Your worldview is, quite simply, your view of the world. It is your belief system — the lens through which you see all of life. Everyone has a worldview, whether they’ve thought it through or not.
Your worldview is important because it drives what you think, say and do. To determine your worldview, simply answer five questions:
• How did we get here?
• What went wrong with the world?
• What will it take to fix it?
• What is my role in this life?
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• Where do we go when we die?
If you are unclear about your worldview, it’s easy to fall for good-sounding ideas that may not ultimately line up with what you really believe. Lack of clarity can leave you vulnerable to someone else’s agenda and view of the world.
For decades, the worldview under which America was birthed has been under relentless pressure to give way to another worldview. Some call it “fundamental transformation.”
We are now at critical mass. At the risk of oversimplification, let’s take a brief look at those competing worldviews. Understanding the difference is critical to the future of the country.
Karl Marx, the “father” of socialism and communism, was an avowed atheist who believed that all of life is matter — a house, the sky, an animal, you, me. No soul, no spirit, no Creator. Just matter. Marx’s idea that there is no God was helped along by Charles Darwin.
If, through an elaborate series of mutations and mistakes, man simply evolved out of a primordial swamp, Marx was home free with his idea that there is no God and man is the highest authority on the planet. What is beyond the planet? Just matter.
Marx’s answer to question two — What went wrong with the world? — was that some people have more than others. It’s all about the material. In communist North Korea, there are no locks on doors. Government can come into your home, unannounced, and take inventory. If you have more than your “fair share,” they can punish you and confiscate your overage.
Question three: What will it take to fix things? According to Marx, it’s the right political and economic system, where government owns the means of producing goods and services (communism) or controls them through regulation (socialism). Government collects the fruit of people’s labors, and the ruling class determines how things are redistributed so everyone is “equal.” Marx said, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
Question four: What is my role in the world? Marx spent the better part of his life attempting to convince the world that his system was the fairest way to achieve social justice. Education was the key. He believed that man is simply a highly developed animal that can be programmed and conditioned like Pavlov’s dog. “He who controls education controls the future.”
The last question: Where do we go when we die? Well, when you’re dead, you’re dead. Back to the primordial swamp.
The founders of America had a different view of the world.
Question one: Where did we come from? In their own words: “The Creator,” “Providence,” “the Almighty,” “our Lord.”
Question two: What went wrong with the world? Almost to a one, the founders were men of profound faith. Over half the signers of the Declaration of Independence were graduates of seminaries or Bible schools. Most were members of Orthodox Christian churches. They were highly biblically literate and had a keen understanding of man’s susceptibility to both good and evil, and how often he opts for evil.
Question three: What will it take to fix things? A government that takes into account the realities of human nature. One that would provide as much freedom as possible for man to fulfill his own destiny within the bounds of civil and moral law.
In a world where kings and emperors dictated the rights of peasants and commoners and ruled with iron fists, the founders established this country on two radical and revolutionary ideas: that all men are created equal, and that our rights don’t come from other men but from God.
For question four, the founders believed their role was to establish a country from scratch on principles that were in large part borne out of Scripture, i.e., out of their biblical worldview.
Question five, where do we go when we die? Well, they believed that depends on a few decisions you make while you’re here.
The founders’ worldview produced the most productive and generous people the world has ever known. Ever.
Americans are a caring and compassionate people, not wanting anyone to be left behind. They responded to the call for a “War on Poverty,” which, for many, has evolved into an expectation for free health care, free birth control, etc. and now free college education. Any resistance is framed as immoral and unfair, a heartless disregard for minorities and the poor. But history has shown that the “redistributive” i.e. socialist worldview gaining traction in America has failed the poor (and everyone except the ruling class) every time it has been tried. It always results in a loss of incentive, creativity and productivity in the poor, the wealthy and those in between. And it always results in the loss of freedom.
In the move to transform America from the founders’ worldview to that of the secular left, virtually every aspect of American culture has been permeated with new “spins” on the meaning of freedom, rights, equality, justice, etc.
Education was the key, and education will be the key to reclaiming and rebuilding America on her founding principles. Those principles so unleashed the power of freedom and human potential that 200-plus years ago the American spirit was born, a spirit that has done more to raise the quality of life for more people in more places than any other country in the history of mankind. It is time for America to be America again.
• Nancy Schulze is a Colson fellow, speaker, founder of the Congressional Wives Speakers and co-founder (with Vonette Bright) of The American Prayer Initiative. She is the wife of nine-term retired congressman Dick Schulze.
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