Posted on 03/02/2014 2:54:18 AM PST by markomalley
If Jesus is incarnate God, then of course He would be (and is) for ideas that are better rather than worse.
Jesus is recorded just well enough to get Him creds at divinity, through the kinds of things He did. To try to milk every possible philosophical angle out of the limited view of the gospels without reference to the illustrative power of the rest of the bible is vain.
Then clearly, making sure we pay the lowest taxes possible was not a priority.
Jesus would not have had to go to Rome, seems to me He had a chat with Pilate. No words there about this at all. I guess the widows mites should have gone to Pilate so he could take his cut and disperse the rest.
You're missing my point. Back then, the concept of government helping the poor was completely foreign. Therefore, the concern that the government SHOULD NOT help the poor would never have occurred to any of them.
To quote you, the fact remains that Jesus came as savior, not social worker. He came for us as individuals.
That's right! Not a social worker. Not a tax reformer either. Not a proponent of American conservatism. He has nothing to do with American politics today. But if he did, I'm afraid he probably would have been a Democrat (although I doubt he'd have been a big fan of gay marriage and abortion.)
He never said anything against helping the poor? You are so correct. In fact he did say to help. He said that to YOU. Do you? Or is your conscience salved by the idea that govt does enough?
I think he would have wanted BOTH. Government programs that help the poor, and the rich and comfortable donating yet more on a local level.
If you do not read the about Jesus as YOUR savior, and all He said directed to YOU, then, IMHO, you’ve missed the boat.
It's all fine, it just has nothing to do with taxes.
Your line of reasoning (he didn’t say that) is faulty and often used to allow unbiblical things. Such as: Argument - Jesus never said homosexuality is bad.
He may have considered that as being covered by the prohibition on adultery. I've had plenty of Freepers insist that he was against rape, too, although he never mentioned it. They always say the adultery clause covers it. I think rape and homosexuality were simply not high on his priority list... rather like taxes.
Nope, can’t find the words that He did. Yet, Jesus is the Word, so it can be said that the Bible, being the Word, IS Jesus. And that Word tells me homosexuality is a sin.
Okay, let's work with that. Where does the Bible say taxes should not be used to help the poor? Anywhere? ANYWHERE?? You find it, I'll take it.
So, context, context, context.
You find me a place in the Bible where it says taxes should not be used to help the poor and I won't even ASK the context. Just find it.
And finally, you say that Jesus wasn’t on my side. Apparently, His focus was not for YOU?
His focus was not making sure my tax money didn't help the poor, far as I can tell.
Lets take your reasoning a bit further. You are OK with allowing Govt to coopt or force YOUR function of giving (We are told to give).
No I'm not. I'm a conservative. I just don't think it goes against Jesus' teachings. I see no evidence anywhere that Jesus would have disapproved.
Bottom line, living as the Lord would have you to, is a choice. An individual choice. Not a governmental/group choice.
So having the government ban gay marriage in the name of following the Bible wouldn't have impressed him either. After all, gays wouldn't be living "right" of their own free will, only because the government prevented them.
And to answer your last (Funny how you have ‘chosen’ not to answer any of my questions) of course I realize Jesus wasn’t American. You do realize this country started by people coming here to be able to freely worship Him? And government was started, acknowledging Him? That being the case, WHERE in those governments was the Dept of Free Money?
Hate to tell you, but creating the welfare system was very much supported in the name of Christian charity. Now you may say they had the wrong idea of what Christian charity should be, but that's your opinion. There's no evidence Jesus would have agreed.
The ‘burden’ of helping falls to Church, family, friends, charity. Government is a necessary evil to conduct a nation. It is not a charitable company.
There's no evidence Jesus would agree with you.
A Christian who is Liberal (Progressive) needs to ‘examine his ways’. They have bought a lie.
You're the one who has bought a lie. You've created Duck Dynasty Jesus, who never cared about taxes until they started helping the poor.
It sounds as though you have too. Liberalism destroys. It dehumanizes. It murders and steals. None of which are Godly characteristics.
A liberal Christian would say the same of wars. They have their interpretation of Jesus, you have yours. Theirs has more Biblical support. Yours is terribly thin.
Me, I’ll take the Jesus in the Bible that came for ME. That spoke to ME. That had commandments for ME. Who loved ME. It is amazing to me that He loved me enough to endure what He did, so that I would have a way back to the Father.
Oh, I thought he did it so your tax money wouldn't be used to help the poor.
> Soros can’t pony up any bribe like Satan can.
Soros
Eye of needle
Camel
Hopefully he gets it but i think he and Katy Perry serve the same god nowc
Satan loves it when theologians argue.
The requirement that Christians help the poor is a moral requirement, for the purpose of glorifying and pleasing God.
A moral decision can only be made in the context of freedom of choice.
Taxation by the government through force is entirely separate and in fact contrary to this.
What I’m getting at is that the atheist himself has to be hating God badly enough to want to go through with the blasphemy. Even if he was getting bribed.
That's not true. You are free to decide how to spend the money you don't pay in taxes. And let's face it, you're only paying a percentage. There's plenty left over to give to the poor, if you would just do it.
Taxation by the government through force is entirely separate and in fact contrary to this.
1.) Nothing prevents you from doing both.
2.) Jesus said to pay your taxes.
3.) No one has yet provided me with any quote that indicates that Jesus would have disapproved of the government helping the poor.
Just show me where in the Bible God or Jesus state explicitly that government should not help the poor. Anywhere.
It does warn you that doing so will make the poor Caesar’s.
... I mean habitual handouts. Random or opportunistic kindness by a ruler would not do that.
What we need to recognize is, the bible is not always a systematic theology book — sometimes it’s a teach by example book.
The intrigues by which King David was euchred out of his palace (after having sinned through his affair with Bathsheba, and God let it happen in order to chastise David) are an example of dirty politics by means of promising the moon to the people.
I do criticize the state of modern Christendom. I think it let the government take over charity way too easily. And with charity went the credibility of the gospel message. If you are telling your neighbor that God lives in you, that God loves them, but they should go to Caesar for help, that’s a mixed message. It’s not an unrecoverable problem, but it will need a changed mindset to address.
I’ll give you some of the time but not most. Libertarianism is too much about limited government to be fundamentally compatible with liberalism. Even when they share a position on an issue, they’ve usually arrived at it through different reasoning. The basic substance is different. The Koch brothers are libertarians and liberals rightfully recognize them as an arch enemy. Confusing libertarians and liberals is sort of like confusing Sikhs and Muslims.
Can you just point me toward that verse?
Atheists are idiots.
You and I both see where it's heading, but that doesn't make them Not Christian, or incorrect in their interpretation of What Would Jesus Do.
“The Koch brothers are libertarians and liberals rightfully recognize them as an arch enemy.”
Both are for open borders and amnesties. Koch brothers are well know to be one of the GOP big donors who push Boehner and Cantor towards amnesty
Amnesty will kill the right wing in America. Libertarians too. Third world immigrants are not libertarians
But no one would say the Koch brothers are liberals. Immigration is a good example of how libertarians can arrive at the same position as liberals by opposite logic. For libertarians it’s a limited-government issue, not a social justice issue. They also favor the total dismantling of the welfare state and all social programs, which is the only context in which open borders could work, at least in theory. Of course the former will never happen which makes supporting the latter a bad idea, but it shows that they’re coming from a different place than liberals.
If you look at your posts, you will see you have nothing that shows Jesus wants us to pay taxes to help the poor.
You have shown that paying taxes has nothing to do with the commandment to love our neighbor or to help the poor.
The message of Jesus is that righteousness and coercion don’t mix—they always oppose each other.
That's the point the atheist makes that started this whole debate: your messiah is not a poster boy for either Left or Right (although most of his quotes work better for them than for us.) If you want to take him as your personal guide in life, go ahead.
But don't bother trying to use anything about him to prove he would have opposed the government helping the poor. That suggests that the poor only exist to give you a chance to show your worthiness... that helping them is secondary to making sure you help them in the right spirit. I think it's pretty nonsensical to hold that Jesus would rather they go without than get help in a way you disapprove of.
Because that is what you are saying: Jesus would have rather they starved than you be coerced.
What Jesus wants is for us to choose righteousness. In fact, this includes his teaching that we should choose poverty. Thus, simply handing things of material value over to the poor, for the rest of their life so that they remain in poverty, is not what he wants. He cares about what’s in our heart, and the government forcing us at gunpoint to give poverty level alms to the poor is the opposite of what Jesus wants.
I’ll clarify for you what my point has been:
Atheism provides for no ultimate objective source of individual sovereignty.
The only version of individual sovereignty available to atheism is the subjective kind, which makes it no different, ultimately, from any form of liberalism.
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