The Right to Choose
In reading William Norman Grigg’s history of the draft, “Conscription = Communism”, it occurs that the power to require men and women to serve the state according to the will of the majority or their chosen rulers has been a major blight on societies hoping to live at liberty.
Http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig5/grigg-w5.html
He quotes Woodrow Wilson as saying, "The nation needs all men, but it needs each man not in the field that will most pleasure him, but in the endeavor that will best serve the common good…. To this end, Congress has provided that the nation shall be organized for war by selection; that each man shall be classified for service in the place to which it shall best serve the general good to call him."
Wilson goes on to state, “It is a new thing in our history and a landmark in our progress.”
Of course it is ridiculous to believe that the draft is a new idea. Drafting men into service has been around since the American revolution. It was not done by the Americans but to them. It was called impressment and was one of the reasons listed in the Declaration of Independence as a complaint against the tyranny of the crown. The history of governments having the power to take the sons of their subject citizens goes back much farther and the warnings against such arbitrary power are well recorded.
Yet generation after generation continues to follow the same error and foolishness with a resonating excuse that there is no better or sounder principle.
Journalist Joel Tyler Headley stated concerning the efficacy of the draft, "[W]e do not believe there is a sounder principle, or one that every unbiased mind does not concede with readiness that it does an axiom, that, if necessary to protect and save itself, a government may not only order a draft, but call out every able-bodied man in the nation... If this right does not inhere in our government, it is built on a foundation of sand, and the sooner it is abandoned the better."
Personally I believe that Joel is a false prophet whose idea that governments should have the power to force men and women into its service is the true foundation of sand. In fact such authority in the hands of government is diametrically opposed to God’s will.
Is that too radical a claim for the sensibilities of modern patriots? Can it be backed up by any simple truth or verified by any prophetic doctrine?
Absolutely. But not without doing damage to the delusions of a self-righteous and deceived populous.
When the people were looking for a central government to take on the responsibilities of the government of, for and by the people established by Moses, which had existed for 400 years in Israel, there were a few things that God told Samuel to warn the people about.
First, When the ‘voice of the people’ democratically desired a “commander in chief” Samuel warned the people that this central leader would obtain the power to take their sons for himself. In other words their sons would be forced to serve and “honor” this new government. God was telling the people if you choose to elect leaders who can exercise authority one over the other those leaders will have the power to draft you sons into their service.
God clearly did not want that power in the hands of men or their governments. The authority in some types of governments to select the sons of men to serve the leaders of government has been around for millennia. But such power and authority did not exist in God’s government during the centuries when Israel remained faithful and had no king.
It should be noted that the word king, “Is in Scripture very generally used to denote one invested with authority, whether extensive or limited." So, this would mean that a choice of a president or prime minister by the people is no different than that of the Israelites choosing a king. It is the investment of power, no matter how slight, into the hands of a man or group of men that God considers to be forsaking Him.
Each man is endowed by his creator with certain inalienable rights which are personal responsibilities. To vest those rights and responsibilities, that is to say power and authority, in another individual or group of men is a principle of government that God considers leaving the principles of His Holy kingdom or government. This is what Cain did when he went out of the presence of the Lord. He departed or forsook the Lord and started a city State with central powers vested in a government for the people.
God did allow such governmental systems to exist but has made it clear as to what He thought of people who looked to governments of that kind. He said people who went that way had “forsaken” him to serve other gods.
God led Abraham out of city states like Ur and Haran. He took the people out from under governments like Egypt that had compelled them to pay 20% income tax while they were under the rulership of that government. God sent ministers like Moses and Samuel to teach the people how to live in a government of the people, by the people and for the people under the perfect law of liberty. Christ did the same thing. He set the captive free so that they could serve the God of Heaven through their own conscience rather than the gods men appoint for themselves.
Governments that were given the power to draft the sons of the Families of men were contrary to God’s plan as suggested by Abraham, delivered through Moses and forewarned through Samuel.
Of course this is Old Testament. What of Christ? Is not God the same yesterday as He is today? Didn’t Christ say the same thing in Luke 22:25, 26 “And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors. But it shall not be so among you:..”
Jesus said that God commanded us to honor our Fathers. Have our Fathers put the state in the position of the parent [Parentis Loci]? Where would the state get the power and authority to take our sons for their service? Unfortunately, this is exactly what has happened. The people began to give power and authority to forms of government which Moses, Samuel and Jesus warned us against. We have failed to seek the kingdom of God at hand which was a form of government that left the power of “choice” in the hands of the individuals and individual families bound together in a system of charity, hope and faith.
At least in part the Churches have preached an apostate Gospel. To preach part of the truth while omitting the rest is the essence of a lie. They have allowed, even encouraged, the people to seek governments that call themselves benefactors but exercise authority one over the other which Christ forbid, which God through Moses took people from and forbid their return, and for which Abraham was called faithful for leaving.
Membership in such national estates requires that we accept government as the patriarch or Father of our society. All central governments rely upon the law of the Family as a template, the law of the father, Patronus. But God has forbid this from the beginning and Christ made no exception.
This is why Jesus also said we were to call no man on earth your father.
In Israel there was no king and yet the people came together in the face of danger and emergencies through their patriarchal and congregational system of 10s, 100s and 1000s. A patriarchal system simply places the eldest Father at the head of a Family group. That family is the core of all social and governmental duties and responsibilities. The families then come together in voluntary cooperation to form a nation of free people.
These small intimate groups are like families but we do not invest rights in their chosen ministers. Yet for such groups to take on the nature of a body we must invest something. Something must be vested in the ministers of this government of, for and by the people. What is vested in the minister is the contribution of the people, the gifts they lay upon these living altars of faith, hope and charity.
The stones of Abraham’s altars were living men chosen by the people. This was also true of Moses and Joshua and is the same form of the early Church. The altars of God are sacred purpose trusts established through the men called out in His service and supported by the free will offerings of the people to aid them in establishing His kingdom under the perfect law of liberty.
Could such a government work? It has many times in the history of mankind but it requires a certain kind of person or individual.
First, they must have the character of God the Father which includes an acute sense of justice and mercy, charity and patience. Second, they must care about their neighbors rights as much as they care about their own. These rights include Family rights and property rights. This is why the bible speaks of returning every man to his Family and to his possessions. If we are to be Christ like or Christian then this same purpose must also be our own. In order to express that concern for our neighbors we must be willing to gather together as a people in networking congregations of charity and defense.
Such congregational nations of free people require constant attention and sacrifice. The hardships in early America tempered the people’s character. The quality and character required of individuals to make such systems work is rare in modern populations. Apathy and avarice have become pandemics. A self indulgent, placated and pampered populous has made a truly free government almost impossible for the masses.
Pride and ignorance play no small role in barring men from freedom, blinding men from the nature of true liberty. They call evil good and good evil. Many desire to escape but few desire to enter the kingdom and less to serve it.
Democracy is no solution. “‘Democracy’ is but one of the many lies we keep repeating to ourselves in an effort to believe, in the words of Voltaire’s Dr. Pangloss, that our self-destructive society represents ‘the best of all possible worlds.’ Democracy is the illusion that you and I, combined, have twice the political influence of David Rockefeller, and Americans cling to this illusion as fiercely as Linus does to his blanket.”
In the recent article by Devvy Kidd, Constitutional Income: Do you have any?, Devvy suggests several strategies.
The first was “Vote out this corrupt, compromised Congress”.
"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."
To vote in a congress vested with power is already a corrupt act of the people and a violation of God’s and Christ’s precepts. It is in essence a forsaking of God’s plan. This concept is so foreign to most people, let alone the vast Christian populous, that it takes the humblest of hearts to accept the truth of our complete deception and present strong delusion.
As Madison's famous quote from his Federalist paper number 10 states:
"...democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths."
To imagine that voting could be our salvation is at the very least impractical because the fact is most voters are corrupted already and would only vote in other corrupt men to do their selfish bidding. The offices in question are authoritarian in nature and will attract men seeking authority and power. We know power corrupts even the best of men like David, who though he was after God’s own heart, did many evil deeds once he had received the vested powers of the people. Voting in a new Caesar can never be the goal of true Christians.
“It is the besetting vice of democracies to substitute public opinion for law. This is the usual form in which the masses of men exhibit their tyranny.”
The kingdom of God is not a democracy. James Russell Lowell said that, “Democracy gives every man the right to be his own oppressor.” Democracies are a common purse of rights that runs towards tyranny and destruction. The fact is most of the people in the world are more concerned about their own desires than they are about their neighbors rights or needs. This has always been the case and those who rest their hopes on democracy are laboring under one of the great delusions of our time.
The Second Proposal
A second proposal Devvy put forward is to get the states to adopt one of Dr. Edwin Vieira's money bills. Again, can anyone imagine that is ever going to happen? Is it even possible to legislate such concepts no matter how sensible they are? Who are we to compel such wisdom on the people? We personally have the right to implement wisdom in our own life but not compel it in the lives of others. Christ said seek the kingdom and its righteousness not force the kingdom on others.
A Third Proposal
Devvy also suggests that we change public opinion about the income tax through education. I believe that this is impossible to any great degree because most people defer or prefer the benefits of Nimrod over the responsibilities of Christianity within the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is an alternative to the governments of men which exercise authority and compel compliance through a membership that makes you entitled but gives a corresponding entitlement to the leaders of government over the people.
The Bible tells us that Nimrod ruled the people of the world:
He was a mighty hunter before the LORD: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the hunter before the LORD. (Genesis 10:9)
In Genesis 10:9 the word ‘hunter’ is from the Hebrew word tsayid which is more often translated provision, food, food-supply, or victuals. The word paniym is translated before in the sense of face or in the face of, before or in front of. So, it could be said that Nimrod was a mighty provider before the LORD or instead of the Lord.
In desiring entitlements from benefactors those benefactors who exercise authority have become entitled to a portion of our person. In coveting the benefits of kings and rulers we have become merchandise or human resources.
Peter told us this would happen and it was the mission of the first century Church to provide an alternative to memberships that subject the people to these exercising authority. Have we forsaken God by electing leaders that have the authority to take our first fruits and even our sons? Have we delivered our sons into the selective service of another Nimrod, Caesar and Cain? Could we be under a strong delusion that we are doing God’s will when we are actually forsaking Him? Have we fallen prey to an apostatized gospel that teaches only half truths? The word ‘forsaken’ in 1 Samuel 8 is from azab which is defined by words like, “to leave, loose, forsake” even “abandon” and “apostatize”.
Have we followed Christ’s gospel or have we done like those Israelites of old. Have we done according to their works after they were taken out of Egypt? Have we been seeking the kingdom of God and its righteous ways of liberty and sacrificial paths of responsibility or have we been seeking the ways of Rome, benefactors like Caesar, Herod the Great, Pharaoh of Egypt, Nimrod of Babel and Cain of Enoch?
Not only did God, through Samuel, say that your sons will be taken but also your daughters will be drafted to serve the will of the leaders who you choose to have over you.
The Universal National Service Act introduced by Senator Ernest F. Hollings (D-South Carolina) wishes to make a two year period of military or civilian service mandatory for all American citizens, both male and female, between the ages of eighteen and twenty-six.
Both your sons and daughters will not have a choice in this as long as you are a citizen entitled. You are under a system like that of Egypt and Babel for the same reason as men went under Nimrod. You have desired benefits and prayed at the civic altars of men who collect contributions by force. As long as you are entitled you are subject to the ruling judges, that is to say the gods you have chosen for yourself. The state is now your Father and the heads of the families have been cut off.
I am not saying that men should not serve their country or share their wealth in contributions to the needs of society. I am saying without choice there is no freedom. Good government is always founded on the solid rock of faithful liberty under God. To take away the right of choice is to take away the very thing that makes a man a man.
If you can be selected for service, and compelled to serve, then you are not free. Your are nothing more than a resource, a thing. Of course that is exactly what they tell you that you are but people still delude themselves into thinking that they are free. That is false pride. The contrary is unthinkable to those without the desire to awake and the humility for repentance.
"And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." 2Th 2:11
If you do not have a choice then you are not free and Thomas Jefferson made this clear when he said, "Freedom is the Right to Choose, the Right to create for oneself the alternatives of Choice. Without the possibility of Choice, and the exercise of Choice, a man is not a man but a member, an instrument, a thing."
The fact is you do have a choice and that choice is to seek to serve the unrighteous mammon and benefit from it or seek the kingdom of God in hope of serving the mammon of righteousness. Israel in Egypt began to help one another and glean in the fields at night for their benefits of community and fraternity even while they worked in the day to pay their tally of bricks which was figuratively the taxes of that government. They began to choose to do without the benefits of governments of exercising authority rather than to be a part of taking their neighbors goods or away his neighbors choice.
"The advocate of liberty believes that it is complementary of the orderly laws of cause and effect, of probability and of chance, of which man is not completely informed. It is complementary of them because it rests in part upon the faith that each individual is endowed by his Creator with the power of individual choice."
God gave men the freedom of choice. Men make governments that take that choice away in the hopes of benefit for himself. "Man is a being capable of subduing his emotions and impulses; he can rationalize his behavior. He arranges his wishes into a scale, he chooses; in short, he acts. What distinguishes man from beasts is precisely that he adjusts his behavior deliberately." When men form governments to exercise authority and adjust their neighbors behavior those governments become beasts which take the choice from men and reduces them to human resources.
This is what Christ and John the Baptist were preaching when they told the people the kingdom of Heaven was at hand and that we were to seek it and preach that others should also seek it. The kingdom was that other form of government that was an alternative to Rome and the government of the Pharisees and Sadducees.
"Our Founding Fathers believed that we live in an ordered universe. They believed themselves to be a part of the universal order of things. Stated another way, they believed in God. They believed that every man must find his own place in a world where a place has been made for him. They sought independence for their nation but, more importantly, they sought freedom for individuals to think and act for themselves. They established a republic dedicated to one purpose above all others - the preservation of individual liberty..." But the people have changed and decided they wanted benefits at the expense of their neighbor and called upon democratic systems that exercise authority in order to obtain such systems. They have elected leaders and given them the power to choose for the people in an indirect democracy. To obtain their share of the covetous benefits of such governments they have become “a member, an instrument, a thing."
"We have the gift of an inner liberty so far-reaching that we can choose either to accept or reject the God who gave it to us, and it would seem to follow that the Author of a liberty so radical wills that we should be equally free in our relationships with other men. Spiritual liberty logically demands conditions of outer and social freedom for its completion." "Above all I see an ability to choose the better from the worse that has made possible life's progress."
Christ preached a kingdom at hand in spirit and in truth and it is up to us to seek it. One of the beautiful things about the kingdom is that you do not have to wait until you convince the majority to seek the kingdom but you may began that journey today. As two or more gather together they began to form the kingdom in the name of Christ. When they form congregations and choose ministers in the manner of that first century Church they began to create that alternative of choice.
It may be wiser to seek the kingdom rather than repair old wine skins of governments that hold your vested rights. It was Christ’s purpose and it is the purpose of his Church to return every man to his Family and every man to his possession. This is the journey we must all seek to take. This is the path to the kingdom of God, the viable republic in the heart of the Roman Empire.
You still have the right to choose but you must choose to set your neighbor free if you are to also have the choice of freedom. You must first give up the benefit in one world in order to obtain the benefits of the other.
But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you. Lu 12:31
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