Christian Worldview course, team taught by the new dean of the (then) School of Christian Service and an outside apologist.

So that's probably a good way to get a ton of students to take that class.

Granted, I didn't take the class. So I can't tell you with any sort of certainty what happened there. I can make a few guesses.

But why guess? Now, the newest members who shape the doctrines of OBU have published a 6-part series which will show me exactly what a Christian Worldview is.

So, what is a Christian Worldview? What are we teaching our students is necessary to believe in order to be a Christian? As we go through this series and reveal what those who are taking OBU in a new direction say, you might be surprised.