This article was inspired by a conversation with an acquaintance and encouraged by this recent quote from Gary Barnett:

“…the truth hurts, but without acceptance of truth, what is left is a deceitful lie…”

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2023/08/gary-d-barnett/the-only-national-defense-needed-in-this-country-is-defense-against-the-real-enemy-the-ruling-class-and-the-u-s-government/

The title of the article is adapted from Robert Heinlein’s novel, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. I have reason to believe that Heinlein would not be offended by my use of it.

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There are only two reasons to believe that government is necessary, neither one of them positive nor uplifting:

1. A personal desire for power and control over other people, with the purpose of getting what one wants via the use of force, and/or,

2. A deep-seated, irrational desire for protection against imagined events which might, but are not guaranteed to, happen.

It is accurate to say that those who use government at any level from the very top to the very bottom seek control of others via the proxy known as government for personal, selfish desires, i.e., to get what someone else has OR as a bulwark against loss, i.e, to keep what they already possess. Neither of these are Christian attributes. Both are grounded in one basic emotion–fear. Both use force, either implicitly or explicitly to attain their goals. Both are a violation of the commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Steal.”

Everything which is negative in life can be boiled down to fear. Fear was the very first emotion expressed in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve ate the apple, causing them to cover themselves with fig leaves out of shame for their nakedness. Fear of being found wanting caused them to try to hide from God, resulting in their being driven away from and deprived of the right to live forever. This assumes that the Genesis account is accurate. Whether it is or not, the principle is the same.

Fear, all-encompassing, unreasoning fear, consumes us as individuals and societies. It conjures up imaginations deep within our souls which, if allowed to come to pass, might cause enormous pain, suffering, and deprivation, perhaps even death, which is usually resisted to the very end with all the strength we can muster because we are afraid of dying. Fear causes us to develop tactics and strategies to overcome these imaginations, which, being rooted in irrationality, exacerbate the fear and drive us to greater effort in devising new methods to overcome it. It is a repetitive cycle, a doom-loop, which never ends within our minds–unless it is broken completely and thoroughly discarded as a way of life.

In all of this, it is understandable why people first banded together to oppose enemies, whether they had two legs or four. When violent death via saber-toothed cats was a constant threat, they learned quickly that there was safety in numbers. When marauding Stone Age bands from different tribes appeared on the horizon, it was necessary to follow the leader to repel the threat. What evolved out of these situations was a system in which some people learned that existential threats were good for their status within the community and they began to devise ways to manufacture fear to keep their subjects in a continual panic-driven state of mind. Government became the norm as it became more and more evident that the populace could be manipulated into submission and subjection due to a perceived, existent threat. We have now progressed to the point where the threat does not have to be existent, i.e., Covid, Climate Change, or Russia!, Russia!, Russia!, but is only perceived to be. We are constantly bombarded with propaganda which serves the purpose of maintaining and consolidating the false narrative–which is designed to keep us in a perpetual state of fear.

Bad things do happen to good people. This is true. It is a fact of human life. Into every life a little rain must fall. However, this does not justify giving up our human liberty to an external government in the hope that somehow, perhaps, just maybe, the threat will not materialize or, if it does, that the government will defeat it before it strikes us, keeping us safe and our way of life secure. We do not need to live this way.

We do need to be aware of the potential dangers around us. Yellowstone might blow. Kim Jong-Un might unleash an EMP attack in the airspace above Nebraska. A respiratory disease might kill half the population, including myself and/or those close to me. Aliens might invade. A meteorite might strike the world. The economy might collapse tomorrow. And on, and on, and on…infinitum. [Note: the present economy will collapse someday and another will take its place. This much is certain. All the others mentioned are purely conjectural. Of these, there is no guarantee that they will occur.]

Yes, there are dangers and threats, but we do not have to be afraid. We can conquer the fear within our own individual lives to the point that every potential threat remains just that…only a potential threat and refuse to allow it to gain control over us. We can choose to live fearlessly, unafraid of what the future might bring.

“You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free…” (John 8:32) were the words spoken two thousand years ago and they ring true today. This brings up the question, however. What are we set free from? Obviously, wars, diseases, and earthquakes still happen. Auto accidents occur. Marital infidelities abound. Crime is rampant. Any of these, et al., might happen to us at any time. Therefore, we cannot say that the truth will automatically preserve us from these nor from any other specific negative event. What we can say, however, is that the truth sets us free from being controlled mentally and spiritually by fear. The truth sets us free from one thing and only one thing–fear. If we are free from fear, then there is nothing which can stop us from achieving our destiny in this life. If we are free from fear, we become uncontrollable by other people and are accountable only to the truth–that we are children of God, responsible only to Him, and, as such, can live freely.

As people who profess faith in Jesus Christ, we should understand that the greatest enemy we face is not an external one, but the one which resides within us. It should be our goal to overcome this enemy so completely that it is rendered perfectly impotent. We are, as the Scripture says, more than conquerors (Romans 8:37). Instead of giving in to the fear which we are all prone to, we ought to recognize that God, not a government nor any impersonal event, holds our future and that nothing, absolutely nothing, can happen to us unless He allows it.

“Without faith, it is impossible to please Him.” — Hebrews 11:6

I do not need government. I am not a threat to anyone and I am not afraid of what life might bring. I am confident in my faith in the Sovereign God Who is my provision and my protection.

Why would I have need to fear?