Are Your Views Based on the World or the WORD?

Everyone has what is called a “world view.” Basically, it is how we view the world and everything in it. It shapes our opinions, thoughts, actions and lifestyles, and it is based on what we truly believe to be truth. Many Christians would assume that they have a biblical world view because they believe in God, but their lifestyles reveal what they really believe as truth.

John 18:37-38 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Therefore Pilate said to Him, “So You are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?”

This is a common question in our day; what is truth? Truth has become relative, selective, and subjective. Many want to say that the truth is whatever we want it to be. Truth depends on the persons views. Instead of basing our world view on the truth, truth is based on our world view, but Jesus says something different.

John 8:31-32 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

John 14:6 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”

Jesus is the Truth. He is the founder of absolute truth and everyone who gives their lives to Him (through submission and repentance) will know the truth and it will set them free from the lies of sin and the world. Truth really isn’t relative. It is absolute and objective. It is based on God (Who doesn’t change) and what He says in His Word, not on our experiences or ideas. Instead of basing truth on what we think or experience, we need to base what we think and experience on truth. Instead of allowing suffering to make us believe God has abandoned us, we need to see our suffering in light of the truth of God’s love and sovereignty.

Now we come back to the first point, that what we believe is evident in our lifestyles. If we believe that God’s Word is absolute truth, then we will respect and obey it. If we don’t respect or obey it, if we have the mindset that it doesn’t matter what we do and obedience isn’t important, it shows that we really don’t believe God’s Word is absolute truth. We are living with a worldview based on our desires instead of God’s truth.

John 3:20-21 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.

If we run to the Bible, if we are open with God, if we are adamant about living for God, we prove that we believe God and the truth is in us. But if we hide and excuse what we do, avoid the bible and accountability with other believers, and live for ourselves, we prove that we don’t completely believe God and the truth is not in us. Again, our actions are proof of what we truly believe.

In order to live lives marked by truth, we need to allow the truth to penetrate us to the core, to change our lives according to the truth, to sacrifice our own sinful desires for the sake of the truth. We need to run to God, ask Him to cleanse every wrong idea from us and submit to His will and discipline. We need to pray as Jesus did.

John 17:17 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth.

We need the Bible. We need to read, study and apply it daily, regularly. We need to write it on our hearts through memorization and application. It must be the absolute truth by which we judge all other truths. The Bible needs to be what we use to define everything in life: what is good and right, what is profitable, what is worthwhile, what is appropriate, what is manly, what is just. We should even use it to define who we are. Any other definition will not only fall short, but leave us wanting. Only our identity in Christ can truly define and fulfill us.

How do you view the world? Do you allow the enemy’s lies to define anything in life for you? Get into the Word. Let it saturate your mind and soul. Let it teach your heart what is right. Let it guide your heart. Seek to be defined by the only Truth.