Why College Matters to God

A Student's Introduction to The Christian College Experience

Rick Ostrander

• Publisher: Abilene Christian University Press
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9780891128687
• Topic: Didattica
• Subtopic: Istruzione superiore

At last, a brief, readable introduction to the unique purpose and value of a Christian college education. This book draws on the insights of a wide range of Christian philosophers, historians, scientists, and theologians, but communicates key concepts in straightforward language and analogies that will connect with today's college students. Brief enough to be paired with other 'first-year' texts, it is an ideal introduction to the Christian college experience for students, faculty, and staff.

1 INTRODUCTION
Christian Worldview and Higher Education

ONE of my favorite Far Side comics by Gary Larsen depicts a herd of cows grazing on a hillside. Suddenly one of the cows raises her head and exclaims, “Hey, wait a minute! This is grass! We’ve been eating grass!” Like most Far Sides, the comic works because it uses animals to depict a universal truth: In society we often do things automatically without ever asking the question “Why?”

Take college, for example. A Tibetan herdsman visiting America would notice a strange phenomenon. Among the middle and upper classes of society, young people around the age of eighteen complete a certain level of schooling known as “high school.” Then millions of them pack up their belongings and move to a centralized campus to live with other young people, most of whom they have never met. For the next four or five years, they complete a rather odd assortment of classes that collectively comprise what is called “undergraduate education.”

Just what are these classes? First, they take “general education” or “core curriculum”—classes such as English literature, history, natural and social sciences, and philosophy—the kind of stuff that people have been studying for centuries, and which enables college graduates to sound sophisticated at parties. Along with the core, students take classes in what they call a “major” area of study: A subject that they are most interested in, or one that they (or their parents) think will yield the best career prospects. Amid all of this coursework, the students find ample time for eating, socializing, competing in athletics, and playing Guitar Hero in the dormitory.

It all may seem quite normal to those of us who have gone through or are going through the process. But our Tibetan herdsman probably would be hard pressed to see the purpose in all of it. His perplexity would increase if he visited a private Christian college, where chances are students pay more money for a narrower range of academic programs and more restrictions on their social lives.

Of course, there are a variety of reasons why students choose to attend a Christian college. For many of them, it’s the perception of a safe environment. For others, it’s a particular major that the school offers; or perhaps the Christian emphasis in the dormitories, chapel, and student organizations; or the school’s reputation for academic rigor and personal attention from Christian professors. It may even be the likelihood of finding a Christian spouse at a religious college.

None of these features, however, is unique to a Christian college. For example, if it’s safety you’re looking for, you could just as well attend a secular college in New Hampshire, which boasts the nation’s lowest crime rate (but has few Christian colleges). Moreover, most public universities have thriving Christian organizations on campus that provide the opportunity for fellowship and ministry— and more non-Christians to evangelize as well. One can also find good Christian professors at just about any secular university. One of the most outspoken evangelical professors that I had as a college student was my astronomy professor at the University of Michigan.

The difference between a Christian university and other institutions of higher education is this:
A Christian college weaves a Christian worldview into the entire fabric of the institution, including academic life.

The real uniqueness of a Christian college lies elsewhere. Simply stated, the difference between a Christian university and other institutions of higher education is this: A Christian college weaves a Christian world view into the entire fabric of the institution, including academic life. It is designed to help you see and live every part of your life purposefully as a follower of Christ. Such a statement will take a while to unpack in all of its complexity; and that is the purpose of this book. If properly understood, however, this concept will enable you to thrive at a Christian college and to understand the purpose of each class you take, from English literature to organic chemistry. But first we must establish four foundational concepts, the first of which is the notion of worldview.

1. What Is a Worldview?

The 1999 film The Matrix has been a favorite among youth pastors and those who like using movies to discuss deep ideas. That’s because amid the fight scenes and big explosions, The Matrix forces us to ponder the age-old philosophical question posed by Rene Descartes back in the 1600s: How can I know what is really real? The film begins with the protagonist, Neo, as a normal New York City resident. But gradually he becomes enlightened to the true state of reality—that computers have taken over the world and are using humans as power supplies, all the while downloading sensory perceptions into their minds to make them think they are living normal modern lives. Neo achieves “salvation” when he accurately perceives the bad guys not as real people but as merely computer-generated programs.

The Matrix thus challenges us to recognize that some of our foundational assumptions about reality—that other people exist, that this laptop I’m writing on is really here—are just that: assumptions that serve as starting points for how we perceive our world. If my friend chooses to believe that I am a computer program designed to deceive him, it’s unlikely that I will be able to produce evidence that will convince him otherwise. Furthermore, as Neo’s experience in the film indicates, shifting from one perception of reality to another can be a rather jarring, painful process.

All education, whether religious or secular, comes with a built-in point of view.

In other words, The Matrix illustrates the notion of “world view”— that our prior assumptions about reality shape how we

perceive the world around us. A worldview can be defined as a set of assumptions about the basic makeup of the world. As one scholar has stated, it is a view of the world that governs our behavior in the world. A worldview is revealed in how we answer basic questions of life such as, Who am I? Does God exist? Is there a purpose to the universe? Are moral values absolute or relative? What is reality?

We can think of a worldview as a pair of glasses through which we view our world. We do not so much focus on the lenses; in fact, we often forget they are even there. Rather, we look through the lenses to view the rest of the world. Or here’s another metaphor: If you have ever done a jigsaw puzzle, you know that the picture on the puzzle box is important. It helps you know where a particular piece fits into the overall puzzle. A worldview does the same. It’s the picture on the puzzle box of our lives, helping us to make sense of the thousands of experiences that bombard us every day.

We cannot help but have a worldview; like the pair of spectacles perched on my nose, my worldview exists and is constantly interpreting reality for me, whether I notice it or not. Neo begins The Matrix with a worldview; it just happens to be an incorrect one, and he has never bothered to think critically about what his world view is. One of the main purposes of college, therefore, is to challenge students to examine their worldviews. Which brings me to the second foundational concept.

2. All Education Comes With a Worldview.

Worldviews shape not just our individual lives but universities as well. There was a time when scholars claimed that education was completely objective. Professors in the secular academy, it was believed, simply “studied the facts” and communicated those facts to their students. Now we know better. All education, whether religious or secular, comes with a built-in point of view. Even in academic disciplines, the worldview of the scholar shapes how the data is interpreted, and even what data is selected in the first place. Nothing illustrates this fact better than the following optical illusion commonly used in psychology:

Some viewers immediately see an old lady when they look at this drawing. Others see a young woman. Eventually, just about anyone will be able to see both (if you cannot, relax and keep looking!). This is because while the actual black and white lines on the page (the “facts,” so to speak) do not change, our minds arrange and interpret these lines in different ways to create a coherent whole. Moreover, this is not something that we consciously decide to do; our minds are programmed in such a way as to do this automatically. We cannot avoid doing so. Neither can those who visualize the drawing in different ways simply argue rationally about whose interpretation is the correct one, since their disagreement is not so much over the facts of the drawing but over what those “facts” mean.

In a more complex way, the same process occurs whenever scholars work in their disciplines. Historians, for example, agree on certain events of the American Revolution—that on April 18, 1775, Paul Revere rode through the New England countryside shouting “The British are coming!”; that the Continental Congress signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776; that on December 25, 1776, George Washington and his army crossed the Delaware River and surprised Hessian soldiers at Trenton. But what do these facts mean? How are they to be arranged into a coherent whole? When did the American Revolution actually begin? Was it motivated primarily by religious impulses or by Enlightenment philosophy?

Historians argue endlessly over such questions, and the answers to them depend in part on the worldview of the historian, who selects and interprets historical data according to certain assumptions about how politics and societies change—ultimately, basic assumptions about what makes humans tick. Thus, a Marxist historian who believes that ultimately human beings are economic creatures motivated by material rewards may interpret the American Revolution in a way that emphasizes the financial interests of colonial elites. The Christian who believes that human motivation often runs deeper than just economic interests will likely emphasize other factors such as ideas and religious impulses. The “facts” of the Revolution are the same for each historian, but like Neo’s perception of his world, the interpretation of those facts is shaped by the scholar’s worldview.

Or, to cite an example from science: Biologists generally agree about the makeup of the cell, the structure of DNA, and even the commonality of DNA between humans and other life forms. But do such facts “demonstrate” that human beings evolved from other life forms, or do they indicate that some sort of intelligent being used common material to create humans and other life forms? The answer to this question is not simply a matter of evidence; it is influenced by the scientist’s assumptions about ultimate reality.

More generally, not just academic disciplines but entire universities operate according to worldviews. One of the universities that I attended, the University of Michigan, had a worldview; it was just never stated as such. In fact, one could argue that like most secular universities, my alma mater suffered from worldview schizophrenia. In the classroom, most of my courses were taught from a worldview perspective known as scientific materialism: the material universe is all that exists; human beings are a complex life form that evolved randomly over the course of millions of years; belief in God is a trait that evolved relatively recently as a way for humans to explain their origins, but now this belief is no longer necessary. Thus, academic inquiry is best conducted when one sets aside any prior faith commitments.

Student life at Michigan, however, typically embodied a different worldview—that of modern hedonism, or devotion to pleasure. It could be stated as such: In the absence of any higher purpose to life, personal pleasure and success are the greatest values. You should get good grades in college since that is your ticket to a successful career. However, you should not let studies interfere with having a good time, generally defined in terms of parties, dating, and of course, college football.

Paradoxically, however, a third worldview governed much of campus culture, one best described by the paradoxical phrase tolerant moralism. According to this world view, intolerance and abuse of the environment are the great evils of modern society; diversity and ecological responsibility are the ultimate goods. The actions of individuals and the university community, therefore, are rigorously scrutinized according to how they measure up to these moral values, and anyone from the custodian to the president is liable to censure if their words or actions are seen as detrimental to these causes. Recently, for example, the president of Harvard University lost his job because of remarks he made that were deemed critical of women’s scientific capabilities.

A Christian university seeks to provide an overarching framework that gives a sense of purpose and unity for everything from English Literature to chapel to intramural soccer.

3. The Christian College: A Unified Worldview

From a Christian perspective, one could argue that each of these worldviews contains at least a grain of truth (though we’ll wait until chapter three to make that argument). The problem, however, is that the secular university makes no attempt to articulate an overarching philosophy that gives a coherent purpose to all of its parts. As a former college president has remarked, the modern university is not a uni-versity at all but rather a “multi-versity.” a uni-versity at all but rather a “multi-versity.”
A Christian university, by contrast, seeks to provide an overarching framework that gives a sense of purpose and unity for everything from English Literature to chapel to intramural soccer. That umbrella, of course, is a Christian worldview. The particular elements will be explained in greater detail in the chapters that follow. But briefly, the Christian worldview, as described in the Bible, can be thought of as a grand drama in three acts:

Act 1: Creation. The universe didn’t evolve by chance.
Rather, an all-knowing, all-powerful Triune God created everything that exists. Moreover, God called his creation good and delighted in it just as my ten-year-old daughter delights in constructing animals from clay. God culminated his creative work by making human beings in his own image and giving them the capacity to delight in creation with him and act as sub-creators in their own right.

Act 2: Fall. Human beings, created with a free will, used that freedom to disobey God. Their sin corrupted every part of God’s good creation, from human relationships to rivers that overflow their banks and wipe out villages.

Act 3: Redemption. God, however, immediately set about redeeming his fallen creation and restoring it to its original goodness. The key player in the redemptive drama is Jesus Christ, who came to earth to take the cosmic penalty for sin upon himself. Eventually history will culminate in the re-establishment of God’s reign throughout the entire universe. In the meantime, the followers of Jesus carry on God’s redemptive activity in all of creation.

That’s the biblical narrative in a nutshell, and it has tremendous implications for a Christian college. Plants thrive when they are exposed to a healthy combination of sunlight and rain. Similarly, we can think of “creation” and “redemption” as complementary purposes that give life to virtually every aspect of a Christian college. For example, we don’t just have a college basketball team to boost school spirit or attract attention, as secular colleges do. Rather, basketball has both a creative and a redemptive purpose for us. The biblical creation story tells us that God delights in his creation, and he created human beings in his image to delight in creation as well. Thus, play honors God; and developing our ability to shoot a basketball— or spike a volleyball, or swing a golf club—is a way to more fully express God’s image.

College sports, however, also bear the marks of the fall. Athletes are placed on pedestals, coaches sometimes cheat, and heated contests can degenerate into hatred toward referees and opposing players. A Christian college, therefore, also plays basketball in order to “redeem” this particular corner of God’s creation by fielding teams that demonstrate sportsmanship and fans who display Christian charity to opponents and referees (that’s the ideal, at least).

The Christian story provides us with a sense of purpose in the classroom as well as on the court. This concept will be explored in detail in subsequent chapters, but for now let me illustrate with an example from a common major, Business. One thing that we learn in the book of Genesis is that God intended for humans to live in community. That’s why he created Adam and Eve. He also designed his creation to increase in complexity and interdependence. Today we see that complexity in virtually every aspect of life. Take, for example, my morning cup ...