“Now when the people saw what Paul had done, they raised their voices, saying in the Lycaonian language, ‘The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!’ And Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul, Hermes, because he was the chief speaker.” Acts 14:11-12

Worldview

When we hold a belief that something is true, we will act accordingly. For instance, in childhood I believed my stepfather had taken the place of my father, and since I was miserable, I acted as if everything my stepfather did was to make my formerly happy family miserable. This intruder could do nothing right in my eyes. I’m sure he wondered if he would ever break through to me.

In our passage today, God healed a lame man through Paul and Barnabas, and those who believed in other gods assumed Paul and Barnabas were those very gods. The priests of Zeus in that city brought garlands and intended to make sacrifices to them. The worldview of these people was that other gods were real. They had been living in this “reality” or belief system, and thus interpreted every event according to what they assumed to be true. Since they already believed in other gods, it wasn’t a big leap to conclude Paul and Barnabas were Zeus and Hermes.

When we deeply believe something, we can easily jump to conclusions. If we deeply believe life is dangerous, then we will fear whatever is around the corner. If we deeply believe life is unfair, we will usually feel everyone and everything is against us.

We assume that what we see with our eyes confirms our beliefs, when in fact Scripture tells us that our beliefs should be conformed to the Word of God. We are to live by the truths of the Bible. These should shape our thinking, our worldview. If we are alienated from the life of God, we will misinterpret events and likely miss seeing His orchestration of circumstances. We won’t recognize His work in our lives.

It is so important to be immersed in what God says and knows. What does HE say about your life, about the enemy, about the world? It isn’t enough to just tell ourselves what to think about, although that is a good start. What we all need is a completely changed mindset (worldview). We need a new way of seeing life—to see it as He sees it.

Let’s not just dip our toes in the streams of Living Water—let’s jump in and be buried in Him. Let’s make His Words the most important words of every day. Let’s make His thoughts about us rule over what we think about ourselves. This is how we will gain His worldview. Then we can interpret events with His perspective.

“God, may our thoughts align with Yours, so that we do not live by what we see or feel, and thus jump to wrong conclusions. May our worldview come by the wisdom of Your Word. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.”