Can a Christian Be a Socialist? Part 1
Ask the Pastor with J.D. Greear
J.D. Greear
4.9 • 624 Ratings
🗓️ 6 June 2022
⏱️ 12 minutes
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Summary
Show Notes:
This is a great question, and while we don’t usually get into partisan politics on this podcast or in my preaching, this is a little different. If we’re honest, socialism is a worldview that’s also becoming increasingly prevalent in our culture, both explicitly and implicitly.
A 2020 poll showed that 40% of Americans had a favorable view of socialism, up from 36% in 2019.
I saw a survey that said 47% of millenials and 49% of Generation Z viewed socialism as favorable.
So, what is socialism?
The World Socialist Party (WSP) of the United States says: “The establishment of a system of society based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and in the interest of society as a whole.”
The government becomes the sole authority and controller of the means of production. So, in reality, it’s under control of an oligarchy, not individuals.
What is the difference between communism and socialism?
Interestingly, the WSP/U.S. says that these terms are synonymous. But, technically socialism usually refers to an economic system in which the state controls most businesses and factories (the “means of production”) while communism usually refers to a system where the state controls not just those things but also owns most of the property.
We should at least recognize that socialism definitely arises out of an underlying ideology.
Specifically, Marxism, put forth originally, of course, by Karl Marx. Marx was not a good man: He was a misogynistic, racist tyrant. His own son called him a devil.
He hated Christianity, which he labeled as a source of oppression. Religion, he wrote, is the “opium of the people,” and for communism to prosper, the church needed to be replaced by the state in the hearts and minds of the people.
Marx’s successors – Stalin, Castro, Pol Pot, etc.–have all shared that same view.
* Dr. David Jeremiah has a great little book on this called Socialism: What It Is. What It Means for You. Dr. Jeremiah writes that…
Marxism is totalitarian
One of the key ideas of Marxism is a total, undying devotion to the state. There is no individual ownership of property, there is no free thinking, there is no free speech–in fact, totalitarianism essentially removes the meaning of truth, and the state attempts to define truth as whatever the state says truth is.
Marxism seeks the destruction of the nuclear family.
Marxism is divisive
It splits people into two categories: the oppressed and the oppressors, pitting them against each other.
Marxism is deadly
Socialist countries have a staggering death toll resulting from political carnage and state-ordered deaths to political opponents:
Latin America: 150,000
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, everybody. |
| 0:18.8 | My name is Matt Love. |
| 0:20.0 | I am the host of Ask Me Anything. And today, Pastor J.D. has a |
| 0:24.5 | question that some of you may have asked, but never thought to get a pastoral or biblical perspective |
| 0:30.0 | on. And it's actually a pretty, I don't know, not challenging question to answer, but a question |
| 0:36.0 | that's worth going in depth on. |
| 0:37.6 | So we're actually going to take two episodes to process through this one. So, J.D., the question |
| 0:42.0 | today is, can a Christian be a socialist? Matt, this is a dozy. And it's a great question. |
| 0:51.2 | You know, or ask me anything listeners, No, we don't typically get into partisan |
| 0:54.2 | politics on this podcast, and I typically don't deal with it, my preaching. I do think this |
| 0:58.8 | is a little bit different, because, you know, if we're honest, socialism is a worldview that is |
| 1:03.8 | becoming really prevalent in our culture, both explicitly and implicitly. I do think it's very relevant |
| 1:10.1 | because I saw a poll just last year that |
| 1:13.0 | showed that 40% of Americans had a favorable view of socialism. That was up from 36% the year |
| 1:19.8 | before, so it's on the rise. 47% of millennials and 49% of Gen Z views it as favorable. |
| 1:26.7 | And then you got the popularity of people like, you know, |
| 1:29.0 | Bernie Sanders, who is a self-described Democratic socialist senator from Vermont, who is, you know, |
| 1:35.9 | a well-established figure in American politics. So I think it's relevant. You know, probably the |
| 1:41.7 | first thing for us to do is to ask like what exactly, you know, socialism is one of those terms that people define differently. Probably a good place to turn for a definition is to the world socialist party of the United States. I would think that they'd be pretty reliable. Here's what they say. They say it is the establishment. Socialism is the establishment of a system of society based on the common |
| 2:02.0 | ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth |
| 2:08.9 | by and in the interests of society as a whole. Shorthand of that is that the government becomes |
| 2:14.5 | the authority and controller of the means of production for the benefit |
... |
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