My appearance in 1996Wayne Stegall


Copyright © 2011 by Wayne Stegall
Created June 3, 2011.  See Document History at end for details.

Political Lovers


It is odd that love is such a political motive.  While trying to exclude Bible believers from public life in the name of the Establishment Clause, some would rob others to give to yet others in the name of love.  Prisoners are released to prey on communities in the name of love.  For love, some harbor fugitives and give special entitlements to special interests.  Partiality is shown to the oppressed.  Paradoxical to their claim on love, the same advocate infanticide, homosexuality, protected religious status for Occult religions, and other agendas destructive to society.  After doing these things, they condemn those who most qualify to claim love.

What then is love?  All agree on the apparent kindness of love.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  Love never fails.  (1Co 13:4-8 NIV)

Secular and liberal lovers miss other important aspects of love.

One is that love is tied in the Bible to righteousness.  The one, who quotes

Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.  (Ro 13:10)

as permitting him to do as it seems right in his own eyes on the basis of supremacy of love, forgets that the statement defines love in terms of obeying the God's commandments.  Therefore it is impossible for the someone who has not dealt with the issue of sin to claim a higher love.

Secondly, hard things sometimes have to be done for love.  Just laws must be strictly enforced and violations quickly punished.  Children must be corrected if they are to become moral participants in civilization, even by means that cause temporary pain.  Indeed, Benjamin Spock was wrong in teaching that  the spanking of children causes them psychological problems.  War is sometimes just, as in the struggle against Hitler.  Love withholds charity to those deemed to use money for criminal or self-destructive behavior.  The severity of hard preaching against sin is love in view of eternity.  It is also just for the wicked suffer their consequences and even to go to Hell if do not obey the Gospel, after all it is not hard to receive Jesus.  I would guard here against those who would label actual hateful acts as love:  this principle does not justify acts of political expediency.  Hard things not clearly justifiable on some moral principle should be left to God's wisdom.

Third, love for the poor will help them in ways that leave natural incentives to prosper in place.  Where secular and liberal lovers will enslave them with a free handout, the Bible would require them to work for it. 

And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest.  And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger: I am the LORD your God.  (Lev 19:9-10)

It would appear that behaving toward others with redemptive kindness is only possible with the help of God, as he only has a full view of the outcome of a sequence of behavior in view of eternity.  It is wise to seek Him

How does a misguided view of love enter politics?  The desire to use Church as a means to gain respectability for one.  The smooth road of respectability not agitating the compromises of power lead to the liberal church;  and there they learn to compromise spiritually as well.  Others have adapted Christian love to other belief systems, even atheism.  What atheist would disagree with the few verses relating to love which they and others have assimilated into their own beliefs?

It is not surprising that those who resist the smooth road are found to have a different faith from these.



Document History
June 3, 2011  Created.
June 3, 2011  Made corrections and additions.