The First Christians Were Not Socialists

Kevin DeYoung (click here for a bio) just wrote an article whose title strikes instant fear into the hearts of most religiously conservative Christians in America. The title of his article: Were The First Christians Socialists? Such a question raises the blood pressure of every good patriotic conservative American Christian because we all know that Socialism or Communism goes against their view of America. For their view of America centers on Capitalism, the Free Market, individualism, and speaking American English.

Now because the very first Christians shared everything in common, DeYoung felt compelled to address the subject. According to DeYoung, the first Christians were not Socialists, or even Communists (click here for his article). And DeYoung is correct in his assessment though perhaps not  for the reasons he specified.

DeYoung is correct, the very first Christians were not Socialists despite sharing all their possessions with each other. DeYoung goes on to say that neither were the very first Christians Capitalists either as far as we can tell. But then he grants Capitalism an indulgence that he does not share with Socialism/Communism. That indulgence states that we need to rely on Scriptural evidence other than explicit Biblical statements or specific examples provided by the very first Christians to determine if Capitalism is promoted by the Scriptures..

Now though DeYoung shows a bit more knowledge of Socialism/Communism than the average conservative American, he demonstrates that he has much to learn. What his article demonstrates about religiously conservative Christian Americans is their desire to use the Bible to enable Christians, if not everyone, to recover the Garden of Eden. Though they may not say that in those exact words. the moment they use the Scriptures to try to find what kind of economy would best meet the needs of people as they were created before the fall, they are looking to recover the Garden of Eden to some extent.

However, such a question itself may be at odds with the New Testament. After all, there is a danger in trying to use the Bible to sanctify one's preferred economic ideology. That danger is that by claiming that a particular and personally preferred school of economics is the Biblical choice, then one's Christianity becomes an avenue to self-worship, not the worship of God. That is because the Bible and the Christian faith become servants to a preferred sacred cow of one's own choosing.

How do we know that the First Christians were not Socialists or Communists, or Capitalist or whatever else? It simple. Socialism, Communism, Capitalism, and whatever else remains deal with economic or political-economic ideologies. What the New Testament is concerned with is to how to equip Christians to live as pure and reputable ambassadors of Christ who are always looking to enlist new citizens into Christ's Kingdom. The New Testament is not concerned with telling us how we can recover Eden.
 
Does that mean that Christians do not need to be concerned with political and/or economic ideologies and how they impact the world? Not at all, especially in these times. For though we don't have any examples of any First Christian endorsed ideologies or systems, our very placement in the world requires that we share society with unbelievers. So did the very First Christians. But unlike those First Christians, we live in a world where the Gospel has been spread throughout the world and we Americans live in a democratic political system that calls on us to participate with others. And thus the matter of how will we address political-economic ideologies and systems becomes mandatory for us religiously conservative Christians.

The above is said with one caveat: that though neither the New Testament tells us nor the First Christians demonstrated what kind of economic system we should have in the society that we share with unbelievers, we are called to speak out against the injustices practiced by any political-economic system by even, or especially, our favorite systems. Perhaps all of us will have our favorite political-economic systems, but there are two things we cannot do with those systems. First, we cannot say that our favorite system is endorsed by the Scriptures. Second, we cannot shy away from speaking against the injustices that our favorite systems promote or allow.

The above is the approach that DeYoung should have taken. He is more than correct in saying that the First Christians were not Socialists. He also shows that he is no opportunist by claiming that the First Christians belonged to some school of Capitalism. But in trying to show that the First Christians were not Socialists, he went out of his way to list the differences between how the First Christians lived and his understanding of Socialism or Communism.

DeYoung is correct in saying that if we can't make our case for a particular ideology or system from the Scriptures then we need to be upfront in correctly attributing the sources for our thinking to non-Scriptural sources such as practical considerations, history, or the Social Sciences. And overall, DeYoung's article is good and deserves to be read. It is that he could have taken a better approach in answering the question posed by the title of his article.