Biblical Freedom

As I read the early chapters of this book, I thought I would probably give it three stars in my review. The author, Wayne Grudem, writes well and his material is well-organized. He also supports his points with researched material, even if he does so in a totally one-sided manner. In the book’s early chapters, he uses a lot of Bible quotes in demonstrating that it’s good for Christians to be involved in politics. And he makes good use of the Bible in the areas where the Bible actually does lend strong support to the Republican stance on a given issue.

Unfortunately, the last two-thirds of the book has very little to do with the Bible. Grudem uses Romans 13:4’s quote that government “is a minister of God to you for good” as an excuse to argue the Republican stance on every issue under the sun. He covers everything from cap and trade to foreign policy, to activist judges, to gun control, to his desire to abolish public schools, to the money supply, to his claims that the media has a liberal bias. And he doesn’t just mention these things in passing, he argues the Republican view on them in great detail. I honestly cannot thing of a single political issue he failed to address. This book does nothing more than take advantage of Christians who were looking for biblical guidance in politics. Once Christians are lured into reading it, Grudem bombards then with the Republican stance on everything.

This should come as no surprise to anyone who reads the preface. In it, Grudem reveals how the book came to be: “Alan Sears and Ben Bull of the Alliance Defense Fund [an extreme right-wing litigation group] first approached me several years ago with the interesting idea of writing a book like this. They were able to provide helpful funding for some aspects of the research and editorial work…” In other words, the Republicans paid him to write this book!

Grudem gives away his Republican bias even more in the book’s disastrous economic section. He repeatedly quotes economists from the right-wing Heritage Foundation and Cato Institute, but fails to look up the numbers for himself to see if they are deceiving. For example, he quotes the Heritage Foundation saying that the 2001 Bush tax cuts actually increased tax revenues in 2005, thus proving that tax cuts always pay for themselves. But anyone who examines Table 6, column 2, of the IRS Data Book can see that we lost over 100 billion dollars a year in tax revenues in 2002 and 2003, thus proving the Bush tax cuts added to our debt. The CBO calculated that they cost us 2.8 trillion dollars in tax revenue in the first ten years. Thus Grudem deceived his readers by relying on Republican research only.

Most appalling of all is Grudem’s repeated arguments to abolish the public school system and replace it a with a voucher system to fund private schools. What he fails to mention is that the reason our colleges are so expensive is that Pell Grants and student loans enable colleges to charge more, because they’d be stupid to pass up all of that free government money. Republicans argue against Pell Grants for this reason, but they fail to mention that Pell Grants are vouchers, where the government gives everyone money to spend where they want. A private school voucher system will make k-12 education unaffordable for most people. Plus, the logistics of driving and busing kids to schools when they are scattered all over the place also puts lower income Americans at a disadvantage and would be a huge headache.

There are many other points I could argue, but that would take too much of your time. My recommendation is that you not waste your time with this book. In the end, it’s just a political book that uses the Bible where convenient.

I’m a former hardcore Republican, turned Republican-leaning independent, turned Democrat-leaning independent, turned moderate registered Democrat. So I appreciate views on both sides, because I’ve been everything along the political spectrum except an extreme liberal or libertarian.

Left Right & Christ got off to a bit of a slow start. The early chapters were a bit vague, thus lowering my expectations. But as the authors got into specific issues, the book delivered and was better than expected.

I was particularly impressed with Lisa Sharon Harper. Most liberal Christian books tend to be high on bleeding-heart liberalism, but light on comprehensive historical and economic facts. I expected Harper to deliver the same thing, but her writing is very well-supported with history. I learned some things from her I didn’t know, and, to me, that’s what books are all about. And even though I’m anti-abortion, I found her understanding of the political realities of this issue to be very helpful.

D.C. Innes writes well, but I was disappointed that such an extremist Republican was chosen to represent the conservative view (but that seems to be the case more and more these days). He says on page 73 that he opposes public schools and school-provided lunches as well as “government environmental protection” and “workplace safety standards.” He says later in the book He wants the Republicans to return to being the party of Reagan, but Reagan was nowhere near this extreme. I wish I could send Innes back 100 years in a time machines so he could experience first hand what a hell hole America was for the working class when there were no worker safety protections (8500 workers killed in the railroad industry alone in 1889) and no environmental protections (the Cuyahoga river caught on fire 13 times from 1868 to 1969, but never since the EPA started in 1971. Meanwhile, Bethlehem was so polluted, only sycamore trees could grow). This guy is not a Reagan Republican; he’s a Gilded Age Robber-Barron Republican. But that seems to be the direction today’s Republican Party has chosen, which is why I finally registered as a Democrat in 2012.

The book’s biggest weakness is that neither author has room to get into any issue in depth. There’s a lot more that could have been said. But it’s still a very worthwhile read. And best of all, it’s one you can recommend to your Christian friends without sounding like an extremist that’s just trying to promote one side of an issue.

I know a man very close to me who has never cared much for going to church. He has never been much of a singer, nor has he ever been moved in a major way by listening to music. He’s not offended by sermons, except on rare occasions. But he’s not excited by them either. He finds church-going to be somewhat of a chore.

He believes in God. He will not dispute what the Bible teaches. Neither does he lead a life full of sins that he would have to give up if he devoted more of his life to serving God. Nonetheless, to focus much of his thinking on God or much of his energy on serving God has never been a priority of his. It always seemed to me that he would never grow closer to God. I had lost hope.

Therefore, I was thrilled when I learned that this man started to attend a weekly men’s Bible study. He told me he did so, because he wanted to learn more about God.

After he attended the study, I asked him how it went. He responded, disappointingly, “They spent most of the time talking about politics. All they could talk about was gay marriage and how they all hated Obama.” This man, however, was a Democrat. He had once been a Republican, but their relentless support for the interests of big industry at the expense of workers, consumers, and the environment turned him away.

This man returned to the study the next several weeks, and the conversation changed very little. He felt left out, that everyone was against him, and that he was wasting his time, because he did not attend the study to hear about politics. That he could do by turning on TV. So he stopped attending the study, and has not returned to a church or Bible study since.

This is what talking about politics in the church can do. It can, and does, drive people away from the church and away from God. Here’s what it doesn’t do: It doesn’t change peoples’ political stances, especially those of older adults. Thus, discussing politics in church isn’t worth it. It does little good and lots of harm. So make a promise to yourself that you will never be the one to bring up political issues in church. When you keep this promise, you will be a peacemaker much like Jesus commanded.

(To enjoy every-verse-method Bible studies that are usually not political, check out my site at www.biblicalfreedom.com)

While, technically, Mayor Bloomberg, of the great city of New York, is an independent, I’ll count him as a Democrat, since he favors business regulations that Republicans throw fits over.

Over the past year, Bloomberg has inspired a lot of controversy by implementing a ban on soft drinks sold in containers larger than 16 ounces (it was supposed to go into effect last month, but it has been held up by the New York state Supreme Court.) This has many conservatives crying that Bloomberg is wrong, and that he is destroying our liberty to sell and buy what we want.

According to Bloomberg, his intention is to battle obesity, which he says is bankrupting our healthcare system and our nation. This is a good intention. Bloomberg is correct in that obesity is a health problem that ruins many American lives. He’s also correct that obesity costs us a lot of money.

Where he is wrong, however, is in failing to compare the costs of obesity to other diseases, like Alzheimer’s. A European study from about 5 years ago demonstrated that Alzheimer’s is far more costly than any other illness. This makes sense. A person who dies from a massive heart attack at 55 only spends a short amount of time in the hospital. On the other hand, Alzheimer’s patients spend years, even decades, in hospitals and in care facilities. So even if we eliminate heart disease and diabetes, these people are likely to suffer from Alzheimer’s and cost the system even more in the long run.

Bloomberg is especially wrong in thinking that his big soda ban will make a dent in the amount of soda people consume. People who want more soda will buy more containers of soda. And this has me wondering whether the true intent of the big soda ban is to actually get people to buy a higher number of sodas, which will earn more money for those who sell them. The price of two 16 oz sodas is more than the cost of a single 32 oz soda. Remember that Bloomberg is a billionaire, so he may be looking out for soda retailers who want to see more units sold.

How does the Bible relate to all of this?

That all depends on Bloomberg’s intentions. If he were banning some sort of unnatural toxin that sickened people, then he would be right in God’s eyes, because he is seeking to protect the common good from being victims of those who would harm others for money. The fact that he would be limiting business liberty would be irrelevant, because people are more important than principles.

However, Bloomberg is really protecting no one, here. Therefore, the Bible does not support him on this issue, but it doesn’t condemn him either. If Bloomberg’s intentions really are to reduce obesity, then he’s not immoral; he’s just simply ineffective. Being ineffective is not sin. It’s just dumb.

(To enjoy every-verse-method Bible studies that are usually not political, check out my site at www.biblicalfreedom.com)

Just this past month, Senator Rob Portman, a Republican from Ohio, reversed his opposition to same-sex marriage. This, of course, caused quite a stir in the political world, since the Republicans have, in recent years, taken a strong stance against gay marriage.

Why did Portman change his mind?

He did so, because his son is gay.

If this sounds familiar, it might be because former Republican Vice President Dick Cheney also favored gay marriage. He did so, because his daughter was a lesbian.

If you oppose the legalization of gay marriage, however, there’s no need to fear. Since only 3% of the population is gay, it’s unlikely that a significant percentage of Republicans will have gay children who cause them reconsider their stance.

Nonetheless, the simple fact that Republicans who have close personal relationships with homosexuals change their views is cause to question what Republicans are all about. This is because those who are “in touch” with homosexuals tend to have a more merciful stance; while those who are out of touch remain merciless. If being out of touch is necessary to hold a Republican stance on gay marriage, perhaps other Republican stances are also the result of being out of touch.

Many Republicans hold a merciless stance on torture. One major exception – Senator John McCain. Why? Because he was tortured as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. He’s “in touch” with those who are tortured.

At one time I was a hard-core conservative Republican who held a merciless stance toward the poor. To me, they were lazy, stupid people who deserved poverty. I not only opposed welfare, but I desired a flat tax, so the poor would pay their fair share. Then I found myself making little more than minimum wage and realized I could not have afforded to pay a higher tax, because I needed every penny just to get by. A flat tax would have cost me my heat and the rest of my food.

I worked my way to higher income jobs as the years passed, however, perhaps proving right the Republican belief that hard work leads to prosperity. But then, in 2007, I found myself unemployed, despite all of my years of hard work and avoidance of alcohol, drugs and even cigarettes.

These personal experiences obliterated my mercilessness toward the poor. The major difference between me and these aforementioned Republican politicians, however, is that I left the Republican Party. I simply find its mercilessness to be downright anti-Christian. This is not to say I agree with the Democrats on everything, especially abortion. But even their abortion stance is merciful to girls in difficult situations. So I understand their stance, even if I don’t agree. But the Republicans seem to be merciless to all, except, of course, when it’s personal.

(To enjoy every-verse-method Bible studies that are usually not political, check out my site at www.biblicalfreedom.com)

Welcome back to the Biblical Freedom blog. The blog is now taking a new direction. In the past, I posted every-verse method Bible studies. Going forward, however, this blog will focus on my views as a politically-moderate Christian.

In our current hyper-partisan political landscape, it’s easier than ever to get sucked in to believing that one party is right and the other is evil. When this happens, the parties dictate Christianity to us. This creates in us a tendency to twist our Christianity to fit our politics, and that’s idolatry.

As I scour the internet and the TV, all I can find is extreme right wing and extreme left wing sites and programming. It seems as if everything is run by the parties and no one has an open mind. This is even true in the case of Christian media. Whether we read books like God’s Politics by Jim Wallis or Politics According to the Bible by Wayne Grudem, we find that one says the Democrats align with God’s will on all issues and the other says the Republicans align with God’s will on all issues. This, of course, is highly improbable. What are the chances that with all of the issues under the sun, and all of the thoughts and cultures in history, that a single American political party will have all the answers?

Therefore, in hopes of giving Christians a break from being dominated by political parties, I’ve chosen to launch the Politically-Moderate Christian blog. With it I intend to warn Christians of anti-biblical political rhetoric, even that which quotes Bible passages but distorts their meaning. I hope to post something at least once a week.

Enjoy!

(To enjoy every-verse-method Bible studies that are usually not political, check out my site at www.biblicalfreedom.com )

What better time to address this subject than when we’re less than two weeks away from the debt ceiling deadline. Our hyper-polarized government is stuck in gridlock, nether side willing to budge on the promises they made to those who voted for them. Yet disaster is certain if they can’t come to some sort of compromise. It’s like having two co-captains of a ship, and one insists on going left to avoid the iceberg ahead and the other insists on going right, and neither will give in, so the ship is doomed unless someone finally does.

Some will say that the system is broken and must be dismantled. They are wrong. The system isn’t broken. The system was never fully functional in the first place.

Why?

Because it’s man-made. And anything man-made is going to have serious flaws, because every member of mankind has serious flaws. And one of those flaws is that we’re far from being all-knowing. Our minds can’t come close to handling all of the variables and psychologies that go into voting, economics, etc. Only God has perfect knowledge, and only He can design a perfect system.

Is there another system I think would be better? Sorry, I think democracy is the best system humans have ever devised. But that doesn’t mean it’s not flawed, nor should we give it the level of praise that only God deserves.

We Christians take great pride in the superiority of American democracy. It’s one of the main reasons that we hear Christian Americans repeatedly saying that America is the greatest country on earth. We tend to look down on other nations who have a different system, even to the point where we’re willing to take military action against them.

Yet, if our system are so much better than that of the other nations, why do we have such difficulties? Maybe it’s time for us American Christians to stop singing the praises of our system, and, in humility, admit that nothing we create is all that worthy of praise. Only God can create perfection, so let us transfer to Him the glory that we’ve been misdirecting toward our man-made systems and solutions.

Last week I wrote of a church service in which “You’re a Grand Old Flag” was sung as a worship song. The pastor’s message in that service was that America is a Christian nation. He spoke of monuments in Washington DC that had Christian inscriptions on them. He told us that this was God’s chosen country, much like Israel was, and that we had to ensure that our legislation forced all Americans to follow Christian morality.

In more recent times, I’ve seen Glenn Beck also insist that our nation is God’s chosen, but Beck takes the idea further to a dangerous level. He, as well as many of his Fox News colleagues, intertwines Christian values with American values, so that every value that conservatives consider to be American is now Christian because this is God’s country. Thanks to these teachings, many Americans see everything from capitalism to freedom to lowering taxes to patriotism as Christian, even though they are unbiblical.

The danger here is that when we allow ourselves to see our nation’s values as being one-in-the-same as God’s values, we unknowingly replace God’s biblical values with those of our nation, and then our nation becomes our god.

Beck may like to compare ideas he opposes to Nazi Germany, but Germany incited its religious folk to support its evil doings by getting them to think that God’s will was the same as the will of the nation, thus replacing their allegiance to God with allegiance to the nation. So ironically Beck’s approach is similar to Germany’s and just about every other nation in history that has used religion as a rallying point to gain support for evil.

Let’s not fall for scams like these. The first century Christians in the Bible weren’t worried about being good Romans first. They concerned themselves with being Christians first. They weren’t impressed with the fact that Rome was the world’s most powerful, most accomplished nation. They didn’t make it their god because it had founding fathers or because many soldiers sacrificed their lives for its sake. They placed God’s biblical will ahead of all else and only accepted Roman values that were consistent with those of the Bible. That’s the approach that God calls us to take as well.

(To learn more, go to www.biblicalfreedom.com and read studies that examine every Bible verse addressing various issues.)

On this day of celebration of our nation’s independence, I thought it would be the right moment to give a little reminder to Christians about how far we should take our love of country. Living just a few miles from Philadelphia, our nation’s birthplace, I’ve taken many an opportunity to relish in our nation’s place in history as one of the world’s most amazing success stories in both prosperity and quality of life for its people. But despite the great privilege God has given us to live in such a place, we must take care not to worship the gift, but rather the Giver, just as we must not worship created things like the sun, but rather the Creator.

I’ve been in more than one church service over the years which has included the singing of patriotic songs during the service. God Bless America is the only song that has not offended me, since the lyrics are directed toward God. It’s like a prayer. America the Beautiful, however,  is sung to America, so it’s inappropriate for a church service, but at least it calls for God to “shed His grace on thee”.

The most idolatrous song I’ve ever heard in a 4th of July church service is You’re a Grand Old Flag. The song is sung directly to a piece of material made with human hands. It’s the purest form of idolatry. Today churches often equate our love of things and entertainment with idolatry, but the idolatry that angers God over and over again throughout the Bible is that of making something with human hands and worshiping it.  In a church service, only God is to be praised. While we may thank God for our nation, we may never sing it’s praises in church. Our government, constitution, and flag are all made by humans, and nothing made by humans is ever to be placed on the same level as God, being worthy of worship.