Worldviews in Conflict: Choosing Christianity in a World of Ideas

I've read this book a couple of times over the years and each time it has opened my eyes to some new worldview truth that I hadn't seen before. Ron Nash was an excellent writer. He had the rare gift of making difficult concepts easy for the reader to understand. This book is no exception. It's a great read on a great subject!

Great book with much useful insight on world views and their effects on the way we live. I am reading this for a class on Christianity and Philosophy and it has provided so much eye opening info and helped me piece together some oddities I've experienced in life. Mr Nash makes everything plain and writes in an engaging way to help keep me from falling asleep while reading (as I often tend to do).

Direct quote and quite possibly the purpose of the book, “I am convinced… few Americans have been taught to think in terms of worldview. They do not know what a worldview is; they could not spell out the context of their own worldview if they lives depended upon it; they are unaware of how various aspects of conflicting worldview clash logically.” (p. 9) Nash writes, “the most important step for Christians is to become informed about the Christian worldview, a comprehensive systematic view of life and of the world as a whole. No believe today can be really effective in the area of ideas until he or she has been trained to think in worldview terms.” (p. 14)I purchased this book so that I could intelligently explain the concept of a world-view. I am teaching teenagers so I did not need the book to be complicated. I wanted to explain the concept in the simplest of terms. And I think that (throughout most of the book) Nash did explain the concept very well. I enjoyed the book and underlined some great quotes. I am sure that in the future I will continue to use this book as a resource. It is little dated, published in 1992. I would love to see an updated edition. Seeing how Nash is no longer with us but with the Lord, an updated edition would be impossible. In that regard, if any readers of this blog knows of a recent and valuable work about world-views, I would love to hear some recommendations.I enjoyed the first few chapters where Nash definitively explained what a worldview is. He explained the role of presuppositions and the five major elements of a worldview. Nash wrote about choosing a worldview and contrasted the Christian and naturalist worldview. Which I think was great, he really simplified this through a visual illustration. One I will continue to use as I explain God’s creative work and intelligent design. He contrasted Christianity with the new age worldview. I just skimmed through this section. I am not certain, but I am assuming that the new age movement has lost its thrust in the world of ideas. Very rarely do I ever hear about the new age movement. As I said, I wish that the book was updated. I would love to hear what Nash thinks about modern atheists, and the multicultural-religion (worldview) shift in America.Nash contributed a section on reason, which I also dredged through. It may appeal to others, but it was a little academic for me (most books are). Sometimes I have to read a book twice to comprehend the context. Many of the books reviewed on this blog I have had to read twice. Hopefully those of you who read my book reviews are encouraged by my efforts. He also dedicated one chapter to the problem of evil, a very succinct proposition, hardly exhausted. After looking through the chapter once more, I realize that I only underlined two small sections. Which means that there was nothing new to his argument, but remember the book is twenty-five years old. Nash hashes out some arguments for the incarnation and resurrection of Jesus. Overall I liked the book, my biggest complaint is that the book is outdated.

In Worldviews in Conflict Ron Nash provides a great, accessible introductory overview of the concept of worldviews: why they are important, why we all have one, why Christianity is strong and logically sound as a worldview compared to others.

would recommend 10/10

A very understandable look at a complex topic. I am blessed to have known Dr. Nash and it is a joy to be able to use his work for my own students. He left a wonderful legacy in this and other titles.

This was an interesting read and helped in writing some papers regarding Christian world views. Surprisingly turned out to be a page turner for me. But then I do like most of Nash's material.

This book is a concise and shallow introduction to world view thinking, which is a subject that is vital to christian apologetics. Nash gets righ to the point and explains the core of the subject, without being too scholarly or using difficult language.There are more than one way of approaching the concept of a world view as well as explaining an organizing its content. For example, Nash speaks of five aspects while Colson (How Now Shall We Live?) speaks of three. Nash speaks of three world-view-tests while Colson speaks of one. In the end the result is the same, but Nashes way makes it very easy to understand what a world view is all about. Then he leaves it to you to apply it in real life.The book is a great supplement to Nashes lectures in christian apologetics, which can be found on iTunes U.