We have an exciting Advent planned for this year. Each Wednesday night, Peace will have a Soup Supper, followed by Evening Prayer & Radio Drama, followed by a pastor’s class. This year Advent will only have three Wednesdays.
You all know more about the Soup Supper than me. The supper will begin at 6 pm. Invite a friend to come and fellowship. I hear good things about this event and cannot wait to experience a Peace Soup Supper.
After the supper, we will have a short service at 6:30 pm. The service begins with Evening Prayer. Evening Prayer is one of the traditional prayers of the church coming out the church’s earliest days. Luther appreciated Evening Prayer so much that Luther thought that evangelical churches should continue to worship using Evening Prayer. Our Evening Prayer service will be a spoken version contained in the Lutheran Book of Worship. The highlight of the evening will be a Radio Drama of “A Pirate Advent” written by the Rev. Paul C. Koch.
Finally, the evening concludes with a lesson by Pastor. We are hoping the study begins at 7 pm. The study will be on “Three Worldviews Opposing Christianity.”
It ain’t easy being a Christian in the world today. With modern technology, the world seems smaller and smaller every day. As the world shrinks, Christians are being confronted with views foreign to the Christian faith. Indeed, popular culture seems to be throwing these views into our faces. We are being proselytized to convert to these views, or at least pollute our faith.
These different views have different starting points in how the world is viewed. As Christians, we cling to the cross of Christ by faith. Our view of the world is shaped this fundamental belief. Because of our belief in Christ, our view of the world is shaped by God’s self-revelation in the Holy Scriptures.
We each have a basic understanding of the world that shapes how we see what is happening. Scholars call the collection of these basic inclinations a ‘worldview.’ Worldviews serve as the foundational framework through which individuals perceive and interpret the world around them. They encompasses a set of beliefs, values, assumptions, and perspectives that shape one’s understanding of reality, influencing thoughts, behaviors, and decision-making.
Worldviews present a way of talking about world religions without getting into the details about Buddhism, Confucianism, Hinduism, Mohammedanism, Tribalism, Modernism, or “Spiritual but not religious.” It is a broad brush approach to help us understand the views that try to distract us from Christ.
This study will follow the divisions of Is Reality Secular?, by Dr. Mary Poplin. Material naturalism is the belief that the only thing that exists is stuff. Secular humanism is the belief that human beings are alone in the world and must create morality. Pantheism is the belief that everything is god. These three views account most of the non-Christian beliefs we encounter. Come and learn more about them!