”He who digs a pit will fall into it, and a serpent will bite him who breaks through a wall. He who quarries stones is hurt by them, and he who splits logs is endangered by them. If the iron is blunt, and one does not sharpen the edge, he must use more strength, but wisdom helps one to succeed. If the serpent bites before it is charmed, there is no advantage to the charmer.“ Ecclesiastes 10:8-11 ESV
Work is a fascinating subject to consider from the Christian perspective. Living in a fallen world in need of redemption, we’re told rather bluntly that work and survival are going to be wrought with difficultly. We must develop the integrity and toughness to hear all of the Bible. It’s not in vain that it’s written: “Since you listened to your wife and ate form the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it. It will grow thorns and thistles for you, though you will eat of its grains. By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return (Genesis 3:17-19).” Contrary to this, we’re quite tempted to hear the Tempter’s voice. He whispers to us still. He says, “work is hard…it shouldn’t be.” How do we know the voice of the Serpent? He never speaks of sin and its curse so, therefore, he never mentions God’s redemption in Christ either. He offers freedom that’s actually slavery to lust and greed rather than righteousness through faith alone.
Is work hard? Doesn’t the reality of our labor prove the truth of the curse? Yes and yes. But we do well to remember – and must! – that “they twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on His head (Matthew 27:29).” Our problems are spiritual, not economic and political. Those problems, like all others, are downstream of our central issue which is sin and its curse. This means that our challenge is theological. Life’s great battle ground is faith, not politics and economics. At the cross of Christ alone we have deliverance from both sin and its curse. Thus, to live a life of faith we must be renewed in our minds and not fall prey to the winds of worldly doctrines about life and work.
As it goes, however, we often don’t do that. Instead of developing a Christian mind, rich with its presuppositions and premises, we’re often too conformed to this world. It’s truly shocking how much the Bible has to say about economics and law in light of how little the average churchman regards the principles of God’s word-law in those areas.
Instead, Marxist ideology dominates modern educational, media, and political culture.
The average Christian rarely stands upon Scriptural principles when discussing work, economics and law. In some cases, we don’t for the simple reason that we’ve been convinced that the Bible is neutral in those areas. An erroneous reading of Jesus’ comment about rendering unto Caesar is often at the root of it. We’ve let the world define critical biblical principles for us, which is a lot like letting the thief set your security codes. Watching Christians lose or be stalemated in debates over economics and labor with atheistic democrats is like watching Chuck Norris lose a fight to a man with no arms. This happens, sadly, because too many of us are ignorant of the Scriptures and, worse still, accept the myth of neutrality (the erroneous presumption that mankind has an excuse for unbelief, contrary to Romans 1 and Psalm 19).
The key is: we must never debate the Serpent on his terms. When we’re asked, “did God really say…” in whatever iteration, the answer is always a resounding yes. Shall Christ be Lord of our soul but not our vocation? Is the sovereign creator of the universe outranked by Bernie Sanders?
In all work – in all labor and economics – God has spoken clearly about the core principles. He alone is the Creator God and owns literally all things. By virtue of this, He alone is authorized to issue ethical commandments. The logic is obvious: no ethical commandment can proceed from a derivative being, only the Creator. If there’s no Creator God, there can be no ethics because equal parties can’t command other equals. Whoever is God is alone authorized to issue moral absolutes. If the state, as Francis Shaeffer once explained, can declare ethical commandments, then the state is and must be god.
God, who is the true and only God, emphatically and clearly states that property is sacred and that covetousness is evil. Therefore, one’s property may not be stolen by anyone. For any reason. The implications of this for society are, of course, enormous. If slavery is wrong (the total theft of a person’s property and labor, which is the sum of one’s doing, i.e., their life) then so is stealing any part of it. If one, then the other. The question is one of degrees.
The modern state, and the modern voter, recoils at the obvious truth of the eight and tenth commandment. After eleven soaring chapters of blessed doctrine in Romans, as the Lord explains what’s wrong with mankind and what He’s done about it in Christ, chapter 12 begins with the logical implication of it all. “Therefore,” the Spirit tells Paul, “present your body as a living sacrifice…for this is your spiritual (reasonable) worship.” The Lord who created us, and the One whom we’ve rejected, and who died for our sins so that we’d be reconciled, by faith, commands our obedience but doesn’t force it!
Mankind is forever pretending to be the God that he rejects. But we, in faith, should be “perfect” just as our Heavenly Father is perfect.
A living sacrifice is a person who dedicates all of their life – labor and leisure – to the Lord. This is the only rational way of life. It’s a life of worship and love rather than regulation and force. It’s a life of freedom and creative productivity…of amazing opportunity and the privilege of using one’s God-given talents in the service of others to the glory of the Lord. All humanistic ethical and economic systems reject the plain logic of this and, therefore, mankind’s existence and history is a minefield of conflict, tyranny and sorrow.
Today, despite the fall of the Soviet Union and the discredit this did to communism in the main, the ideology upon which it rests, Marxism, is alive and well. In fact, its principles are ubiquitous throughout academia and politics.
We must beware of this, be on our vigilant guard against it, as Marxism, in all its evil little forms, is decidedly anti-Christ. We could say, in fact, that of all the evil spawn ideas of Satan throughout history, Karl Marx is Satan’s most talented prophet. The ideology of greed and covetousness, of selfishness, and the destruction of God-given property rights (thou shalt not steal…with your own hands or through complicated government schemes like “progressive” income taxes) has literally led to the wholesale slaughter of hundreds of millions of souls since Marx. It’s also led to economic misery and systemic oppression like we see in Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea. All who love God’s word-law, and love their neighbor, hate Marxism or, if presently naive, learn to hate it.
Marxism is a counterfeit gospel…an ethic of covetousness and theft. Darwinism is the metaphysic of humanism, the lie that something came from nothing. And it’s the epistemology of man’s mind. In the name of science, it relegates God’s word-law to the “values” or “personal belief” rather than truth. The Enemy is crafty beyond belief. These are great and systemic lies, so very subtle and smooth. They’re the default setting of our age.
We send our kids to Sunday school, we have them worship for an hour on Sunday, maybe again Wednesday night but for the rest of the time they hear that false gospel preached. Evolution is the 666 of Genesis 1:1. In evolution, man was created by chance, for chance, and he is his own end and must find his own way. That way will be humanism (666) in whatever variant catches his fancy. It’s not whether we’ll have a standard of life and truth, but which standard. This is how one’s creation narrative (metaphysics), theory of knowledge (epistemology), and ethics are all bound up in an integrated unit we refer to as one’s worldview.
The basics of one’s worldview/philosophy are metaphysics (ultimacy), epistemology (theory of knowledge), and ethics (right and wrong). Politics, economics, art, and leisure, and all other things are based upon and downstream of these. Thus, for the Christian to grow more like Christ means that he/she must endeavor in the Spirit to develop a thoroughly “Christian mind” rather than one conformed to the world. To be vacuously conformed to the world’s philosophy is the easiest thing of all. It takes no effort.
The metaphysic of our time is evolution.
The epistemology is “we believe in science.” Note the “we believe” is religious/philosophical language and can’t be tested scientifically. God is not mocked. The metaphysic of chance can’t explain nor support why we’d ever be interested in truth in the first place.
The ethic is Marxist, which is to say that there’s no real theory of good and evil except that one is reduced to an economic unit.
Such are the consequences of choosing this day that we’ll serve the false gods of the age. You’re reduced to the status of a human widget; you’re identified not in terms of being an image bearer of God but as a mere consumer. You’re told that if you don’t make this much money or that, have this retirement plan or that one, that your rights are violated. Again: Marxism has no logically consistent ethical system. It’s a counterfeit of God’s word-law.
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