“A Pie in the Sky?”
Socialists have long accused
religion of offering “a pie in the sky by and by” as a way of distracting
and
pacifying those who suffer under capitalism, thus keeping them from rising up
in insurrection. The phrase (which has
moved into our general conversation in reference to things other than religion)
comes from a folk song, titled “The Preacher and the Slave,” which was written
by a radical revolutionary named Joe Hill a century ago. He was echoing the charge of Karl Marx that “religion
is the opium of the people.” The far
Left has long regarded religion in general, and the church in particular, as
supporting the interests of the rich (who, they say, control religion) by
mollifying the discontent of workers using vain promises of heavenly rewards
for those who will not make trouble for capitalists. The ironic fact, however, is that it is socialism,
and not Christianity, that promises rewards it never delivers.
Dr. Rick Flanders
The different kinds of socialism
that have appeared on the scene in the past 250 years have all promised utopia
and yet they have all failed to deliver.
And it is strange that those who in our time are charmed by Leftist
promises have not noticed this fact. So-called
“utopian” socialists in the 19th century set up a number of communal
colonies, such as Robert Owen’s New Harmony, Indiana, and, and none of them
succeeded. One of the participants in
the New Harmony experiment explained the reason for its failure in these terms:
“We [the members of the
famous communal colony] had a world in miniature—we had enacted the French
revolution over again with despairing hearts instead of corpses as a result…It
appeared that it was nature’s own inherent law of diversity that had conquered
us…our ‘united interests’ were directly at war with the individualities of
persons and circumstances and the instinct of self-preservation…”
(Josiah Warren, 1856)
Every one of the other utopian
colonies set up in America and abroad in those days (such as those in Nashoba,
Tennessee; New Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Fruitlands, Massachusetts; and the
Oneida Community in New York) failed for the same reason. Human nature makes successful communalism
impossible. And government-enforced
collectivism must always become oppressive.
The communist revolutionaries who
overthrew the monarchy in France gave the French the Reign of Terror and a
corrupt dictatorship, instead of the liberty, equality, and fraternity it
promised. All of the revolutions inspired
by Marx and Engels ended badly, and certainly not in the Workers’ Paradise they
convinced people they were creating.
Look at the miserable histories of the Soviet Union, China, Cuba,
Romania, Czechoslovakia, Cambodia and East Germany. See how socialism sucked the very soul out of
these once-great nations, and put them under the rule of terrorists who
murdered great numbers of innocent people.
The history of the past two centuries seems to prove that if politicians
promise Heaven on earth, they will give us Hell on earth.
In Europe and America, socialism
and communism arose in response and opposition to the gospel preached by
evangelical preachers in the churches and revival meetings. The Gospel of Jesus Christ comes to us as
good news in contrast to the bad news that all men are sinners and justly
condemned before God for our sins. The
good news is that God loves us and sent His Son on a mission to rescue us from
the power and consequences of our sins.
Jesus died on the cross “for our sins, according to the scriptures”
(First Corinthians 15:1-3-4), and God “raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;
who was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification”
(Romans 4:24-25). Sinners who come to
Jesus for their salvation and trust Him to bestow the grace of God upon them
will receive eternal life, and a new life of peace and hope, and also the
promise of Heaven. They will not be
condemned because Jesus paid for their sins (John 5:24, Romans 8:1). They can live triumphantly because He arose
the Victor over sin and death.
Preachers of the socialist gospel
say that the evil present in human society does not arise from the human heart
or the fall of man in the Garden of Eden, but rather is generated by the way we
operate the economy. Capitalism, they
proclaim, creates evil. Suffering and
injustice come, not from our innate sinfulness and our need of the Savior, but
rather from the selfishness and oppression that is part and parcel of our
economic system. Our need is not for
Jesus, but for a new economic system. We
need to devise and implement some system of collectivism and force it upon our
society. Private property and free
enterprise are the enemies of the good, and must be crushed by a socialist
revolution and communist-type government.
Things will be better for everybody, they say, soon after the socialist
gospel is believed and accepted. But all
of the nations that have received and implemented socialism, expecting the pie
that was promised, are still waiting for it to come out of the oven.
The Apostle Peter wrote by divine
inspiration about the false prophets that will come to challenge the truth:
“These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with a tempest;
to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever. For when they speak great swelling words of
vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness,
those that were clean escaped from them who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they
themselves are the servants of corruption, for of whom a man is overcome, of
the same is he brought into bondage.”
(Second Peter
2:17-19)
Socialist rulers rise to power by
offering empty promises that desperate people accept. Whether it was Lenin or Stalin or Hitler (who
called himself a “national” socialist) or Mao or Pol Pot, every socialist
dictator gained absolute control over his people by promising them the pie in
the sky, which he never produced. This
is true also of less vicious rulers who have gained power with the same vain
socialist promises. Socialism in any
form has never worked. It doesn’t share
the wealth, but only the misery. It is
never a movement of love and compassion, but always a movement of hatred and
envy. It is a false gospel that has been
proven a lie over and over again. And
the revolutionaries of our day in our country still sway people by promising
the pie that never materializes.
On the other hand, the gospel of
Jesus Christ comes through with all that it offers, and has never been a
message offering only hope in the next life.
Those who receive Christ receive benefits of profound value right
away. Jesus told the sad and sinful woman
He met at the well of Sychar,
“If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give
me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee
living water…
“Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever
drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst: but the water
that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into
everlasting life.”
(John 4:10 and 13-14)
The sinner who comes to Jesus for everlasting
life receives immediately a new life that satisfies him forever. Just ask a born-again Christian if all He got
in Jesus was a promise of something after he dies. He will tell you that the need of the thirsty
soul is fully and forever satisfied the moment he turns to Christ for
salvation. It happens every time, in
this present life, because Jesus came that men might “have life and, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).Dr. Rick Flanders
Revival Ministries
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