How can we better teach truth to our children? God planted the seeds in my mind eight years ago. Teachers and homeschoolers who loved the Principle Approach and Webster’s 1828 Dictionary asked me, “Is there a Christian dictionary for young children that you recommend–one that has definitions as rich as the 1828 and is based on Scripture? I love Noah Webster’s original 1828 Dictionary but the vocabulary is too difficult for young children.”

After much reflection, I realized such a resource was needed. In fact, it was essential in shaping a Christian worldview! According to my research, the only Christian dictionary for children was produced by Bob Jones University and is now out of print. Is it appropriate to let the internet replace this tool? Even young children are now bombarded with false narratives. How are children today able to understand such words and topics as socialism, evolution, gender, slavery, equality, fascism, nationalism, racism, etc.? Children often have no idea what these words mean, or worse, the meaning is based on TV, film, friends, and social media. Often what they understand is partially true or completely wrong! How would our children embrace a Biblical understanding of the world–how could they think and act like Jesus–if they embrace unbiblical views about important cultural issues?

I began to pray with my wife and daughter as I was burdened with these realities. We dreamed about creating what would become the Student Worldview Dictionary.

We decided we will not stand idly by while the secular world re-defines many words that shape our worldview. We will not rest while our children are bombarded with the false definition of words through social media, music, entertainment, podcasts, and the news. We will not simply complain while students search for definitions of words on the internet, AI, and Wikipedia. We will not settle for the indoctrination of our students learning an unbiblical secular/socialist worldview.

True, sound definitions call for a Biblically-based tool which stays true to the original meanings. Noah Webster led the way by producing the 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language that defines words using Scripture and Biblical principles. The Student Worldview Dictionary follows this model. This powerful resource is now available with the Bible at the heart of every definition!

Noah Webster, the Father of American Christian Education, pioneered the use of Scripture in a dictionary. What more appropriate source should we reference when defining a word? This may seem obvious to Christians of our day, but this is not the norm! Pick a dictionary off of a shelf today and you will be hard pressed to find that the author used the Bible as the basis for the meaning of words. Indeed, the best and most pure source for the true meaning of worldview words is completely missing! This cannot be a coincidence or accident!

To recover the Biblical worldview in our generation, we must recover the use of the Bible for the basis of the meaning of words. God has the first and final word on everything, including theological, philosophical and worldview topics.

So in 2019, the team was assembled and the work began. I started by identifying the words that would be included. I went through the entire 1828 Dictionary and choose 4,000 words which were eventually reduced to around 1,000. We added to these 126 words that did not exist in Webster’s day, such as socialism, fascism, evolution, etc. I wrote a definition that could be understood by a young reader. Then I used Webster’s original definitions, sometimes edited for the sake of space. Webster would sometimes have 10-20 definitions for a word! To write the child’s definition I consulted several children’s dictionaries, including ones published in 1913, 1914, 1956, 1982, and 2000. In addition, I consulted The All Nations English Dictionary, a dictionary published in 1992 with around 18,000 words, that does use Scripture and gives the Biblical meaning of words. I also found inspiration in Sam Sorbo’s Words for Warriors.

One thing that was very interesting but sad in this process was by tracing word meanings through dictionaries from 1828 to the present, I was able to see how word meanings devolved over the past two centuries. 1828 was the pinnacle of defining words Biblically, and ever since then dictionaries have become less Biblical and more secular, humanistic, socialistic, and/or “woke.”