For school my younger siblings have been watching a video documentary by a "genius first class." His name is Francis Schaeffer and the series is called, How Shall We Then Live. Its very good and tries to answer the question, "How are we to live in this world of such complexity and meaninglessness?" A good question and one which everyone ought to be asking themselves.
The premise of the video is this.
Humanism can not produce the necessary purpose and meaning which all humans require.
Francis proceeds from this point to explain the many differing worldviews which have been in conflict with Christianity since the Roman Empire. All the worldviews try to give man purpose and all, ultimately fail and pass away into the sands of time. Christianity believes that mans purpose is to serve Christ and his meaning comes from being a creation of Christ. This has remained constant and continual since the dawn of time.
From the Christians perspective, the world is one big web of lies, some old, some new, some more powerful then others but all lies and only the Christians are free and capable of breaking free from this prison of lies. My brother Ezra asked a very good question when he said "but who says truth is important if another worldview can satisfy me more?" Their are indeed people who can live their whole lives in a "lie" and yet be happy, moral, good people and they don't have to deal with all the questions that Christians do of "am I offending God?" "should I worry about sin?"
If we look at this world, we see people believing lies, lots of lies and living their lives based on lies. These people are believing false realities. False because they are not true at least not true in accordance with biblical truth but they are realities because people really believe them and build their lives upon them.
But who cares? Who cares if one is believing a false reality if that reality is better then the "true" reality? What Ezra does not understand because he hasn't studied enough history is that life is bigger then my own self in my own present time. We have this false view that what I do is my own business and it wont effect other people. History proves this to be wrong. The world we live in is primarily built on apathy. People want to do as little work as possible and have very little motivation or drive except in the pursuit of the satisfaction of their own desires. Inspiring sermons and messages can not arouse us from our state of stupor because our generation is the most recent in a string of generations which have not tried to battle the problems of society. While our situation is it not justifiable it is understandable because for the past four hundred years philosophy, art, literature, and popular entertainment have been largely allied together, officially and non officially to destroy the Christian worldview which in times gone by had been so powerful. Their was a day when a Christian could stand up alone with a bible as his authority and say "your wrong" to the majority. Today someone may stand up but nobody is willing to become uncomfortable and actually figure out whether something is true or not. So until people care about truth, courage to stand up and say what is truth will not help anyone. Rather then confront truth we prefer to live in our false realities which tell us that our feelings are supreme and God's will is for us to feel good all the time.
Not only gold but man must make
A nation great and strong
Men who for truth and honor's sake
Stand fast and suffer long
Brave men who work while others sleep
Who dare while others fly
They build a nations pillars deep
and lift them to the sky
A nation great and strong
Men who for truth and honor's sake
Stand fast and suffer long
Brave men who work while others sleep
Who dare while others fly
They build a nations pillars deep
and lift them to the sky
Men who for truth and honor's sakeStand fast and suffer long
The reason we don't care for truth and the reason we don't care for honor is because the church has largely failed in its duty.
First we have failed to present real, absolute, orthodox standards of living, which are real and in accoradnce with God's law. This lack of a clear reality has made people seek purpose and meaning outside of the church and outside of Christianity. This is why hypocrisy and laziness are such huge problems. People see no reason to be serious about God because they think they can find purpose elsewhere and the Church isn't saying anything contrary.
First we have failed to present real, absolute, orthodox standards of living, which are real and in accoradnce with God's law. This lack of a clear reality has made people seek purpose and meaning outside of the church and outside of Christianity. This is why hypocrisy and laziness are such huge problems. People see no reason to be serious about God because they think they can find purpose elsewhere and the Church isn't saying anything contrary.
Second we have not provided examples of what it means to be a Christian so that men and woman are not left in the dark to pursue meaning. Every church should have hardened veterans of the faith saying confidently, "Christ is your purpose and your meaning and everyone else claiming to have purpose and meaning are liars."
Third we have made our culture believe that church is just another social club. Its a place to fellowship or in modern language "hang out with friends who don't swear". Church ought to be the place we love to come so that we might be built up in the imagine of God and not just because it is a more comfortable atmosphere then our home or school or work.
This is a church in France being fired upon during World War I. Spiritually the church has never ceased to be under attack. All that has changed is the human response to that attack.
