World view and Theology

Today a question struck me:

Does our world view shape our theology or does our theology shape our world view or are our world view and our theology the same thing by different words?

For instance, I part of my world view is optimism that upholds that humans deserve the benefit of the doubt and yet humans need assistance because sometimes we make near sighted choices that are not helpful in the long run.  This sounds a lot like my theology which, in part, up holds the original goodness of humans, and yet we are held hostage to sinful cycles and we need God's help.

Are secularists who are writing about their world view just theologians who do not like the language of theology?

Devotional for Holy Week

Mark 14:32-36

Holy Week is a time to remember that Jesus received a call from God that was much bigger than his personal want, his personal desires or personal wishes. God had a call on Jesus life that, as we can deduct from this Scripture, Jesus did not like. He did not want to go.

And yet, Jesus put his personal wants, desires and wishes aside. He responded to the call on his life that was much bigger than himself.

Had Jesus done what he wanted to do, had Jesus gone the way of his personal desires, had Jesus received his wish and the cup passed from him, had Jesus gone the way that his disciples wanted him to go, then the world would be lost. Creation would miss out on the goodness and blessings of God that come through Christ Jesus. Had the cup passed from Jesus, Jesus might have gotten what he wanted, but God had bigger dreams than the desires of one man.

Are we responding to God’s greater call on our lives or are we holding onto our personal wants, desires, and wishes?

Are we willing to let our desires die so that God’s dream can live?

Palm Sunday Sermon in a cloud

Below is the sermon that I preached about the difference between the Culture of Competition and the Culture of God. Needless to say there was a little game theory in the sermon...