What grounds human dignity? Without the answers that the Christian ideas of inherent dignity and equality provide, the culture turns to sex.

In the first session at the 2019 IFI Worldview Conference, John Stonestreet spoke on what it means to be human. In his second lecture, available here, he speaks on the sexual revolution and how culture has completely sexualized their answer to what it means to be human. After identifying the three major ideas of the sexual revolution, Stonestreet presents the redeemed reality of these ideas in light of the human dignity God has given us.

Please watch and share this video (1 of 5) with your family. This presentation is a great opportunity for group study and discussion.

You can watch this presentation on the IFI YouTube channel, and find the other worldview sessions here.

Background

John Stonestreet serves as president of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. He’s a sought-after author and speaker on areas of faith and culture, theology, worldview, education and apologetics. John is the daily voice of BreakPoint, the nationally syndicated commentary on  the culture founded by the late Chuck Colson.

Before coming to the Colson Center in 2010, John served in various leadership capacities with Summit Ministries and was on the biblical studies faculty at Bryan College (TN). John has co-authored four books: A Practical Guide to Culture, Restoring All Things, Same-Sex Marriage, and Making Sense of Your World: A Biblical Worldview. John holds degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (IL) and Bryan College (TN). He and his wife, Sarah, have four children and live in Colorado Springs, CO.

You can follow him on Twitter @jbstonestreet.

A bold voice for pro-family values in Illinois!

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Although the subject of worldview has become a hot topic among Christians, there are many in the church who still don’t understand what a worldview is and why it matters. At best, it can often seem like an entirely theoretical topic with little bearing on the practical realm. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth.

What is a Worldview?

A worldview is simply a framework of beliefs we use to interpret the world around us. Charles Colson and Nancy Pearcey, in their book How Now Shall We Live?, write that any worldview addresses three issues: Creation, Fall, and Redemption. In other words, they say, a worldview answers these fundamental questions:

1.) Where did we come from, and who are we?

2.) What has gone wrong with the world?

3.) What can we do to fix it?

It’s easy to see that different worldviews will answer these questions in very different ways. Christianity teaches that sin is the problem in our world. Marxism, on the other hand, teaches that private property is the problem. While the first two questions above are largely philosophical in nature, they lay the foundation for the third question which is intensely practical.

The Impact of Worldview

Worldviews aren’t simply theoretical constructs that have no impact on the world around us. Hitler had a worldview and used it to wreak havoc on the world and exterminate millions of people for no better reason than their ethnicity. William Wilberforce had a different worldview and used it to stop the slave trade in England and put an end to untold human suffering. These two men—with their different worldviews and world-changing legacies—show us that when worldviews are put into action, they can either do great harm or tremendous good.

Why Your Worldview Matters

It’s easy to see why the worldviews of leaders and influencers—whether in business, politics, the arts, or education—matters intensely. These individuals wield enormous influence over the culture and impact the destinies of men and nations.

But what about you and me? Most of us don’t hold the fate of the world in our hands. Why does our worldview matter? Let’s look at a few reasons.

Because You Can Vote. In a representative republic like ours, we have the freedom to help decide who governs us. An understanding of a Biblical worldview will help us understand the proper role of government, which will help us stand up for these principles at the ballot box. If the worldviews of our leaders matter, our worldview also matters.

Because We’re Raising the Next Generation. I don’t know what my children will grow up to be. Perhaps one will be a future president or Supreme Court justice. Perhaps one will become an extraordinarily successful entrepreneur. Perhaps one will write books or make movies that will influence millions. If so, I want them to have a Biblical worldview, and it’s up to me to teach them. But even if they grow up to occupy quietly ordinary roles, it’s important for them to have a Biblical worldview because they’ll still have some level of influence on those around them.

Because We’re Supposed to Live Out Our Faith. If we believe that Christianity is separate from the practical realm—in other words, that some things are sacred and other things are secular—we’re not going to successfully live out our faith on a daily basis. Implementing a Biblical worldview essentially means bringing our faith into our daily lives in every area—from family life, to finances, to the workplace, and so on.

The Bottom Line

Our worldview matters because, as the saying goes, ideas have consequences. If they didn’t, it wouldn’t matter what we believed or what worldview we held. But if we really want to live out our faith on a consistent basis, we need to understand a Biblical worldview.

The balanced Christian life consists of both a personal relationship with a personal God and a proper understanding of how His truth impacts everything in our lives. Having a Biblical worldview is an indispensable part of that equation.

IFI Worldview Conference

To help equip Christians to think and live out our faith in the public square, the Illinois Family Institute is hosting their Fourth Annual Illinois Family Institute Worldview Conference with John Stonestreet – President of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview.

What:  IFI Worldview Conference with John Stonestreet

When:  Saturday, May 5th, 10 AM to 3:30 PM

Where:  Medinah Baptist Church, 900 Foster Avenue, Medinah, IL 60157 (map)

How much:  $20 per person/$50 per family

Click HERE for a flyer for this event.

You don’t want to miss this!

Before Christmas, I warned how Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity laws, or SOGI laws, as they’re called, create new protected classes of people based on inclination and behavior, not biological realities of race and sex.

I also warned that so-called compromises to carve out religious exemptions for churches and religious organizations would not only fail to protect people of conscience not in religious organizations, it would mark all of us seeking exemptions as bigots with a Scarlet B.

Now it seems that we’re at an impasse, but not really. I’m grateful how the Heritage Foundation’s Ryan Anderson has demonstrated, in a new report, that fighting discrimination and protecting religious liberty do not have to be mutually exclusive.

A key point of the report, which is entitled “How to Think about Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Policies and Religious Freedom,” is that proponents of such wide-ranging SOGI laws have failed to prove they’re even needed. In fact, as Ryan says, there’s “no evidence that people who identify as LGBT have been turned away by a single hotel chain, a single major restaurant, or a single major employer.”

Even so, like all laws, SOGI laws will have a pedagogical role in our society, teaching that the Judeo-Christian worldview is “not only false, but discriminatory and rooted in animus.” They will impose a new orthodoxy concerning human sexuality “by punishing dissent and treating as irrational, bigoted, and unjust the beliefs that men and women are biologically rooted and made for each other in marriage.”

So at their core, Anderson writes, “SOGI laws are not about the freedom of LGBT people to engage in certain actions, but about coercing and penalizing people who in good conscience cannot endorse those actions.”

So what’s the way forward? First, as Anderson suggests, we should identify real-world instances of discrimination and then tailor-focus responses appropriate for the need, rather than implementing sweeping SOGI legislation. We might even find, as we look for specific real-world instances of discrimination, that government action is not even necessary—if “social, economic, and cultural forces” (are) sufficient to address the needs on their own.

Second, Anderson points out, both sides need to carefully define terms. There is a difference, for example, between discrimination and making distinctions. Sex-specific bathrooms and locker rooms, for instance, are not based on discrimination, but upon observable physiological and common-sense distinctions. And here’s another distinction: religious adoption agencies “decline to place the children entrusted to their care with same-sex couples not because of their sexual orientation, but because of the conviction that children deserve both a mother and a father.”

Another term to define is “public accommodation.” If a church holds a spaghetti dinner and welcomes the public, does that make it a place of “public accommodation” subject to SOGI laws? No. But the commonwealth of Massachusetts seems to think so.

Ryan concludes, “if other policies are adopted to address the mistreatment of people who identify as LGBT, they must leave people free to engage in legitimate actions based on the conviction that we are created male and female and that male and female are created for each other. This would,” Anderson asserts, “leave all Americans—not just the lucky few who are sufficiently well-connected to be exempted from SOGI laws—free to act on those convictions.”

I encourage you to read Anderson’s report. Then send the report to your state and federal representatives, as well as to friends and relatives open to a common-sense discussion of these very choppy waters. Finally, consider adding your name to our statement on SOGI Laws. You can find it at our website: BreakPoint.org.

BreakPoint is a Christian worldview ministry that seeks to build and resource a movement of Christians committed to living and defending Christian worldview in all areas of life. Begun by Chuck Colson in 1991 as a daily radio broadcast, BreakPoint provides a Christian perspective on today’s news and trends via radio, interactive media, and print. Today BreakPoint commentaries, co-hosted by Eric Metaxas and John Stonestreet, air daily on more than 1,200 outlets with an estimated weekly listening audience of eight million people. Feel free to contact us at BreakPoint.org where you can read and search answers to common questions.