Worldview, Culture & How We Are to Influence Culture

1. Session 2
Worldview, Culture &
How We are to Influence Culture

2. 1998 survey: Belief in God
93%90%
Military
70%
Business
owner
50%
Politicians
3%
2%
A&E
Media

3. 19% Christians in U.S. have a
biblical worldview.
Bridgers 3%77- 2010
The Barna Update, “Americans Worldview," 2009.

4. Biblical Worldview by Generations
Builders 65% <'46
Boomers 35% '46-'64
• Source: Thomas Rainer in “The Bridger Generation”

5. Christian Worldview
Busters 16% '64-'76
Bridgers 4% 77- 2010

6. 24%
General population
believe Satan is real
52%
Christians
believe Satan is real
Belief in a Literal Satan
When you’re deceived you don’t know you are deceived.

7. 84% of Christian 18 to 29-year-olds admit that they
have no idea how the Bible applies to their field or
professional interests.
---Barna Group, June, 2012.

8. Today’s Cultural Covenant?
Covenant of Tolerance
“I won’t tell you what to do as long as you
don’t tell me what to do.”

9. Culture and the

10. American’s changing attitude toward
same sex marriage since 1996
0
20
40
60
1996 2013
% in Favor
Same Sex
Marriage
27
53

11. Attitudes by age on gay
marriage June 2013

12. Rom 12:2
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world,
but be transformed by the renewing of
your mind.

13. Romans 12:2 (MSG)
Don’t become so well–adjusted to your culture that
you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your
attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside
out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and
quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you,
always dragging you down to its level of immaturity,
God brings the best out of you, develops well–
formed maturity in you.

14. 7 Nations Greater and Mightier
“When the Lord your God brings you into the land
which you go to possess, and has cast out many
nations before you, the Hittites and the
Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites
and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the
Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier
than thou” (Deuteronomy 7:1).

15. Kingdoms of this world
The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and
there were loud voices in heaven, which
said:
“The kingdom of the world has become
the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah,
and he will reign for ever and ever.”
Rev.11:15

16. August 1975, Boulder,
Colorado
• Bill Bright, Campus Crusade for Christ
• Loren Cunningham, Youth with a Mission
Why no progress since ‘75?

17. Why?
• Stopped at evangelism.
• Strategy - Church mountain
• Pluralism in calling - sacred/secular
hierarchy
– support raising
– contributes to a poverty mentality
Immaturity of marketplace

18. Beware lest anyone cheat you through
philosophy and empty deceit,
according to the tradition of men,
according to the basic principles of
the world, and not according to
Christ. Col 2:8

19. How We Lost the Mountains

20. The Most Christianized
City in America
British television documentary

21. TV Documentary
Most Christianized City in America
Dallas, Texas
Criteria: More people in church per
capita on Sunday than any other city

22. Comparisons
• Life in Dallas was
examined in a variety
of ways:
• Health care
• Hospitals
• Emergency care
• Contagious diseases
• Infant mortality rate
• Job availability
• General economics
– How easy is it to get a job?
– How easy is it to get
housing?
– The relationship between
potential income and
potential housing.
• Homelessness
• Racism The existence of
abuse
• Crime rates
• Economic discrepancies

23. Results
The city was one of the lowest ranking cities
in the nation providing core services
No one would want to live in a city
in that condition.

24. Dallas Pastor Responses
“Those things do not concern us.
We are spiritual leaders”

25. “A gospel that does not deal with the issues
of the day is not the gospel at all.”
Martin Luther

26. Prov 29:2
When the righteous are in authority, the
people rejoice; But when a wicked man rules,
the people groan.

27. Would the community notice if your local
church shut its doors tomorrow?
Would your workplace notice if you were no
longer there?
Is your industry different because of you?

28. Accomplished through Obedience
If you fully obey the LORD your God
and carefully follow all his commands I
give you today, the LORD your God will
set you high above all the nations on
earth. - - Deut 28:1-2

29. Deut 8:19-20
Then it shall be, if you by any means forget the
Lord your God, and follow other gods, and serve
them and worship them, I testify against you this
day that you shall surely perish. As the nations
which the Lord destroys before you, so you shall
perish, because you would not be obedient to the
voice of the Lord your God.

30. Why we lost the mountains
Disobedience
Deut 28:15-19
However, if you do not obey the LORD your God and
do not carefully follow all his commands and
decrees I am giving you today, all these curses
will come upon you and overtake you...

31. Head vs Tail
The LORD will make you the head, not
the tail. If you pay attention to the
commands of the LORD your God that
I give you this day and carefully follow
them, you will always be at the top,
never at the bottom. - Deut 28:13-14
?

32. LIFE OF JESUS
Dominion (influence) is a result of our love,
humility and obedience to God, not a goal to
be achieved. It is the fruit of our obedience.

33. “Use your authority and you will lose your influence;
use your influence and you will gain authority.”
Loren Cunningham

34. #1:
Why we lost the 7 mountains?
Disobedience
If you fully obey the LORD your God and
carefully follow all his commands I give you
today, the LORD your God will set you high
above all the nations on earth. - - Deut 28:1-2

35. Our enemies didn’t have to kill
us, we simply disobeyed God
which entitled our enemies to
take our mountains.

36. The Gospel of Salvation
Vs
The Gospel of the Kingdom
Reason #2: Satan’s Key Strategy

37. #2
Gospel of Salvation
vs
Gospel of the Kingdom
And this Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached
in the whole world as a testimony as a testimony
to the whole world, and then the end will come.
–Matthew 24:14

38. Gospel of
the
KingdomSalvation
Healing
Hearing God
Provision
Work
Sonship

39. Kingdom?
A kingdom is the governing impact of a king’s will
over a territory or domain, his influence over a
people, and a government led by a king.”
-- Myles Munroe, Kingdom Principles

40. An Incomplete Gospel
Gospel of Salvation
• Proclamation evangelism
• Addresses only the “Soul”
• Sacred vs Secular
• “Rapture” mentality
Focuses on Transaction
Nigeria
Gospel of the Kingdom
• Soul and body
• Impacts all aspects of society
– Material, social, earthly, secular
• Occupy
Focuses on taking dominion
“Possess the Land”
Almolonga

41. Reduced Wholistic Gospel to
Only the Entry Point
1. Get people saved
2. Get them in church
3. Focus on other unsaved

42. Early Gospel
• Transformed Israel
• Transformed Roman Empire
• Laid Foundation for Western
European Nation’s Prosperity
F
f

43. “Christians have become
more known as a political
action group rather than a
people modeling the love,
power, and servant-hood of
Christ.”
– Network TV Producer
Early church
changed Rome by
living the gospel in
an ungodly culture.
Failed Strategies

44. Jesus’ Method for Change
Problem Solving = Influence!

45. Culture changes when ideas are
adopted, institutionalized, and lived out.
Will never legislate moral behavior

46. Unbiblical View of
Work and Ministry
Refer to Change Agent
course for theology of work

47. “We have a leadership vacuum”
-- Henry Blackaby
“I do not see societal transformation
coming through political leaders or
pastors. I see it coming through the
marketplace”

48. Many people shall come
and say,
"Come, and let us go up
to the mountain of the
Lord, To the house of
the God of Jacob; He
will teach us His ways,
And we shall walk in
His paths."
Isa 2:2-3