God's Sovereignty, the Christian's Security and the Evolving face of Marxism

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand." (John 10:27-28)
Picture by Christopher Juncker

During a graduate class at California State University, Sacramento, in the early nineties, I remember some interesting discussions by a professor and several students, all atheists and marxists; they were attempting to explain how it was that the USSR had collapsed. Any spiritual reasons never came into the discussions it was all economics.

When the “iron curtain” metaphorically, and in Berlin quite literally fell, some groups and nations were left alone with an ideology that seemingly had failed.

In the intervening years of that downfall, discussions continued, in particular, among those whose ideologies were Socialist and Marxist. One of the new terms added to that ideology is “cosmovision.” Christianity-- Cosmovision & Marxism: The beginning of an exploration is the title of a series that I started several months ago. In that posting I looked at the meaning of cosmovision, Marxism, how those two terms linked together and how they were a problem for evangelical faith.

This article is a continuing look at an evolving Marxism and biblical Christianity and in particular how they stand in contradiction to each other.

Besides evangelical, I stated that I would also look at an evolving Marxism alongside two other terms I identify with, that is reformed and orthodox Christianity. Reformation Christianity is a very important part of my Christian faith. There are many aspects of the Reformed faith but there are two I want to use in contrast to Marxism and its evolving worldview.

God’s sovereignty is one aspect; the perseverance of the saints is the other. The first, God’s sovereignty, refers to God’s rule, his trustworthy control over all that is. The perseverance of the saints refers to the Christian’s secure place in the hand of God. They are saved for eternity, called to union with Jesus Christ forever. No one is able to remove the Christian from their secure position within the fold of Jesus Christ.

In South America, where Marxist ideology took the form of liberation theology, where Marxism was itself shaped by liberation theology, there has been a deliberate move away from materialistic Marxism. At first at least part of the biblical text guided the South American movement, however post modern thought on the one hand and what I will call cultural revelation is now guiding the various movements.1

New definitions have evolved. For instance, the idea of class which was so important to classical Marxism is now redefined by different socialist and Marxist movements. In the other posting on Marxism and Cosmovision, I have noted above, I point out that for many theorists indigenous peoples take the place of class. In fact, the usual classification of workers as the emerging and important class is joined by other groups including women, ethnic groups and those in the gay community.

Besides the above redefining of the term class there is a new view of the determinist aspect of Marxism. Karl Marx thought it was inevitable that societies would move from capitalism to Marxism; this was a materialistic play on Hegel’s evolving spirit which would eventually and consciously absolutize itself in history through the state and art.2

In the United States as Professor Dwight Hopkins explains in an interview with, The Other Journal .Com, “Black theology” started without Marxism but evolved by using Marxist ideology. Hopkins states,

“Black theology started outside the academy…it started in the churches…it started within a context of movements of people struggling for human rights and justice. Second, black theology of liberation started differently from Latin American liberation theology, because it started out of the churches in the black community. Only then did it move towards Marxism in its search for tools of analysis to make sense its struggle.”3

It should be added to this that black liberation theologians refer to African Americans not in particular as Americans but as indigenous peoples in Diaspora. Therefore what counts for them as important in their theology is once again something like cosmovision. It is their whole culture which is seen as both revelation and sacred. But it is important to add Marxism to this mix.

In some sense the determinism is still there. But, for these Socialists and Marxists, its outcome will include such groups as women, indigenous people groups, the gay community and workers. Therefore various results are involved in what is perceived as an end to oppression. For instance, looking from a socialist’s or Marxist’s point of view the worker would be freed from a capitalist society and so prosper.

The homosexual would be able to live in a completely inclusive society including an inclusive church. Indigenousness people’s cultures would be respected, as they should be, but from an ideological basis that would make them closed communities. Because, notice, class or group implies a collective, individual freedom is fundamentally left out of this mix. These are communities and collectives of people not individuals.

Each group is motivated by a sense of oppression and is moving toward what they consider freedom. Of course the end result at times appears hazy because the various visions of utopia are at odds with each other’s goal.

For instance, Andrea Smith of Solidarity states,”In FORA such as the U.S. or World Social Forums, gender and sexuality are often reduced to discussions on the status of women or LGBT communities. What we pay less attention to is how the logic of heteropatriarchy fundamentally structures colonialism, white supremacy and capitalism.” She then goes on to attempt to show how her own Marxist movement is failing to fulfill women’s vision of the future.

This is no future at all and any promise stands at the door of hell.

And this is where I will interject the Reformed positions of Christianity. If one is a Christian—standing on a biblical foundation eliminates standing on any other. All are oppressed by others but all are equally oppressed by their own sin. Only the promise of new life in Christ Jesus counters a dark society.

Security for the individual Christian rests in Jesus Christ, therefore security for the collective will finally—in the end—be only in Jesus Christ. It is never biblical to insist on Christ and culture, anymore than it is biblical to insist on Christ and capitalism or Christ and Marxism.

In Jesus Christ we feed the poor, seek to eliminate human slavery, fight domestic abuse, and care for the immigrant. But the Church is not called to share its faith in Christ with any or every other ideology and will lose its way anytime it does.

There is everlasting security in Jesus Christ. God rules the nations and brings about the final vision which rests only on the true foundation, Jesus Christ.


“I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands…These are the ones who came out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” (Rev. 7:9,14b)


1By “cultural revelation” I mean the idea that each culture embodies all the necessary norms, laws and even the sacred, These are unique to each culture so what may be unholy or unrighteous in one culture may be acceptable in another. And that there is a difference among cultural norms is seen as acceptable and truthful for each culture.
2See, John W. Cooper, Panentheism: The Other God of the Philosophers: From Plato to the Present, (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic 2006) 106-119; and, Ernst Breisach, Historiography: Ancient, Medieval & Modern, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1983) Chapter 15, “Historians as Interpreters of Progress and Nation--1”
3 See “Voices of Liberation and Struggle: A Conversation with Dwight Hopkins,” an interview with Dwight Hopkins by Jon Stanley at The Other Journal.Com.