I was recently reading the Old Testament with my family, and we read 1st Samuel Chapter 8. I found an application to today which is somewhat frightening - and when I give this application and thus make an interpretation of scripture, I am not speaking for my faith (which is almost always neutral in politics), but for myself, and my own political views.
The prophet Samuel was being asked by the people of Israel to "make us a king to judge us like all the nations" (verse 5). Using the King James translation, verse 10 reads: "And Samuel told all the words of the LORD unto the people that asked of him a king."
Samuel gives several reasons why having a king is a bad idea (verses 11-18), which I will not quote in their entirety, but rather just the concluding sentence in verse 18: "And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day."
The next verses record that "Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, Nay; but we will have a king over us; That we may also be like all the nations; and that our king may judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles. And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he rehearsed them in the ears of the LORD." (verses 19-21)
The people wanted a king partly so that they "may also be like all the nations." This sounds a lot like the reasons people often give for going socialist: "The Europeans are doing it; so we should, too."
Karl Marx
Nonetheless, despite its popularity, and how much it might be seeming to serve other countries; they shall "cry out in that day ... and the LORD will not hear [them] in that day."
We can go socialist if people want, electing a bureaucracy to rule over us; but in my not-so-humble opinion, the Lord will not hear us in that day. The government will become more powerful, freedom will be trampled on, and the Lord will not hear our prayers.
Adam Smith
The solution: Maintain our system of free enterprise, and keep laws and regulations to a minimum. Listen to the words of Adam Smith, and give us the economic freedom to reward others for serving our needs, so that they'll continue to do so. Uphold the Constitution given us by our Founding Fathers, and allow the free market to serve our needs, providing us goods and services with extraordinary timeliness, in a way that the citizens of communist countries can only imagine and envy.
The Constitutional Convention
This is what America should do. And all this America can do.
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