Benefiting at another’s expense

I just got my paycheck today and saw that I am about $20 richer than I was last pay period, before Obama’s stimulus package went into effect. My unemployed husband and I sometimes struggle to make ends meet, so any extra money that comes in truly is a blessing from the Lord.

But I am not doing cartwheels. Why? Because two of my friends, a married couple with two incomes, are paying dearly for the tax break I was given, to the tune of a $7,000 tax increase per year. Small business owners also are footing the bill for Obama’s apparent largess.

In addition, my friends’ children and grandchildren will be paying for Obama’s $800 billion in deficit spending for years to come.

Currently, U.S. federal debt obligations exceed the Gross Domestic Product not just of the United States, but of the entire world. “The total U.S. obligations, including Social Security and Medicare benefits to be paid in the future, effectively have placed the U.S. government in bankruptcy, even before new continuing social welfare obligations embedded in the massive spending plan are taken into account,” says economist John Williams, quoted in WorldNetDaily.

“In the seven years of GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Practices) reporting, we have seen an annual average deficit in excess of $4 trillion, which could not be possibly covered by any form of taxation," says Williams.

“Put simply, there is no way the government can possibly pay for the level of social welfare benefits the federal government has promised unless the government simply prints cash and debases the currency, which the government will increasingly be doing this year,” Williams says.

Last month, Christianity Today’s liveblog cited an anti-stimulus ad that had Christian economic professors among its signatories (“Losing Faith in the Stimulus”). A number of readers attacked the professors for their stand. One person wrote, “I know some people in need are in that position because of their own mistakes and poor choices, but I don’t see that as a Scriptural reason not to reach out in compassion.”

My question is this: how is it “compassionate” to demand that future generations pay for other people’s poor choices? Furthermore, as Christians we need to consider the stewardship implications of passing on such onerous debt to our nation's children.

Would I prefer not to receive that extra 20 bucks every two weeks? Let’s put it this way: I would prefer to live a country where all people are free to keep the fruits of their labors, so it can be saved, invested, spent or given away as each family sees fit.

The Greatest Social Need

A timeless reminder from Christianity Today: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/january/20.18.html

May Christians Vote for the Lesser of Two Evils?

The following is an excerpt from an article that was written before the outcome of Tuesday’s elections, but I feel it is worth posting. For the full article and URL, click here: http://www.visionforumministries.org/issues/ballot_box/sen_john_mccains_record_on_lif.aspx

Sen. Barack Obama’s ardent support of abortion is evil. Yet Sen. John McCain’s less active support of abortion is evil as well. While Sen. McCain’s advocacy for abortion is less pronounced than his opponent, he nonetheless condones the shedding of innocent blood in some circumstances — something God Almighty abhors (Proverbs 16:16-17).

In view of this fact, many well-thinking Christians have asked this important question: Should we vote for the lesser-of-two-evils in this circumstance? If we believe Sen. Obama will vociferously promote abortion, while Sen. McCain will be less of an advocate for the murder of the innocent, should we cast our vote for the latter?

To answer this question rightly, we must turn to God’s Word, the ultimate source of authority that gives us everything we need for life and practice — including a theory of ethics on how we should approach choosing civil magistrates:

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

In considering our duties at the ballot box, we cannot appeal to our human autonomy in deciding this question; we must bow our knees to God’s inscripturated Revelation. William Einwechter states the matter succinctly, “In voting, the question is not, ‘What makes the most sense to me?’ but rather, ‘What does God’s Word require of me?’”

In short, whatever God says goes. To quote the prophet Moses, “What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.” (Deuteronomy 12:32).

So just what are the biblical requirements for choosing civil rulers? To explore this question in detail, we would urge you to examine William Einwechter’s excellent article, “Biblical Standards for Choosing Civil Magistrates.” For the purpose of this discussion, we offer these brief thoughts.

Exodus 18:21 is among the primary biblical texts that establish the requirements for choosing magistrates:

Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens.

One of the chief qualifications for rulers found in this passage is that they “fear God.” Elsewhere, King David affirms: “He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God” (2 Samuel 23:3).

How do we know if a respective ruler fears the Lord? Among the most important indicators are these: that he hates evil (Proverbs 8:13) and is committed to executing justice as God prescribes (Romans 13:3-4; Psalm 82:1-4; Jeremiah 22:1-3; 7:4-7).

One of God’s primary mandates to civil rulers is to protect the shedding of innocent blood (Deuteronomy 19:10; Exodus 23:7) and to punish those who take life unlawfully (Genesis 9:6; Deuteronomy 19:13) so that evil will be purged out of the land.

A God-fearing ruler will hate what God abhors — including the murder of the innocent (Proverbs 16:16-17), and he will not hesitate to use every means within his duly-constituted power to protect the lives of the defenseless (Proverbs 24:11-12).

Civil rulers who support the shedding of innocent blood invite God’s judgment upon a nation (2 Kings 21:2-4; 24:2-4) and should expect His wrath as punishment (Psalm 106:37-42).

Being mindful of these truths, our nation’s founders wisely recognized the right to life as an inalienable right in our Declaration of Independence, and the framers of our Constitution affirmed this same principle in the Fifth Amendment to the Bill of Rights. The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution sought to further protect this inalienable right.

The legal sanctioning of abortion as well as embryonic stem cell research directly violates our nation’s charter documents, but more important than this, these heinous practices violate the fundamental order that God established for His creation and commanded civil rulers to oppose in their jurisdictional posts as God’s ministers of justice (Romans 13:3-4; Jeremiah 22:1-3; 7:4-7).

What then of the lesser-of-two-evils argument? If only two candidates appear to have a reasonable chance of gaining the presidency, should we support the one whose advocacy of the evil practice of abortion is likely to lead to fewer unborn babies killed?

The answer is no, for God holds men accountable for how they steward their individual vote — whether or not they cast it for a biblically-qualified candidate — not for the outcome of an election.

Man’s whole duty is to fear God and keep His commandments (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14). We are thus not permitted to break His law in seeking to influence the outcome of an election, even when we believe that our vote could “save more lives.” The Almighty Sovereign governs the affairs of men and nations (Daniel 4:34-35; Ephesians 1:11; Isaiah 46:9-11); and it is He, not finite voters, Who ultimately raises up and brings down the rulers He wills should rule (Daniel 4:17, 25, 32; Psalm 75:6-7), whether they be good (Psalm 78:66-72) or evil (Exodus 9:14-15).

When it comes to our vote in an election, the standard is clear: Duty is ours; the results are God’s. Voting for a lesser-of-two-evils candidate is not a lawful option for us to pursue. God will raise up whom He wills; let us trust Him to decide the election as He deems best.

While their advocacy varies by degrees, both Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain support abortion in some circumstances and are thus disqualified from receiving our vote to serve as rulers in the civil realm. Neither man “fears God,” and neither man should receive the support of God-fearing Christians.

Might abortions increase if Sen. Obama is elected as America’s next president? Quite possibly. But as believers, we must fear God more than man. We must fear violating the standards established by our great Creator in how we cast our vote even more than we fear the potential results of a Barack Obama presidency.

Such is our duty before the Lord.

How can we vote for evil and expect to get good government?

Over the years around election time, I’ve heard many conservative Christians grudgingly state that they plan to “hold their noses” and vote for what they consider the “lesser” of two evils. This year is no different, apparently. When faced with the possibility of an Obama presidency, many evangelicals acknowledge that John McCain’s record on promoting righteous government hasn’t been much better. They realize that while McCain claims to be “proudly pro-life,” he has hardly been stalwart in his defense of the unborn, our nation’s most vulnerable citizens. He did not support Congressman Ron Paul’s Sanctity of Life Act, which would have ended abortion.

McCain also has stated that he does not favor overturning Roe v. Wade and has been endorsed by the pro-abortion PAC Republicans for Choice (http://sweetness-light.com/archive/shocker-republicans-for-choice-endorse-mccain). In addition, McCain was a member of the infamous Gang of 14 senators whose purpose was to oppose pro-life, strict constructionist judges (http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/blog/g/74897dbc-8491-49fb-a5ff-e7ca7b1c9ac5). He voted for pro-abortion Supreme Court justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg and has voted many times to increase federal funding for abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood.

Considering that many who plan to vote for McCain will do so because of his perceived commitment to family values, McCain is far from being a paragon of virtue in that area. His biographer, Robert Timberg, chronicled McCain’s numerous sexual affairs with subordinates both when he was an executive officer and later squadron commander in the U.S. Navy. Joel Skousen’s World Affairs Brief, 2-1-08, states: “McCain cheated on his first wife after she had a severe accident. He then divorced her and married his multimillionaire mistress…”

When it comes to governmental ethics, McCain’s record has been abysmal. He was a ringleader of the infamous Keating Five ethical scandal, which cost taxpayers $160 billion and through which many elderly investors were defrauded and lost their life’s savings (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five). He also used his influence as senator to have his POW records permanently sealed from public scrutiny, most likely due to allegations that he collaborated with the enemy (http://www.vietnamveteransagainstjohnmccain.com/). Even more reprehensible, McCain, along with Senator John Kerry, blocked congressional efforts to locate abandoned POWs who were still being held prisoner in Laos and Vietnam (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_in_action).

Finally, McCain supported the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street, showing that he is willing to force American taxpayers to pay for the poor choices of wealthy corporations.

Conservative Christians are quick to point out all of Obama’s flaws (and they are many) but are strangely silent when it comes to the evil McCain has done while in public office. When they are confronted with these things, the typical response is, “But we HAVE to vote for McCain to prevent Obama from becoming president!” Their support for McCain is based on nothing more than fear. They are so afraid of a greater evil that they are willing to vote for a lesser evil. But to me, choosing our leaders out of fear does not seem to be compatible with God’s standard, the Bible. 2 Samuel 23:3 states, “He that rules over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God.” Since God wants rulers to govern justly, it follows that He expects His people to choose righteous leaders when given the opportunity and not to settle for any kind of evil, whether greater or lesser.

What few conservative Christians are aware of today is that there is a truly righteous candidate running for president: Chuck Baldwin, a born-again Christian and pastor of Crossroad Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida. He is running on the Constitution Party ticket, the fastest-growing third-party in America (to find out more, visit www.constitutionparty.com). He has been endorsed by Republican Congressman Ron Paul, is a staunch defender of the unborn, and fully supports the U.S. Constitution. Unlike McCain—who voted to give Social Security dollars to illegal aliens and whose Hispanic outreach director, Juan Hernandez, is known for his “Mexico First” declarations—Baldwin will protect our borders and has said that his first official act as president would be to free border agents Ramos and Compean.

When I tell my fellow conservatives that they have the chance to vote for a genuine man of God who is unequivocally committed to the ideals of individual liberty, limited government, and America’s national sovereignty, they tell me to “get real” because Chuck Baldwin has no chance of winning, as if choosing goodness is supposed to be based on whether it has a “chance” of prevailing (if America’s founders had thought that way, we’d still be subjects of Great Britain). Some Republicans have told me that if I vote for McCain, I would really be voting for Sarah Palin, even though she has stated that if McCain enacts any public policies that violate her principles, she will be forced to stand by his decisions.

This past Saturday, a volunteer for McCain’s campaign stopped by our apartment, asking my husband and me if the Republican Party can count on our support for McCain. We told him that we had already voted for Chuck Baldwin and explained why (and there are many more reasons than those I’ve listed here). The volunteer said that he was aware of all of McCain’s deficiencies and agreed with us that Baldwin would be a much better choice. He admitted that the only reason he was supporting McCain was out of fear of Obama.

If Christians are not supposed to fear the enemy of our souls, why are we so afraid of man that we won’t even consider voting for a truly righteous candidate? Why not choose goodness and trust the outcome to God?

How can we vote for evil and expect to get good government?

For an excellent review of the current political dilemma we are facing in America, check out the following three articles:

Today's Christians: No Hope in God's Way
http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/c2008/cbarchive_20080709.html

Three Peas in a Pod
http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/c2008/cbarchive_20080516.html

Conservatives Offer No Hope
http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/c2008/cbarchive_20080311.html

Urgent message from Focus on the Family

I don't agree with everything James Dobson says, but this is right on. I urge you to read it and share it with anyone else who cares about our nation's economic future.

Dear Friends:

In recent months, I've become friends with Glenn Beck, one of the few conservative commentators on CNN who also hosts his own national radio talk show. You may have heard me discuss current events with Mr. Beck on a few occasions in the past. I appreciate his firm grasp of the values we hold dear and his ability to use humor to address some very serious issues.
One of those concerns is our national budget, a subject on which Mr. Beck offered some insightful commentary during his CNN program on March 26th. A transcript of those remarks, edited for clarity, is included below. (Brace yourself, because he opened with a scary but phony news story.)

"Right now, we are getting word from my newsroom that says scientists are tracking a large asteroid that appears to be heading towards Earth. Information is coming in right now. Initial reports say the impact will be around the year 2019 and the consequences could be 'catastrophic.'

The president has just released a statement. He will be speaking here in just a few minutes. Apparently his message is, 'The threat is real, it is dire, and we have decided to let the next administration figure it out.'

'Let me ask you something--first of all, there's no asteroid headed our way. If that were real, would you be sharpening the end of your pitchfork and driving to Washington [to demand action from our leaders]? Yes, of course you would. We're going to let the next administration figure it out?

If there was an asteroid [coming our way], we would take care of it. And there is an economic asteroid, and no one seems to care. The Social Security and Medicare trustees--and I use that term loosely because it has the word 'trust' in the center--released their annual report yesterday. The news isn't really good.

This year, 2008, Medicare will pay out more in benefits than it takes in from taxes. Got it? The same thing happens to Social Security in 2017. That's when the government will have to start paying back all the money it has stolen from the people from the Social Security "lock box" [that doesn't exist] over the years, something that could be a little dicey considering the fact--you might have heard this--we're out of money!

By 2019, Medicare becomes completely insolvent. And by 2041, Social Security runs dry.

Great. By most estimates, this is a $53 trillion asteroid.

Now, you find one person--if you can find them, I'll pay you--that's credible on either side of the aisle that disputes the size of this threat or how quickly it's coming. In fact, most would say the dates and the figures I just gave you are conservative.

So, why is it no one's doing anything about it? If there were a real asteroid, do you think we'd allow our leaders to keep passing the next buck to the next administration until we could actually see the flying rock in the sky?

We're not only letting [our leaders] get away with that, we're letting them do something worse. We're letting them actually go out into space, and they're [asking] 'I wonder if we could make the asteroid bigger?'

I mean, they're putting prescription drugs on. We've got billions in bailouts and rebate checks. I'm sorry, this is criminal negligence.

I don't know who people think are going to swoop in and save us from this disaster ... I've got news for you, it's not going to be Congress ... The president is not going to do
it. And believe me, Bruce Willis and Tommy Lee Jones, are going to be a little too old. They'll be on that non-existent Social Security system by then.

Like always, we have to save ourselves. And we have to start right now... "

Glenn Beck is absolutely right. Our political leaders are spending us into oblivion, and guess what? They plan to raise our taxes exponentially so they can waste even more.

One of my personal heroes, Winston Churchill, once said that "for a nation to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle."1 He was, of course, talking about the economic situation in Great Britain many decades ago. But his words have striking relevance to the United States today and to the scenario described by Glenn Beck on CNN. If you're like most Americans, you filed your income taxes this month. And as you realized just how much of your hard-earned money will go to support the bloated bureaucracy and to an ever growing catalog of entitlements, you may have felt as helpless as a man in a bucket trying to lift himself up--or a scientist watching an asteroid hurtling towards earth while the government leaders did nothing to prepare.

Last month, our Congress passed its proposed $3 trillion national budget for 2009.2 While the headlines of the day focused on the presidential race and the latest Hollywood starlet to enter rehab, the budget received surprisingly little attention. It has frightening implications for all of us.

Thanks to the efforts of liberals in the Senate and the House, you will almost certainly be paying even more taxes next year than you did in 2008. Voices on the Left have long decried President Bush's tax cuts, which they claim favor the "wealthy." But by their reckoning, "wealthy" Americans include those who are barely making enough to scrape by. The Associated Press reported that the Senate's budget would "allow income tax rates to go up on individuals making as little as $31,850 and couples earning $63,700 or more."3 In other words, congressional liberals are coming after middle-class families with a vengeance.

The budget passed by the House of Representatives is even more damaging, as it effectively eliminates all of President Bush's tax cuts, including the 50 percent reduction that citizens in the bottom tax bracket received when he cut the rate from 15 percent to 10 percent. The House budget also ensures that the "marriage penalty" tax will return, saddling 50 million married couples with an average of an additional $3,000 in taxes for the coming year while those living together without benefit of marriage will pay less. How ridiculous is that? Even more outrageous is the fact that the per-child tax credit will be cut in half, from $1,000 down to $500.4 This is an outrageous assault on the well-being of the nation's families. It is shameful to require moms and dads to pay for useless pork and it should bring howls of protests down on the heads of our elected officials. Instead, liberals in Congress are proposing up to $683 billion in new taxes over the next five years.5 Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the House's budget for 2009 is not that it will increase taxes, but that it will weaken the financial stability of families.

What are elected leaders doing with this additional money? Let's consider a few facts based on past trends:

• Each year since 1969, Congress has spent more money than it brought in. The Treasury Department has to borrow money to meet Congress's appropriations. The national debt is now more than $9,000,000,000,000 (that's $9 trillion) and growing. Even when government officials claim to have a surplus, they still spend more than they get. You and I pay enormous interest on that huge debt. In fiscal year 2006, the U.S. government spent $406 billion of our money on interest payments to the holders of the national debt.6 Alarmingly, we are heavily in debt to the Chinese government, which could "recall the loan" at will and throw the U.S. economy into a tailspin.
  
• The complete Internal Revenue Code is more than 21 megabytes in length and contains more than 7.8 million words. If printed 60 lines to a page, it would fill almost 16,000 letter-size pages. In reality, the exact number of tax laws and codes cannot be ascertained due to constant changes.7
  
• The IRS sends out 8 billion pages of forms and instructions each year. Laid end to end, they would circle the earth 28 times! American taxpayers spend $200 billion and 5.4 billion hours working to comply with federal tax regulations each year--more than it takes to produce every car, truck and van in the United States.8
  
• The IRS employs 114,000 people--twice as many as the CIA and five times more than the FBI. A full 60 percent of taxpayers must hire a professional to get through their own returns. Taxes consume 38.2 percent of the average family's income--more than for food, clothing and shelter combined.9

It's not that the government doesn't have enough money--it's that it's mishandling money and spending the lion's share of it in the wrong places. Of prime concern is the issue of "earmarking," which refers to provisions in legislation that direct federal funds to be spent on the politician's pet projects, often in his or her home district. It is called "bringing home the bacon" and is one of the ways they stay in office. Republicans and Democrats alike have been guilty of abusing this practice for years now. At the 11th hour, earmarks are quietly slipped into massive spending bills by members of Congress. Do you remember the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere" fiasco? Congress tried to fund a $230 million bridge that led to an Alaskan town of 50 people.10 The funding was ultimately axed--but only after public outrage demanded it.

A few of the saner voices in Congress have called for a serious reform of the earmark system, or even for the elimination of earmarks altogether. But alas, during its budget proceedings, the Senate failed to implement even a temporary ban on this wasteful and irresponsible practice. It's worth noting that the three front-running presidential contenders did, in fact, vote for the temporary ban, perhaps because they are in the spotlight and know how unpopular pork-barrel spending is with the American public. Nevertheless, for the majority of Senators in both parties, earmarks are a sacred cow. Or is that a cash cow? Whatever the case, the effort to end earmarks went down in flames in a 29-to-71 vote.11 Alas, the asteroid is heading our way!

Clearly, our elected representatives do not represent us when it comes to their spending habits. The much-publicized economic stimulus checks that are being mailed out this year will, for all intents and purposes, be sent straight back to the government to help cover the $683 billion tax increase. Meanwhile, hard-working families will continue struggling to make ends meet. Our leaders in Congress continue to play fast-and-loose with our tax dollars because they are so out of touch with what it means to live on a limited income. A recent study from the Center for Responsive Politics found that the median net worth of a U.S. senator is nearly $2 million, while the median net worth of a member of the House of Representatives is more than $600,000.12 Rush Limbaugh has called Congress our "House of Lords," and it's not difficult to see why. And yet these same leaders have the audacity to suggest that people earning $31,000 a year are somehow "rich" citizens who owe the government a larger proportion of their income. Liberals call it "paying your fair share." What this really means is that the big spenders in Washington want to build their version of a "bridge to nowhere."

There is much more that could be said on this point, but I do not have the space to expand on the topic here. The role of the government is discussed in greater detail in Focus on the Family's The Truth Project® DVD curriculum, which offers a biblical view of the government as part of a larger discussion of what constitutes a biblical worldview. In particular, Dr. Del Tackett argues that in modern times, the government has endeavored to take over the role of the church. We believe that God did not institute governments to "save" people, especially in a manner that intrudes on every citizen's God-given right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. For a further exploration of this idea, visit thetruthproject.org.

I hope my comments this month haven't left you feeling depressed. I also don't want you to be gripped by fear. You've heard about the 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles in which many listeners mistook a dramatic presentation of H.G. Wells' book, War of the Worlds, for an actual news report about an alien invasion. The public panic that ensued was of historic proportions--at least until listeners realized that the radio program was fictitious. Although the economic crisis we are facing is not fiction, it is no cause for panic, especially for those of us who find our peace and security in Jesus Christ. We must not be fearful, but we do need to respond to this impending crisis with concern and a sense of urgency.

Despite our government's flaws, we are still blessed to live in a country in which our voices can be heard and in which we have the right to choose the men and women who will represent us in the corridors of power. Indeed, our elected leaders often "get away" with so much because the rest of us aren't paying attention or holding them accountable. If nothing changes, politicians will grab more and more of your family's income. I hope you'll contact your representatives in Washington and let them know what you think. Tell them respectfully but passionately when you think they've gone too far. After all, they work for you and at your pleasure. When you've had enough, elect other representatives who will be more responsive to the nation's well-being.

Thanks for your continued interest in the ministry of Focus on the Family. I hope you'll let us know how we can serve you and your loved ones in the days ahead.

God's blessings to you.

Sincerely,

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.
April 2008

Should Christians obey the Anti-Christ?

The answer should be obvious, but perhaps not to all of us. Click on the following link to read more: http://www.geocities.com/fountoftruth/scota.html

Are You a Red Letter or a Black Letter Christian?

Click here to find out:
http://www.americanvision.org/articlearchive2008/02-25-08.asp

Here’s proof that our nation is going off the deep end:

We kill unborn babies for being the "wrong color" and suspend students for taking vitamins.

Read about it here: http://wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=57526

and here:

http://wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=57533

Defining Evangelicalism Down

By Paul Edwards

The Religious Left is successfully redefining what it means to be a conservative evangelical by misrepresenting what it means to be a conservative evangelical. In a recent conference call hosted by Faith in Public Life, one of the emerging voices of the Religious Left, Dr. Joel Hunter, said:

There’s also a change in the voices that are defining what is conservative now, and what is evangelical. In the past couple of decades you’ve had some very loud voices on both sides – hard right, hard left – and when those were the only choices, then of course many evangelicals are going to go with the hard right because, well, that’s kind of where we mostly are. Now there are many more voices that are expanding the agenda, and so those people that have always had kind of a holistic approach, rather than just a one or two issue approach, are now feeling permission and given permission to be more nuanced and more sophisticated in their approach, rather than just going in a very bifurcated system. And so, what you’re hearing now is that the old voices that appointed themselves as the definers of what was evangelical or what was conservative are not holding sway with the majority of evangelicals anymore.

By convincing America that conservative evangelicals are concerned only with two issues, stopping abortion and preserving traditional marriage, these new voices of evangelicalism are effectively making the case that conservative evangelicals ignore poverty, HIV/AIDS, and the environment. The history of evangelicalism tells a different story.

Evangelicals have set the standard throughout history for social action which continues into the present through numerous humanitarian relief organizations. The Association of Evangelical Relief and Development Organizations claim 64 such organizations as members, including World Vision, Compassion International, Samaritan’s Purse, and Mercy Ships.

One of the largest humanitarian relief organizations in the world is the Salvation Army. It defines its commitment to social services as “…an outward visible expression of the Army's strong religious principles.” Those social services include disaster relief, services for the aging, AIDS education, medical facilities, and shelters for battered women. The Salvation Army impacts 30 million people a year in the United States alone. The founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, was a Methodist minister. On its website the Salvation Army defines itself as an “evangelical group.”

To these readily recognizable evangelical organizations add the innumerable evangelical churches across America that in very quiet and unrecognized ways minister to the needs of the poor and suffering every day. In my own community a local evangelical church runs the oldest and largest homeless shelter in our county. Grace Gospel Fellowship in Pontiac, Michigan serves 127,000 meals a year, provides rehabilitation services and housing for drug addicts and single mothers, and creates jobs. It accomplishes its mission without one dime of government funding, and is “dedicated to recovery through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”

The Religious Left’s appeal for the Religious Right to “broaden its agenda” to include poverty, HIV/AIDS, and the environment ignores the fact that conservative evangelicals have always had a strong commitment to these issues. So if conservative evangelicals are already leading the efforts to relieve poverty and disease, what’s behind the call to “broaden the agenda”? Another agenda altogether.

What’s really happening here is an attempt by the Left to define evangelicalism down by moving it away from its emphasis on the power of the gospel to change lives. The church’s ability to affect social and cultural change, bringing relief to the poor and suffering, is rooted first and foremost in its commitment to the gospel of Jesus Christ, and what the gospel says about the condition of man in sin which results in the symptoms of poverty and disease.

The Religious Left invalidates the conservative evangelical commitment to humanitarian relief because we are achieving our ends in the name of Jesus Christ through the gospel, without the assistance of government funding. The fundamental tenant of modern liberalism is that a government program funded by redistributed wealth is the preferred method of humanitarian relief rather than what the church is accomplishing by faith through compassionate hearts.

The new voices of the Religious Left – Rick Warren, Joel Hunter, Tony Campolo, Jim Wallis, et al – are defining down what it means to be an evangelical by making the symptoms of man’s sin (poverty, disease, etc.) a priority rather than addressing the cause of those symptoms (sin) and the cure found in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The argument for this reprioritizing is a convincing one, suggesting the new priorities for evangelicals ought to be determined by asking, “How would Jesus respond to (fill in your favorite social cause here)?” The implied answer is that Jesus would be more concerned about the treatment of the poor (especially illegal immigrants) and, at best, neutral on the questions of abortion and homosexual marriage because Jesus never spoke against abortion or homosexual marriage.

These new voices of evangelicalism wear the label “red letter Christians,” but they are in reality “white space Christians,” determining Jesus’ view of abortion and homosexual marriage by focusing on what he didn’t say rather than on what he did say. In Matthew 5 Jesus upholds the standard of the Mosaic Law, which is clear in its call for punishing anyone responsible for killing a child in the womb (Exodus 21:22-25). When Jesus wanted to illustrate true greatness, he set a child in the midst of the disciples and said, “Of such is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:14). In Matthew 19 Jesus clearly affirmed that marriage is between one man and one woman by validating the story of Adam and Eve, holding it up as the standard for marriage. As for the question of how Jesus would respond to illegal immigrants, I’m pretty sure he would tell them to obey the law (cf. Matthew 22:21).

The new voices of evangelicalism sound eerily similar to the old voices of the social gospel movement who moved their churches away from the priority of the gospel in the early 20th Century, focusing instead on positive thinking and welfare as a solution to social ills. The result was empty pews and even emptier hearts. I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution, take a bow for the new revolution, then I’ll get down on my knees and pray we don’t get fooled again (with apologies to Pete Townshend).

Paul Edwards is the host of The Paul Edward Program and a pastor. His program is heard daily on WLQV in Detroit and on godandculture.com

URL: http://townhall.com/columnists/PaulEdwards/2008/02/12/defining_evangelicalism_down

Since when does being a Christian mean giving “unmitigated support” to the military?

Last week, I received two frenzied e-mail alerts from Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), an organization ostensibly devoted to defending our First Amendment liberties, particularly the free exercise of religion. The ACLJ identifies itself as “Christian Advocates Serving Evangelism, Inc.,” a “tax-exempt, not-for-profit, religious corporation.” The e-mail I received demanded that I “give generously” in order to punish the city of Berkeley, California, for “insulting” the U.S. Marines. Apparently, the City Council had decided that the Marines’ recruiting office was no longer welcome there. The e-mail also chided the Mayor of Toledo, Ohio, for canceling a military training exercise scheduled in Toledo because the Marines “frighten people.”

As the wife of an Air Force veteran, I care deeply about the men and women in our armed forces. I admire the sacrifices they make to protect our country, and I ache for those who are separated from their families while serving overseas. However, I fail to see how a city’s refusal to allow military recruiting and/or training exercises in its communities warrants the intervention of evangelical Christians.

Here are some quotes from Jay Sekulow’s e-mails:

“Do not allow this anti-military, anti-America sentiment to pervade!”

“At best, this kind of action is nothing more than hostile liberal activism.”

“With your help, we will ... take radical, anti-military rhetoric to task. We will hold liberal politicians accountable for their outrageous behavior.”

“[U.S. military personnel] deserve our unmitigated support.”

Here are my problems with Jay’s tirade:

1. Refusing to allow the military to conduct training exercises in one’s city is not necessarily “anti-American.” As someone who is extremely wary of the dangers of big government (my father grew up in Nazi Germany), I sympathize with those who would be fearful upon seeing an overt military presence in their communities. After hearing about numerous innocent Americans who were killed in no-knock paramilitary-style raids on their homes (at least one instance was a case of mistaken identity), I would be quite uneasy if I observed uniformed military personnel conducting training exercises in my neighborhood.

2. It is wrong to assume that only “liberal activists” would object to military recruiting offices/training exercises in their cities and communities. Libertarians and Christian pacifists may also have qualms about allowing recruiting offices or military training to take place in their cities.

3. As evangelical Christians, I’m not sure we should be devoting our time and energies to taking “anti-military rhetoric to task.” When Jesus spoke about our being salt and light, somehow I don’t think this is what He had in mind.

4. There are a host of abuses that politicians—liberal and otherwise—have committed in recent times for which they should be held accountable. I’m sure Jay could have found even more “outrageous behavior” to castigate had he looked far enough, including SWAT-type raids on home schooling families, government control and manipulation of juries, and unreasonable searches and seizures against innocent people. With so many serious problems in our government, I question the wisdom of focusing his organization’s resources on punishing a couple of cities for insulting the Marines.

5. Many patriotic Americans, including my husband who served in the military, have legitimate gripes with the armed services and therefore may not support their recruiting efforts. My husband has often said he would never recommend military service to anyone because of the experimental vaccines that new recruits are forced to undergo (he suspects that the autoimmune disease he has stems from an experimental Swine flu vaccine he was given in the Air Force). In addition, some conservatives and constitutionalists object to the way the U.S. military is being used as a global policeman. One such “police action” was the invasion of Congo’s Katanga province in the 1960s, which broke away from the pro-communist Congolese regime of Patrice Lumumba. As part of a UN “peacekeeping” operation, U.S. planes bombed hospitals, churches, and schools in order to force the Christian-led government of Katanga to submit to communist rule.

6. The Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal in Iraq, while hardly typical of the U.S. military as a whole, should make Christians wary of giving any branch of the armed forces “unmitigated support.”

If anyone else wants to weigh in on this issue, I’d be interested in your comments.