Posted on 01/31/2012 7:05:50 PM PST by billflax
It’s fascinating how frequently modern dilettantes re-make Christ in their image via Matthew 25. Socialists finesse Scripture to justify redistributing wealth to “the least of these” (Matthew 25:40), while capitalists overplay the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30). Both tout Christ’s teachings as a trump card.
Other passages are mentioned. Socialists highlight descriptions in Acts of voluntary, privately orchestrated, local and temporary communalization to prescribe permanent, coerced communism under a distant, godless government. But Matthew 25 leads from both directions.
The rapidity and carelessness of these misappropriations of “End Time” parables startles anyone who actually reads Matthew 25. Either these essential lessons are torn from context transforming Christ into favored worldly philosophers, or he contradicted himself within several sentences.
He demanded sustenance for “the least of these” twenty seconds after declaring “For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” Like most of Christ’s ministry, Matthew 25 teaches spiritual lessons. We are to serve Christ with all our talent which entails supporting brothers and sisters being persecuted. The “least of these” in Matthew 25 are Believers enduring the tribulation described in Matthew 24.
Taking these passages in an economic sense eschews their essential meaning. Christ’s mission wasn’t to elevate our physical status, but to redeem mankind. Christ came to ransom sinners, not to cure cancer and extend voting rights; nor implement free markets. He comforted temporal afflictions to authenticate his claims so we’d believe, not for physical comfort.
Politicians expand power by sowing discontent with our worldly estates relative to others – what the Bible calls covetousness. Demagogues encourage jealousy to justify looting taxpayers. They violate the eighth and tenth commandments through programs enabling recipients to avoid the fourth commandment’s requirement of work.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
“He who does not have a sword, should sell his cloak and buy one.”
That pic is border line blasphemous.
I say borderline, because Christ would never smoke.
A socialist works with imperfect people who do not necessarily believe in God, they believe in government. In fact, you could say their government is their god.
Actually, Jesus is a monarchist - of the absolute variety.
who says that’s tobacco (duck’n & runn’n)
the Man did drink. that is documented.
and yet a quite unusual one, because he yielded himself to be a sacrifice for the sake of his voluntary subjects.
I was thinking more like a Benevolent Dictator :)
Yes, he did drink wine, but it was not like the wine they drink today.
Plus he drank it with a meal, not to get sloshed.
I guess I have too much respect to ever consider posting an image of my God with a cigarette in His mouth.
It just reeks of what the left would do to marginalize Him so that they will feel less sinful.
Capitalism and Christianity both emphasize personal responsibility. You’re free to choose your fate, your financial fate and the fate of your soul. Some will refuse to work and be poor. Some will go to Hell. This is inherently “unfair” in the eyes of the left. Nevertheless, it’s reality. The very idea that Christ was a Socialist or a leftist is absurd.
Nobody has shown that modern Jews do not have the same potency of traditional wine that existed in the days of the 2nd temple. Even if the concord grape is a modern innovation (Mogen David is actually pretty good stuff, if seeming to want peanut butter along with it). Baptist-style parsing over “new wine” and “grape juice” is colossally unconvincing to me.
Being a divine soul in union with a mortal-style body, it also appeared logical to me that Jesus would have a choice about how intoxicated/tipsy/drunk/etc. he would actually get from a given quantity of alcohol. We can see a pale shadow of this sort of power in the way that some Zen monks manage to melt off a number of frozen robes during their ordeals (and this isn’t even Christian).
He was Messiah. He is Messiah.
And Paul was a tent maker. He said he could have survived on contributions of the faithfull but he earned his living to be an example.
And the only legitimate king was Him. Everyone who claimed to be a king was a liar.
It can be argued that Marxism is radical Christianity without Jesus. It was embraced by agnostics, marginalized people, anti clerics and others who had come to shun or have an antipathy to religion. The devotion of these people was as fervent and passionate as the most dedicated Christian. Of course communism was a rotten enterprise to its very core. The suffering and deaths of millions is well known. But it is interesting that its fervent followers did need a “god” like figure at its head. Stalin, Lenin , Mao and other communist leaders were deified and literally worshiped by their followers.
Didn’t Jesus’ political advisor burn Bush? So he’s a socialist? /S
Jesus Christ set up his form of >government in ancient Israel as set out in the Old Testament. Jesus provided for:
1. A 10% flat tax.
2. A Theocracy. (God is ultimately in charge.)
These ‘truths’ found in the Bible should always be pointed out when anyone makes claims about the ‘type’ of >government Jesus wants!
Jesus, himself, wants -everything- from all of us (even from the people that say they don’t believe in God). Unfortunately, a lot of people think -they are ‘God’- & they have the >right to everything that belongs to someone else. —Even when all that ‘someone’ has is life itself!—
Joel3:10, “Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears; let the weak man say, >I am a warrior!”
Luke 12:49-53
“I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled! have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. For from now on in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”
While living among us Christ was all human. He got hungry, tired, happy, and even angry,( He got righteously angry, and He did not sin by hating while being angry) and if He drank too much He could have gotten drunk.
The difference is He had 100% faith and that is why He was able to perform miracles. Remember, He told his disciples, if they had the faith of a mustard sea they could command a mountain to be thrown into the sea. They could do what he did if they had the faith He had. We still could, IF WE HAD THE FAITH HE SPOKE OF, but alas we are weak in our faith.
His disciples did have faith, and some performed miracles like Peter and Paul did, but even they admitted their faith was weak. Peter denied Christ 3 times, and all abandoned Him in His hour of need for fear of being arrested and harmed.
Ultimately Jesus died, which proves He was all Human. One must believe He was all Human when He walked among us, or else His perfect life would not have been good enough to be the perfect unblemished sinless sacrifice that died for the sins of mankind. He had to live the perfect sinless life as a man, not as a God. Remember, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death.
Smoking is a sin against your body. That is not a baptist thing, it is reality. Your body is your a type of a temple of God. We fail to treat it as so, and that is one of the many reasons Jesus died for us, because we fail to treat it as His temple.
So I re-iterate, Christ could have, but never did drink enough to get drunk, and he never ever would have smoked. That is a sin against one self, and Jesus was sinless.
Just look at Occupy Wall Street. They started off with theft and it didn't take a month before their were into violence. And how many deaths have there been at their camps?
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