Both the Old Testament and the New Testament remind us hundreds of times that righteous conduct and justice require each individual to soften his heart to make him attentive to the needs of others, to keep him from being self-centered.
This is very different from left-wing liberalism's presumption that the perfect social paradigm – political-correctness and egalitarian social justice – is exclusively the product of the collectivized, materialistic political state.
Today's sermon at the Long Ridge Congregational Church continued the exposition of the Book of Ecclesiastes.
You can see outlines of each Sunday's sermon and you can download the full, recorded sermons at the church's website http://www.longridge.org/.
Our text was Ecclesiastes 4:1-12:
Oppression, Toil, Friendlessness
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed— and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors— and they have no comforter.
And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living who are still alive.
But better than both is he who has not yet been, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.
And I saw that all labor and all achievement spring from man's envy of his neighbor. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
The fool folds his hands and ruins himself.
Better one handful with tranquility than two handfuls with toil and chasing after the wind.
Again I saw something meaningless under the sun:
There was a man all alone; he had neither son nor brother. There was no end to his toil, yet his eyes were not content with his wealth. "For whom am I toiling," he asked, "and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?" This too is meaningless— a miserable business!
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work:
If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up!
Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone?
Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
Our minister's focus was on the essentiality of real community, in the sense of individuals, of their own free will, coming together in the body of the church or synagogue, acting as individuals to befriend, help, and encourage their fellows suffering hardship. Each of us individually must also seek ways to help the unfortunate citizens elsewhere in our communities beyond our churches and synagogues, on a one-to-one basis.
To do that, every individual must search his own heart and listen for the voice of God (what non-believers might call inspiration) calling him to do what is needed at any particular moment. Jesus said, "Come, follow me;" individuals must learn to follow the inner voice of conscience and the Holy Spirit telling them what they should do to help their fellows.
It is the opposite of the "me generation" produced by today's liberal leaders, the Baby Boomer student-anarchists in the 1960s and 70s.
Liberals continually and erroneously state that the socialistic welfare-state is what Jesus preached. Apart from the fact that socialism is an atheistic and materialistic religion, its conception of social justice is at the opposite pole from that of Judaism and Christianity.
Liberal-socialism presumes that God does not exist and that, in any case, state-planners can do a better job than God.
Liberalism fosters an "I gave at the office" mentality. Liberal individuals have only to mouth pious sentiments about "caring" for the poor and the sick, while leaving it to the bureaucrats in Washington to aggregate citizens into legislatively-determined classes of faceless ciphers identified as Social Security numbers.
For individuals in need of help, the liberals' welfare state is one of loneliness in the middle of a vast crowd. It certainly is not a real community, despite Hillary Clinton's assertion that "it takes a village," in the form of collectivized government.
By focusing on collectivized, bureaucratic solutions to mass-class problems, liberalism paradoxically fosters self-centered pursuit of worldly pleasures and material wealth. Vulgar displays of wealth and arrogant exercises of political and corporate power are not the result of Judaism or Christianity. They are the inescapable outcome of liberal-socialist philosophical materialism and John Dewey's pragmatism that says that there are no standards of right or wrong; whatever works for you is OK. If robbing a bank makes you happy and you can get away with it, Dewey's pragmatism won't stand in your way.
The insuperable problem for today's liberals is that their definition of right conduct for individuals, proclaimed endlessly by the New York Times' editorial staff, is simply hedonistic license to indulge and debauch oneself with drugs, alcohol, and sexual promiscuity. Individual men and women owe nothing to each other. The liberal's definition of a relationship is little more than a one-night sexual encounter, as demonstrated by the immense popularity of the TV series "Sex and the City."
The 1776 definition of liberty as freedom from arbitrary exercise of political power by the sovereign has been degraded into the socially destructive assertion that people have a "right" to say anything and do anything that their momentary impulses dictate.
The results are all too prominently displayed in society today: rudeness, crudeness, illegitimacy, single-parent families, rampant divorce, drug and alcohol addiction, and preoccupation with amassing wealth.
The Apostle Paul's letter to the Galatians (6:2) sums up the Old Testament and new Testament admonition to each of us as individuals: "Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ."
Thomas E. Brewton is a staff writer for the New Media Alliance, Inc. The New Media Alliance is a non-profit (501c3) national coalition of writers, journalists and grass-roots media outlets.
His weblog is THE VIEW FROM 1776
http://www.thomasbrewton.com/
Email comments to viewfrom1776@thomasbrewton.com