“Just as Death and Destruction are never satisfied, so human desire is never satisfied.”
Proverbs 27:20 NLT
Today is Memorial Day and on this day in America we honor those soldiers who fell in war.
The other day a sitting Congresswoman, Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, gave a speech, oddly behind bullet proof glass, in which she proclaimed it was time for the north to “roll up” on the south. The obvious logic of the statement, as with all rhetoric from socialists, is war language. Why? Because socialism-Marxism is a war theology of revolution. It’s the product of greed and envy and sold in the name of Utopianism and justice. No epistemically consistent Christian can be a socialist for the simple reason that it attempts to establish justice on earth not through the gospel reigning freely in the hearts of the people, but through government coercion and force. For this reason, on Memorial Day, it’s appropriate to point out to the Lord’s people in America the nature of the battle. And it is. Make no mistake.
But the thing is, the battle that’s coming unless the Lord intervenes is because the church has lost her way. She’s fighting idolatry with politics. You see, the congresswoman sees herself as a champion of the poor. That’s not true. Christ is. She offers a poison pill of radical humanism to fix the problems of sin without repentance. Are we ready to counter that false gospel of Marxism with Christ? It’s to this purpose that this is offered.
The answer to this coming war with radical modern marxists is our submission to God and prayer. Politics and culture are downstream. We conveniently forget that God very often punished Israel with pagan nations because of their unrepentant sin and syncretism. Do we think we are any different today? In fact, if the counter arguments Christians make to budding socialists are evidence, we are worse! Yes, worse.
To answer the socialist ideology and its pretense of concern for the poor and powerless with anything but the gospel of evidence that we are unfaithful.
Let’s be blunt: greed is a sin. Envy is a sin. But many Christians become so invested in the so-called culture war that they forget to point that out. This is often due to an unhealthy attachment to their wealth and money and the fear that they’ll lose these things through politics. But the law of the Lord and faith in Christ is more precious than fine gold (i.e., any material possession we could ever have) and sweeter than honey (i.e., any physical pleasure) and those are ours in Him! That a socialist congresswoman decries greed in America is a wonderful opportunity to point out what true greed is and how it’s a sin. And, alas, the answer to sin is always Jesus Christ. Easy. The answer isn’t government forcing people to be charitable saints, but the repentance of sin and faith in Christ reigning in the hearts of free men and women abounding to charity in the name of the Lord!
Make no mistake, the love of money/wealth is idolatry. It causes stress and conflict because it believes that what one has is what secures him/her instead of the Lord. A fascinating thing can happen in our war with the world, the flesh, and Satan and that is we can become so angry at one of his ploys that we end up being guilty in reverse.
For example, the fact that socialism is organized covetousness and theft causes some of us to be so anti-socialist that we forget to preach the excellencies of God’s true love for the poor via biblical economics. Rapacious profit seekers who love money at all costs and have scheme upon scheme to make more money may have not committed a crime but they certainly aren’t biblical. The thought that no one should be forced to give under compulsion doesn’t mean our hearts shouldn’t ache over the abuse of the poor via abusive interest rates and never-ending debt cycles. In Israel the Lord established a Sabbath year where all debts were erased. Every seven years! Such is His concern for the evil tendency of the powerful to abuse the powerless through neglect. Do we flippantly say, “well, everyone has to make their own choices” as a way of exonerating our system? Don’t be fooled: America’s economic system is not biblical. Yes, it’s better than socialism but we must understand the Scripture in order to effectively and truthfully counter the arguments inspired by Marx.
Socialism isn’t the answer to poverty and the abuse of power by the wealthy. Socialism is a power-grab itself in the name of opposition to power-grabs. But true biblical justice to the poor is what the Christian should know and express to the world. Railing against socialism without bringing the argument around to Jesus Christ, the forgiveness of sin, and pointing out how socialism is a counterfeit gospel trying to steal God’s jubilee, is a grave error on our part.
If our aim is to encourage and develop a Godly society of justice and peace we must know that such is only possible when hearts are melted through the love of Christ. Unless sin is beaten back, stuffed down, and personally hated, which is only possible through the love of God poured into our hearts by grace, we cannot find justice. Unless there is repentance of sin there is and can never be justice because the heart that won’t submit to God’s law will never love his neighbor, but use him. Or worse, if he gains the power. Any attempt to establish a kingdom on earth without the gospel is treason against Christ. Therefore, a Christian socialist is a contradiction in terms. A culture built on humanism is a brutal tyranny.
It is Christ who sacrificed Himself so that we might live.
Man’s systems – especially socialism – sacrifice countless lives in the false name of equality.
Again, unless sin is repented of in Christ, and paid for by Him on the cross, there is never peace.
Our obsession with stuff, with material wealth, is because we suffer under the weight of fear. Of what? Of judgment due to our sin. Greed is a symptom of the greater disease of our attempt to be secure without repentance of sin and faith in Christ. Our attitude towards money and business, and our resulting conduct, is the surest mirror of the condition of our soul. There are those who name the name of Christ who chase the idol of wealth and success and sin in order to do so. They’re careful, though. They cover their greed with a battalion of half-truths. Lies, in reality, of course.
We must all be vigilant, therefore.
What will we do to attain our position, our property, our job? Will we truly trust the Lord or will we sin. Will we step over others? Will we betray? Will we do what’s almost right rather than what is right? Don’t be deceived…this spiritual battle is one we must all fight. It strikes at the very core of who we are. What do we truly want? If it’s wealth – in whatever manifestation – we will use others as a means to that end. If it’s the Lord then we will use the talents He’s given us to glorify Him and serve others.
These are the only two options.
Every one of us must and will choose a road.
That said, like a boxer who jogs every morning and watches his diet, who keeps his hands up in training, we must guard our hearts with the truth of God lest we fall victim to covetousness.
“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.“
Matthew 6:19-21, 24-34 ESV
To defeat the idolatry of socialism with the world’s weapons won’t work simply because it’s a product of sin and the Enemy in the first place. Let us love the Lord and seek Him first and always. And let us do that before the world, preaching His name, and showing how He upholds His people who are humble before Him. Let us show the world the Way. Let us lead them by our lives to the reality that it is God who saves, not man and his sinful governments. Christ died for all so that we might have life. Let us show that today, on Memorial Day, so that others won’t have to die for the idols of man.
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