President Barack Obama appointed a self-proclaimed communist as one of his special advisers. Does that concern anyone besides Glenn Beck and me? It’s an event certainly worth exploring through a biblical lens.
Anthony “Van” Jones, our “green jobs czar”, is supposed to be some sort of public relations prince in the area of creating green jobs. Yes, he has some knowledge and experience related to green things, but also with radical things.
According to Beck, this man, who has been arrested for rioting at least twice, “founded Green For All, an organization focused on creating green jobs in impoverished areas,” yet also co-founded “the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Color of Change, which includes Bay Area PoliceWatch, a group devoted to “protect[ing] the community from police misconduct”.
Jones started his career as “a prison-reform advocate in Oakland, Calif., lobbying for reform of the juvenile justice system and youth-violence prevention programs”, yet later “formed a socialist collective, Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement, or STORM, which held study groups on the theories of Marx and Lenin and dreamed of a multiracial socialist utopia. They protested police brutality and got arrested for crashing through police barricades.”
Since his appointment by Obama, Jones now claims to be a capitalist, yet previously in 2005 said he had become a communist. Talk about all over the board.
Six months ago, in March 2009 at the Power Shift ’09 Conference, Jones spoke in an impassioned manner to young adults about creating a green economy for all people. Here are a few of his comments from his keynote:
“Each one of you is a walking technological superpower. Each one of you, you have more technology on your person right now than the US Government had when it put a man on the moon…. It used to be ten years ago, you know ancient times, if a person could just sit on a bench and pull all the knowledge of the world into their mind, that person would be considered a god. That’s just you with a laptop on Google. That’s how much power you have individually….I want you to understand how much power you have.
“Greening this economy…it’s a moral challenge. We have to create a green economy; that’s true, that’s true. But we have to create a green economy that Dr. King would be proud of. That’s why we say, “Green for all”. The challenge is: “Will you settle for green apartheid?” You are the final hope for humanity.
“We need to get down on our knees and thank…these…uh…Native American communities, but also the Latino community, Asian community, and every other community that’s willing to come here and help us out. Cause we obviously need some help. We need some wisdom from someplace else, cause what we come up with here don’t make no sense at all.”
Despite the poor grammar, Jones holds a law degree from Yale. He may be an intelligent, gifted man, but for all of his intelligence he lacks the most crucial component of effectiveness–wisdom. And he admitted it.
Those who have walked in the ways of God for a while have experienced the truth of Psalm 111:10, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; A good understanding have all those who do His commandments; His praise endures forever.”
Even the most intelligent men and women are fools without the wisdom of God. Their fleshly minds may grasp the most difficult of concepts, but without godly wisdom, their intelligence is futile. Like Jones, they jump from belief system to belief system seeking something that proves true over time. They swing as a pendulum from such divergent places as creative capitalism to collective communism, reasonable reform to riotous revolt.
I think it quite ironic that Jones spoke these words at a conference entitled Power Shift ’09. One of Power Shift’s goals is to power America’s future with clean energy, not dirty fuels. What an analogy! How we need to power America with the pure and unadulterated power of the Holy Spirit rather than the dirtied, sinful power of man.
As many Americans battle for power and search for wisdom, our entire country is like that pendulum swinging back and forth yet continuing to return to the same center. This same center is self. Real change for our country will come only from a power shift of a different kind. It will come from a change of center. We need to return to the One who has ultimate power and wisdom, yet by His authority allows us the freedom to choose to submit to it. This is what “One Nation under God” truly means.
God yearns to bless the nation that will turn from their wicked ways and follow His (2 Chronicles 7:14). He is the source of all knowledge and understanding, wisdom and power. His Word is true and His ways are proven. True hope for humanity comes from placing God at the center of our existence.
There is one thing Jones said with which I wholeheartedly agree: “What we come up with here don’t make no sense at all.”
Van Jones is great at creating green jobs and doing community organizing. Why he was named to the President’s cabinet is beyond me though. He is all over the place and really has a hard time being radical, yet rational (yes, it is possible). I’m glad he stepped down from his position.