Since I was twenty years old when I came across Francis Schaeffer’s The God Who is There, I’ve been a worldview guy. I went from a fundamentalist type of Christianity focused on the personal, on my relationship with Jesus, the Bible and me, to seeing how Christianity applied not just to me but to all of life and everything in it. I went from wearing the default set of secular glasses to Christian glasses, and everything looked different. As a Christian, although it may seem counterintuitive, it is possible to see the world through secular lenses. This means we see our Christian lives in primarily personal spiritual terms, and everything else as part of this fallen world, and thus not spiritual. The implication is that spiritual, personal stuff is important, and the other stuff not so much. I never thought through any of this before my worldview epiphany, but I didn’t see Christianity applying to the fallen world outside of the church. Thankfully, I found Schaeffer only two years into my born-again Christian life, and in addition to being so young and busy with college, thinking through any of this wasn’t a priority. But finding Schaeffer, and that a Christian view of the world and everything in it was possible, was exciting, not to mention being introduced to apologetics, and knowing I could credibly defend the veracity of the Christian faith I had embraced.
I’ve realized only recently, however, that having a worldview is not enough to fully capture the profound world transforming power of the Christian faith. Worldview assumes the intellect and how we think about things is primary, and applying those thoughts to what we do is what is transformational about the Christian faith. It is that, but it’s so much more. A Christian worldview is necessary for this new creation transformation (2 Cor. 5:17), but not sufficient. What is, what takes a Christian worldview to the next level, so to speak, is something almost completely neglected in Evangelical Christianity: the ascension. In all the years I’ve been a Christian, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard a sermon on it. I didn’t realize this until I heard a talk by someone back in 2018 or 19. He said Evangelicals pretty much completely ignore the ascension, stopping at the resurrection, and I immediately realized he was right.
The Book of Acts makes it clear the church was built and grew on the declaration of the resurrection, but Luke starts with the Ascension. After Jesus promises his disciples to send them the Holy spirit, and gives them a charge to be his witnesses “to the ends of the earth,” Luke writes:
9 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
Although the disciples were no doubt befuddled, this raises two important questions. Where did Jesus go, and what does it mean? We learn by the time of the Apostles Creed the ascension had become foundational to the Christian understanding of the faith. It addresses the second person of the Trinity thus:
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to hell.
The third day he rose again from the dead.
He ascended to heaven
and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.
From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.
We learn explicitly from several passages in Scripture not only where Jesus went, as the creed affirms, but why he went there.
What Exactly is a Worldview and Why It Matters
Before we get to the implications of the ascension we need to address what a worldview is because not everyone is familiar with it, and for some who are they don’t believe it’s a valid concept. What I said previously assumes familiarity and validity, but I need to make that case and not just assume it.
Discussing worldview requires us to address the meaning and significance of presuppositions, and how they determine our view of the world. Having presuppositions means we assume certain things, we pre‑suppose them. Most people know what assumptions are, but have no idea the role they play in how they view the world, how they understand, process, and perceive reality. In fact, most people don’t believe they assume anything at all! But finite creatures like us have to assume all the time because what we can actually know with any certainty is limited in a multitude of ways. James Sire in The Universe Next Door was one of the first to address worldview from a Christian perspective, and he defines it this way:
A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false) that we hold (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) about the basic constitution of reality, and that provides the foundation on which we live and move and have our being.
I used glasses above as a simple metaphor for worldview because everyone understands without having to explain it that glasses change how you see everything. If it’s sunglasses, it brings a certain hue, or if corrective, they turn blurry to clear. You can’t not see what the lenses determine you will see. That is how the set of presuppositions we hold, knowingly or not, become the framework by which we see, or interpret, all things. In Sire’s words, worldview is a “fundamental orientation of the heart” which is the “foundation on which we live and move and have our being.” How people view reality, how they see things, what has meaning to them, what they value, what seems true to them or not, their “fundamental orientation,” is bound up in their worldview. Hence, their existence, how they “live and move and have their being,” is determined by it. We are fundamentally interpretive beings.
Everyone has a view of the world, but few understand how worldview is the lens through which they interpret reality. As such, it colors everything they see, hear, read, and do. In other words, there are no ultimately objective, neutral observers. Yet, this doesn’t leave us without the ability to actually know things, which is epistemology, or the study of how and what we know. It only says everyone has some type of interpretive grid through which they make sense of reality. In his book Popologetics, Ted Turnau has an excellent explanation of how worldview and presuppositions interact:
Worldviews, then, are not simply rooted in “the facts,” as if we could gather the relevant facts to build a picture of the Truth with complete, presupposition‑free objectivity. Rather, the way in which we process the facts is always already involved in a specific set of presuppositions. We are, in a sense, always “captured” by our worldview, our presuppositions. Worldviews are ultimately based on fundamental faith commitments from which we understand evidence, truths, facts, and all of reality. Your set of presuppositions is the most basic place you know from. At this level, worldviews are fundamentally religious. That is, they are types of faith. Worldviews are religiously rooted in these basic, nonnegotiable beliefs called presuppositions.
Therefore, all human beings are fundamentally religious because all people live by faith which become the glasses through which they try to make sense of an uncertain, chaotic, and often confusing world. What we’ll be doing in the next section is discuss how we can in effect fortify our Christian worldview because of the ascension.
As I mentioned, not everybody is on board with the concept or value of a worldview understanding of human psychology. As best I can tell, the critics think what we’re saying is that worldview is some kind of static grid through which people become robots, or something. I haven’t engaged in any depth with the arguments against it, but they don’t seem well thought out or thought through. Worldview isn’t some infallible measure of human nature, but simply a tool to help us understand how and why, in the words of Sire, we “live and move and have our being.” If we look at people from various cultures as a group, say Muslims from the Middle East, or Asians from China or Japan, or secular Europeans or Americans, we can better understand them because of their basic presuppositions, their worldviews. For me it’s an invaluable tool to help me better understand people and cultures and how the gospel message and Great Commission can advance in Christ’s worldwide mission, to which we now turn.
King Jesus and the Great Commission
Before I began to better understand the ascension, I saw Christ’s reign limited to my personal life and battle for holiness, along with other Christians and thus only for the church. Christ’s authoritative power was not meant for those people or institutions outside of the church; the fallen world I assumed would always remain in its rebellious fallen state until he returned. So when Jesus spoke these words to the disciples I assume it primarily meant saving people so when they die they go to heaven, and being made more holy while they are on earth (Matt. 28):
18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Making disciples of all nations meant the people within the nations, not the nations themselves. Jesus doesn’t say that, but that’s what I took him to mean because of my assumptions about Jesus’ ascension and its implications for the world. It didn’t, or so I thought, apply to the world, just Christians, just the church. Then what does Jesus say? He says to baptize all ethnos-ἔθνος in Greek which primarily refers to a group of people or a nation, not merely the individuals within a nation. It is all the people in a nation and whatever they do to develop a society, along with the institutions, mores, and customs to create a unique cultural identity. Christ is Lord and King with authoritative power over all of it, and what that society becomes flows out of the people in it. The gospel and what flows out of it in Christians’ lives affect all of it, every square inch. Jesus’ authority is not in any way limited just to us!
Thus, a broadly Christian people can make a Christian nation, just as a broadly secular people can make a secular nation. Does that mean every person in those nations is Christian or secular? Of course not. Even those who reject the notion that a nation can be Christian, have no problem calling our nation, for example, a secular nation. That’s because the idea is not that every person is secular, but rather that the general makeup of the nation as a whole is secular in outlook. God recognizes nations as a whole, as one entity, and it is nations and everything in it that Christ calls us to disciple. Who people are affects everything they do; it’s as simple as that. As we disciple an increasing number of people, the influence through them of Christ and his kingdom will spread to all aspects of that society. This is what happened in the Roman Empire. It took almost 300 years, but eventually a pagan empire became a Christian one, and that had profound implications for how that empire was run. However, a merely personal faith, something Christianity was never intended to be, won’t do that. It will stay merely personal.
The difference between purely personal King Jesus and King Jesus who has “all authority in heaven and on earth,” is that non-Christians and their worldviews, who they are and how they act, are under the same authority as Christians. Jesus is as much in control of their lives as he is ours, and for the same reasons, to disciple the nations. A personal King Jesus, by contrast, does not include his reign over this fallen world to take back territory, so to speak, from the devil, specifically for advancing his kingdom on this earth as it is in heaven outside of the church. The fallen world in this telling will inevitably get worse until Jesus comes to rescue us out of it at the end of time. It is a pessimistic view of things, which is logical if Christ’s rule has little or nothing to do with anything outside of the church. When I believed in personal King Jesus I effectively equated the kingdom with the church.
As I began to understand the ascension more and its implications for all of life in this fallen world, I had a kind of cognitive dissonance, a discomfort from my contradictory understanding of the ascension. On the one hand Christ had all power over all thigs, on the other it really only applied to the church. This seemed to be what Paul was saying in Ephesians 1:
22 And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church.
True enough, but the church lives in a fallen world, and Christ’s authority in that world is ultimately to benefit the church in this world, on this earth, to take back territory from the Devil so we can experience God’s blessings in all of life. While many Christians on earth suffer for their faith, as I read very month in the Voice of the Martyrs magazine, that isn’t the goal. Which is why I pray that God would raise up a multitude of Christians in those nations to disciple and turn them into Christian nations where the gospel is proclaimed, and peace and justice reign. That isn’t just for the next life, on this redeemed and renewed earth, but here and now in this fallen world, bringing heaven to earth as Jesus taught us to pray. If Jesus didn’t mean this, he wouldn’t have given the command to his disciples and to us, in just that way; all authority has been given to him, therefore go.
Postmillennialism and the Ascension
Everything about my understanding of the ascension changed when I embrace postmillennialism in August 2022. In addition to my broadened understanding of the Great Commission, I now looked at Daniel’s vision in chapter 7:13,14 differently as well. Daniel sees “one like a son of man” at his coronation being ushered into the presence of “the Ancient of Days” being given “authority, glory and sovereign power” which all “nations and peoples” acknowledge. Prior to postmillennialism I automatically assumed this referred to Christ’s second coming, not a reference to his first. But Jesus clearly tells us it does apply to his first coming. How could I have missed that, and for decades? Paul confirms this all-encompassing authority Jesus received at the ascension was indeed for his first coming in Ephesians 1:18-23. When Jesus was placed by the Father at His right hand, he was now in a position “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is named.” He adds as if, oh by the way, this rule of Jesus is “not only in the present age but also in the one to come.” In other words, it’s so obvious it’s for life on this fallen world, this the present age, that his readers needed to be reminded it’s also for the age to come. That never stood out to me until I embraced postmillennialism.
Without understanding the true all-encompassing implications of the ascension, a Christian worldview will not positively affirm Christ’s authority over everything, literally every single thing, every single person, including every institution, every government, and every spiritual being beyond earth. If it’s just a Christian worldview, seeing things and applying a Christian view to it all, Christianity will not have the kind of world conquering spirit Christians had for much of the church’s history. In the gospel we declare King Jesus to whom all earthly power must submit, which gives us confidence that bringing heaven to earth is not a product of merely our own efforts or power, but of the rule and reign of Christ over all things. This is why I now pray something I learned from Joe Boot, that Christ would extend his reign on earth, advance God’s kingdom, and build his church. I add this to my four R prayer, for revival, renewal, restoration, and Reformation. That about covers it all!
This brings me to the final point we must discuss: how does this all work? The critics of postmillennialism think our confidence in victory, and our optimism, is in our efforts, and they don’t like that one bit! This straw man is trotted out a lot, but it isn’t true. What is true is that God can’t bring heaven to earth without us, we wretched sinners who always seem to get so many things wrong and messing things up. He’s stuck with us! Read the Bible. Working with imperfect sinners to accomplish his purposes on earth didn’t change when Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. Our confidence then as now is in Christ, in what he accomplished in his first coming, which was to destroy the works of the devil and push back the effects of the fall as far as the curse is found. Now, instead of hell on earth having the upper hand, heaven does.
This is a biblical fact, and if you have faith, and eyes to see, you can see it everywhere. Don’t take my word for it, but do take it from Jesus. As he told his disciples, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” It never occurred to me until I read it in a book about postmillennialism, that gates in the ancient world were a defensive mechanism. How could I have missed that! And why didn’t preachers at all the churches we attended not tell us this! It is we Christians, Christ’s church, who are on the offensive; the devil and his minions don’t stand a chance!
Add this to your Christians worldview, and you will be a world changer. As I often say, work like it depends on you, but pray because it depends on God. I finish with these world conquering words from Joab, the commander of David’s armies (I Chron. 19:13):
Be strong, and let us fight bravely for our people and the cities of our God. The Lord will do what is good in his sight.
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