Week 26, 2014

        The foundation of a biblical worldview is the first four words in The Bible—“In the beginning God….” That God is, and made all that is, is our foundational understanding. From this, all other truth springs.

         The first implication of this is that the world is the Lord’s, and we are His. He created us for a purpose, and to find and fulfill that purpose is the only path to a truly successful human life. As Jesus said in Matthew 22:37-40:   

“And He said to him, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.’

“This is the great and foremost commandment.

“The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

         Therefore, our main job description as human beings is to love God above all else, and then to love one another. By this we can measure our most basic progress toward accomplishing our goal: How much are we growing in our love for God and one another? Our main purpose is not so much what we do as what we become—lovers of God and lovers of others.

         “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.” We must keep growing in love, for God must be our primary devotion in life. Only if we keep this as our primary devotion can we accomplish the second commandment, which is to love one another. Only by keeping these two can we truly succeed at the purpose for which we were created. It is when we keep these in proper focus and order in our lives that we realize the peace and joy that is the normal state of those who are abiding in the Lord.

         As we are told in possibly the greatest of all Scripture verses John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” God loves the whole world, not just man. He said that we were worth more than many sparrows, but He loves the sparrows too. As we love God and one another as we should, we should also love the entire world because it belongs to the Lord, and He loves it.

         Because God loves the world so much that He would give His own Son for our redemption and reconciliation, if we are going to see the world with His eyes, or have His worldview, we must see the world through love. This is why Paul wrote in Philippians 1:9:    

    And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment.

         “Real knowledge and all discernment” can only be had when our love is abounding. We will not see anything or anyone as God does if we do not love them. This love is the truth that all other revelation, knowledge, wisdom, and understanding is based upon. This is the foundation of having a biblical worldview, or God’s view of the world.