Socialism And Christianity

Socialism is a historical failure. Even though the principle behind it causes nearly every generation to seek socialism, it has never succeeded anywhere it has been tried. The idea of a utopian society where everyone is equal and where everyone contributes to the good of the community is far better than the societies that many of these idealists come from. The reality, though, is that socialism fails for several reasons. Let's take some time to examine how socialism would work, and how it fails. Socialism can only be successful in a small community, a.k.a commune. For socialism to work you must have one hundred percent buy in and participation. Every socialist society of the past started out this way, but soon measures had to be taken to keep the people in compliance. These measures usually included violence and severe punishment. Each member must deny themselves. A member must belong to the society, and therefore has no individual rights. Having rights goes against the dictates of socialism. A member cannot own anything. The society of socialism promotes the fact that everyone owns everything, and everything can be used by everyone in the society. You cannot own land because it belongs to everyone. You cannot decide what to plant on your allotted space on your own. The community dictates who will plant what and when. When the crop comes in, the farmer is not allowed the money. It goes into the general fund. In a true socialist society there is no need for money within the group. Money is only used for dealings with those outside the group.

A true socialist society has to be cut-off from the rest of the world. If any in the society see someone speaking freely, or able to buy a car, or even listen to some music; the society begins to fail. The person who chooses to think must be eradicated. So the enforcers must eliminate any threat to the society. Once a group is designated as enforcers, the society is already failing and the end of socialism is just around the corner.

Christianity requires many of the same attributes of socialism. To become a Christian, one must deny themself and give themselves totally to their King, Jesus Christ. They are to dedicate themselves to serve God no matter what happens, and failure to serve God faithfully will have dire consequences.

Everything the Christian does is supposed to be for the betterment of society. If by our example, others can learn to be nicer to people, and treat their families with love, and respect the rights of others; we will make our world better. Everything that is wrong with the world and our society finds its root in sin. Many people are not happy with society as a whole because it is becoming very evil, yet they are not willing to acknowledge the only true antidote to all these problems is to get everyone involved in Christian living.

The world and all that it offers is detrimental to the Christian, yet we are not commanded to separate ourselves from the world. We are commanded to influence the world around us for good. We are often frustrated that we are not seeing ourselves successful in changing the world for good. Yet that should not dishearten us from doing good. 2 Corinthians 4 speaks of taking measures to not lose heart in the things the world does to us.

Can you imagine a world in which everyone did things in service towards others? Imagine them doing this without complaining. It would be a world where everyone was treated as an equal, thus removing class warfare and racism. Young and old would work side by side helping each other. There would be encouragement for people to serve and learn to enjoy serving others. There would be a desire to better ourselves so that we could serve others better. A world in which we had all things in common, and there were none who suffered because they were poor. Imagine the society being of one accord and everyone dedicated to honoring others and their God. Honor God by obedience to His word, and honor others by treating them right.

Just imagine if we took the principles of socialism and applied them to the church where we attend, how much better it would be. In fact, God gave us the rules for the church which are identical to the rules to make a socialistic society successful. Imagine that. Now if we could get everyone involved in doing God's will, we would hear less of a longing for a socialist society. We already have one that works; it is called the Church of Christ.

By Carey Scott

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