David Barton Interprets Jesus

'Look, it's written right here in black and white, well, actually in Red if Jesus 'said' it.
But really, no matter What Colour, it's right here as 'living proof' that Jesus 'said' it...or at least Somebody, at Some point in history, 'said', or 'wrote' it. Look, no need to muddy the historical 'waters' here so lets not get off track.
Ok, it's like This, waaaaay back 'when', you know, long before there were Micky-dees, and fast food joints, back when things were simplier, and people actually Worked for a living, the devil tricked a few merchants into cheating their employees by not paying them for the work they performed in the factories where they chisled wheels out of rocks, in the malls where merchandice was marked up 500%, and big box stores where everything was made in China, and especially Landowners who hired immigrants to work as happy go lucky indentured slaves on their farms. Pretty soon Jesus got wind of this trickery, and boy, was he ever pissed off! "I gotta write something prophetic that will put the brakes on this sort of conivery, And, so that a zillion years from now someone can interprute my words just about any ol' way he wants to", Jesus thought to no one in particular. And so he sharpened a stick and started scribbling these words in the sand;
"The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard"
20 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius[a] for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”


Now I'm not a Christian Historian for nothing you know. Sometimes you gotta read between the lines and see what was 'actually' going on here.
Here's the way I, Jesus Historian extradinaire David Barton reads and interprets this little parable, and I'm betting that after reading this yourselves, you Too will agree with me;

Jesus says, "Is not my money to do with as I please? I’m the employer. Don’t I get to decide what I’m going to pay everyone in this thing?" No, no, no, the government has a minimum wage. No it didn’t. Jesus says, "My money is mine to do with as I please and, by the way, you made a contract with me."
And then he tells the guy, "If you didn’t like the contract, you can go down the road to another vineyard and see if they’ll pay you two silver coins for what you did, but you agreed to work for me for that."
So what you have here is Jesus says, "Hey, the government doesn’t tell me how much to spend, I get to choose my own wages. And two, if you choose to work for me for that, you have an agreement, we have a contract. And three is if you’ve got greater skill, you can sell it to somebody else for a higher price, you can go down the road."

And so what Jesus was 'really' 'saying' was, that he opposed the federal Wage Act. Plain and simple! In a nutshell! Jesus was way ahead of his time with This one! Talk about being able to see the future! Wow! Spot On! It sure pays to be a famous, and not least of all, a very intelligent and God fearing Christian Historian like myself, who can actually 'read' between the lines and 'see' things that the average person simply cannot ever hope to see.' ;) ;)

 

Christian Historian: Jesus Opposed Minimum Wage (Video)

August 30, 2016| by Michael Allen

0 0

Controversial Christian historian David Barton said on Aug. 25 that Jesus opposed the federal minimum wage (video below).
During his Wallbuilders radio show, Barton cited the Bible to support his assertion, noted Right Wing Watch, an organization that Barton lamented was listening to his broadcasts:

Every one of our programs gets listened to by those on the progressive secular left. Right Wing Watch listens to every program we do and they make fun of me because "Barton says that the Bible addresses the minimum wage." It is highly unlikely that they even know what’s in the Bible.
But they’re making fun, "Oh, the Bible doesn’t deal with." Yes, the Bible does deal with that. And the concept of a free market means free from government regulation. A minimum wage is the government telling you what minimum wages you have to pay to someone.

So let me take you to Matthew 20 for just a moment and look how the Bible is specific even on something like freedom of wages, the viability of employer-employee contracts.

While the Bible allows and endorses slavery, it never mentions any federal regulations regarding labor, including minimum wage.
Barton referred to Matthew 20: 1-16 where Jesus is telling a parable about a landowner hiring workers throughout the day and pays them all the same amount of money, which one worker objects to because he put in longer hours than others.
Barton went on to replace the landowner (third person) with Jesus (first person):

Jesus says, "Is not my money to do with as I please? I’m the employer. Don’t I get to decide what I’m going to pay everyone in this thing?" No, no, no, the government has a minimum wage. No it didn’t. Jesus says, "My money is mine to do with as I please and, by the way, you made a contract with me."
And then he tells the guy, "If you didn’t like the contract, you can go down the road to another vineyard and see if they’ll pay you two silver coins for what you did, but you agreed to work for me for that."
So what you have here is Jesus says, "Hey, the government doesn’t tell me how much to spend, I get to choose my own wages. And two, if you choose to work for me for that, you have an agreement, we have a contract. And three is if you’ve got greater skill, you can sell it to somebody else for a higher price, you can go down the road."

As a matter of Biblical record, Jesus never mentions the government, never says he's the employer, never mentions contracts, never mentions greater skills and never mentions selling one's labor for a higher price to another employer.
Christian psychologist and professor Warren Throckmorton noted Barton's comments on his blog, and asked five Bible teachers and pastors if this section of the Bible means that the government cannot set minimum wage; none of them said it did.
Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, told Throckmorton: "The account in Matthew 20 is a parable, in which Jesus is teaching the kingdom of God and how it is entered. It has no more to do with setting economic policies for nations than Matthew 18:33-34 has in setting up debtors’ prisons."

Sources: Warren Throckmorton, BibleHub.com, Right Wing Watch / Photo credit: David Barton/Twitter