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From: Bruce Woodford [mailto:bwood4d@...] 
Sent: Tuesday, 24 October 2006 7:59 AM
To: soundofgrace@...
Subject: RE: [soundofgrace] NCT and Politics

Hi Jeff, 
When I wrote:" Certainly there are commendable accomplishments and benefits
provided by almost any government system. But my observation has been that
when government takes on the task of feeding the hungry ( a mandate BTW
which God has never assigned to civil government) it always ends up feeding
those whom God says should NOT eat! i.e. those who will not work! See II
Thessalonians 3:10."...
You responded:"I have heard that argument before about what the government's
tasks are in relation to Scripture and I do not buy it! Frankly I do not
believe that the scriptures actually speak to those issues of what the state
is supposed to do and what it is not supposed to do, at least as far as the
NC is concerned. What I think that the NC does do is to define our
relationship to the world, including the government, but I fail to see that
it addresses governments per se. I also think that you oversimplify the
situation in relation to what governments do in relation to programs to feed
hungry people."
I would answer that I Peter 2:14 tells us why governors are sent by God (or
as Romans 13 puts it, "ordained by Him"..... "For the punishment of evil
doers, and for the praise of them that do well." That BTW is part of NC
scripture.
Brother, can you be more specific as to how you feel I am oversimplifying
the situation relative to governments feeding hungry people? 

[Jeff comments]
I compared you to the JW's because you are using these verses and taking it
in a particular way, just as JW's do to certain verses. I mean that JW's say
that John 1:1 is saying that the Word was *a* god. They also will mention
the verse John 14:28 'the Father is greater than I'.

Now they do this and persist in doing it because they presuppose that there
cannot be such a thing as the trinity. 

In your case I would suggest that you have already made up your mind about
the role of government and the state and have seen in these verses support
for your perspective. You are clearly a minimal statist.

This is all okay but you have to bear in mind that there are other
scriptures that could be considered. Consider the following from Proverbs
31: 9 Open thy mouth, judge righteously, and plead the cause of the poor and
needy.

It is not unreasonable to suggest that if our system has created great
wealth for us - and even Marx conceded that it had - then it is reasonable
for the king or government to redress the anomalies that occur when people
find themselves in poverty through no fault of their own. If this means
collecting taxes to help the poor then I say so be it.

In any case the words that Paul rights to the Romans are not purposed to
define the role of government but rather to advise God's people as to what
they should do in view of the presence of a government and one which was
often hostile to good works.


[Bruce again]
May I also ask you whether it is right to feed hungry people with no regard
for the reasons they are hungry? God has created hunger to be a tremendous
motivator to work! When hungry people who are lazy and will not work are
fed, governments are short-circuiting what God intended when He created
hunger pangs in the first place! They are promoting laziness and sloth when
they feed those who will not work.

[Jeff responds]
This is largely a nonsense to suggest that the unemployed are that way
because they do not want to work. Our system, though it may be better for
it, has as an unintended consequence various levels and forms of
unemployment, the like of which would not have been known in the era when
Paul wrote.

In any case governments are dealing with such people and there are in my
country work tests for those who claim they cannot work.


I think that I have dealt with your other points already so I will leave it
as it is.

God bless,
Jeff