Posted on 04/27/2007 7:32:08 PM PDT by Simi Valley Tom
By Dr. Tom Snyder, Editor of Movieguide®
A group of self-described "progressive" Christian Evangelicals calling themselves "Red Letter Christians," and led by the liberal, left-oriented Sojourners Magazine and left-oriented religious pundits like Jim Wallis and Tony Campolo, has recently emerged in the body politic. These self-proclaimed "progressives" have been making a lot of noise recently complaining about the ties that other Christian Evangelicals have long held with the conservative movement in the United States, including the conservative movement in the Republican Party.
One conservative policy under attack by these "progressives" is the conservative effort to "cut programs to the poor." They say that such a policy goes against Jesus Christ's commands in Chapter 24 of the Book of Matthew to feed those who are hungry.
These "Red Letter Christians" are making a lot of noise, but they are just a bunch of clanging cymbals. And, the love that they claim to spout has no truth in it whatsoever.
What these misguided religious zealots conveniently fail to note is that, nowhere in the New Testament, or the other books of the Bible, do Jesus Christ, His apostles, God the Father, the Holy Spirit, Moses, or the Hebrew prophets command the government to take money from its citizens and transfer it to poor people. In fact, the Bible says just the opposite.
God presents us with three general ways in the Bible to take care of the poor and needy: 1) Through the family; 2) Through the church; and 3) Through individual charity. The applicable passages for these three ways are Deut. 14:28, 29, Numbers 18:24, Matthew 6:1-4 and 1 Timothy 5:3-16.
Now, the first two ways are pretty clear. People’s first obligation is to the needy, poor, widowed, and orphaned in their own families. Only after they do this do they have any obligation to help the needy, poor, widowed, and orphaned through their local church organization. God established the pattern for this kind of church giving in Numbers 18:24 and Deuteronomy 14:28, 29. As David Chilton points out in his great book "Productive Christians in an Age of Guilt Manipulators," the bulk of Christian giving to the local church should be geared toward financing professional theologians, experts in biblical law and church discipline, teachers of God’s word and leaders skilled in worship. It was only every third year that all the giving was set aside to help the needy, poor, widowed, and orphaned. Even then, the money was not given just to anyone who showed up. Those able to work but don’t, do not qualify for help. Also, those who have families to take care of them don’t qualify, nor do widows under age 60 qualify, according to the Apostle Paul in 1 Timothy 5:3-16.
Jesus Christ, who is God in the flesh, talks about the third way in Matthew 6. He tells His listeners that they should give individual charity. He also says they should give such charity secretly: “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.”
In other words, God is not a socialist. Nor is he a liberal. In fact, in none of the Bible passages just cited, nor in any others I know of, does Jesus, God or even Moses cite the government as the means by which the poor, needy, widowed and orphaned are housed, clothed and fed.
Thus, a simple, straightforward reading of the Bible, God’s Word, including the "Red Letter" words of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, clearly shows that the American welfare state is anti-God, anti-Christian and unbiblical. Any Christian or Jew who advocates such a government welfare system (including clergymen or women) should be harshly rebuked and disciplined by their church and synagogue congregation or hierarchy. Furthermore, any members of any political party, including Republicans, Democrats, Reform Party members, Libertarians, or whatever, who advocate such a socialist system yet claim to be Christian or Jew should be reprimanded by their fellow brothers and sisters and by all church and synagogue leaders. If any such party members refuse to repent and change their ways, then their names should be posted at their church or synagogue and throughout the whole land so that all Christians and Jews in the United States or elsewhere can know not to vote for these people or place them in positions of authority and leadership.
Of course, all Christians and Jews should encourage families to take care of their own. And, they should also encourage their churches and synagogues to give at least one-third of their gross income to help the poor, needy, widowed, and orphaned.
On that note, it is interesting to recall that the Tenth Commandment in Exodus 20:17 actually protects private property by commanding people not to covet their neighbor’s house or belongings. That commands applies to the average citizen as well as the elected official, the judge and all other government officials.
Furthermore, the Bible condemns laziness and praises hard work. Proverbs 10:4 says, “Lazy hands make a man poor, but diligent hands bring wealth.” Proverbs 14:23 says, “All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.”
Finally, it is interesting to note that, in Mark 7:20-23, not only does Jesus Christ declare that all sex outside of heterosexual marriage, including homosexuality, pre-marital sex and adultery, is evil, he also declares that both greed and envy are evil. Thus, Jesus Christ condemns both the greed of the rich man as well as the greed of the poor man, and the envy of the poor man as well as the envy of the rich man.
Thus, God condemns the politics of envy of the left, and He extols the virtues of hard work and capitalism, not just the value of charity!
Liberals and socialists like the "Red Letter Christians," Sen. Hillary Clinton, Sen. Ted Kennedy, Sen. Barack Obama, and Al Gore are violating the commands of the God of the Bible. If they truly want to follow God, they should stop their ignorant opposition to the conservative movement in America and join it. One of the first things they should do immediately is help cut government programs for the poor.
Americans and Europeans must stop the ungodly, immoral rape of taxpayers by the totalitarian, socialist welfare state of liberalism! They must establish a proper and godly system of family, church and private charity. Everyone should follow God’s clear guidance in this matter. God will reward people mightily for their total obedience in these matters.
Note: A journalist with 20 years of experience, Dr. Snyder has a BA in political science from Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio and a Ph.D. in film studies and communications from Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., where he studied politics and film and political philosophy. He is the author of "Myth Conceptions" (Baker Books) and co-author of "Frodo & Harry: Understanding Visual Media and Its Impact on Our Lives" (Crossway Books). He has done post-graduate work in Christian apologetics, history and philosophy at Simon Greenleaf University and at Answers in Action in Southern California, where he lives with his wife, Jan. You can write to Dr. Snyder at tlsnyder42@yahoo.com.
You read what is not there and then ignore what is really there.
No one at all is opposed to private charity.
Private charities can do 1000 times the work with the same dollar that the government tries to do and botches.
When you by point of gun take away more than 50% of a man/woman’s income you have enslaved him.
When you by forcing another man to neglect his own family for the sake of a corrupt system you have not helped the poor but you have done great damage to the man enslaved.
You are arguing from a false premise.
You are entitled to ignore the real world if you like. You are entitled to pretend that your system actually makes anything better when there is evidence is super abundant evidence that it has only worsened the problem.
You never solve a problem unless you correctly identify the problem, the source and continually evaluate the effectiveness of the solution.
Ok, we have the hypocrite pompous strawman argument.
I don't see the problem.
Is it Reagan? Or is is Memorex?
I'm still waiting for you to show me what's wrong with it.
Take your time.
Correct. But that does not empower the government to spend the tax money anyway they like. Charity is not one of the ways they are supposed to spend it.
I only split it because your argument hangs from it. Without the logical equivalence of "government" and "people", your left with the losing proposition of arguing that federal programs work better then private charity.
So I'm not surprised you object to the distinction.
Your argument appears to be that the government is right and just in fostering poverty.
Right. That is exactly my argument.
LOL.
I'm left with no such thing. I never made this argument nor have I ever believed it.
So I'm not surprised you object to the distinction.
I never objected to this anywhere in any of my posts.
Perhaps you would quote the portion of the Constitution that forbids government charity.
Show me where I was EVER "arguing that federal programs work better then private charity."
Show me my words.
YOU CAN'T because I NEVER have.
I don't even believe such a thing.
Try reading what I actually post instead of assigning me those positions you feel most comfortable arguing against.
Prior to the War On Poverty legislation, The poverty rate was a little over 22%.
government was not intended to rob peter to help paul, but to protect peter’s assets so that he may help paul of his own accord...
right now, government sets the limit of charity, which suffers because government takes a very big cut.
teeman
when government hands out money, it is an entitlement that is expected and accepted without shame or remorse that others are doing without... no gratitude to the people who actually give it to them.
shame is a good motivator to get one working.
teeman
Sorry, you have got it backwards. The 9th Amendment says:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
So as far as the federal government is concerned, they don't have such power unless it is enumerated. So now perhaps you would quote the part of the Constitution that does this...
I didn't say you have. I was pointing out that you were avoiding having to do this by refusing to make a distinction between individuals and government.
I don't even believe such a thing.
Good. Its not a defensible position, so its not surprising your avoiding having to take it, by refusing to distinguish between individuals and government in the context of providing charity.
Try reading what I actually post instead of assigning me those positions you feel most comfortable arguing against.
Good advice. Sometimes I have messed up on what people were saying, and ended up taking back some of what I said. I don't think this is one of those times though. I think you misunderstood me this time.
Consider:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States...
Then consider the social unrest caused by high unemployment and poverty during the depression.
Not Yours To Give
Col. David Crockett
US Representative from Tennessee
One day in the House of Representatives a bill was taken up appropriating money for the benefit of a widow of a distinguished naval officer. Several beautiful speeches had been made in its support. The speaker was just about to put the question when Crockett arose:
“Mr. Speaker—I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the suffering of the living, if there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has not the power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member on this floor knows it.
We have the right as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I ever heard that the government was in arrears to him.
“Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.”
http://www.house.gov/paul/nytg.htm
Rather, they would have used a word like "charity", or "for charitable contributions", or "for the poor". The term "general welfare" already applies to things that the feds were already empowered to do.
Also consider, that if we take a loose flexible interpretation of "general welfare", and if we consider that later Amendments over rule earlier ones where they are in conflict, then congress could claim it empowers them to do just about anything, as long as they feel it is for the "general welfare".
For instance, they could pass a law against the Christian bible because it upsets gay people. For the general welfare you understand. The first amendment swept aside, because it is conflict with "general welfare"...
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