I am happy Mr. Beckel has had, according to your information, a change of heart regarding Christ. But political belief and religious belief are in fact inseparable. Not in the denominational sense, of course, but in the natural law sense, upon which our Constitution and its form of government is based.
As for Mr. Beckel’s conformance to the Ten Commandments, I take him to be a sincere person who has up till now expressed an uncritical support for people and ideas which clearly do run against the divine law.
Socialism in particular, especially when it has metastasized to communism, is the setting up of the State as a direct and intentional substitute for God, from whom one is expected to derive all sustenance, all moral guidance, even the creation or destruction of any and all rights. This is brazen idolatry, and violates both the first and the second commandments.
The tenth commandment is to not covet your neighbor’s stuff. Yet socialism demands covetousness as a requirement of its evangelists, because it is for lack of having my neighbors income, or my neighbor’s genes, or my neighbor’s gender, that I am supposed to acquire the “moral courage” to demand equality. Nothing could be more profoundly anti-God, and more like something forged in the bowels of Hades, than this requirement of socialism to defy the very heart of God’s law.
As for lying (or more precisely bringing false testimony against one’s neighbor), I am happy to give Mr. Beckel the benefit of the doubt and assume he is personally honest as far as any fallen human can be. But again, socialism, because it defies the natural law, is denying reality itself, and is necessarily built on a foundation of lies, and requires its best practitioners to use lies as a means of “creating new truth.”
Therefore, to the extent Mr. Beckel is a “true believer,” he is merely an innocent dupe of more obscure and cynical figures hiding in the shadows. But to the extent he uses party spin without a moral reference point to check him, he must own that as contributing with intent to the deception of innocent people.
Conversion experiences are great, but if God is genuinely involved, there will be profound changes to how a person conducts their life. The Holy Spirit will not leave a person comfortable with evil. If he has become a person led by God’s Spirit, I have every confidence he will eventually forsake the public evil of his support for liberal policies and persons. But all in God’s good time.
It would seem to me by your criteria mentioned for being a Christian, no citizens of the UK, Ireland, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Poland, France, Italy, Canada, Japan, etc. who likes their own country’s government, could possibly be a Christian, since all are more socialist than the USA.
Of course the USA is quite socialist in certain areas, (with very bipartisan support) like agriculture, medicare & social security.
So are Christians who receive benefits in those areas defective, compromising, Christians?
I agree, socialism moves toward substituting government for God—and it is no accident that some of the most socialist countries in the world are also the most godless... However its a very broad brush to judge some individual you do not know—except for his political rhetoric—as to his individual devotion to Jesus Christ.
There are unfortunately a lot of conservatives...going to hell...and not a few socialists...who aren’t. Who knows what ratio—and that doesn’t contradict that limited government is indeed a better system, for godly people anyway.
Again, very dangerous, regarding individuals, to mix politics and religion in evaluating them.
You have no idea where they are coming from or where they are going...