As I write this, there are still five states to go in the counting for President. Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada and Alaska. As of right now, Alaska has a huge Trump lead, but Anchorage and Fairbanks have yet to report. Alaska will likely go Trump, but there are only three electors for Alaska. So, it is Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina and Nevada, and right now they are all to close to call. Control of the Senate is still up for grabs. And the House, while still unresolved, will almost certainly remain under control of the Democratic Party. However, it may be that by the time you read this, all will be resolved.

Personally, I do not like writing about politics. I prefer to write about the work of the Lord in our lives. But this is a time when we have to consider both Christianity and politics. Please bear with me.

         The history student in me is hearing alarm bells ring. It seems most people do not have real knowledge of history. People just don’t like it. Anything prior to the year 2000 is ancient history and is useless. Even the events of 09/11/2001 no longer matter. A famed American philosopher, George Santayana, coined the often repeated quote, Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. There is an undeniable truth in the quote. (Winston Churchill said it better, but who has ever heard of him?) We are seeing now, however, that the lessons of history are of no use.

The Democratic Party has been relentlessly drifting towards socialism for decades now. The last few years the thing that riles conservatives is the call from the Democrats to ban guns. This is inane to me. Saying guns kill people is like saying that my pencil wrote the wrong answers on a test. Even so, the clamor continues. I no longer have a firearm, but it is merely because I have no use for one. I am very opposed to the government taking them away.

Socialism goes further than that, though. And that is what I wish to explore here.

If you ask most people thirty five and older what the letters USSR stand for, they will tell you communist Russia. Anyone younger will have a problem because it is ancient history. But. USSR does not stand for communist Russia. It stands for Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. There were many nations other than Russia that made up the USSR. Now, if you ask people what NAZI stands for, many will say it stands for Trump and his Hitler tendencies. Which is, of course, stupid. NAZI stands for, in German, Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei. In English that is National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Both called themselves socialist. Now, someone out there is rolling their eyes, but it is a fact that the two most destructive regimes to ever to exist were socialist.

Webster’s defines socialism as, “a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done.” Someone might say that the NAZIs were fascist, but that person has no idea what a fascist is in reality. Fascists are so much like communists that it is hard to see the difference. So, from Webster’s definition we see that socialism is a stepping stone to communism. Webster defines communism as “a doctrine based on revolutionary Marxian socialism and Marxism-Leninism, a totalitarian system of government in which a single authoritarian party controls state-owned means of production.” In communism there is no private ownership. Your farm becomes the government’s, your home becomes the government’s, your labor does not benefit you, it benefits the government.

I was in Pittsburgh in January and got into this conversation with a young adult. BUT, he said, WE WILL DO SOCIALISM RIGHT! To which I replied, Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. To which he looked me right in the eyes and said, “Huh?”

There is no way to do socialism right. It has always, always, always given rise to dictators and strong arm rulers. I have been amazed over the years at the number of people who point out that the early church followed a socialist way of life. That is completely true, too. But it wasn’t put forth as government. The early church was more reminiscent of a family. In a family it is all for one and one for all. In a government situation, however, the traditional role of a father in a family is taken over by the dictator, and he is never a loving and kind father figure.

So now it appears that we are on the slippery and steep slope heading down to the sewer that is socialism. People are posting on Facebook that they are loading up on guns and such like. Your choice. But I have a different concern.

In the Soviet Union, in NAZI Germany, in communist China, in North Korea and in every other so afflicted country, they do round up weapons. Nothing says total control like fear of the government. But there is something else. Karl Marx (the creator of socialism and communism) wrote that “Religion is the opium of the masses”. (In the original German it just goes on and on.) Marx’s thinking was that if the people have access to religion, they will turn away from government. Because of this, in every socialist/communist regime ever, Bibles are confiscated from the regular folks. Churches are either eliminated or so heavily controlled by the government that they hardly resemble churches. In all of that, though, the underground church, the church of Godly people willing to die for their faith, flourishes.

This also is what socialism breeds. Don’t be foolish and believe otherwise. When we lived in south Florida, I had a conversation with an older Cuban man. He told me that when the revolution was taking place in Cuba (where the communist forces of Castro were warring with and seeking to overthrow the leadership and army of Batista) he was drawn to communism. He had always been poor and this was a way for him to rise up a little. His only concern was for his faith. He was told that he would be able to worship God as he saw fit. So, he fought for the communists. And then, in a fairly short while, he was in prison for his faith.

 In my sermon on 11/01/2020 (which is available on the church website http://urbanayokeparish.com/worship-videos) I shared a passage out of Luke. Luke 21:5-19 is the entire passage and deals with the time before the end times begin, but right now I wish to look at just verses 14 and 15. Jesus is talking about the hardships Christians will face at the hands of government, but this will be an opportunity to share the Gospel. Jesus says, Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer, for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict. I believe He will have to give us knowledge because our Bibles will be gone and our churches will be shuttered. Churches have already been closed in some states in the name of COVID and for the last decade and a half the Bible has been said to be full of hate speech.

Read your Bibles. Not just devotions, but really read them. Store that knowledge up. We are on the very verge of losing everything. A land that was once a land of equal opportunity will become a land of equal outcome, and a land that promises you can worship how you wish will become a land that closes the door on that wish.

And you know what? This is the reason we Christians are here. This is our time, our opportunity. Offering hope to a hopeless world.