https://www.vcy.org/crosstalk/2026/02/24/the-bible-and-your-vote/
If you can stomach it, listen to this episode of CrossTalk - or more properly John Birch Society Radio. The show frequently hosts the society's leaders and thinkers and functions as a platform for its brand of Right-wing politics. It's almost a comprehensive study in all that is wrong with the Christian Right and today's Evangelical movement. Woods (the guest) is a bit simplistic to be sure, but he's consistent in his representation of their platform. With the Bible in hand, he launches an assault on New Testament Christianity every bit as subversive as that of James Talarico. The latter won't actually fool anyone grounded in Scripture but Woods and his ilk are persuasive to many and continue to do great harm.
Ironically Woods and Talarico are really proponents of the same syncretist error - both have imbibed the same polluted waters that they then use to dilute Biblical doctrine. The only difference is in their commitments and allegiances with neither camp exhibiting primary loyalty to the Church founded by the Apostles of Jesus Christ.
According to both Woods and the host Jim Schneider our vote is a stewardship. What Biblical evidence is there for that?
In fact Paul says he has nothing to do with those who are outside? Paul it would seem has a very different conception of the Church and its relation to society. The same is true when Christ declares Caesar's coin is something not rendered to God, something outside the Holy Realm as it were. The principles and assumptions of these statements (and there are certainly more) seem to belie the claims made by Wood and this Bircher radio programme.
Woods' thinking is also clouded by his clear commitment to Dispensational Theology (with references to the Rapture, multiple judgments and the like) which is again ironic as the early proponents of that view tended to argue that Christians should separate from society. But it was the First Red Scare at the conclusion of World War I that drove many to abandon that position for one of social engagement and activism. We saw this same spirit at work again with McCarthyism and the later emergence of the John Birch Society and its one-time apologists such Barry Goldwater. Fear of communism (and thus the full-throated embrace of capitalism) and an increasing nationalism and militarism seem to define their movement. There's nothing remotely Christian about it.
I disagree with Woods regarding the restrainer of 2 Thessalonians (that it's the Church) but if he does believe that to be the case - then why does he wish to fight against what is providentially inevitable? God has declared something will happen but then it's the Church's task to resist this? It's a mindset that is baffling to say the least and without a shred of Biblical warrant.
The worldview discussions and claims of apoliticism (around 3:00) are misleading if not outright deceitful. The programme is political through and through. I expect nothing less from these people.
It would seem that Woods believes we are to 'manage' society and in a rather dubious manner compares votes to the parable of the talents. This represents the confusion so typical that surrounds the parables and their application. He reads and interprets them as a lost person would - in opposition to the spiritual nature of the parables as revealed mysteries. They're not about voting, financial advice, or agricultural theory. This is to completely miss the point.
When you vote, you assume the parameters and values of the system which means you accept the results and the 'will' of the people. It's a fluid utilitarian ethical system that (even with constitutional restraints) is problematic. It's based on anti-Christian assumptions such as the Social Contract (and the right of rebellion) as well as the regime of rights. Woods repeatedly begs the question on these issues and like so many American Christians cannot think outside the box of America's Enlightenment ideology - even to the point of confusing the identity of the Church and America. So much for a Christian worldview.
His pronouns are confused and he wrongly assumes that by voting we can somehow bring Biblical influence to bear. This rests on the premise that we're called to coerce people to behave in a Christian manner and are willing to chain them, throw them in cages, plunder them, and even execute them when they don't. Where do you find this in the New Testament? You don't. The notion is absurd as it's an ethic antithetical to New Testament teaching. We're not even to seek justice or vengeance in this age and so the very premise being argued by Woods is prima facie erroneous.
The Bible is not about just about how to get to heaven but Woods is wrong when he says the Bible comments on just about every issue. The Scriptures are covenantal in nature - written to the Church for the Church in this present evil age. They are not a guidebook on how to politically and economically structure society - let alone to deduce such models. It's not a guide to aesthetics or science. This is not to say these spheres (as it were) are neutral. By no means. They're fallen and incapable of redemption - even by voting in legislation. At best the Woods model can put a kind of Christian veneer on things - or rather a pseudo-Christian veneer.
And once again I would argue that pseudo-Christianity is actually far more dangerous, deceptive, and destructive than blatant anti-Christianity. With the latter, the lines are clear. Woods and those like him (no matter how well meaning) end up sowing seeds of confusion and leave the Church in a fog - one in which it quickly loses its way. The CrossTalk programme is a testimony to this.
If 'faithfulness is our responsibility, the results are up to God' was something he really believed, then he wouldn't push so aggressively for Christians to vote. Be faithful - don't entangle yourselves in the affairs of this world or become busybodies in other people's matters. We live as pilgrims and strangers - people who are not invested in these Babylon-societies and as such we lay up our treasures in heaven. That's the way the Scriptures speak.
But Woods like most American Christians doesn't really believe what the New Testament teaches on these matters. He rejects the pilgrim-stranger concept and the call to take up the cross. And when people are given over to mammonism- yes, they care a great deal about who is calling the shots, who might restrict their profits, tax them, regulate them, and the like. When you have no money and you aren't invested, these things are of very little importance. In fact it allows you to step back and understand the pervasive corruption in this world and this society in particular, as well as the absurdity in thinking that it can be fixed by just voting in some new candidates.
'We want righteousness to prevail in our land', says Woods. Who can disagree with that? But I want to know how righteousness can exist apart from the Holy Spirit? Does the Holy Spirit indwell America? Is America in union with Christ? Given the pronoun confusion that Woods continually exhibits, one might think that's what he actually believes. Such notions are heretical and constitute a redefinition of the gospel and the very definitions of Christianity and as such are accursed by the apostle.
One needs to be careful pulling from the Proverbs and other Old Testament passages and then applying them mutatis mutandis to a completely different context - such as the Church in the Last Days. The land in question is the Church not America. Dispensational Theology only helps to further cloud and confuse these issues.
Right-wing activists tremble at the thought that their base might actually vote on the basis of economic issues - which they largely do not. If they did, they wouldn't vote for people like Bush, Reagan, or Trump. And so they continually resort to this kind of rhetoric that picks up around 7:15.
Once again the pilgrim mindset casts all of these questions in a completely different light. Woods is right, the Bible and even the New Testament has a great deal to say about economics - that is how Christians should view and interact with money. It does not offer a societal blueprint and any argument to that end is not the result of exegesis but philosophical speculation and deduction (at best). Often it's the fruit of a commitment to an alien and anti-Christian ideology which is then read back into the Scriptures, selectively using and manipulating some texts while choosing to ignore others.
The Ten Commandments (8:00) are not concerned with upholding property rights but even if they do - are they universal or covenantal? The answer is found in the text and ironically older form of Dispensationalism acknowledged this - that they are covenantal. And for the record, there is no candidate in US politics (even Mamdani) that doesn't uphold property rights. To suggest otherwise is ridiculous. The self-interest/restraint argument Woods makes is a classic case of reading something (in this case Locke and Adam Smith) into the text when it's not there - even while he just plain ignores the many ethical imperatives taught in the New Testament concerning money and this world's goods. Ironically he argues that the self-interest principle works because of human depravity, when in reality the model has also been the source of death, avarice-driven destruction and profound evil. There's no doubt such doctrines have (admittedly) generated tremendous wealth but often via usury and market alchemy. There's nothing moral about this and Smith's Invisible Hand has nothing to do with Providence but is a perverted and false asserted law of nature. Or if it is a 'law', then it's law that belongs to a fallen world and has no moral claim.
Woods utilizes the typical Right-wing argument that charity is private as the state is not given that power but of course in all other instances these same people want the state to exercise and enforce what could otherwise be described as private and specifically Christian ethics. The blindness, inconsistency, and self-serving nature of their arguments on these points cannot be overstated.
Has Johnson's Great Society generated debt? To be sure, but then we're going to ignore the American war machine, the Military-Industrial Complex? They justify this epic criminality and corruption by arguing that it kept Americans (or 'us' as they say) safe. I would argue that America avoided war in spite of the fact that its actions on multiple fronts fomented sabre-rattling, militarism, fear, and proxy war on a massive scale. Others often suffered as a result. And don't think for a moment that today's wars are unconnected to the world that was shaped by the Cold War epoch and the ethos it spawned.
Woods speaks of inherited wealth and the like - but not in the context of the New Testament. He condemns debt and borrowing but in doing so reveals that he understands next to nothing about the Capitalist (and Supply-Side) system he would champion - a system predicated on credit and usury. It's sad to listen to this as his arguments undoubtedly are music to many ears and will even seem common-sensical and yet in reality he's undermining the Bible left and right. This is not to say the Left has any answers or that the response to Woods' errors is to then turn to the Left and embrace its ideology. The Christian response is to reject both views but I must say the positions advocated by Woods are actually more dangerous in that he presents them (erroneously) as Christian and in accord with Scriptural teaching. In reality he strengthens the hands of the evil doers and champions the rich and powerful - something repeatedly condemned in both Old and New Testaments, and specifically when it's God's people who are given over to such mammonism and how it drives them to treat others. Woods and others like him try to force you to either embrace their way of thinking or accuse you of siding with Marx. Christians must reject both options and arguments (as well as such framing) with equal force.
'God was very interested in having wealth stay in the family,' - such statements are made but fail to understand Old Testament wealth and the wisdom literature in redemptive-historical terms. Wealth signified spiritual riches, wisdom, and knowledge of Christ. The New Testament never takes these passages and monetizes them. They're not fiscal advice nor (as already mentioned) are Christ's parables.
'The Bible wants to retain the family as the building block of society,' Woods claims. Where do we find that? The New Testament speaks to Christian families - those in covenant with God, those who are baptized, who are in union with Christ by means of the Holy Spirit. Nowhere in the New Testament do we find some kind of blueprint for society. Woods is begging the question and if his assumptions are dismantled (which is easy enough to do), then what are we to make of his statements? They're completely off base. He doesn't know what he's talking about. While he's presenting his arguments as Biblical, he is in fact undermining Biblical authority and misleading God's people - distracting them into trying to sanctify Babylon. It's dangerous and easily succumbs to idolatry which is what today's American Church is given over to. I blame teachers like Woods for the confusion that reigns in today's Church.
Hellenistic society was just as wicked as our own. Christians needed to understand what was happening and bear witness against it. Nowhere is there any suggestion of transformation, let alone some imperative to do so by means of seizing the reigns of Roman government.
Jim Schneider is right at 19:00 - we need to address these issues. Now more than ever. We need to explain the nature of our society, why Christians should not participate in it, how they bear witness against it and prepare for martyrdom, and we also need to warn of the many false teachers who would lead the Church astray, who think godliness is gain, who seek too transform today's version of the Roman Empire into the Kingdom of Heaven. They would take the Tower of Babel, put a cross on top, and proclaim its glory. This is the false Christianity that Woods is promoting on this programme.
Does a candidate respect heterosexual monogamous marriage? Schneider asks at 21:50. Well, given that Trump doesn't, then why do they support and defend him? This is all completely self-serving and disingenuous. Trump is a serial adulterer and rapist. He perversity is public and yet they support him because (fools that they are) they believe him when he pays lip service to them in order to garner their support.
All Woods is doing is trying to manipulate his audience into always voting for the GOP. And even when the GOP candidate is rancid (such as with Trump) - then you still have to vote for them. The whole thing is farce, a fraud.
We're supposed to believe that society took this secular turn (23:00) because apathetic Christians didn't bother to vote for a generation. Aside from being misleading, this sentiment is rightly described as both delusional and myopic and it completely ignores the subversive nature of American ideology (which they support), the individualistic and utilitarian value system of Liberalism and Capitalism, as well as all the history leading up to the 1960's - the decade they tend to isolate and demonize above all others. If they think the Sixties just happened out of the blue, then they really are living in a fantasy.
With regard to the environment, Woods uses the same Right-wing arguments I used to make - we care about the Earth and want clean water and air but in the name of so-called 'common sense' we basically let the corporations and polluters do what they want. Let the market decide is the argument. His attempt to paint science-driven materialist Environmentalists as pagans is bunk. Very few hold to some notion of Gaia. For most it's a metaphor at best. It is incompatible with the dominant evolutionary and materialist view that dominates our culture - and largely has since long before the 1960's.
While I agree that global warming was a phenomenon that took place around 1000AD, this kind of dismissive attitude (in the name of defending capitalist liberty) does not address the massive environmental problems facing the world. This includes population as well as basic resources. I will grant that many cities have been built where they probably shouldn't have been and I do have some doubts as to whether cutting pollution will solve rising sea levels and the like. And yet, I still oppose the polluters and the corporate ethos which puts profits over people. The problems are profound and systemic and I often think that both camps (Materialist Environmentalism and Right-wing Libertarianism (often paired with unbiblical forms of Christianity) are confusing the issues and dodging the core problems. They are admittedly so epic in scale that apart from conflagration and catastrophe it's hard to see how anything can meaningfully change. But spinning the issues and glossing over the problems certainly is no help at all.
Woods is basically a shill for powerful monied interests and he's either deceived or just willing to distort the issues, perhaps motivated by consequentialist reasoning. It's okay to lie and distort, if the end result is reckoned to be right. It's thoroughly unbiblical.
Woods adds to the confusion by failing to draw a proper distinction between the US Constitution (born of Enlightenment Liberalism) and New Testament thinking and ethics.