Today is the birthday of the great Austrian economist, Ludwig Von Mises. I have very much appreciated his scholarship and I know many others do. Perhaps today would be a good day to crack open an Austrian beer and toast it to the legacy of Ludwig. He very much established much of the intellectual landscape of the libertarian movement.
HT: Mark Horne
Kevin DeYoung, a pastor in Michigan, recently wrote an excellent blog post and I thought it was very insightful and important. It has to do with why a Christian should be a church member.
I know that some people, having been exposed to some unbiblical or perhaps “sub-biblical” ideas surrounding church membership, have “thrown out the baby out with the bath water” and forsaken the idea completely. But the fact that historically the concept of church membership has been abused does not give us the right to discard the thoroughly Biblical concept of church membership. If anything, the fact that there are abuses of the concept all the more strengthens the need for a solid, Biblical appreciation of it.
Highly recommended.
The full set of audio/video for the Desiring God National Conference, “With Calvin in the Theatre of God” is online! That’s full video/audio! You can get it here for free.
I have a confession to make. Listening to the the President of the Czech Republic, Václav Klaus, speak on The Struggle Since the Fall of Communism makes me secretly wish I was Czech. I’m sure he’s not perfect, but I just love some of the things he says.
OK, it’s been a while since I’ve shared a topic which really got my libertarian blood boiling, but here we go..
As an Eric Margolis points out in The Ghosts of Vietnam Haunt Washington (September 22, 2009), mission Afghanistan is continuing to be a disaster for the U.S. He makes a comparisons to the old British imperialist failure in Afghanistan, except with the telling assesment that “[t]he British imperialists did it much, much better and with a lot more style”.
Margolis points out how American general Stanley McChrystal is “warning that the US risks being beaten by lightly armed Taliban tribesmen in spite of his 107,000 western soliders, B1 heavy bombers, F-15′s, F-16′s, F-18′s, Apache and A-130 gunships, heavy artillery, tanks, radars, killer drones, cluster bombs, white phosphorus, rockets, and space surveillence.” The U.S. has spent $250 billion (that’s approximately the cost of 10,000 F-15s!) in Afghanistan since 2001. And each wave has caused an increase of resistance and more power for the Taliban.
After 8 years and $250 billion, the Taliban still controls 55% of the country. And get this, the commanders are still asking for 40,000 troops, even after Obama has tripled the presence there. Margolis does a fine job of exposing the sheer lunacy of what is going on over there.
And all of this is not even getting into things he brings up in other columns, such as the illegitimacy of the “elections” that the U.S. has implemented in Afghanistan–stage managed votes with canadidates hand-picked beforehand. All parties were banned, only individuals were allowed to run. It has been said that even the Soviets allowed parties to run in the elections they imposed on Afghanistan in 1986 and 1987. In the U.S.-run election, only candidates who favored continued U.S. and NATO occupation were allowed to stand. Foreign observers reported extensive fraud and vote-rigging. As Margolis has said elsewhere, “Compared to this pre-determined vote, Iran’s recent elections almost look Swiss by comparison”. Is this the democracy being exported?
This is not merely a crazed empire, this is a crazed empire on a self-destruct mission.
May some day God bless the U.S.A. with a leader or leaders that will be capable of ending this non-sense. May God spare the people of Afghanistan and us Westerners from the present and future chaos that this is causing.
Excerpted from a sermon by Mark Driscoll on Luke 1:
[Theophilus] is probably a new convert to Christianity. So there is a wealthy, prominent, affluent, significant man who becomes a Christian. And what he’s wondering is, is it really true? Is Jesus really God? Did He do what I’ve heard he’s done?…he has a lot to lose in declaring himself to be a Christian because in that day Caesar was lord, and as a Christian he would declare: “not anymore. JESUS IS LORD”. And in that day he would say “my highest allegience is my nation” and upon meeting Jesus he would have to say, “no, my highest allegience is to His kingdom”. And as a governer he would need to say “All religions are welcome, the worship of all gods is equal” and as a Christian, he would have to say “no, Jesus alone is God and savior”. This would get him in great trouble with his boss, Caesar. This could get him fired…maybe even in prison. This could cost him his income, his job, his prominence…
And so he is this man wrestling…with his faith…There’s a lot at stake. And so he contracts out, hires, funds, supports Luke. Fellow gentile, not a Jew, not looking for Messiah. Not predisposed. Educated, articulate man. Has access to apostles and the eyewitnesses and the disciples. And he says, “Luke, I need you to go find the truth. Go get the facts”…
Now, here’s what’s amazing: That was very expensive. This is a classic ancient way that someone who had been funded would acknowledge their benefactor. They would dedicate their play, their poetry, their book to their donor…So here’s what you’re supposed to understand. Theophilus paid for two books of the Bible to get written. He would have allowed Luke to take years off of work, I’m sure Luke kicked in his money as well, and to go do all the eyewitness investigation. Now think about this, 2,000 years later, had it not been for Theopholis’ generosity, we would be lacking the largest contribution to the entire New Testament.
I’ll tell you, one of the weaknesses at Mars Hill, actually one of the sins of Mars Hill is that this is a church that has not excelled in generosity. Now God’s been very generous to us, that’s for sure. But we’ve not been very generous, and in saying that some of you will be like “Oh, this is where he wants to take my money”. It’s not your money, it’s His, you’re a steward, and if it bothers you you’re an idolater. Let’s keep it simple, because you either worship your money, your status and possessions and wealth, or you worship with your money, your status, possesions, and wealth. It’s very simple. Theopholis was a man who gave generously for Luke to do his ministry
…a lot of libertarion theologians and the real hardcore liberals they’ll read Luke and say, “Well, that Gospel talks about the poor more than any other Gospel. It shows that Jesus was poor, Jesus loved the poor, and Jesus includes the poor, and Jesus is all about the poor.” And they forget that the only reason we know that is because the rich guy paid for the book that tells them that Jesus loves the poor.
You see, Christianity is not like the class warfare that you have been brainwashed in since infancy over here on the left coast. Rich people can love Jesus and they are supposed to give generously and poor people can love Jesus and they’re suppoesd to give generously, and sometimes it is rich people who pay for things so that poor people can know that Jesus loves them. That’s good. And Theophilus is that guy. I hope some of you earn a lot of money and are very very very generous…See, its not how much you make, it’s about what you do with it.
Now what Theopholis didn’t decide to do was to get a new camel with rims and get another vacation home…what he decided was: I need to find the facts about Jesus and I need to find and educated, objective, scholarly, academic historian and I need to just make an enormous financial sacrifice and let him go out and give me the facts. And we got two books of the Bible out of it. That’s wonderful, isn’t it? That 2,000 years later, a few billion of us on the earth claim to worship Jesus Christ as God, and so much of what we know about him, and how we function as a church comes from the books of Acts about the church and Luke about Jesus. Amazing. I want you to share in Theophilus’ joy. I want us to be, I want you to be, generous.
Nathaniel Macon (1758-1837) was an influential voice in the history of North Carolina and the U.S.A. in general. He fought in the Revolutionary War, had three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, and was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1781, 1782, and 1784. He also served on the CFR and had an unsuccessful run for the Vice Presidency in 1825. He was Speaker of the House during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency. He has been described as an anti-federalist and a Jeffersonian libertarian.
Nathaniel attended a Baptist church and was an intimate friend of figures such as Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and John Randolph. It should be noted that Jefferson’s famous quote about truth in advertising originated from a letter to Macon. He is known for having stood up against a Alien and Sedition acts, among other things and quite consistently stood against the expansion of federal power.
In the memoir written by Weldon Nathaniel Edwards, it is said that
“Of his political creed, it is scarcely necessary to speak. His unchequered consistency–the frank and manly avowal of his opinion on all proper occasions….Adopting to the fullest extent, the doctrine which allowed to men the capacity for, and the right of self-government…and never would consent–however strongly the law of circumstances, the common plea of tyrants, might demand it–to exercise doubtful powers.”
John Randolph commented about Nathaniel: “He is the wisest, the purest, and the best man that I ever knew”. He leaves a legacy of republicanism (with a small ‘r’) and has had a handful of towns and counties are named after him.
Here are a few exerpts from an article by Clyde N. Wilson on Macon:
“…an important Founding Father almost unknown these days. Comparing Macon with the politicians of today gives us a benchmark as to how dreadfully far America has degenerated from the principles on which it was founded…Macon was admired because he never changed from the principles with which he began. What were these principles? The federal government should be tightly bound by the Constitution. It should not tax the people and spend money any more than was absolutely necessary for the things it was entitled to do, nor go into debt, which was just a way to make the taxpayers pay interest to the rich. Eternal vigilance was the price of liberty. Power was always stealing from the many to the few. Office-holders were to be watched closely and kept as directly responsible to the citizens as possible. A few words from Macon in Congress often stopped bills that proposed supposedly attractive measures…As time went on, Macon realised more and more that preserving true republican principles was a losing cause, but in the company of John Randolph and John Taylor he never wavered…But Macon, like Washington and Jefferson, was not important and respected because he was elected to office. He was elected to office because he was important and respected. He never campaigned for an office. He never attended a party caucus. He never promised anyone patronage to support him. Macon was elected over and over and revered because of what he was….Macon was more Jeffersonian than Jefferson himself.”
No doubt Macon, along with many other founding fathers, kept slaves and had a troubling and despicable view on the slavery question. And many of these politicians and other later highly lauded politicians, including the often revered Abraham Lincoln, had very racist ideas. But nonetheless, there is much to be learned here about principles of politics and nobility in politics by looking into the history of these men. Macon, for all his warts, is an example of a early zealous “Dr No”, so to speak. In a few different ways, he should be an inspiration to those who would boldly against statism.