Our Revolutionary Mindset—We drank the Humanist Kool Aid and don’t even know it

By Al Benson Jr.

Years ago I had a friend on the East Coast who was the pastor of a small, independent Separatist church. He was also quite a student of history. He had, over the years, talked with several people that had been Communists and had broken with the Party. He mentioned on a couple occasions talking with a man who had been the editor of the major Communist “newspaper” in the country. The man’s name was Louis Budenz and at the time I believe he lived in Newport, Rhode Island.  Mr. Budenz told the pastor once that “the patriotism of the 20^th century will be Communism.” On first thought that might sound rather ridiculous, but, in looking at our culture today, you can see that, in many ways, it was a very accurate description.

How many of our patriotic and conservative folks today have joined in petitions and drives to “get prayer back into public schools?” These well-intentioned folks do not begin to realize that the public, or government school system is, itself, a revolutionary vehicle. Far from being as “American” as motherhood and apple pie, the government school system is, instead, a leading component of the revolutionary mindset—in fact it is a necessary component for promoting that revolutionary mindset in future generations of students. Karl Marx believed in and promoted its use in the tenth plank of the Communist Manifesto.  The public school has never been reformed from the revolutionary intent of its founders in this country (Unitarians and socialists) nor will it ever be. It continues to be an instrument of socialist propaganda and it’s highly doubtful if it will ever be anything else. That doesn’t mean there are not good people that work for the system, there are. But these folks have no real clue about its true foundations or what it was founded to counteract.

The late and noted theologian, R. J. Rushdoony, in his book The Nature of the American System , noted that the “public or statist schools’ began their history as a “subversive movement” and that their aim from day one was to subvert the old order of things. Part of that subversion was the attempt to rid the country of church schools, thereby doing away with Christian education and thinking. In our day many Christians, conservatives, patriots, and even many Southern Heritage folks seem to think the government schools are just wonderful and, at best, all they really need is just a little “fine tuning” to make them what they should be. These good folks have imbibed the revolutionary Kool Aid and don’t even realize it. Still other good, conservative folks want to preserve the Pledge of Allegiance with the words “Under God” in it. They seem to think they are performing some sort of patriotic duty for America if they manage to do this. More revolutionary Kool Aid! How many of these folks even realize that the Pledge of Allegiance was written by a defrocked socialist minister who was asked to leave his church because of his socialist views—and sermons in which he claimed Jesus was a socialist? How many good Southern folks who are in favor of the Pledge realize that the part about “one nation indivisible” was inserted in there as a final slap in the face at the legal secession their ancestors fought and bled to preserve? The “under God” part was only tacked on in the 1950s to make the whole thing more palatable. Yet, people today seem to think they are somehow being patriotic  if they rise up and defend a Pledge written by a socialist.  They have also sampled the Kool Aid of revolution and, thanks to their almost total lack of knowledge, they don’t begin to realize it. So, under the illusion of defending patriotism they are, in fact, promoting socialism.

The ultimate aim of the promoters of the revolutionary mindset is the destruction of God and His truth and the replacing of these with themselves and their “truth.” It helps them in their anti-Christ agenda if they can get lots of patriotic folks to unwittingly further the program  they are promoting. Pastor Steve Schlissel of New York has observed that: “The popular culture hates—not just the Reformed faith, but—Christianity…For man has undertaken the gigantic effort of interpreting the whole world, and all the things that are therein, in their essence, origin, and end, what is called purely and strictly scientifically, that is, without God, without any invisible, supernatural, spiritual element, and simply and alone from the pure data of matter and force.  All the foundation work of that enterprise is done. The West is simply putting the broom to the dust of deity that remains on the periphery of our shared space. Our culture is very serious about eliminating God from the Public Square…As moderns see things, there is no need for God, not even as a limiting concept.” Needless to say, such a situation did not arise overnight. It has been progressing for some time now, while most Christians and  patriots have been pretty much asleep. Something else the dregs of this revolutionary potion contributes to is spiritual drowsiness, lack of concern and, among Christians, lack of spiritual discernment in critical areas.

Unfortunately, we have, whether we realize it or not, been much influenced by Enlightenment thinking.  Just before the socialist revolts of 1848 in Europe (the revolts that sent myriads of communists and socialists scurrying to this country) a Dutch Calvinist scholar and statesman, Guillaume Groen van Prinsteer published a series of lectures which he had given over a period of two years to several close friends.  He titles these Lectures on Unbelief and Revolution. His theory was (and he was probably correct) that the unbelief caused by the European Enlightenment was what led to the terrorism and wild excesses of the French Revolution. In regard to the Enlightenment he said: “…the Enlightenment has thrown civilization back into the abyss of unbelief.  Like the Reformation, so the Revolution touches every areas of life and study. With the former the principle was subjection to God; and with the latter the principle became revolt against God.” And Rev. P. K. Keizer, a pastor in the Reformed Church in the Netherlands wrote: “During the eighteenth century, Europe sank into a Deistic religion…Deism is atheism in disguise since it removes God from everyday life. The French Revolution turned out to be…a total change in thought and attitude. It started in France but eventually engulfed all of Christendom. In essence, the causes of the French Revolution should not be sought in the social problems of those times but in man’s evil desire to become autonomous—independent from his Creator.” Is it any different today? In the White House dwells a man who thinks he is the messiah, or at least the Vice President of the world.

The French Revolution was responsible for many following revolutions in Europe, including the 1848 socialist revolts which sent to many fleeing socialists and communists to America, many of which ended up either joining Mr. Lincoln’s armies or helping to establish the Republican Party, both before and during the War of Northern Aggression. Read the book Lincoln’s Marxists for an in-depth study of this particular issue. It’s still available on Amazon.com

So the Enlightenment, with its rampant unbelief (apostasy) has created for us many problems that we are still dealing with today and it has helped to create much of the revolutionary mindset that even Christians and conservatives are still influenced by, though again, most, not having any firm grasp of history, fail to realize. Evangelical Christians continue to come down on the wrong side of many social and political questions because they simply don’t know the history and have been consciously taught not to worry about it. Therefore, they cannot deal with many questions in their true context and so they end up attempting to deal with them only in the context of where they are at present.

The Bible historian, Louis Berkhof has observed that: “The study of doctrinal truth apart from its historical background leads to a truncated theology. There has been too much of this in the past, and there is a great deal of it even in the present day.” The same principle should be applied to social and political issues, which are, at root, theological.

Until Christians, conservatives, Southern patriots, home schoolers, and others of our persuasion can begin to throw off revolutionary and Enlightenment thinking and begin to look at important issues in the light of Scripture and a sound interpretation of their historical context, we will continue to spin our wheels, fighting meaningless little battles that do nothing more than enable us to think we are “doing” something, and the “patriotism” of the 21^st century will continue to be Communism.

(Write to P O Box 55, Sterlington, Louisiana 71280 for information on the mini-history course that deals with the period of the War of Northern Aggression.)

 

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Pressure From Above–Pressure From Below–Playing the American people for suckers

by Al Benson Jr.

Several years ago, back in the planned revolution of the 1960s, a young college revolutionary, James Simon Kunen, of New Left persuasion, wrote a revealing little book called The Strawberry Statement: Notes of a College Revolutionary that was published by Avon Books of New York.

I guess, in his own way, he was trying to explain what the so-called “spontaneous” campus riots of the 1960s were all about. In some areas his observations were a bit naive, but in other areas, he showed some perception of what was going on and who was paying for it all. As as aside, I worked at a college on the East Coast during the Kent State affair when all the students in the local colleges took to the streets and believe me, there was nothing “spontaneous” about those campus riots. They were well-coordinated all around the country to create just the situation Kunen mentioned in his book.

Kunen, on page 130 of his book, made the following observations: “Also at the convention, men from Business International Roundtables–the meetings sponsored by Business International for their client groups and heads of government–tried to buy up a few radicals. These men are the world’s leading industrialists and they convene to decide how our lives are going to go.” Sounds like the Bilderbergers or the Trilateral Commission, with which I am sure there must be interlocking memberships. Kunen continued: “These are the guys who wrote the Alliance for Progress. They’re the left wing of the ruling class.” He talked about people who wanted Eugene McCarthy in as president, but they felt the only way for McCarthy to win was for the radicals to act up enough that they made McCarthy look like a centrist instead of a leftist. This is so reminiscent of tactics that are still used to befuddle the American public today.  In many cases, the Democratic candidate has been made to look really left-wing to scare people off so they will end up voting for the Republican (who is really as leftist as the Democrat) and all the Republican has to do is bite his tongue and utter a few conservative shibboleths that will ensure his election. In recent elections using this tactic has been enough to guarantee Republican victories. And you can be darn sure the useful idiots who voted for him will never bother to check out what he said as opposed to what he ends up doing. Of course they play it the other way, too. In the last two elections the Republicans have picked the two weakest sisters in their stable of weak sisters to guarantee that our current Marxist-in-Chief was a shoo-in.

Anyway, on page 131 Kunen continued: “We were also offered Esso (Rockefeller) money. They want us to make a lot of radical commotion so they can look more in the center as they move to the left.” Such quotes are quite revelatory if you think about it.

They prove the old contention that the American people are being and have been led, for years into buying into an old Communist tactic known as “pressure from above and pressure from below.” This pressure is always applied pretty much the same way and always used to achieve specific goals in the ongoing plan to restrict our liberty.  A prime example was the so-called “Patriot Act” which Congress was coerced into voting for in the emotional heat of the moment, without ever even having the chance to read it. It was supposed to “protect” us from all those nasty terrorists, when all it really did, overall, was to enact severe restrictions on our liberties. Then we had to go to war with Iraq because those nasty terrorist thugs employed by Saddem Hussein had all those weapons of mass destruction and so we had to take them out by our unending “war on terrorism” which still goes on. You know how it is–perpetual war for perpetual (Communist) peace. As for all those weapons of mass destruction that were being hoarded by Saddam–well they never really found any. You could put all the WMD’s they found under George Bush’s kitchen table! But not to worry–the “war on terrorism” continues on, and on. Now we are being told that we need to invade Iran because they are testing nuclear weapons. I find it very interesting that, in the Middle East, what we end up doing is invading all those countries that the State of Israel seems to have a problem with. And that subject is one that, unfortunately, most Christians in this country, at this point, are light years away from even trying to think about dealing with.

But, for a moment, let’s go back an analyze what this young college radical has told us–wealthy industrialists in this country buy left-wing radicals so they can look moderate while the radicals in the streets look like barbarians.  And the average American, caught in the middle, will always look to government to protect them from the barbarians at the gates–and the government is more than willing–at the cost of your liberties they will “protect” you from those their friends have recently bought and paid for–to scare you into trading your liberty for security. In plain English, they are running a scam on the public. Just trade your liberty for “security.” And, of course, part of that security they provide will be gun control, supposedly to “remove guns from the hands of the criminal element.” What they don’t tell you, however, is that they have redefined who the “criminal element” is. Now the criminal element consists of Christians who believe the Bible, home schoolers, defenders of the Second Amendment, veterans, people who voted for Ron Paul, etc. Anyone buying this old dead horse deserves to get fleeced! We have seen, with a handful of “false flag” shootings, what our new Marxist-in-Chief  and the head of his “Just-us Department”  has planned for gun owners in Amerika. Exactly the same thing Stalin planned for them in the Soviet Union!

Thanks to our government school mis-educations most Americans have lost the ability to really know what the politicians are doing. We no longer seem to have discernment. We can’t seem to grasp anymore the novel concept that we have to start checking out what these prevaricators say against what they do. Until we can, somehow, relearn that basic concept things will continue from bad to worse. It’s almost as if the Lord has blinded our eyes to the truth so that we can believe the political fables we seem to love so much. If that be the case, then this country is under judgment and needs to repent. Will our churches wake up and lead the way?

For those who might be interested enough to do a little research on their own, (and I realize you will be in the minority) I would recommend two books, one published in 1972 called None Dare Call It Conspiracy and one published in 1976 called The Rockefeller File. Both were written by the late Gary Allen and I am told they can  be found now on the Internet. If you want to find out how, you, the voting public, have been scammed, check out these two books. Having read them both, I can recommend them.

The Lord is in Control, So Don’t Worry (and above all, don’t DO anything)

by Al Benson Jr.

There seems to be a mindset in the evangelical community today, (though it’s not really new, it’s been there for 150 years) which, to me, seems like the great neutralizer of the church. It seems to be most prevalent in those you could wish would be more active and concerned, but are not. They seem to be possessed of the concept that if God is in control of all things, which He is, then there are some areas where believers just don’t need to get involved.

Should you become involved in one of these “forbidden” areas they will question you about any comments you happen to make. The question they usually start out with is “Do you believe God is in control of all things?” If you answer “yes” to that they will bombard you, almost immediately with the next question which will be “Then what are you so upset about?” The result of this is, in many cases, to shut down your complaint so you will feel a bit foolish trying to carry it any further, especially if you are in a group setting, and at that point, you are supposed to quietly bow out and allow the discussion to return to such important topics as “personal holiness.” Why discuss politics, education, the state of the culture or anything along those lines when you can just ignore all that and dwell on personal holiness? This somehow becomes the end-all of all discussion. It all amounts to personal holiness (pietism) and nothing else. I can’t count the times I have had this done to me and I am sure most of the folks that have done it were not real happy with me, because I refused to play the game and shut up.

Let me state here, before someone jumps up screaming, that I am not opposed to personal holiness. The Scriptures enjoin us to seek to live holy lives, to treat others as we would be treated, and, realizing we simply cannot do that in our own strength, we must admit that we need a Saviour  who has already done all this perfectly for us and now sits at the right hand of God, Jesus, the God-man.

Along with this, at least for those of us in Reformed circles, there should come a certain outlook, a certain worldview if you will. Part of that worldview is that God is very concerned with what goes on here on earth and He wants His people to be concerned about it also. We are not just supposed to “get saved so we can go to Heaven” and that’s all there is.  Since “the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof” I believe He wants us to be concerned about all areas of life–education, culture, art, music, –and the most dreaded of all for Christians–politics. God wants His people to be involved in what is happening in the world. He wants them to be concerned about it and He wants them to be knowledgeable about it. We are not just supposed to be so concerned with our own personal holiness that we let the world go to hell.

Many of our problems in this country today, along with our lack of repentance, are present just because Christians don’t want to be bothered. It’s really too much trouble to learn about a problem and why it exists, so why bother? If the Lord is in control, He’ll take care of it all, so I don’t need to do anything about it, or know anything about it. All I have to do is “trust God” and go on my merry way. Oh, there is one other thing I must do. Should someone come along that points out a particular problem, I need to try to keep their comments to a bare minimum so no one really gets shook up over this (especially me)!

The evangelical protests against any action at all run the gamut from “If God’s in control why worry about it” to “You’re not showing much love talking about all this stuff.” The idea being that if your were just a little more “loving” you would be content to give evil politicians or public school “change agents” a pass. The novel concept that Christians could also be “loving” by seeking to expose evil has never occurred to them, and probably won’t, as long as they can keep those who question what goes on quiet enough.

Many of these are the same folks that tell you that Romans 13 means that you must give unquestioning obedience to whatever government, at any level, wants to do. Government has the “authority” so you just cave in. After all, it’s what they do.The concept that governments are responsible to God, and that, under God, their authority is limited, is something that never seems to occur to them. It’s lots easier just to knuckle under than it is to find out what government has the legitimate authority to do or to require of you and what it does not. No one questions that where government performs its God-given functions it should be obeyed.  I am not preaching anarchy here. But what’s to be done when government starts usurping functions it has no right to? That’s another question–and one many in the evangelical community would prefer not to have to deal with–so just do whatever they tell you to do and shut up–after all, it is the government. I wonder how many Christians realize that in taking such an attitude what they are doing is reauthorizing the “divine right of kings” (or presidents) to do whatever they want.

This mindset, carried to its logical conclusion in this country, would leave us still as subjects of Great Britain and that Christian patriot, Patrick Henry, would never have gotten to say “give me liberty or give me death.” Or better yet, would Martin Luther have even dared to nail up his 95 theses on the door of the cathedral? After all, the Pope might not have liked it. Once you allow any government, church government or civil government unrestrained power they will do whatever they want, no matter how evil, until they are resisted.

Our current regime tells us we are being forced to buy “health care” and it has performed, along with the regimes before it, many unconstitutional actions.  The usual evangelical response to this is “God’s in control, so what are you upset about?”

The thought comes to mind that, possibly, God has allowed some of what has happened to occur in order to provoke a response from His people–repentance, yes, but also resistance to evil.  And the response for most of the church today is still “Hey, the Lord’s in control, just don’t worry about any of this (and certainly don’t ever try to DO anything about any of it).” And some tend to look down their noses at you for being such a cretin as to even dare to bring up some of these things. You’re just supposed to be silent, cave in to tyranny, all the time seeking more “personal holiness.”

Another thing we (are supposed to learn) in Reformed circles is that God works in history and that He is often please to use “means” (people) to do some of what He wants done. You can ask, what would have happened to the kids in public schools in West Virginia 40 years ago if their parents had not risen up and fought the corrupt school system and the rotten books it tried to foist on the kids? Would those kids have been better off if their Christian parents had just practiced “personal piety” and said nothing about the horrible textbooks? You know the answer to that one.

What if the Lord decides to use people to upset evil politicians, corrupt “educators” and others who do what they shouldn’t? Oh, I know, we don’t discuss all that. That’s not a debatable topic. That might require getting involved and learning something new, and we’re not sure we’re ready for that, so throttle the one who makes such an absurd suggestion and let’s all get back to personal pietism.

Now you might think I sound a little ticked at some of my fellow believers for their almost total lack of response in areas I feel they ought to be concerned about. You’d probably be somewhat correct in that assumption. I’ve been listening to evangelical responses in some areas for almost four decades, and most of it boils down to “Why are you telling us about the current Marxist in the White House when, in love, we should just be ignoring what he is doing to the country and loving him?” I often wonder if many evangelicals have ever (probably not) come up with the possible thought that “loving” whoever the current occupant of the Oval Office is might just entail exposing some of what he is doing and calling him to repentance for it. And this doesn’t just apply to whoever is currently the president, or the governor, or the head of the local school board.

After all, they don’t call Washington “Sodom on the Potomac” for nothing, and the same thing could probably be said for a number of state capitals.

As long as we continue to play the “just love ’em and don’t get upset over anything” game, nothing will change.  The country will be judged and go down the tubes and the church will be judged also. What about the possibility that the Lord would like a response from His people to what is happening, and He’s not getting it?

Why Is It Only A Crime If The Perp Is White???

by Al Benson Jr.

Back on November 24, 2013 a white man from the Houston, Texas area knocked an elderly black man down and broke his jaw in two places. It was said that he laughed and shouted “knockout” as he did this.

The man, a twenty-seven year old, has been indicted by a federal grand jury in Houston for a hate crime against the elderly black man. No one argues against the fact that this was a despicable act and that the man should be punished for what he did. However, if he shouted “knockout” when he did it, where do you suppose he got the idea for calling it that? It couldn’t have been from blacks that have done the same thing to whites could it? If anyone has kept track of the news for the past few months you know that’s exactly where he got the idea. I don’t know how many cases of this same dastardly act I’ve read about in recent months where a black, or blacks, have done this selfsame thing to some elderly white person and that’s what they call it–knockout! Of course, thanks to our progressive “news” media, we didn’t read about nearly as many of these black on white crimes as actually happened. Many of the stories about these were simply spiked and you never heard about it, but you did hear about some.

At this point, I have a couple questions which I hope my readers will ask at every opportunity. This one white man did this to one black man and it was labeled a “hate crime.” What was it labeled when all the different black guys did it to elderly white folks? I never once, in the “news” media saw that labeled as a hate crime. Why not?

If it’s a “hate crime” when a white guy does it then why isn’t it a hate crime when a black guy does it? Nobody seems to want to deal with that question. Why not? Seems to me that what’s sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander. If it isn’t then we have a monstrous double standard we are operating on in this country, or maybe you hadn’t noticed that.

If it’s a hate crime when the white guy commits it, then why isn’t it a hate crime when the black guy commits it? I have yet to see that question even addressed by anyone. Most of what passes for our “news” media sincerely hopes no one will think along those lines and that no one will ask such embarrassing  questions, especially not in public. Of course should someone dare to address this sensitive issue they can always be labeled a “racist.” That should shut most folks up right there.

But it won’t shut all of us up! Of course I realize there are some whacked-out college professors that glibly inform us that “only white people can be racist” and no one else ever could. But, folks, in all honesty, who really believe that bovine fertilizer except the most politically correct of the politically correct? Ordinary folks that live in the real world just don’t buy it. They may not argue over it for fear of being labeled as “racists” but in their heart of hearts they know it’s all balderdash.

So I keep asking–why is it “racist” for a white man to do something when it is not racist for a black man to do the same thing? I have never forgotten the missionary from South Africa I talked to years ago who said, of blacks, that they were “the most ethnocentric people in the world.”

If that is, in fact, the case (and I realize there are exceptions) then you have to ask yourself–who are the real “racists?” Since the term “racist” is of Trotskyite origin I don’t really like to use it. Maybe the term “racialist” would be more appropriate.

So who is the real racialist? Is it just possible that it’s the person who accuses everyone else of being one?

When Will Christians Wake Up To What Public Education Is Really All About?

 

By Al Benson Jr.

Literally for decades now I have watched Christians defend public education in this country and subtly denigrate those among their brethren that dare to pass up the questionable benefits of public schooling and educate their children in a Christian way, either via a Christian school or home schooling.

 Those who have taken the trouble to do some reading and research have discovered that public education in this country has been in the business of trying to blunt and dilute the influence of the Christian faith here literally since day one. This is not a problem that has arisen since the 1960s, which is what many people seem to believe. This is a situation that has been a major part of the public education agenda since the beginning. I realize that lots of folks reading this will not really want to believe that, but again, go back and do the homework. Read Samuel Blumenfeld’s Is Public Education Necessary?  Blumenfeld is an expert in the field of education. Read what he says. Then go from there.

What we see going on in public schools today only corroborates what Blumenfeld and others have written about for the last forty years and more. An article on http://cryandhowl.com  for January 8^th of this year noted that: “Jesus isn’t allowed in school, but Islam is…” It went on to note an article in The Christian Science Monitor from July, 2007 which dealt with an elementary school near San Diego, California that made time during the school day for Muslim kids to worship. The article noted: “The school’s policy ‘presumes that Christians are less religious and less inspired to worship and praise the Lord and come together’ says Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute.  He is asking the school district to set up special rooms where Christians can pray, too.” Wonder if that ever happened. Why does the school “assume” that Christians are less prone to want to worship than others? The person who posted this noted: “Can you believe this line of certified b.s.? In my previous post, I noted some Christian kid couldn’t even hand out a Christmas candy cane with a benign little religious saying on it, but schools will set up rooms and special times during the day to accommodate Muslims and their prayer times.” I don’t know who posted this, but whoever it was, they understand what the game is all about and they are protesting. The post continued: “There are so many Christians who are content to go to their little churches on Sunday and maybe a mid-week service and that’s it. I suppose that’s okay, but Christians need to get involved in politics to a certain extent. ‘Oh, I’m not interested in politics’ you’ll hear them say. Well, they’d better get interested because politics and who we elect to make laws, has a direct effect on our freedom to worship as we choose. One doesn’t have to be into politics to a fault, but…folks, get involved enough so that after Sunday service and IHop and the football game you can make a difference by getting informed and making wise choices. Until Christians do, collectively, the ‘Jesus isn’t allowed in school’ bunch will continue and will get much worse…” This person is most likely trying to reach the same “Don’t worry, the Lord’s in control (so I don’t have to do anything)” bunch that I have been trying to reach. I hope they have more success than I have.

A recent article on http://americanvision.org  noted a essay written by an Al Mohler on the problems facing public schools today and the article noted how Mr. Mohler seemed to gloss over some of the history of the public education movement. The article’s author, Joel McDurmon, stated, quite accurately that: “His (Mohler’s) reasoning is that public schools used to be okay because they were locally controlled. Again, this begs the question of whether, from a Scriptural point of view, public schools ever should have been an option for Christians. And this causes problems with his subsequent narrative. It ignores the history previous to the period he highlights, it neglects important facts about the very period he presents essentially as a golden age of public schools, and it simply gets some of its facts wrong. For example, Mohler writes, ‘The earliest public schools in the United Stated were community-bases and parent-controlled. Parents and fellow citizens within a community would establish a school and hire a schoolmaster.  The community would establish the curriculum…’ These are very broad, sweeping generalizations that do not represent the majority of the early public school movement, or do not represent it in all its humanistic glory.”

And Mr. McDurmon continues: “Let’s just be honest to start with: socialism is socialism, and statism is statism, no matter how small or large a scale on which you operate them. Public schools are and always have been based on civil government coercion, forced taxation of property, and redistribution of wealth.  These principles are unbiblical whether they are nationally controlled or locally controlled—Washington-based or community-based. Further, from day one the public schools were designed to be centers of humanistic indoctrination…” He noted the early Unitarian influence, which is seldom, if at all, discussed or even mentioned. He mentioned the teachers union, the National Education Association, which goes all the way back to 1857. That’s right, 1857, not 1957! How many Christian folks even have a clue about any of this? Those that continue to talks about how good the schools were back in the “good old days” mostly do not know what they are talking about. They may be sincere. I don’t doubt their sincerity, but they are sincerely wrong. Someone who studies the history of the public school movement realizes that there never were any “good old days.” It was humanism and socialism since day one, as Mr. McDurmon has so aptly noted.

It would seem, also, that many of the public school teachers around the country are aware of this. An article on http://www.humanevents.com  for October 17^th, 2013 and written by Larry Elder gave some interesting statistics. Mr. Elder observed: “About 11 percent of all parents—nationwide, rural and urban—send their children to private schools. The numbers are much higher in urban areas. One study found that in Philadelphia a staggering 44 percent of public school teachers send their kids to private schools. In Cincinnati and Chicago, 41 and 39 percent of public school teachers, respectively, pay for a private school education for their children. In Rochester, New York, its 38 percent. In Baltimore it’s 35 percent, San Francisco is 34 percent…” You get the idea. These public school teachers have sense enough not to trust their own kids to the system they work in.

I recall, years ago now, when I worked for a Christian home schooling program in Illinois. One day a public school teacher, from New York somewhere, I think it was, called up and wanted information about the home schooling program we had. In talking to her I sought to ascertain why she was interested in home schooling seeing that she was a public school teacher. I never forgot her answer. She said something like “I work here every day. No way do I want my daughter going to school here.” I thought “what a resounding vote of confidence for the public school system from one of its own.” Folks, when even the public school teachers don’t want their kids “educated” in the system they work for you know there is something wrong.

Mr. Elder noted that Obama ended up sending his kids to a private school. He brought up Obama’s comment about education being “the civil rights issue of our time. Yet his opposition to K-12 education vouchers guarantees that many of America’s kids will sit in the back of the bus.” And that’s just fine with Obama. If the kids all go to miserable public schools and never learn anything, then they don’t have enough knowledge to ask any questions about the direction the country is going in, they just accept the Marxist agenda because they’ve never been taught anything else.

Those who advocate for “reform” of the public school system don’t have a clue as to what it’s all about. If the system was bad from day one, what do you “reform” it back to??? That’s one no one has been able to yet answer for me. When I bring the question up someone usually replies by telling me how good it was when they went. They simply don’t get it. The only difference between when they went to school and now is that the degree of humanism and socialism back then was not as blatantly apparent then as it is now—but it was still there—and the fact that they so staunchly defend public education proves that it was there and they just didn’t recognize it.

If you can’t reform or improve something, especially if it has always been questionable then you have but one option—you separate from it and seek out a Christian alternative. If you are concerned about the future of your children and their children then this is what you need to do. Christian children do need a Christian education, not humanist indoctrination. In fact they need an education that will teach them how to identify humanist indoctrination when they hear it and how to oppose it.

Obama “Reforms” National Security Agency (pigs fly too)

by Al Benson Jr.

After reading what the leftist “news” media had to say about our Marxist-in-Chief’s “reform” package for the National Security Agency I couldn’t help commenting on this. If you followed and were foolish enough to believe the “lamestream media” you would think Obama drastically reduced the power of the NSA and was almost on the way to abolishing it. However, in the cold light of reality, if you take the trouble to analyze what he did (and didn’t do) you find it was all a smokescreen to befuddle the public into thinking he is really concerned about their concerns. Nothing could be further from the truth.

He made just enough cosmetic changes to try to fool the public at large which, after the recent revelations about government spying on ordinary Americans, has become quite concerned about their privacy. Folks, let me be blunt here. For this president and his handlers, the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution does not exist, anymore than do any of the rest of the first ten amendments. For this administration the Bill of Rights is meant to be done away with. We need to get that through our heads. Oh, Obama will continue to give lip service to it all–while he is working to destroy it.

From what I could read about his “reform” package, all it does is to change where the data his administration has collected is going to be kept. The government won’t keep it, someone else will, that someone being yet to be determined (if that ever happens). But the material will still be mined and “searched” only now they supposedly will have to get a court order to do it. Big deal! What Federal judge will bother refusing to issue such an order? All this does is to add one more step to the process but it doesn’t change anything, not really. And this is the “reform” he is touting? I hope the public isn’t dumb enough to buy into this fable.

One thing Americans have got to learn to believe is that almost no one in government is ever going to do anything to lessen their own power and control over the public. If you think they will, then you are not dealing with reality. Ron Paul and a small handful of others are the exception rather than the rule, which is one reason Mr. Paul had to be denied the Republican nomination at any cost in the last “election.”

Americans have to relearn the truth that politicians will never surrender power and control once they have it. They won’t surrender it because they like it. It’s like an aphrodisiac to them–the more they can get the more they want. And all three branches of government will team up with each other to promote the gathering of illicit power to one branch or the other. So the supposed system of checks and balances in the Constitution has not really worked for a long, long time. It has only been an illusion–again, to fool the gullible public.

We have a bad habit in this country, and we have had it at least since Lincoln was in office, of listening to politicians and believing what they tell us and never bothering to check out whether what they tell us matches what they do–and it the vast majority of cases never the twain shall meet.

Over the years I have had people tell me “Oh Lincoln must have been a Christian. He quoted the Bible.” Well, if you take the trouble to read the fourth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel you will find that the Devil also quoted the Bible. Did that make him a Christian???

Sadly today, the majority of our public schools do not teach our kids any real history. What they get is mostly a twisted version that has been carefully crafted in the last 150 years so the kids are guaranteed to learn really nothing that will help them to rationally discern what goes on around them. There are public school teachers that do try to teach real history. Ive known a couple, but mostly they are few and far between. And unfortunately, our churches don’t in the main, do much better. Where they should advocate spiritual discernment they mostly go along with big government schemes because it is the “patriotic” thing to do. It isn’t, but they think it is–so wave the flag on holidays; better yet, plant 100 flags around your church building on holidays so folks will know how “patriotic” you are and how much you love Big Brother and you will have done your duty, right? Wrong!

Start learning what the constitutional functions of government are and watch to see if your “elected officials” are going beyond them. If they do, call them to account. Start learning to watch what politicians say and compare it with what they do–and find out if what they do is in accord with the powers that were delegated (not surrendered) to them or not. Start reading to learn what government should and should not do. A good place to start is a book I have mentioned before, the Kennedy Brothers book Nullifying Tyranny published by Pelican Publishing. You can find it on Amazon.com

Until a sufficient number of Americans begins to wake up to what goes on we will continue to fall prey to the Marxist proclivities of King Barack the First and the One World Government puppeteers that pull his strings.

Public Schools Bully Christian Kids

by Al Benson Jr.

Within the past day or so, I read an article from http://www.foxnews.com which proves, once again, how anti-Christian the public school system and its minions really are. Over the past several years I have seen so many of these that I have to wonder how long it is going to take Christian people to realize what goes on in public school classrooms. I have come to the conclusion that many, if not most, never will. As I have said before, to admit there is a problem with public education in this country would be to admit that you need to do something about your youngster’s education other than continuing to put his or her soul in danger by re-enrolling them in public school. And sadly, whether they even realize it or not, most Christians today just don’t want that responsibility. So they continue to make excuses for the “educational” system that is destroying their kids and they verbally shoot the messengers that bring them word of the destruction. If you can just continue to do that then you can kid yourself that you don’t have to do anything else.

In this particular instance, the Fox News article I referred to above was written by Todd Stames and it involved a six-year old girl. According to Mr. Stames: “The incident occurred December 19 inside a first grade classroom at Helen Hunt-Jackson Elementary School in Temecula, California. The previous day the teacher instructed boys and girls to find something at home that represented a family Christmas tradition. They were supposed to bring the item to school and share the item in a classroom presentation. Brynn Williams decided to bring the Star of Bethlehem that adorned the top of her family’s Christmas tree.”

Brynn said, in her presentation, “Our Christmas tradition is to put a star on top of our tree. The star is named the Star of Bethlehem. The three kings followed the star to the baby Jesus, the Savior of the world.”

That last statement was enough to rattle her teacher’s cage.  The teacher said “Stop right there! Go take your seat.” The youngster was not allowed to finish her presentation in which she would have recited the Bible verse, John 3:16. She was the only one in the whole class that was not allowed to finish her recitation After the girl sat down the “teacher” took the time and trouble to explain to the whole class that the girl just wasn’t allowed to say anything about the Bible or share anything from it. What does that statement say to this youngster about her family’s Christmas tradition?

Thinking she had done something wrong and might be in trouble, she told her mother, who then met with the school principal the next day.  The principal wanted to hear Brynn’s presentation and when she gave it the principal agreed with the teacher that had stopped her from finishing. The mother was told, flat out, that this was to protect other students from being “offended” by the girl’s presentation. There’s that famous “O” word again! You can bet if the youngster had recited something having to do with Kwanza there would have been no attempt at stopping it, rather it would have been encouraged and applauded. You don’t dare let Christians “offend” anyone else, but it’s perfectly okay to offend Christians and no one is supposed to say anything about it. That’s part of the “education” process in many public schools.

Mom was not completely satisfied with this and so she contacted a group called Advocates for Faith and Freedom and the general counsel for that group, Robert Tyler, sent a letter to the school demanding that they apologize to Brynn and that they reverse their policy that limited religious liberty.  Will that happen? In your dreams! The school released a statement that said the School District respects all students’ rights under the Constitution and they take seriously any allegation of discrimination, but they can’t comment on this just now because it would be “inappropriate.” What about the discrimination against this six-year old Christian youngster? Being the only one in the class not allowed to give her presentation was clearly discrimination.  I may seem cynical. Decades of watching this sort of thing happen in public schools has contributed slightly to that cynicism.  Forgive me if I don’t believe that the school district, and most other school districts in the country, care two hoots about discrimination against Christian students–that’s part of their agenda.

Lest you think this was an isolated case, last October this same school district had another problem over religious liberty issues.  A seventh grade student was publicly ridiculed by a teacher for reading the Bible. The students had been assigned to read a non-fiction book, but the teacher told the student, in front of the class, that the Bible was fiction and she refused to give him credit for the assignment. You think discrimination against Christian kids and what the believe isn’t part of their official policy? Don’t kid yourself.

Mr. Stames finished his article by stating: “What happened inside that classroom is nothing short of un-American. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting tired of my tax dollars being used to pay the salaries of public school teachers who humiliate and bully Christian boys and girls.” Mr. Stames, with all due respect, and I do respect you for writing this article, get used to it. This is part of what public education is all about. Education really has little to do with it–humanist indoctrination has everything to do with it. I am not saying that all public school teachers are evil people, though some are, but the good teachers are employed by an anti-Christian school system whether they realize it or not. I have several friends that are ex-public school teachers that will attest to that fact.

It’s no fun for any youngster to be made fun of and ridiculed by teachers and/or students.  I have had some personal experience there and it was no fun. And why any Christian family that has the ability to do otherwise is willing to subject their kids to that atmosphere is simply beyond me.  My first advice, especially to Christians, has always been, and continues to be, get your kids OUT of the public school system. There have been enough books published over the past 20-30 years explaining what the public school system is really all about, that this information is available to anyone who is willing to read a little. Believe me, most of it is not fun reading but it is entirely necessary for your kids’ spiritual health that you be aware of what goes on in these institutions of “learning.” A mass Christian exodus from public schools should be the order of the day.

A final thought–if these school systems are so afraid that kids will hear about the Bible or about Jesus Christ that they have to discriminate against Christian kids, I wonder if the real truth is that they are afraid of Christian truth. They don’t want it and they labor to make sure none of the kids in their classes hears any of it. The public education system, from the federal level on down, hates Christianity and I think they are afraid of it. Oh, they’d never admit such publicly but I think, at root, that’s what the real situation is.

Evangelical Marxism–part 4

by Al Benson Jr.

Eileen Flynn did an article for Cox News Service on October 20, 2008 in which she said: “According to the Faith in Public Life survey, younger evangelicals are more likely than their elders to support bigger government with more services and show more support for diplomacy versus military strength abroad.” Now I have no problem with genuine diplomacy, although I don’t think we get much of that anymore, and I think it’s long past time that America should quit trying to be the world’s policeman.  All that has done is to cost us American lives and much financial loss as well as the loss of good will around the world. Of course the multi-nationals are reaping big profits while everyone else suffers. As they say, follow the money. What bothers me is the seeming evangelical willingness to go along with more and bigger government. Where is that supported in Scripture? Didn’t any of these people even read 1 Samuel 8:10-20? The government has stepped in and taken over in many areas the churches used to be active in until many churches started practicing retreatism and were willing to accept Christianity as a “sub-culture.” I wonder where they ever got that idea–but then that’s a story for another series of articles which I guarantee would really tick lots of folks off.

There seems to be little discernment today among young evangelicals as to what the proper functions of government are (or aren’t). Of course if the majority of them attended public schools then that should come as no surprise. Many evangelicals are big supporters of public education and don’t want to hear about any other kind. One young evangelical noted that “Jesus is constantly talking about taking care of the poor, taking care of the least of these.”  And she honestly thinks that Obama’s platform better reflects the Gospel! This young lady needs to learn the lesson that party platforms, no matter which party, are strictly for public consumption and seldom reflect what a politician does once he is in office. Party platforms are for the gullible who actually think the president or whover will actually do what he said he would. I agree that Jesus is concerned for the poor, but where in Scripture does He advocate big government “taking care” of them? And how does the program of a Marxist candidate reflect the Gospel? Somehow that one is just a bit much for me to swallow.

In an article from http://www.cnn.com for July 2, 2008 it was noted that “Brian McLaren, a former pastor who spent 24 years in the pulpit and is now an informal advisor to the Obama campaign, believes that a significant portion of evangelical voters are ready to break from their traditional home in the Republican Party and take a new leap of faith with Obama.” McLaren stated: “I think there’s a very, very sizable percentage–I think between a third and half–of evangelicals, especially younger evangelicals who are very open to someone with a new vision.” Only problem is that Obama’s “new vision” is really the old, failed vision of Marxism and the poor evangelicals can’t figure that out. And part of that “new vision” is the desire to end “global warming”  and the war in Iraq.  I can agree with them about the war in Iraq, where we never should have been in the first place, but in light of the “climate gate” revelations only a few years ago I think they really ought to be willing to take another look at the global warming scam–if the media will ever actually report on it. On the other hand, maybe you had better check out the Internet. The “news” media won’t give you anything even approaching an honest viewpoint.

Another young evangelical noted that the Republicans had failed to deliver on the abortion issue. He was right, they did, but voting for a candidate who was openly pro-abortion and openly in favor of sodomite marriages somehow doesn’t strike me as a solution to that problem.

And often, the leadership in many denominations lets their people down. When they could give their congregations some truth, they take a pass and continue on with the usual leftist propaganda. A case in point in Richard D. Land of the Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. According to an article on July 19, 2010 on http://gulagbound.com by Arlen Williams “He (Land) is supporting the ‘transnational progressives’ cynical and destructive policy for imposing a virtual open borders policy and granting of amnesty to America’s multiple millions of illegal aliens. And he is joined by Matthew Staver, of Liberty Counsel and the frequently leftist-leaning Bill Hybels of Willow Creek Community Church in Illinois, the world’s leading proponent of ‘seeker sensitive’ evangelical church services, this according to the New York Times article of July 18, 2010, ‘Obama Gains Evangelical Allies on Immigration.'”

Of course Richard Land has been listed as a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. That he even belongs to this One World government organization should tell you something.

For decades the term “social gospel” was the Christian equivalent of a four-letter word. The social gospel was something that liberal “Christians” introduced as far back as the 1880s. (Yes, there were liberals back then and before). Gary North had an interesting way of describing it when he said: “When you hear the words social gospel immediately think ‘Pastors justification of armed government agents acting on behalf of certain special-interest voting blocs to take wealth away from other groups of citizens in order to benefit these special interests.’ This is exactly what the Social Gospel has always been. The central moral, judicial, and political issue of the Social Gospel is compulsion.” Mr. North, on http://www.garynorth.com (I don’t have a date for this article) noted that the Social Gospel started to become more prominent in the early 1900s, after it was adopted by the old Rockefeller-funded Federal Council of Churches, which in the 1950s morphed into the National Council of Churches. North states, and quite correctly, “The Social Gospel asks this question: What would Jesus steal? It’s answer: As much as he can convince politicians to vote for.”

Having said that, we now come to Jim Wallis, “the American Evangelical Community’s Most Famous Promoter.” Gary North observed that “Jim Wallis supports the economic conclusions of the Social Gospel. This is the #1 fact of his ministry and activism.  This is understandable. In his youth he was  a Marxist, or so the entry on KeyWiki says, for which it offers evidence.” North states, and correctly in my view, that “The Social Gospel is a theological defense of the welfare state.”

You expected to find liberals and liberal churches supporting the Social Gospel. So why are evangelicals now supporting it? This is the kind of thing  the new evangelical movement supposedly left the liberal churches to get away from. North observed of Social Gospel proponents in evangelicalism that: “Ron Sider arrived in 1977 with Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger. He faded rapidly in the mid-1980s, to be replaced by sociologist Tony Campolo. Campolo’s close connection with President Clinton as one of his spiritual counselors backfired during the Monica Lewinsky scandal in 1998.  Campolo then rapidly disappeared from the evangelical scene. Today, Jim Wallis is the best-known representative…Jim Wallis holds to Ron Sider’s original vision…” Anyone remember Mr. Sider? We started out with him in part one of this series. All these above-mentioned evangelical leaders have spent more than ordinary time promoting a leftist version of what Christianity should be.

The fact that the evangelical community has within its fold men who promote what only liberals promoted decades ago shows that the evangelical community has been severely penetrated by what may well be a creeping apostasy. Evangelicals need to start checking out some of those that burst suddenly upon their scene to attract a following and take the time and effort to find out where these people are really coming from.

Evangelical Marxism–part three

by Al Benson Jr.

Writer Roy Beck noted, in an article back in October, 2009, on http://www.numbersusa.com that: “Leaders of most of the nation’s evangelical Christians made a shocking endorsement of illegal-alien amnesty today in Senate testimony…Rev. Leith Anderson, president of the NAE, was invited by Senator (Charles) Shumer (D-N.Y.) to testify in favor of the Senate immigration chairman’s push to create amnesty legislation this fall. Sen. Shumer asked Rev. Anderson if many of his colleagues agree with his support for legalizing 12-20 million illegal aliens and increasing the legal immigration far higher than the 1 million a year current level…Rev. Anderson answered that there was no dissent in adopting the pro-amnesty resolution on the 75-member NAE board of directors. Zero dissent!” Not only that, the NAE doesn’t want to be bothered hearing any other viewpoints. Their minds are made up, so please don’t confuse them with any facts! So the entire NAE board of directors is in favor of amnesty for millions of illegal aliens. Charles Shumer is one of the most leftist members of the Senate, yet here he seems to be in concert with the NAE. That should tell you something–not about Shumer, but rather about the NAE (National Association of Evangelicals).

Roy Beck observed: “I would note that NumbersUSA and others have made requests to NAE for several years to present our moral arguments for less overall immigration to protect the stewardship of the nation’s natural resources and to protect the nation’s most vulnerable citizens. The NAE has resolutely refused to hear any voice but pro-amnesty voices as far as we have been able to tell.” It’s worth noting that Beck and his group are not calling for locking up illegal immigrants. They are calling for letting them return to their homelands with no further penalty. But, according to Mr. Beck, “…the NAE has proclaimed that our forgiveness of illegal aliens should allow them to keep the very things they broke the law to steal: U.S. jobs and access to U.S. infrastructure.” Undoubtedly the NAE leadership sees this as a major way to help redistribute wealth in the United States and so they are all for it–taking the same position as do the Marxists.

I have been informed that, since all this came about, there has been some complaining in the evangelical community. Some of the folks in the pews are not all that crazy about what some of their leadership has been doing “for” them (or to them) and so now some of the denominations involved with the NAE have sought to withdraw their support.  After all, if the folks in the pews get too ticked off they may go elsewhere and the weekly contributions will drop off.

This all goes to show you, though, that, over the years, the neo-evangelicals have continued to come down on the leftist side of most questions, while subtly demeaning those to the right of themselves as “unloving” or “lacking in compassion.” Maybe it might be premature, but I would suggest that some of the new evangelicals do a little homework regarding some of the people and left-wing groups they so piously support to see just how “loving and compassionate” they are. If they were honest they might be more than a little shocked, but then, it would be much easier for them to accuse me of being “unloving” for even daring to bring some of this up.

You see, the new evangelical’s love affair with the left has been going on for quite some time. I recall, way back during the 1972 presidential election in which George McGovern ran against Richard Nixon. While Nixon (I am not a crook) was no saint by any means and was, in fact, a Rockefeller devotee of One World Government, George McGovern was a dedicated leftist. In fact, the 72 election, once George Wallace had his “accident” in Maryland, was yet another where the American public had no real choice.

Yet, in spite of his leftist credentials, McGovern was supported and encouraged by a group called “Evangelicals for McGovern.”  If I recall, the group mentioned somewhere in whatever literature they sent out that McGovern spoke strongly in a manner resembling that of Amos, the Old Testament prophet. You’ll have to pardon me if I was just a bit skeptical, but somehow, i don’t think Amos was a left-winger, but apparently some evangelicals couldn’t spot the difference.

And this same trend continues today, with some evangelicals firmly supporting our current Marxist-in-Chief. There was a definite trend among certain evangelicals during the 2008 election that showed strong support for Obama. There was a short blog on http://my.barackobama.com  that was entitled “Evangelicals for Obama.” Sound familiar–like something you may have heard about before in previous elections? The message said, in part, “Senator Obama presents us with the best choice for the 2008 elections…On matters of social justice, he is more closely aligned to progressive evangelicals than the Republicans are…After much soul searching  I believe Obama is a candidate evangelicals can and should support. This group is for evangelical Christians interested in Obama and in furthering his progress toward the DNC nomination and beyond.” The operative word in this partial quote is probably “progressive.” In his book A Communese-English Dictionary Professor Roy Colby defines progressives as “Those who deliberately or unwittingly promote the (Communist) Party Line.” The man who authored this blurb talked of “soul searching” before deciding in favor of Obama. How much homework did he do to determine just what Obama’s background, political and otherwise, really was? I’d be willing to bet he did zip, zero, nada. Rather he responded emotionally to the pro-Obama propaganda he got via the “news” media and ended up supporting a Marxist–albeit an “evangelical Marxist.”

In an article on http://www.forbes.com for January 22, 2009, the writer noted: “It’s no surprise that much of the improvement for the Democratic Party among evangelicals came from the 18-29 year olds. According to our online polling in 2004 Kerry won 14% of their votes. In 2008 Obama received 28%.” What does that say about the decline of evangelical discernment in four short years? Now evangelicals in this age group are supporting a man with verifiable Marxist proclivities. What does that tell you about evangelical “discernment?” Anyone watching what Obama has done in his time in office has to realize where he is coming from. If some of those young evangelicals that so strongly supported him haven’t smelled the coffee by now, one honestly has to wonder, is there any hope for them?

If their parents had really been conservative, then what happened to the kids? And how many of the kids went to public schools?

Evangelical Marxism–Part two

by Al Benson Jr.

Regarding all this, a case in point is a book, originally written in 1977 by Ronald J. Sider and called Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger. It was published by Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship of Downer’s Grove, Illinois. I understand this book has gone through several printings and some of the later ones are not quite as left-leaning as the earlier printings. I wonder, did some folks catch on and complain and so the publisher decided to tone it down a bit? Nonetheless, something like 350,000 copies of the earlier left-leaning printings still went out to a mostly evangelical audience. In the copy I have, which is the 1977 printing, Mr. Sider is quite hard on anyone that didn’t immediately sell all that he  had over and above the bare subsistence level and give it away to the poor. On pages 75-76 he wrote about rulers cheating the poor. What else is new? Surely this isn’t “news” to Mr. Sider. This has gone on in every culture and in every century of human history.  It’s not a peculiarly American problem. On page 76 he wrote about the “God of the poor” as though God were not God to anyone but the poor.  Somehow you get the impression from Sider’s comments that no one but the poor deserved to have God be concerned about them. In John’s Gospel, in chapter 3, we are told that God loved the world, not just the poor that happened to be in it.

On pages 84 and 85 Sider seemed to be indicting all rich people as oppressors–and to be sure, some of the political rich, many of them ideological leftists or corporate fascists, do oppress the poor–and those that oppress them the most are usually those that prattle about how much they are concerned over the plight of the poor. Concern for “the poor” is often the last refuge of scoundrels. However, one should not just issue a blanket condemnation of all rich people for the sole reason that they are rich. On page 116 Sider made distinctions between property rights and human rights.  It doesn’t seem to have occurred to him that property rights are also human rights. He is forced to admit that the Bible allows for private property. There are just too many instances in Scripture proving that for him to deny it, but he seemed to admit it grudgingly. One wonders if he went out and sold all his extra goods and donated the receipts of it to the poor before he wrote the book.

Among his ideas for combating world hunger, Sider proposed more foreign aid (pages 218-219) and he proposed a “national food policy” on pages 214 and 215. In other words, Sider promoted the idea that governments get into setting “food policy” which is an area governments have no business being in. From some of what I have read lately, this seems to at least be on the minds of some in Obama’s Marxist administration. I’ve read articles talking about the government limiting the amount of food one can store in their homes. The government, in some cases, even seems to be going after people that grow their own food–making them “food criminals” because they have home gardens–something that was encouraged during World War 2 when I was a youngster. They called them “victory gardens” back then. One can only wonder what draconian title the Obama regime will levy on them. One thing you can be sure of, once the federal government really gets into implementing “national food policies” everyone’s rights will be trampled on–even more than they already have been. Yet this sort of thing seems to be part and parcel of the mindset of many evangelicals, who, again, don’t know history.  Stalin did the same thing in the Soviet Union–and starved millions to death, but you can figure that many evangelicals haven’t figured that out yet. They may be well intentioned, but their solutions to some problems are as draconian as those of the Marxists.

I remember, and maybe some of you all do too, back in the 1980s, they had a famine in Ethiopia and all the evangelicals rushed to collect money to send.  We all saw pictures of the starving kids on television–that was part of the game to help to keep that evangelical money streaming in. The only fly in this jug of buttermilk was that the government of Ethiopia was Marxist, and all that money that was collected by the evangelicals to help the starving kids had to be turned over to the Ethiopian government, to be supposedly dispersed so starving families could be helped.  Guess what? Like most Marxist regimes, the one in Ethiopia did not use all that food money to help the starving. Rather, they used it to improve their armaments and for other purposes “in the national interest.” Later, I read about tons of food that had been sent to Ethiopia  to help the hungry and much of it was left rotting on wharves or in warehouses because no one could be bothered to load it on trucks and take it to where there were hungry people.  This was what the concerned evangelicals contributed their money to–a Marxist government that really had no interest in helping the starving, but rather used them as a pawn to obtain foreign aid for their own purposes. A great big Marxist scam on the West–and the evangelicals went for it, hook, line and sinker!

Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) is another prime example of this. It used to be a country, when it was ruled by the dreaded white man, that exported food. Now that it is a black Marxist regime (they tell us how good that is) it is an economic basket case. Once the Marxists took the country over and started redistributing all the farmlands to their friends, all of a sudden Zimbabwe found it couldn’t feed itself anymore, let alone export anything. It has been proven over decades that most Marxist countries can’t feed themselves. Why should American evangelicals continue to throw money and food at Marxist dictatorships that, if they simply allowed their people some liberty, would be able to take care of themselves? According to evangelicals like Mr. Sider, American Christians should be ashamed that they have so much and Marxist countries have so little. Has it ever occurred to some of these folks that the Marxist countries have so little exactly because they are Marxist and their limitations on personal liberty guarantee that those living under their regimes will continue to have little. Why should we finance that as Christians?

Sider’s book made enough of a dent in the evangelical world that, in 1981, David Chilton wrote a rebuttal to it called Productive Christians in an age of Guilt Manipulators. Chilton called Sider “one of the new voices in evangelicalism.” Sider was a professor of theology at Eastern Baptist Seminary in Philadelphia and the president of Evangelicals for Social Action. Chilton asked the question of Sider whether he was a Marxist or not. Sider claimed he wasn’t, but the policies he advocated lead you to wonder. Chilton said of Sider that: “he has allowed his economic views to be shaped by an increasingly vocal, socialistic  element in our society, not by the Word of God.”  And Chilton also quoted writer John Chamberlain, author of The Roots of Capitalism who said: “Thou shalt not covet’ means that it is sinful even to contemplate the seizure of another man’s goods–which is something which socialists, whether Christian or otherwise, have never managed to explain away.”

And Chilton continued: “That is the issue: Socialism is theft. I am not speaking of the voluntary sharing of goods, but rather the state-enforced ‘redistribution’ of wealth. If someone, even the government–takes your property against God’s Word, it is theft. And Sider advocates state socialism.” Chilton noted that Sider has used the concepts of guilt and envy “to manipulate ‘rich Christians’ into accepting socialism.” Unfortunately, many evangelical Christians have accepted socialism at some level without realizing it. Dressing socialist concepts up with a few Bible verses (usually out of context) is often enough to gull unsuspecting Christians into buying into it, because, although we have learned to be as “harmless as doves” we somehow have never learned to be as “wise as serpents” (Matthew 10:16).

Even though Sider’s book was first published back in 1977 and David Chilton’s rebuttal was printed in 1981, this sort of thing still continues today in the evangelical world. Author Gary North wrote in 1997 that: “Rich Christians represented what I regard as the second-worst aspect of neo-evangelicalism: its middle class sell-out to liberation theology.”

And the neo-evangelicals today, as represented by the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) continue down this path. In true “liberation theology” style they are now endorsing amnesty for over 12 million illegal aliens because high immigration seems to be increasing the membership roles in evangelical churches and is, therefore, “good for the economy.”

To be continued.