Resurrection Day, AND

[AnOrangeCat]

7 hours ago, AdHoc said:

If I have made my case well, then socialism and communism are not in accordance with God's will. In Acts 5 the early Church tried it and it not only did it not work, but it provoked the death of Ananias and Saphira. In his sentence Peter pointed out that what was THEIRS was at THEIR disposal.

I disagree. Was the Corinthian church an utter failure because they had someone involved in incest? Did God discard Peter because he doubted when walking on the water with Jesus and later denied Him three times? Was David completely disowned because of his sin? Did God go "This isn't working out, time to abandon humanity!" because of Adam and Eve? Clearly not. Nowhere in the Bible do we see the apostles or God Himself saying that the system failed and that it was to be abandoned. Even after the incident with Ananias and Sapphira the sharing of resources seemed to continue as evidenced by an omission in the distribution system and the appointing Stephen and a "select few" others to oversee distribution in the very next chapter.

7 hours ago, AdHoc said:

The earth is the Lord's but for its management He gave it to men (Ps.24:1, 115.:16). Psalm 8 shows the same.

I'd argue here that in leaving men to manage the earth He also gave them the authority to take their choice of government and economic styles. God gave a warning about monarchy yet allowed it anyway. When it was good it saw great heights. When it wasn't there was rampant idolatry and even prostitution going on in the temple.

8 hours ago, AdHoc said:

However, I understand that pure socialism, where all do their duty, and the managers of the pot are honorable, is a nice thought, especially for the weak and not so talented.

This is true of any government or economic style. Democracy is a nice thought when people elect leaders whose hearts are on God. It's a nice thought that through hard work a person can rise above where they started. But Biblical principles include a lot more than who owns what. They include things like caring for the poor, widows, and less fortunate. Any government, organization, or individual can operate under the two great commandments cited by Jesus or not. I'm just not seeing a strong Biblical case for or against any particular style. Like you pointed out God gave it to us to manage. All these systems are just different flavors of sin and misery when they stray from God.

[RdJ]

11 hours ago, AdHoc said:

If I have made my case well, then socialism and communism are not in accordance with God's will. In Acts 5 the early Church tried it and it not only did it not work, but it provoked the death of Ananias and Saphira. In his sentence Peter pointed out that what was THEIRS was at THEIR disposal.

However, I understand that pure socialism, where all do their duty, and the managers of the pot are honorable, is a nice thought, especially for the weak and not so talented.

It did work in Acts because Paul also said don't work don't eat. This wasn't communism or socialism like you have now where people can just take advantage if they're too lazy to work and get a bigger house than someone with a job. In Acts they fed the widows and only those who had no family to take care of them.

The plus side of socialism like in Holland is that they don't dump the load on family or an ex if someone refuses to work and wants to mooch.

Capitalism is also evil.

Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you.
James 5:1‭-‬6 NKJV
https://bible.com/bible/114/jas.5.1-6.NKJV

 

Is this capitalism or socialism? Cause I see this in my country which is a mix. We take care of the poor, but at the expense of the real poor in other countries with cheap labour or people who come work to take money home for a lousy pay the hardest work, while the lazy rich work at a desk. It's totally unfair that I get paid more because I did some dumb study. I have worked in catering. That was way harder work for lousy pay. Of course a doctor should make more than a cleaner, but it's insane how much some get, says my sister who is a doc herself, but not an insane rich one like her friends who are specialists. I refuse to go to a doctor because of her stories. They have money enough and wont get a cent from me and God heals for free.

Edited April 8, 2024 by RdJ

[AdHoc]

5 hours ago, AnOrangeCat said:

I disagree. Was the Corinthian church an utter failure because they had someone involved in incest? Did God discard Peter because he doubted when walking on the water with Jesus and later denied Him three times? Was David completely disowned because of his sin? Did God go "This isn't working out, time to abandon humanity!" because of Adam and Eve? Clearly not. Nowhere in the Bible do we see the apostles or God Himself saying that the system failed and that it was to be abandoned. Even after the incident with Ananias and Sapphira the sharing of resources seemed to continue as evidenced by an omission in the distribution system and the appointing Stephen and a "select few" others to oversee distribution in the very next chapter.

I'd argue here that in leaving men to manage the earth He also gave them the authority to take their choice of government and economic styles. God gave a warning about monarchy yet allowed it anyway. When it was good it saw great heights. When it wasn't there was rampant idolatry and even prostitution going on in the temple.

This is true of any government or economic style. Democracy is a nice thought when people elect leaders whose hearts are on God. It's a nice thought that through hard work a person can rise above where they started. But Biblical principles include a lot more than who owns what. They include things like caring for the poor, widows, and less fortunate. Any government, organization, or individual can operate under the two great commandments cited by Jesus or not. I'm just not seeing a strong Biblical case for or against any particular style. Like you pointed out God gave it to us to manage. All these systems are just different flavors of sin and misery when they stray from God.

 

3 hours ago, RdJ said:

It did work in Acts because Paul also said don't work don't eat. This wasn't communism or socialism like you have now where people can just take advantage if they're too lazy to work and get a bigger house than someone with a job. In Acts they fed the widows and only those who had no family to take care of them.

The plus side of socialism like in Holland is that they don't dump the load on family or an ex if someone refuses to work and wants to mooch.

Capitalism is also evil.

Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you.
James 5:1‭-‬6 NKJV
https://bible.com/bible/114/jas.5.1-6.NKJV

 

Is this capitalism or socialism? Cause I see this in my country which is a mix. We take care of the poor, but at the expense of the real poor in other countries with cheap labour or people who come work to take money home for a lousy pay the hardest work, while the lazy rich work at a desk. It's totally unfair that I get paid more because I did some dumb study. I have worked in catering. That was way harder work for lousy pay. Of course a doctor should make more than a cleaner, but it's insane how much some get, says my sister who is a doc herself, but not an insane rich one like her friends who are specialists. I refuse to go to a doctor because of her stories. They have money enough and wont get a cent from me and God heals for free.

Thank you both for your replies. You have brought some good and valid arguments. But I did notice that neither of you addressed my kernel argument. It was that God gives differing talents and upholds the individual right to dispose of his fruits as he wishes. And then, to anchor this, God gives two of ten commandments, namely, (i) though shalt not steal, and (ii) though shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods to ensure that he keeps them. Can we approve a system that makes the removal of your fruits a law?

What think ye of Deuteronomy 8:18?

18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.

Private wealth is attached to Covenant and God's honor is at stake seeing as He made this Covenant. God gives wealth and man makes it law to strip the man of his wealth.

[RdJ]

22 minutes ago, AdHoc said:

 

Thank you both for your replies. You have brought some good and valid arguments. But I did notice that neither of you addressed my kernel argument. It was that God gives differing talents and upholds the individual right to dispose of his fruits as he wishes. And then, to anchor this, God gives two of ten commandments, namely, (i) though shalt not steal, and (ii) though shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods to ensure that he keeps them. Can we approve a system that makes the removal of your fruits a law?

What think ye of Deuteronomy 8:18?

18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.

Private wealth is attached to Covenant and God's honor is at stake seeing as He made this Covenant. God gives wealth and man makes it law to strip the man of his wealth.

They often get wealth at the expense of others, like the guy who starts a grocery store and pays the Polish workers lousy and crams em with 20 in a house. My son gets 6 euro an hour and the owner has millions. That's keeping back the wages of the ones who get the harvest in. And doctors and such, we are forced to pay healthcare insurance monthly which gives them a nice pay. Vets often quit or the animals die. If you dont want it you're forced to. House owners who bought a bunch of houses and ask insane high rent, taking advantage of the younger ones who werent lucky to be able to buy a relatively cheap house. All these rules. Home owners get taxes back. They now changed the rules which is fabulous. Some rich Canadians bought houses here to take advantage of renters. Haha now they left cause they changed the rules and force em to pay more taxes if you dont live in it. Great. Move it.

 

Taxes is because people are selfish and earn too much anyway, to make it more equal. I get just as much as someone with no education with a part time job, cause what they get less than the minimum they get extra from the govt. That way its less unfair. Now if she's married she already gets an extra income from het man so no extras which is also fair.

In church rich people give no cent and the pastor doesnt get paid. Its always give whats on your heart. Oh its nothing. But in Canada they just say: if you want to come to this conference it costs you whatever. Way smarter.

Edited April 8, 2024 by RdJ

[AnOrangeCat]

22 hours ago, AdHoc said:

Thank you both for your replies. You have brought some good and valid arguments. But I did notice that neither of you addressed my kernel argument. It was that God gives differing talents and upholds the individual right to dispose of his fruits as he wishes. And then, to anchor this, God gives two of ten commandments, namely, (i) though shalt not steal, and (ii) though shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods to ensure that he keeps them. Can we approve a system that makes the removal of your fruits a law?

What think ye of Deuteronomy 8:18?

18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.

Private wealth is attached to Covenant and God's honor is at stake seeing as He made this Covenant. God gives wealth and man makes it law to strip the man of his wealth.

In the OT we see the practice of leaving a portion of one's crops ungathered for the sake of the poor instituted in Leviticus 19:9-10. That's a system that makes the removal of some of your fruits a law. We're not given a precise measurement on what's fair, but over and over again we see commandments for charity. As the NT says our bodies are not our own and should be used to glorify God. This idea seems very applicable to our finances as well.

When the rich young ruler approached Jesus in Mark 10 asking what he needed to do the response was to go sell everything and give the funds to the poor. While I do believe we're more obligated to follow the Lord loving a cheerful giver these days the fact that the story is repeated across three of the Gospels is telling.

Finally we're told over and over (Romans 13:1-7, 1 Peter 2:13-17, Titus 3:1, etc.) to obey the government and as Jesus put it, "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's". If that includes a redistribution system so be it.

All that said I do personally feel like a system that takes all but the bare necessity to survive diminishes the impact of charitable giving. There's probably some happy balance that could be found in putting tax money to good use and while still leaving room to both enrich our own lives and be cheerful givers, but world governments being what they are today it's hard to see them legitimately striving toward that.

[FJK]

4 minutes ago, AnOrangeCat said:

n the OT we see the practice of leaving a portion of one's crops ungathered for the sake of the poor instituted in Leviticus 19:9-10.

Interestingly enough, that system of leaving some behind for the poor to glean also requires that the poor go out and do the work of gathering the remaining crops for their needs, effectively requiring to work for them, not just be given them for nor no effort at all.

This is in keeping with what God told Adam after he was expelled from the garden, that he would now have to work for a living.

Just something to maybe give some thought to when considering the nature of our charitable giving.

[AdHoc]

3 hours ago, AnOrangeCat said:

In the OT we see the practice of leaving a portion of one's crops ungathered for the sake of the poor instituted in Leviticus 19:9-10. That's a system that makes the removal of some of your fruits a law. We're not given a precise measurement on what's fair, but over and over again we see commandments for charity. As the NT says our bodies are not our own and should be used to glorify God. This idea seems very applicable to our finances as well.

When the rich young ruler approached Jesus in Mark 10 asking what he needed to do the response was to go sell everything and give the funds to the poor. While I do believe we're more obligated to follow the Lord loving a cheerful giver these days the fact that the story is repeated across three of the Gospels is telling.

Finally we're told over and over (Romans 13:1-7, 1 Peter 2:13-17, Titus 3:1, etc.) to obey the government and as Jesus put it, "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's". If that includes a redistribution system so be it.

All that said I do personally feel like a system that takes all but the bare necessity to survive diminishes the impact of charitable giving. There's probably some happy balance that could be found in putting tax money to good use and while still leaving room to both enrich our own lives and be cheerful givers, but world governments being what they are today it's hard to see them legitimately striving toward that.

Okay. All you say is true. But FREEWILL giving is not socialism. Socialism is the removal, BY LAW, of your fruits and redistributing them by a small minority.

I'm glad you brought in, as an example, the rich young man of Mark 10. Let us examine it. He was "young" (Matt.19). This is important because usually it takes years to get rich. How did the man get wealth so soon? The answer is in the text. He kept the Law.

The Law of Moses promises diverse blessings for keeping it, and one of them is wealth (Deut.28:1-13). The young wealthy man had simply reaped the benefit of being obedient to God's Law - and it says that "Jesus loved him". This same Law of Moses commanded you to give to the poor and help the needy. The reward for doing this would be MORE WEALTH. So why did our Lord Jesus ask him to give it all away? Was it not legally obtained and in fulfillment of God's promise?

There is a word in the new Testament that has been misused. In Ephesians 1:10 and 3:2 we find the Greek word "oikonomia". It is rendered "dispensation", but instead of using the word that means "to dispense", we have emphasized the TIME PERIOD that God "dispenses". And so a controversial word "dispensation" is argued about as being a time period. But the true meaning is "the time in which God DISPENSES a certain way". The word "dispense" has the meaning and sense of a mother in her kitchen DISPENSING what her family need.

Now, while men like to have a unified way of dispensing, and term anything outside of this way as "unfair", God is not bound by such rules. Much more He "dispenses" for the good of men. And so while he will dispense by "Conscience" to the Nations (Rom.2), He has, for various reasons, dispensed to Israel according to Law. This "dispensation" by Law ended with John Baptist (Matt.11:13, Lk.16:16). And dispensation of GRACE started (Jn.1:17). The dispensation or "economy" by Grace was a system whereby God wanted to be reconciled to man and man needed TIME to consider his ways and once having considered that he was a sinner, could ask for forgiveness.

This great system that God implemented for men has one attribute that men don't like. It is this; JUDGMENT is DEFERRED! The Law required instant RESTORATION and instant RETRIBUTION. But GRACE required a TIME given to come to one's senses. That meant that the OFFENDER would seem to get away with His offense. It would seem that justice was lacking. It was not because God would eventually even things out, but He allowed a TIME when justice was set aside for a later date.

AND THE RICH MAN OF MARK 10 FELL INTO THE TRANSITION BETWEEN TWO ECONOMIES. He lived when John Baptist lived, and so he was keeping the Law, but Jesus asked him to play the game of GRACE. LAW says; "Keep your wealth" and GRACE says; "Help the undeserving". GRACE extends far beyond money. Grace says "turn your other cheek to give time to the offender to rethink his way". Law says, "punch back and give another punch as punitive judgment".

At all times YOURS is YOURS. Under Law you get to keep it. Under Grace you get to give it away, sometimes to the undeserving. Under Law you could claim restoration and retribution. Under Grace you must WAIT for the harvest. If you extend GRACE you invest in the Kingdom. But the Kingdom comes with the king - Jesus' second coming.

This is what happened to the rich young man. He was a model citizen under Law. His wealth was legal and it was his to keep. It was a reward BY GOD. But for the coming Kingdom we need to POSTPONE our claims. Reward will come, bt only when the King comes (Rev.22.12). This was not a lesson in socialism. It was the change of "OIKONOMIA". NOW, you get to lose your wealth. AT CHRIST'S RETURN to get your reward.

The Lord simply asks you to be clever. Invest in the needy and your interest rate is high - but in heaven's bank. In the mean time - YOU WAIT and go short.

[Sower]

On 4/8/2024 at 8:17 AM, AdHoc said:

God gives wealth and man makes it law to strip the man of his wealth.

"For even when we were with you, this we commanded you,
that if any would not work, neither should he eat.

I have been young, and now am old,
yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.

Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means
caring for orphans and widows in their distress
and refusing to let the world corrupt you"