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I like ambitious authors. I especially like it when authors probably didn’t realize the massive endeavor they were undertaking, only to find out they’ve completed a work that accomplishes even more than they initially expected.

Dan Phillips is that kind of author, and The World-Tilting Gospel: Embracing a Biblical Worldview and Hanging on Tight is that kind of book. Here is a basic overview of a biblical worldview. It’s refreshingly God-centered (thus the world-tilting image) and offers a robust yet accessible look at major biblical truths.

To top it off, Dan is fun to read. The book is long, but Dan’s writing style is punchy and memorable.

Here is a quick summary of the 9 “world-tilting truths” that serve as a launching pad for the worldview put forth in Dan’s book:

#1. Over Everything, God

  • The truth of God’s absolute centrality is a wrecking ball to humanity’s constant desire to make ourselves the measure of all things. It dismantles the facade and proclaims the Godhood of God. It reminds us all of what we know deep down inside: We are creatures; we are not gods. We are not ultimate. God is God.

#2. Sin Is a Massive, Universal, Nightmare Factor

  • Men naturally minimize sin insofar as it relates to God. If they could, they would make the concept disappear. But the truth about sin puts sin back where it belongs: directly between the God of the Bible and our guilty selves. Sin is defined by God and embraced by us to our own ruin.

#3. The World Is Not Self-Defining

  • The world is fond of the fantasy that life, the universe, and all that are a blank slate, waiting for us to assign meaning. The truth, however, is that reality is not what we make of it. Reality is what God already made of it. The reality is that everything is designed, overseen, and judged.

#4. Meaning and Fulfillment Cannot Be Found Within the World

  • The world strives manfully to find fulfillment here and now. But the truth tells the world that it cannot itself bring meaning, and it cannot fulfill. For real meaning and eternal purpose and lasting joy, we must look away from the world and beyond the world.

#5. We Mustn’t Reason from “Is” to “Should”

  • The world defines “healthy” as “normal.” It defines “normal” by statistics, polls, and studies of what people do. “Is” equals “should.” But the Bible teaches that the world is marred by sin. Normal human behavior is broken human behavior, abnormal behavior, when judged by the standards of God’s original intent and stated norms. God’s unchanging, transcendent moral and spiritual absolutes shatter the world’s echo chamber of self-serving back-patting.

#6. We Must Reason from “Designed,” “Commanded,” and “Re-Created” to “Intended”

  • The world has no “should” against which to measure itself. Its horizon is low and shifting: itself. It has no clue what a human being should be. But the truth is God created man for a high and distinctive purpose, in which His own Person and Word are central. This truth calls us to be made what we should be by the sovereign grace of God in Jesus Christ.

#7. Jesus Christ Is the Most Important Person, Event, and Figure in All of History

  • The world has tried to do all sorts of things with Jesus. It has tried hard to ignore Him. It has repeatedly tried to mash Him into its image for its own endeavors. But the world needs to hear the truth about the Jesus Christ who won’t be ignored, tamed, lassoed, or co-opted. If Jesus is real, all the world’s values and plans and tidy little sandcastles are doomed.

#8. In Christ and Through the Cross, We Have Been Given All We Need for Godly Living

  • The world is all about pulling itself up by its bootstraps. If that doesn’t work, it just redefines “up” down and doesn’t move. But the truth is that no program or set of rules will perfect man or even improve him. This truth points to the treasure trove that can only be found in the perfect Man, Christ Jesus, in whom all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden away and in whom alone we can be filled full.

#9. The Vast Bounty of God’s Provisions for Us in Christ Enables and Obliges Us to Get on with It to His Glory

  • The world is opposed to Christians getting on with it. To the degree that we walk with Jesus, we reflect His light, which the world finds repulsive. But in the name of God, we need to get on with it: take that gospel – that mighty, robust, saving, whole-Bible gospel – bust barriers, and turn the world upside down again.
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