The Philosophy of Socialism
by Mark Swarbrick
God’s Truth: Christ is the Answer
Christianity and Socialism are diametrically opposed. The Holy Scriptures set forth the Christian Gospel as the cure for man’s ills. It is the fallen heart of man that leads to all societal problems. Poverty, greed, war, broken homes – you name the problem – the core issue is the sinful nature of man.
When a person surrenders their life to Christ, a miracle happens. They are born again, their life is turned around, their sins are forgiven and they are given a new nature created in the image of Christ. When the majority in a society repent and turn to Jesus, that country becomes a Christian nation. Then, all manner of societal problems disappear. If they turn away from Christ, all sorts of evil will return to that nation. We see this example play out many times in the histories contained in the Old Testament. Whenever a nation rejects God, they embrace evil, and calamity follows. In short, repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ is the answer, both for individuals and nations. We see this played out repeatedly with Israel in the Old Testament.
Man’s Idea: Socialism is the Answer
Socialism, on the other hand, is a man-made philosophy that is put forward as the cure for societal problems. It imagines that man’s problems are the result of “classes,” that it is inequality of possession and opportunity that is the root of all evil. If all could be made equal, all would be well in the world. With socialism this equality is brought about through governmental theft. Those who worked, planned, and sacrificed to build something find the fruits of their labor stolen by the government and given to those who did not work for it.
This philosophy was popularized by the rabidly anti-God atheist and anti-Semite, Karl Marx, who lived from 1818 to 1883. Winston Churchill, in a speech before the House of Commons on October 22, 1945, said that “the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” Churchill pronounced in a May 1948 speech that socialism is “a philosophy of failure, a creed of ignorance, and a gospel of envy,” Churchill warned that any society that embraced socialism was on a miserable march toward ruin. Margaret Thatcher, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom aptly declared, “The problem with socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people’s money.”
Karl Marx was an evil man. Dr. Paul Kengor, professor of political science at Grove City College in Pennsylvania, delineates in his book, The Devil and Karl Marx, the anti God nature of socialism, speaking of, “the grim, disturbing, militant atheism and intense anti-religious elements of Marx and other founders and practitioners of communism.” The following words, penned by Marx, demonstrate the demonic influence upon his mind:
“The hellish vapors that rise and fill the brain, till I go mad and my heart is utterly changed. See this sword the Prince of Darkness sold to me? For me he beats the time and gives the signs. Ever more boldly I play the dance of death.”
Indeed, Marx has played the dance of death, for the adoption of his godless philosophy caused the extermination of over 100 million people. The stark reality of socialism is seen in the genocide carried out by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic’s genocide of millions and in Hitler’s National Socialist German Workers’ Party which killed six million Jews. Socialism did not save those countries. And the death-count yet goes on.
The New Socialism
Dr. Kengor’s book points out that “one cannot separate Marxism the ideology from Marx the man.” Yet, that is exactly what people do today; they attempt to separate Marx’s socialism from Marx himself. The track record of socialism is so horrendous that the only way to promote it is to package Marx’s old failed philosophy in a new wrapper.
Dr. Kengor says the “communist ideology possesses a bizarre seductive quality to its ideological cultists.” And so it is. In spite of its failure, socialism is having a resurgence around the world, yet it is presented with a new face in order to hide its past failures. Instead of a bloody revolution that springs socialism all at once, it is now being promoted slowly via ever increasing taxes imposed to fatten government coffers with monies allegedly to be used for the common good.
The reality of that of course is that corrupt politicians get their grubby fingers on the money, and some of it disappears. What’s left falls into the hands of well-meaning but incompetent bureaucrats who mismanage the funds. Sympathetic social workers dispense what money remains to some who have wrecked their lives with laziness and careless living. The root problem is never addressed and there is never enough money to solve problems, so ever higher taxes are imposed upon those who do plan ahead and work industriously.
When the outcry of rising taxes threatens re-election campaigns, politicians promise they will only tax the rich, which means businesses and corporations are taxed even more heavily. To remain profitable, those businesses have to cut wages and raise their prices, which serves only to harm the average working man. Taxing the rich only leads to taxing the poor man indirectly. When that fails to provide enough welfare money, taxes are raised even higher and these businesses either fail or they move to another country. The result is utter devastation of the economy, which is exactly what happened recently with Venezuela’s socialist experiment. The equality of socialism leads eventually to nothing but the equal distribution of poverty. As President Ronald Reagan said when speaking of the failure of socialism: “Socialism only works in two places: Heaven where they don’t need it and hell where they already have it.”
Who is the Real Savior?
The fundamental difference between socialism and Christianity is who is seen as the savior of mankind. Christianity declares that Jesus Christ is the Savior of men’s souls and the Christian Gospel is the savior of a society. As it is written in Scripture:
“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” (2nd Chronicles 7:14)
Socialism sees it differently. Socialism advocates government as the savior of mankind, specifically, a socialist government. God’s Word warns against the foolishness of this:
“It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.” Or as it says in the GNT, “It is better to trust in the LORD than to depend on human leaders.”
That is the basic difference between Christianity and socialism. One depends upon the Word of God and sees Jesus as the answer while socialism ignores or rejects the precepts of God and places its trust in man and his philosophies. Jeremiah 17:5 says:
“This is what the LORD says: “Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans, who rely on human strength and turn their hearts away from the LORD.”
The Christian Roots of America
It is made clear in Jesus’ statement, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” that Jesus had no problem with paying taxes. Yet, it must be understood that the founding fathers of America understood the great danger of runaway government and how a government can run amuck with greed and tax its people into poverty. Thus they implemented strict rules limiting the power of government. Their wisdom laid the foundation for America’s great prosperity.
They also understood that adherence to the precepts of God was the true foundation of blessing. John Adams, the 2nd president of the United States said, “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Realizing that Christian morality and virtue are the foundation of our republic and necessary for a society to remain free, in 1777 the Continental Congress voted to authorize the Committee of Commerce to purchase and import 20,000 Bibles for the people of the United States. In 1781 Congress passed another resolution endorsing the printing of Bibles in the America.
A Matter of Degree
America was founded upon limited government and limited government assistance, realizing that free welfare can breed dependance and languor. In contrast to socialism, American founders promoted self-reliance and independence. For the benefit of the poor and misfortunate, Christian churches stepped up and provided all manner of social services along with Godly counsel, direction, and oversight. Paul mentions in Galatians 2:10 that the highest church authorities urged him thus: “All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I had been eager to do all along.” Sadly, this is not preached on as much as it should be today.
But in early America, churches worked closely with those in need, ascertaining whether difficulty was the result of sinful choices or truly unfortunate circumstances. Such oversight prevented waste and guarded against the promotion of laziness. Additionally, relatives understood that they were the first line of defense against misfortune. As it says in 1 Timothy 5:8, “But if someone does not provide for his own, especially his own family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” And 2 Thessalonians 3:10, “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”
The socialism that has crept into America has destroyed all this. Families don’t take care of their own, they look first to the government. Church benevolence programs are a fraction of what they used to be, with so many believers mistakenly thinking that such help is in the purview of the government. This is the great evil of socialism. It turns people away from God and the church and has them looking to the government to save them.
Income tax was unheard of until it was instituted in the U.S. in 1913. Today, socialist programs have expanded to the point that citizens pay nearly half of their earnings to the government through income tax, sales tax, and property taxes. If our founding fathers had been told that one day the government would steal half of a person’s income to give it away to others, they would be dreadfully shocked.
The Breeding Ground of Socialism
Socialism flourishes in environments where people feel desperate and divided. When socialists begin their work in an area, they accentuate injustices between groups of people. Socialism requires that there be victims and victimizers. If the problems are insignificant, the socialists will magnify the situation out of proportion in order to engender anger and hate. They present socialism as the answer for all this “injustice.”
Socialists will do all they can to bring injustice and chaos, so they can blame the trouble on capitalism. If there are no injustices now, they will point to injustices committed by people who died a hundred years ago and lay the blame for that at the feet of the living. Why? In order to engender guilt, making it easier for people to accept the theft of socialism. That’s why we see socialists demanding that white people pay reparations to black people for slavery. Never mind that the blacks today were never slaves and have the same opportunity now as everyone else. Never mind that white people today never owned a slave. It is all cooked up to promote socialism.
A perfect example of this is Biden’s open borders. Flooding America with illegals who can’t speak our language and can’t legally work here has increased crime and suffering for all. It creates the kind of chaos needed to make a breeding ground for socialism. The answer the socialists give is to provide all the illegals with free everything so they won’t commit crimes. And even though the government has been giving them free medical, free food, free money, free housing, free cell phones, and free transportation, yet many of them are still killing and raping. Why? Because without repentance toward God they are still the same person they were when they ignored our laws and illegally invaded our country. Socialism never addresses the root cause. And regardless of how much money the government steals for others to give to them, it will not change their heart. And by increasing population with uneducated people who can’t speak our language, we create a class of people who are utterly dependent upon government handouts. This creates a voting base of people who will always vote for the socialist wing of American politics, the Democratic Party, thus keeping them perpetually in power. Write it down: Open borders are another socialist plot.
Never Enough
Socialism is a hungry hog whose appetite is never satiated. It can never take enough; it always wants more. Despite the great steal going on for the sake of socialism, society has more ills than ever. There is never enough money to solve the vast problems created by a society that has turned its back on God. New schemes are continually hatched to steal yet more money. Global Warming, is but one example. It has no basis in scientific fact and is just another way to steal more money from people. The scheme of “carbon credits” is an example. They guilt companies for creating carbon dioxide, but then tell them they can make all carbon dioxide want, just so long as they pay the carbon credit tax. It is nothing but a diabolical scheme cooked up to get more money into the hands of crooked politicians.
Fake Christianity
While socialists ignore the worldwide colossal failures of socialism, they rail on about how Christianity has not solved the world’s problems. They ignore a number of facts. One, it solved numerous problems in America and led to prosperity. Wherever true Christianity has flourished, the people have thrived.
The other fact they ignore is that fake Christianity has spread throughout the world. Fake Christianity will not solve any problems. Socialists mistake fake Christianity for the real thing. Churches that don’t lead people to Christ but instead build their own kingdom filled with pomp and ceremony are dead churches that do not represent real Christianity. It is this sort of dead religion that the Pilgrims fled from when they came to America. This is the Laodicean church of whom Christ said, “You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.” (Revelation 3:17)
Recognizing Socialism
Socialism shows up with many different faces and we must be on constant guard against it. Remember that socialism depends on pitting one class against another. Beware of agitators who claim one party is taking advantage of another. They may be socialists just trying to breed discontent in order to foster their demonically inspired philosophy of socialism. Obama’s pitting of whites against blacks was nothing but his ploy to promote socialism. And when their scheme is called out as Karl Marx’s evil socialism, they respond with “Oh, but our socialism is different!” In spite of the failure of every form of socialism everywhere, they continually imagine that somehow they have put a new twist to it that will make it work this time around.
Also remember that a socialist will always look first to government to a solution. God’s way is to look to Jesus for answers and seek Godly intervention through family or church ministries. Beware of those who think more and bigger government is the answer for everything. Yes, government can help with various things, but when a person’s first thought is, “the government should do something,” then they may have been influenced by socialist thinking. A Christian should think, “What does God want me or my church to do about this?”
Never forget: Christianity is men with changed hearts giving, helping and changing the world. Socialism is a government politician stealing money from someone else and giving it to whomever they decide should have it.
Conclusion
Government has no money or resources that it has not first taken from someone else. Anything the government takes impoverishes someone else to some degree. God says: Thou shall not steal. He meant it so much he wrote it in stone. Socialism is theft by the government. It is taking something from someone to give it to someone else. History has shown us that government employees and politicians do not have the wisdom and foresight to properly manage this stolen money. Socialism is a failure from A to Z. It always has been. It destroys people and ruins nations. That is why Satan hatched this evil philosophy through his puppet Karl Marx, an apostle of the doctrine of demons known as socialism.
