10/11/08
God’s Economic Plan
How it was in the beginning:
Specific functions in Hebrew
sanctuary system: God first/He provided security system and, later, daily food
What God expected from earthly
rulers/gov's: peace/defence, conducive environment for growth and prosperity
NT/Acts: the church looks
after the needs of members/sharing/those with means helping those without
Malachi: God instituted a
tithing/offering system of giving which guaranteed continued blessing and
security, as we trust God, and give Him the first 10% of our income.
“ Will a man rob God?
Yet you have robbed Me!
But you say,
‘ In what way have we robbed You?’
In tithes and offerings.
You are cursed with a curse,
For you have robbed Me,
Even this whole nation.
Bring all the tithes into the storehouse,
That there may be food in My house,
And try Me now in this,”
Says the LORD of hosts,
“ If I will not open for you the windows of
heaven
And pour out for you such blessing
That there will not be room
enough to receive it.
“And I will rebuke the devourer for your
sakes,
So that he will not destroy the fruit of
your ground,
Nor shall the vine fail to bear fruit for
you in the field,”
Says the LORD of hosts;
And all nations will call you blessed,
For you will be a delightful land,”
Says the LORD of hosts.
Malachi
3:8-12
Notice here that an entire
nation has become guilty of robbing God, in the form of not returning a
faithful tithe and offering to Him. It
wasn’t just a few households. It was the
nation as a whole. Are we as guilty in
our nation as they were? How are we
robbing God of what is rightly His to begin with? Only heaven can estimate the damage and hurt
to lives and to key ministry situations on this earth, which happen as a direct
result of our reluctance to return a faithful tithe and offering.
The tithe and offering was
God’s appointed means for furthering His work of redemption in the world. It was also God’s chosen plan to ensure our
happiness and well-being.
God is the Chief
Economist. He is the perfect
Government. His system is simple: a flat
rate, across the board, with no loopholes, no way for lobbyists to interfere,
and no possible way to misunderstand.
Just simply give the first 10% of your gross income to Him in the form
of the tithe—so that His workers all around the world can continue to work. And give what you can to Him in local offerings—so
that your church can continue to reach out to the surrounding community, and
keep the lights on as well.
A basic plan, a simple
plan. A plan with a promise. A promise of blessing. You can’t beat that. God still stands behind His plan for today’s
Christian. He still provides security
and stability when we put Him first in our lives.
Economics is the study of the
use of scarce resources which have alternative uses.
Economics is not about the
financial fate of individuals. It is
about the material well-being of society as a whole.
A free market system relies
on prices to allocate resources. A socialist system relies on government
control to allocate resources.
When many African nations
achieved independence in the 1960s, a famous bet was made between the president
of
In later years, the
Similar comparisons could be
made between
Other countries—Germany,
Korea, Sri Lanka, New Zealand—have experienced sharp upturns in their economies
when they freed these economies from many government controls and relied on
prices to allocate resources.
What we have in
[do living wage, rent
controls, healthcare]
The less the government gets
involved in our lives, the better.
Artificially setting prices or wages or rents always makes things worse for the very people that they are
trying to help.
Take minimum wage laws, which
are designed to help younger, less-experienced workers in general.
"Minimum wage laws make it illegal
to pay less than the government-specified price for labor. By the
simplest and most basic economics, a price artificially raised tends to cause
more to be supplied and less to be demanded than when prices are left to be
determined in a free market. The result is a surplus, whether the price
that is set artificially high is that of farm produce or labor. Because
the government does not hire surplus labor the way it buys surplus agricultural
output, the labor surplus takes the form of unemployment, which tends to be
higher under minimum wage laws than in a free market. In country after
country around the world, those whose employment prospects are reduced most by
minimum wage laws are those who are younger, less experienced, and less
skilled. This same pattern has been found in
Thomas Sowell, Basic Economics
People are better off, and the nation as
a whole is better, when government is less
involved in our lives, and the free market is allowed to function as it should.
Take rent control.
“The number of
abandoned buildings taken over by the
Thomas
Sowell, Basic Economics
Again, when the government
interferes and artificially sets prices or rents or wages, people suffer, and
progress stops.
One candidate proposes to
completely overhaul the healthcare situation in
Thomas discusses this issue
of healthcare:
“bAny attempt
at a rational discussion of the economic realities of government-controlled
medical care is almost certain to run up against the trump card of the
political left: The Poor.
The image that
is often invoked is that of the elderly poor, forced to choose between food and
medical treatment. Who could be so heartless?
This has
proved to be a very effective political strategy for extending government
power, not only over medical care but also over housing and other sectors of
the economy.
The amount of
money needed to take care of the poor is often some minute fraction of what
sweeping new government programs cost. But, while big government liberals are
willing to use the poor as human shields in their political battles, their more
basic strategy is to proclaim that everyone has a “right” to some “basic need”
that they want the government to provide.
The only
reason such rhetoric has even the appearance of plausibility is that price
controls work in the short run – and that is good enough for politicians, since
elections are held in the short run. After all, when the government drives down
prices paid to doctors, hospitals or pharmaceutical companies, there is not
much that they can do about it immediately.
Doctors are
not going to give up practicing medicine and become truck drivers. Medical
schools are not going to be turned into bowling alleys or hospitals into
skating rinks. Pharmaceutical companies cannot suddenly shift to manufacturing
cars. So price controls seem to work in the short run – but only in the short
run.
When you
confront doctors with more bureaucratic hassles and lower payments for their
services, do not expect the medical profession to remain as attractive to
bright young people. In the long run, every single doctor is going to have to
be replaced by someone from the younger generation, or else we are going to
have a shortage of doctors.
Is this what
we are supposed to imitate?”
Supporters of
nationalized health care overlook the fact that it often results in health-care
shortages, reduced quality of services, and black markets.
What we are possibly faced
with in the next presidential term is, quite frankly, horrifying and very wrong
for
What this amounts to is the
redistribution of wealth, and the penalizing of American businesses—the ones
that write our paychecks. What it
amounts to is increased taxes not only on wealthy Americans, but the middle-class
as well—those families that make $42,000 per year. AND ALL THIS AT A TIME WHEN OUR COUNTRY IS
HURTING, AND OUR ECONOMY IS WAVERING.
A perfect example of the
disastrous effects of socialism is the present financial problems
In fact, one of the
presidential candidates was the second largest recipient of campaign donations
from Fannie Mae. That’s because this
candidate is in favor of the irresponsible practices of institutions like
Fannie Mae, that have allowed families to get into loans they couldn’t afford.
Groups like ACORN
(Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) have placed legal
pressure on loan institutions to give non-traditional mortgage loans to people
that should not have been given them—people who would not pay their loans, and
therefore end up in foreclosure. Times
this scenario by hundreds of thousands, and it is easy to see why gigantic
institutions like Fannie Mae and AIG would eventually run into serious trouble
because they were stuck with thousands of bad loans. THIS IS CALLED FISCAL IRRESPONSIBILITY, AND
IT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN ALLOWED BY CONGRESS.
One presidential candidate’s
ties to ACORN is particularly troubling.
He taught leadership conferences for this group, and actively sought and
received the endorsement of ACORN for his local campaigns, as well as his
campaign for the presidency.
Groups like ACORN are BAD for
Any candidate of any party
that seeks to use the government to “bail out” institutions or individuals that
have made irresponsible decisions, is not operating with sound economic
judgment.
Since when has the government
been able to solve our problems? It’s
not the government’s role to make up for our stupid decisions! It’s not the government’s role to subsidize
us when we are lazy. It’s not the
government’s job to meddle with our healthcare and doctor visits, and tell us
how often we can see our doctor.
What the founding fathers had
in mind for this country is LIMITED GOVERNMENT.
They fled from a government-controlled situation in
Personal responsibility:
taking advantage of opportunities for education and employment...living within
one's means...living on a budget...and refusing to accept an unrealistic
mortgage loan, even if a loan institution begs you to do it.
What is on the
line in this election: the expansion of big government in our lives, the
largest tax increase in American history, a movement away from a free market
economy and away from personal responsibility.
And as if that
were not bad enough, there is a soft-peddling of the violent intents of those
who wish to destroy us and our way of life.
A relating to leaders of terrorism as if they were peace-loving
leaders. I’m talking about
"American empire in the world is reaching the end of
its road."
Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad
Ahmadinejad wants
to annihilate
AHMADINEJAD IS
NOT A PAL!!! YOU DO NOT HAVE PEACEFUL
NEGOTIATIONS WITH SOMEONE WHO IS PREPARING TO DESTROY YOU!!! MY FRIENDS, IF THIS CANDIDATE GETS INTO
OFFICE, FOREIGN RELATIONS WILL TAKE ON A WHOLE NEW MEANING. WE WILL BECOME THE VICTIMS OF ROGUE LEADERS,
AND SECURITY WILL GO OUT THE WINDOW.
Now more than ever we need to
think for ourselves. We need to study
the issues, and to make informed choices.
We need to think about what is in the best interest of our country as a
whole, and not just what’s in it for us as individuals.
We need to allow our
conscience and our belief system and our value system inform our political
decisions. We should never just go along
with the flow. We are living in the last
days of earth’s history. God is calling
us to stand out from the crowd and act according to principle.
It is good that we are able
to practice now, putting our beliefs and values into our decision-making. This is important, because this is what we
will have to do in the very near future, when our government tries to compel us
to worship in a way that is contrary to Scripture. In that day, we will be ready for the
challenge, because we will have already practiced giving God glory in our
choices, and in our political decisions.
I praise God that we live in
a country where we can actually have a voice.
We can actually vote, and we can talk freely about what we believe. There are many places in this world where
this is not even possible.
May God help us to continue
to grow in our understanding of His will, and may His Spirit help us to
surrender our lives to obeying His Word.