Whether one is Christian, polytheist, agnostic, or atheist, everyone on the planet has a particular view of the world and their place in it. Specifically, everyone approaches answering the ultimate questions in life through a framework each person constructs of reality, and their place within it. These ultimate questions include: How did I get here? What does it mean to be human? And, what will happen to me when I die? How a person answers these questions depends entirely upon that person’s view of the world:thatis,theirworldview.Although there are numerous worldviews, there can be only one true worldview, since two opposites cannot both be true at thesametime.Therefore,thechallenge becomes determining which one of the multitude of worldviews holds the true answers to the ultimate questions concerning the human experience. To determine whether the Christianworldviewiscorrect,comparisons are made with other worldviews using a model composed of a series of probing questions. Worldview scholar Nancy Pearcey’s comparative model, fromherbookFindingTruth,comprises “5 principles”designed to uncover false worldview assumptions. The first of these principles, to“identify the worldview’s idol,”is the subject of this week’s article. According to the apostle Paul, allpeoplehaveaninnatesensethatGod not only exists but also that He created the universe and everything in it. This innate sense is so powerfully present, Paul explains, that those who deny the existence of God are “without excuse.” Even so, many people deny and “suppress” this truth, preferring to go about living their lives as if God does not exist (cf Rom 1:19-2). However, something interesting happens deep within these individuals’ hearts when they give up God. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it this way:“A person will worship something, have no doubt about that.”Since man is created by God to long for and worship Him alone, worship is a part of what it means to be human. In other words, it is impossible for man to worship nothing. As Pearcey notes, “God cannot be rejected without putting something else in its place.” And since man must worship something, Paul argues that man exchanges God for something lower in the created order. Indeed, duringPaul’stime,andforthousandsof years before him, man exchanged the glory of God for carved or otherwise fashioned images of man or animals. These images, then, came to be identified as idols, and their worship became identified as idolatry. In modern times, the carved and fashioned images of idolatry have largely been abandoned, buttheconceptofidolatryremainsvery much in practice. Today, idolatry can be defined as anything that a person replacesworshipofGodwith.Theobject ofworshipcanstillbeacarvedimageof ananimalorotherbeing,butmoreoften than not, today’s idols are things in the worldthatbringpleasure.Sinceidolatry is deeply rooted in most worldviews, it makes sense that the first principle in our worldview-comparative model is to identify the idol of the worldviews being compared. In most agnostic and all atheistic worldviews,nothingexistsoutside of the material world. That is to say that only what we can determine with the five senses exists.This particular worldview isusuallyidentifiedasmaterialism, rejecting the idea of a supernatural realm or beings and asserting that only matter exists. In this view, there are no angels, no demons, no heaven, no hell, noafterlife,andnoGod.Nothingbutatoms andthethingsmadeupofatoms.In that way, materialists claim that matter is the Ultimate Reality rather than God andistheuncausedcauseofeverything. Matter alone is their god. With such a view of the world, it makes sense that the item of worship for the materialist is not transcendent but rather can only be something of this world. It is not hard to see the door standing wide open for what we actually see in society: the idolizing of selfadmiration, power,money,sex,houses, cars,practicallyanythinginthematerial world. The problem with matter as the ultimate reality and the first cause of everything is that it offers stark, skewed answers to the ultimate questions of life. For example, from a materialist worldview, the question“how did I get here?”is reduced to blind evolutionary processes.Whatitmeanstobehumanis answered by saying that I am without a soul and simply made up of atoms, like any other plant or animal. My purpose in life is only to reproduce, and when I die, I dissolve back to atoms, and that is the end of it all.The problem with these answers to the ultimate questions in life is that they do not stand up under closer scrutiny. As will become evident in subsequent articles, the materialist worldview actually reduces the value placed upon human beings, it contradicts what we know about the world, and, more importantly, it contradicts itself. Nevertheless, materialism could verymuchbeconsideredtheworldview ofthemassessincemostofsecularsociety holdstoitsgroundingprinciplesand therefore matter is arguably the most common idol among human beings. Havingidentifiedthecommon idol in a materialistic society as matter, joinusagainnexttimeasweexpandour investigationofworldviewsbyexamining how matter as an idol ultimately leadstoalowerviewofhumanlife.Until then, what do you think: Is God dead?
Gloria in excelsis Deo! Ty B. Kerley, DMin., is an ordained minister who teaches Christian apologetics, and relief preaches in Southern Oklahoma. Dr. Kerley and his wife Vicki are members of the Waurika church of Christ, and live in Ardmore. You can contact him at: dr.kerley@isGoddead.com.