At a Glance
The Western world has been described as a cut flower. This flower was beautiful and flourishing while rooted in a Judeo-Christian worldview, and yet, as it became increasingly secular and rejected God, it cut itself off from its roots. Today, the flower still looks good, but it will soon wither and die if nothing changes.
In this episode, we look at the increasing number of former atheists, Muslims, and agnostics who are calling out the erosion of Western civilization along with its former values of human rights, justice, and freedom. These people–including Ayanna Hershi Ali, Jordan Perterson, Douglas Murray, Tom Holland, and more–are understanding that these Western values came from the Bible.
If Western society rejects God, it will also lose the virtuous and moral framework that created its foundation. This realization is leading to an awakening. It is a unique journey that has led people from an analysis of the culture and the West to the cross.
Join us as we unpack the roots that nourished the West. We consider the incredibly good impact the Bible can have on culture and the devastation we can anticipate when it’s rejected. We live in a pivotal moment in history. The consequences of rejecting God are evident in our society, providing us with a fresh opportunity to promote goodness, truth, and beauty, rooted in the Bible once again.
What You'll Hear
- Christianity’s Influence on Culture (11:25)
- Truth and Forgiveness (19:58)
- Exploring Truth and Cultural Influences (24:34)
- The Importance of Love and Culture (31:28)
- Engaging in Culture and Creating Christian Culture (48:12)
Using the link above, you can read the transcript or listen along while highlighted text follows the podcast audio.
"We live in a biblical universe. So if you really want to know what's the ultimate comprehensive, full-blown, reality-based, true worldview, it's the biblical universe that you–we live in."
Dwight Vogt (56:44)
Quotes
- 21:59 “These are thoughtful people who are seeing the loss of things in our culture, because there really is a huge shift in the culture. They’re seeing the threats and it’s driving them to ask where did these [good and beautiful ideas] come from? And it’s leading them to the Bible. And it’s exciting! I don’t know if you would yet call it an awakening, but there seems to be something happening right now.” Scott
- 23:05 “It’s not just that there is objective truth (counter to what the new Marxists speak or wokeism speaks). There is objective truth. But human beings have intelligence and the truth is intelligible… If we were all just dumb animals, we could live in a universe that has reality, has natural laws, has moral laws, but we wouldn’t have the intelligence to discover them. God has made us in his image. We are intelligent human beings and we can discover reality.” Darrow
- 25:44 “Our point is we get all of these ideas of truth, objective truth or morality, and things like forgiveness or freedom–all of these things are legacies–are the fruit of the Bible, lived out over many hundreds of years faithfully, in a way that formed a civilization, that formed a culture–Western culture. It’s not perfect, but it’s been deeply shaped by these things.” Scott
- 40:26 “This is a personal faith, but it should work its way out into a culture–in your family and in your community and in your whole country. That’s the mission of the DNA. The mission of the DNA is–our faith is to be lived out in ways that create a particular kind of culture, a kingdom of God kind of culture. So I’m excited, as the president of the DNA, for what this opportunity means.” Scott
- 56:44 “We live in a biblical universe. So if you really want to know what’s the ultimate comprehensive, full-blown, reality-based, true worldview, it’s the biblical universe that you–we live in.” Dwight
Go Deeper
Explore More
- Why I am now a Christian: Atheism can’t equip us for civilizational war by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- Ali was born in Somalia and is a human rights activist and author. She is also a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.
- A quote from her article: “Russell and other activist atheists believed that with the rejection of God we would enter an age of reason and intelligent humanism. But the ‘God hole’ — the void left by the retreat of the church — has merely been filled by a jumble of irrational quasi-religious dogma. The result is a world where modern cults prey on the dislocated masses, offering them spurious reasons for being and action — mostly by engaging in virtue-signalling theatre on behalf of a victimised minority or our supposedly doomed planet. The line often attributed to G.K. Chesterton has turned into a prophecy: “When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.”
- Learn more about the Strategy and Approach of Disciple Nations Alliance
The Kingdomizer Training Program
When the principles of the Bible are understood as a comprehensive worldview, it has tremendous power to work transformation in individuals, families, communities, and even nations. Too often, Christians are ineffective because they have absorbed cultural thinking that is not in alignment with truth.
Not all worldviews are equal. Some lead to brokenness and poverty, while the biblical worldview leads to God’s intended flourishing and the blessing of the nations. Our Kingdomizer Training Program can help you understand the biblical worldview and discover areas in your own thinking that need to be transformed by God’s Word.
More than a million people have now been trained in 115 countries. Explore it for yourself! Get started with our completely free Kingdomizer Training Program today!
