Socialism Is Immoral

You can watch a video of this post below.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve heard a lot of Christians talk about communism as being the economy of heaven. They say, “Sure, socialism doesn’t work down here because people are too greedy. But in heaven, it works.”

Now, when Christians say this, especially young Christians, we need to be very gentle in our response. They likely have a lot of voices speaking into their worldview on this issue, and very few wise voices talking them through this issue. Furthermore, they probably don’t understand what communism is, or what the Bible says when it comes to generosity and economics.

Communism, as an economic model, is the forced redistribution of wealth, material possession, or property. Today, it has been expanded to mean far more than that, but we can’t get into that now.

Does the Bible support the idea of the forced redistribution of wealth? Without getting into a response about why communism wants to redistribute wealth and power, I want to simply say: no. Nowhere in the Bible is this idea of the forced redistribution of wealth present.

The Bible argues for generosity with one’s own possessions. Ephesians 4:28 says,

Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.

Let’s unpack this. “Let the thief no longer steal.” In other words, no one should be forcing someone else out of their personal possessions or property. Instead, each person should work hard, honestly, using their own abilities, not exploiting the abilities of others.

And what is the result of this? “so that HE may have something to share with anyone in need.” Did you catch that? The thief who no longer steals, has something of his own, and is able to share that out of the generosity of his heart. He chooses to share it; he is not forced to. This flies in the face of Marxism, which Carl Marx himself defined as “The abolition of private property.”

Communism, as an economic model, is immoral, clearly not because generosity is wrong, but because it removes the opportunity for virtue. If no one can choose to be generous, but are forced to redistribute all they own and are, is that generosity?

In this we see a picture of who God is. Ephesians 2 says,

God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ… by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God

God didn’t send His Son and raise us up with Him because He was under compulsion to do it, but because of the richness of His own goodness! It is a gift, not because He had to give it – for then it wouldn’t be a gift at all! – but because he generously saves.

“In this the love of God was made manifest among us,” wrote John,

that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

When we choose to freely give what is ours, we are reflecting the goodness of God in salvation. One day, Christians will enjoy heaven, where they can live in the economy of the love of God: ever receiving, ever knowing, ever sharing.

If you would like to explore this subject more, you can find as essay I wrote called “Biblical Economics” by clicking here.