Mika Edmondson is "Truly Pro Life"

Proverbs 3 and the Simplicity of Following God

One of the things I like about being a Christian is that though it can be difficult to follow God and to abide in Christ's love and to love the Lord with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength, it can be difficult, but it's simple.

You know what I mean? Like difficult, yes, but very simple a lot of the time. And there's a great verse in Proverbs, I'm going to read it to you, Proverbs 3, and it says, Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lead not unto thine own understanding.

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy path. It's very simple. You know, love the Lord, keep his commandments, and it's right there in the Bible a lot of the time. And look, there are some things that we need to sort of extrapolate, look at the good and necessary consequences of what's written, and that can be tricky at times.

But so much of the Bible is very clear and very easy to apply to our current situation. This is what got me thinking about this. I saw this tweet from Mika Edmondson bemoaning that nearly 700 ,000 will lose food stamps with the USDA work requirement change.

Now, the work requirement change for food stamps is pretty minor, and it's not as sensationalistic as NBC News wants it to be or Mika Edmondson seems to think it is. I'm of the opinion, of course, that food stamps shouldn't exist.

Like a government should not be administering charity in this way. This is the job of the church. But Mika Edmondson has something interesting to say here, and I agree with it, and I think I want to add a few very clear caveats, because we have a word from the Lord on this.

This is not something we need to guess about, this is not something that we need to sort of extrapolate the good and necessary consequences for. We have a direct word from God about this exact issue. Mika Edmondson, OPC pastor, says, Most individuals dealing with this reality deeply desire to work but cannot find stable income.

Local churches should prayerfully consider how they will respond. Now I certainly don't want to argue with prayerfully considering how you should respond, of course, that is good advice. I can take issue with him putting life in quotation marks, because what he's trying to say here is to do what most liberals do, political liberals I mean, and say, if you're going to truly be pro-life, you need to be in support of these social programs as well.

If you're going to be truly pro-family, you need to be in support of these social programs as well, and that is false. Mika Edmondson is wrong about that. He's just dead wrong about that. I don't think he's lying, but I think he's wrong about that.

The Church's Duty to Feed the Poor Without State Charity

In fact, if you are going to be, you know, if you're going to be acknowledging God and loving Christ properly, you need to do what he commands in these areas, and in these areas, that means you cannot have a government-sponsored social program like this.

You cannot. But he's right, though. Churches need to consider how to respond to this, because let's just say I got my way and all people lost food stamps, not just 700 ,000. I think all people should be removed from the food stamp rolls.

The church has a duty to play there, because we ought to feed those who cannot feed themselves. But there's a principle, and so while Mika Edmondson is saying you should prayerfully consider what you should do, I agree.

You should prayerfully consider it, but you should also have your Bibles open, because God has a clear word about this. This is 2 Thessalonians chapter 3. He says this, excuse me, he says, For even when we are with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat.

If any would not work, neither should he eat. Now this is not a theoretical desire to work. Like I think some people say, well, I really, really want to work, so therefore I should get charity, because I want to work, I'm willing.

And the reality is that that is not really what's at play here, because you could have a theoretical willingness to work all day long. I've talked to people, I'm a recruiter, I've talked to people that they're not working currently, and I ask them, why aren't you working currently?

And they say, well, I can't find an adequate job that pays enough. And I'm like, well, that person doesn't really want to work. He wants a job that is a certain way, a certain amount of money, things like that.

And that's okay if you have money, like if you have enough to feed your family, and you've saved a lot, and you want to wait until you find the right position, I have no problem with that. You've prepared for it.

But a lot of these people have not prepared for that. They have nothing to feed their families with, and so they're looking for food stamps. That's not okay. If you're not willing to work, you cannot eat.

Work as a Christian Duty and a Free Man's Mentality

And here's the reality, guys. Mika Edmondson says here that they really want to find stable income, but they can't. They're willing to work, but they can't find a stable job that pays. And so the reality is, guys, that we got to understand this from a biblical perspective.

When Paul says if you're not willing to work, there's always work to be done. Even if there's not a single job that pays, there's always work to be done. So you have to be willing to do literally anything.

Work. There's always work available, even if there isn't income available. You see the difference? There's a difference there. There's always work to be done, even if you can't find a job. See, like right now, I don't have a job.

But I do work every single day, and I make money. I don't have a job. I don't work for an employer. I don't have, quote unquote, stable income. My paychecks every month are different because I work for myself, right?

And so I've got to go out there and make sure that I find customers, offer my services, and sometimes I get more customers than others. So I actually don't have stable income, but there is work to be done.

And I know poor people know this too, because I used to live in New York, right? I used to live in New York, and I would see people selling stuff on the streets. And they weren't high-income people, but they were hustling.

So you got to have that hustler's mentality. And I don't mean like a grifter, a trickster. I mean someone who's willing to hustle for what they want. You buy a bottle of water for a dollar and sell it for two dollars.

Someone that understands that there's always work to be done, even if you can't find a job. Now, I don't think that finding a job is that much of a problem in this economy. The economy is very dynamic.

The unemployment rate is higher than they say it is. This is a question about that. But there's a lot of jobs out there. There's not a lot of jobs for CEO out there. But there's a lot of jobs out there.

And I often tell my wife, like, if for some reason I couldn't find a customer again, I would do anything. Like, I would work anywhere. I'd work at McDonald's if I had to. And that's what Paul's talking about.

It's not just like a theoretical willingness to work. It's actually being really willing and actually doing work that needs to be done. Does the toilet need to be cleaned? You clean the toilet. Does something need to be picked up?

You do that. You know what I mean? Like, so churches, when you're thinking about feeding the poor, you also have to think about this requirement. Because this requirement is not just to hold something over poor people's heads, but it's rather to help them see that there's always work to be done, even if there's not someone willing to give you a job.

You see, that's a slave mentality, where it's like, I'm not going to work unless someone gives me a job. You can't think like that anymore. We can't think like that anymore. That's how I used to think.

That's not the mentality of a free man. A free man says there's work to be done. There's some, like, there's value I can bring to the table with my labor. I got to figure it out because no one's going to give it to me.

No one's going to figure it out for me. That's the difference, man. See, Paul, this is a requirement that is so necessary because it teaches the right mentality. It teaches the mentality of a free person.

And Christ's church should be full of free people. Bond servants to Christ, but freedom for everyone else. Anyway, I hope this is helpful. God bless.