When God vested man with free will, He knew that when it came to charity, some people would choose to not help others in need. But that is the essence of freedom and free will — the right to say either yes or no when it comes to helping others. If God had forced people to make the right decision with respect to charity, then the gift of free will would have obviously been meaningless.
In making this gift, God obviously trusted people with a vast amount of freedom. If everyone used such freedom to reject helping others in need, that would mean that those in need would go without help. In vesting man with free will, God took a big chance.
Enter Caesar — i.e., the federal government. Caesar concluded that God made a big mistake in trusting people with so much freedom. That’s why Caesar enacted Social Security — because he believed that younger people could never be trusted to take care of their parents or grandparents when the need arose.
Oh, sure, God commanded people to honor their mother and their father. But under God’s way, people were free to reject the commandment, and Caesar concluded that many would. Therefore, Caesar entered the process by simply forcing people to comply with God’s commandment.
And yes, Social Security is based on force, not voluntary choice. The government uses the coercive process of taxation to take money from those who are younger and then gives it to people who are older (after deducting a large sum of money to pay the salaries and other expenses to perform this service). If someone refuses to pay his taxes, we all know what the government does to him. There is nothing voluntary about paying taxes.
Under Social Security, Caesar tells people that they are being good, caring, and compassionate when they pay their taxes because the money is being sent to their parents, grandparents, and others in need. Also considered good, caring, and compassionate are the IRS agents who collect the taxes and the bureaucrats within the Social Security Administration who make the disbursements to seniors.
But God does not make mistakes. In vesting man with free will, He wanted younger people to have the opportunity to make this choice and all other choices relating to charity. He knew that He was taking a chance that many people would say no. God was willing to take that chance.
God wanted people to have to sometimes struggle over whether to help another person in need. That’s the way that conscience, which God also vested in man, is strengthened. Should I help that person or not? How much money should I donate to that cause? Should I offer my services instead of money? Through the process of choosing, the conscience is strengthened. Indeed, sometimes it is through making a long series of bad choices that a person, in the depths of despair, finds God.
When it comes to helping others, God’s way is based on freedom of choice. Caesar’s way is based on force. Under what moral authority has Caesar denigrated and destroyed God’s way?
