This week’s events display some of modern liberalism’s fruit. I’m speaking specifically about the impeachment process underway in Washington, and Virginia Governor Northam’s actions surrounding the recent lobby day on the Martin Luther King holiday. Both events reveal the liberal perversion of principles such as stewardship. Stewardship is important for a number of reasons, and this short series explores that topic.
But first we need to define what stewardship is—and is not. Then draw its relevance to the events just mentioned. We’ll see stewardship not only concerns the use of material things, but relationships as well.
Stewardship
Stewardship’s basis lies in dominion, and dominion is concerned with authority. Sovereign authority rests with a ruler, but some of that authority can be granted to another to exercise. That is a republic’s governing basis. Authority rests in the people who in turn grant some authority in specific areas to those they select to govern in their stead. We see this idea present in the Israelites of the Old Testament and the Christian people’s election of their political and religious leaders in the early Middle Ages after Rome’s collapse.
Someone exercising a ruler’s authority in their place incurs a moral duty of stewardship, the responsibility of caring for whatever has been entrusted to them. In other words, as delegated authority is not theirs by right, they have a duty to use it well—to do good. If they use it poorly that authority can be recalled by the source from whom it originated.
God, as creation’s creator, is its sovereign. God’s authority is moral through His act of creation, and His power over creation is absolute. Man, as part of creation, also lies under His authority. Yet God granted man dominion over His creation. With exercising God’s authority in this area comes the duty of stewardship, which includes not only due care over the things of creation, but also over our relationships with others. The basis and nature of this duty will be examined in future articles.
Modern Liberalism’s Basis …
But back to this week’s events mentioned earlier. It all originates with the ideas we hold. Everyone has faith, it is almost impossible to live well without it. It’s just some have faith in God and others in man. Those placing their faith in God try to recognize his authority and live in obedience. Even though we often miss the mark, we live in the virtue of hope and by trying to transform ourselves things get better. That simple concept underlies all of the progress we’ve seen over the last two thousand years, beginning with the early Middle Ages. Within this framework, all men are created equal, with the free will and freedom to make their own decisions. But this freedom is directly by God’s divine and natural law.
Those who place their faith in man are guided by principles from the writings of people such as Machiavelli, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, and Rousseau—among many others who in turn derived their thought from these authors. This thread of thought is pagan because it in some way rejects God’s authority. One basic idea within this line of thought is man is basically bad. Therefore, some earthly power must exist to control man’s natural tendencies—to rule man.
This core idea underlies the modern left’s notion of governance. In Machiavelli’s words, “It is necessary for a prince, if he wants to preserve himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not use it as necessity dictates.” So, it is also important the people be deceived by those in authority. Their leaders must only appear to be good, but are to be free to do whatever is needed to preserve society. Freedom in such societies becomes license to do whatever one wants.
… and Its Relationship to Current Events
In such a world virtue becomes vice and vice virtuous. This happens because man begins to substitute his values for God’s, when man places his faith in man. We see it today in many areas such as abortion, marriage, the gender insanity, education, and healthcare—just to name a few.
A favorite tactic of those practicing this deception is to manufacture a crisis. But care must be used in its creation so they can advance their position regardless of what happens. If the predicted catastrophe doesn’t occur, then the steps they took prevented it. If the worst happens, they can say I tried to warn you—and we need more power to prevent it from happening again. All because only the ends matter, the means used to achieve them not so much.
Impeachment
This is where the current impeachment and lobby day events come in. Democrats have worked for almost four years on impeaching the current president. They created a crisis by falsifying information and using government resources to spy on another citizen. However, they have failed to produce any evidence to support their claim of high crimes or misdemeanors. Instead, we have an economy that is growing, wages that are growing, and more importantly, many of those who have been left out previously are benefiting.
Congressional Democratic leadership is currently advocating they only need more time by adding witnesses to the Senate proceedings. Something has to be there and we will find it. This is a farce, and should clearly be labeled as such. Underlying this notion is the idea the president must be like us as he too is a man. But the ideas he holds are more aligned with having faith in God rather than man, and that difference makes all the difference. Witness his actions, such as this year’s attending the March for Life.
Taking the Democrat’s notion to its ultimate end, everyone in America is a potential witness and we must not end the investigation until we interview them all. This is an asinine idea pronounced by a party of corrupt ideas. If there were something real in their allegations, they would have found it after four years, and all of the millions of dollars wasted pursuing their lie.
Virginia’s Lobby Day
Governor Northam’s actions share the same basis. A crisis was manufactured when Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw submitted sweeping legislation impacting gun rights in Virginia. My understanding is he promptly left town for a couple of weeks. The bill was quietly withdrawn a few weeks later, but enough damage was done. People were properly concerned about the further infringement of their natural rights. The Governor responded by placing a weapon ban on state grounds, installing fences, restricting access, and having people pass through metal detectors to enter the grounds.
Nothing happened, so he can now claim his actions were proper. However, the threat to our rights is real. There were eight pieces of legislature considered this week that all infringe on our right to keep and bear arms—a right outside the scope of both the federal and state constitution.
The truth is the groups supporting and coordinating the gun rights rally day event have always been peaceful. I have been in attendance for the last four or five years, and this year was no different. Estimates place the crowd at over 22,000, but it was likely much larger as many of the people were outside the fenced area. They even took the time to clean up the capital grounds after the event. Now there’s a threat. A government job might be in danger if it happens too often.
Liberalism and Violence
A further truth is that violence is almost always a product of modern liberalism’s ideas. When man places his faith in man, then the ends matter much more than the means used to achieve them. This idea is supported by all of the authors underlying modern liberalism’s tenets noted earlier. But Man can only achieve his purpose and become good when he turns to ideas that are larger than himself—that is, God’s ideas.
We only need to look at groups like Antifa and Black Lives Matter for current examples. The ‘right wing’ militia groups are no different. They share the same ideas as modern liberalism; they just differ in who should have power and how they should get there. As these groups share the same bed with Democratic leadership, they produce the same fruit. Finally, this is not an attack on people, as some will no doubt claim. Instead it is an attack on the ideas they hold, as those ideas in turn shape one’s character.
Many bills are being considered, and a significant number this year are likely to pass, regarding abortion, gender, gun ownership, and other significant rights. But Virginia’s citizens voted these people into office. If we want different outcomes, we need to make better choices—and to become better involved. The power rests with us, but we must make sure it is used wisely if we wish to keep it.
We will try to notify you when bills impacting our religious and civil liberties are presented during this year’s legislative session. It will not always be possible as the time frame between notice and action is noticeably short this year. But it will give you the opportunity to express your feelings to those you elected.
