Finally, I found something on which I can agree with the President. The following comments were in front of the Key Bridge, which spans Arlington, Va. and Washington. The President urged Congress to pass the infrastructure piece of his jobs plan:

“If Congress tells you they don’t have time, they got time to do it. We’ve been in the House of Representatives, what have you guys been debating? John [Boehner], you’ve been debating a commemorative coin for baseball? You have legislation reaffirming that ‘In God We Trust’ is our motto. That’s not putting people back to work. I trust in God, but God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people back to work.”

President Obama is right. The House should not be spending time on a commemorative coin for baseball. If the president is serious about things like this, then there’s a whole lot of stuff that Congress should not be doing, one of which is spending a $20 million on a puppet show to teach religious tolerance in Pakistan. Billions of dollars could be saved every month if Congress and the President eliminated all spending that is not constitutionally permitted.

I agree with him on the “In God We Trust” motto, but for a different set of reasons. First, it’s not just Republicans who voted on the “In God We Trust” motto. Those who favored the measure included 233 Republicans and 163 Democrats, with one Republican and eight Democrats opposing the measure and two voting “present.”

Second, until this nation actually does trust in God and not in government, I would like the motto removed. More Americans believe in government, Lady Gaga, Kim Kardashian, Monday Night Football, their favorite college team, the Almighty Dollar than they believe in God.

The motto’s words were a point of discussion long before the recent bevy of legal challenges from atheists. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote a letter to William Boldly on November 11, 1907 to explain why “In God We Trust” was left off $10 gold coins.

My own feeling in the matter is due to my very firm conviction that to put such a motto on coins, or to use it in any kindred manner, not only does no good but does positive harm, and is in effect irreverence, which comes dangerously close to sacrilege…. It is a motto which it is indeed well to have inscribed on our great national monuments, in our temples of justice, in our legislative halls, and in building such as those at West Point and Annapolis — in short, wherever it will tend to arouse and inspire a lofty emotion in those who look thereon. But it seems to me eminently unwise to cheapen such a motto by use on coins, just as it would be to cheapen it by use on postage stamps, or in advertisements.

I have to say, that with the high percent of politicos, congressmen, and judges who vote pro-abortion and pro-homosexual, Roosevelt’s words ring true. Given how the courts rule about God in schools and law, our motto should read, “In [Fill in the Blank] We Trust.” We don’t want to offend anyone, especially atheists, with a positive affirmation about the reality of God and His laws. If we do, they and we might have to obey them.

For most politicians God is a plot device in a political play, a Deus ex machina who is called on when there is no way out of a dilemma or when a they want to show their religious side to garner votes from the religious folk for the next election.

Now we get down to how the President took God’s name in vain be claiming that “God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people back to work.” White House spokesman Jay Carney said the President was trying to make the point that “we have it within our capacity to do the things to help the American people. I believe the phrase from the Bible is, ‘The Lord helps those who help themselves.’” What Mr. Carney does not seem to realize is there is no such verse in the Bible. It’s like the overused and mistaken “pride goes before a fall” and “the lion will lie down with the lamb.” It’s “pride goes before destruction” (Prov. 16:18) and “the wolf will dwell with the lamb” (Isa. 11:6; 65:25). If God does help those who help themselves, it seems to me that the responsibility resides with the individual and not the State. Mr. Carney did not say “the Lord helps those whom the State helps.”

God wants us to follow His rules to get people back to work. President Obama is using God rhetoric to support (1) raising taxes and (2) deficit spending. The Bible considers a ten percent tax to be a sign of tyranny (1 Sam. 8:15, 17). We passed that threshold a long time ago. Obama wants to double down on taxes, to go where no American president has gone before.

No government ever created jobs and developed a robust and free economy by taxing the most productive people. Jesus never called for a tax on the rich to pay for social programs. One of His converts was a tax collector who paid restitution for his over taxation (Luke 19:1–10).

Yes, Jesus did say to “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s (Matt. 22:21), but we don’t live under Caesar. We live under the Constitution. We elected people to represent that Constitution.

Paul told the Roman Christians to “render to all what is due them: tax to whom tax is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor” (Rom. 13:7). At the present time, we do not owe any more in taxes. Constitutionally, we can work to oppose any and all new taxes and work just as hard to get legislation passed to roll back the taxes that are already imposed on us.

Then there’s the issue of deficit spending. Deficit spending results in the devaluation of wealth. Higher prices are the result. Deficit spending is theft by dilution. The only way governments can fund anything is by printing money (deficit spending) or taking it from people who produce it (disproportionate taxation). Printing money, called “fiat money” because it’s created out of nothing, is a god-like act, and governments are not gods.

There are further consequences. Being in debt puts us in the position of slaves: “The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower becomes the lender’s slave” (Prov. 22:7). Who’s going to buy our debt? If China does, then we will be slaves to China.

Printing money when there is no commodity to back it up (e.g., gold or silver) dilutes the value of dollars that are in circulation and are exchanged for goods and services. This is called inflation, and the result is higher prices because each new dollar dilutes the value of those dollars already in circulation in the same way that water dilutes wine and a less valuable metal cheapens silver (Isa. 1:22).

Israel was indicted by God because of these actions. Their rulers were described as “rebels,” “companions of thieves” (1:23). Their economic policies had the effect of hurting orphans and widows (1:23). Those on fixed incomes are the ones who are hurt most by the creation of fiat money. Those in most need of health care are the ones who have turned to the State for security, and yet it was the State that created the mess in the first place by its control of the healthcare system (making it more expensive to do business) and its inflationary policies.

The next time some politician invokes God, ask him if he also wants to invoke God’s laws.