Common Sense Verdict: John McGuire's "Pledge" Is Not Solemn Nor Binding. Part 1 and 2.
Pledge Ploy Scalds Pure Consciences Of Hypocrites ~OPINION
Have you seen the Daily Mail video claiming John McGuire pledged not to run against incumbent Bob Good? Pastors and Christian organizations are hand-wringing and rushing to judgment on this ruse, accepting the premise McGuire violated a pledge and is at odds with Christianity, going so far as to claim if you support McGuire, you are not a Christian. One problem in so doing is that these people show how either gullible or evil they are and have no idea what constitutes a solemn pledge in the Bible. This 3 part blog will demonstrate their lack of wisdom and patience in waiting for the truth to perk up through this distortion.
In order to unpack this, I’ll present it in three parts: 1) we have to see it all unfold in time to see it in context, 2) I’ll present the Biblical standard of pledging and if that standard was violated, and in the process show certain pastors have no idea what constitutes a Biblical Pledge, and 3) examine Good’s pledges for their pattern of hypocrisy.
Did McGuire pledge allegiance to Bob Good? Casually, yes, but to Bob Good, who was preparing to break his own pledges:
2020: Bob Good challenged incumbent congressman Denver Riggleman. (Bob violates his decree against being challenged as an incumbent.)
Why? Riggleman “de-cloaked” shortly after taking office in 2018 by calling for a huge increase in foreign workers, followed by officiating a gay wedding.
Good beat Riggleman and won the office with the endorsement of Donald Trump.
2021: Virginia is re-districted. McGuire was redistricted to the 5th Congressional District. He very briefly considered running for Congress but instead ran for state senate.
2022: Bob Good runs for re-election and wins. McGuire helped. See below.
2023: January – This article's 1:07 minute video clip purportedly shows McGuire addressing a group in Fluvanna about his race for state senate district 10.
McGuire refers to Good’s re-election a couple of months earlier (Nov. 2022), saying: “…. I got people out to vote for Bob Good. I know I worked hard to get out a ton of Bob Good signs.”
McGuire continued saying, “My pledge to you is state senate, and I'm going to support Bob Good for re-election."
McGuire did not “pledge” but he did say he would support Good for re-election, presumably in 2024.
What could have changed his mind? Bob then is not the Bob now.
In January, Bob’s paid political consultants, Bonnie and Clyde Strategies, LLC, went to work for State Senate District 10 candidate Duane Adams.
Good campaigned hard for Adams, who hid prior candidacies as a Democrat from constituents, against McGuire in the State Senate race. Good turned his campaigning for Adams into an outrageous narcissistic rant fest about McGuire. How dare he even think about challenging me! He’s going to primary me!! He’s mean and a liar!
McGuire endured 5 months of Good’s public rage and interference down stream, more than any man should endure. Clearly, convention-goers agreed and elected McGuire with 63% of the first vote, sending Good home with his tail tucked.
Adams likely lost as badly as he did because of Good’s pathological obsession with McGuire. If Good hadn’t come out as a raving lunatic, Adams might have won more than 24% at the nominating convention.
This silly idea of a pledge horribly violated was invented by Good’s consultants.
Incumbent Good pays his hirelings, Bonnie and Clyde Strategies LLC, $80K a year to ‘shoot down’ his opponents by making claims to divert attention from himself. They orchestrated his Jan 6 debacle last Saturday.
Their background, available online for a few bucks from any public record search site, indicates a disregard for biblical commandments in general. This ploy is, after all, created by people engaging in activities incompatible with the claim of Christianity. Bob hires people who literally identify as criminals to run his campaign while posturing as a righteous man, hoping gullible Christians will accept this pledge ploy at face value.
Naming one’s company after notorious criminals seems to show where one’s heart is and the direction of said company. -Gun down any opponent of your income stream and ‘stick up’ the grassroots by manipulating rules! It explains Bob Good’s interference in County Republican Units at the expense of his job in DC- preserving his $174k salary by hoping “Bonnie and Clyde” will deliver a controlled June convention they cannot otherwise win by primary with the grassroots.
I will show in Part 3 that Good repeatedly reserves reneging on pledges for himself. McGuire’s ‘pledge’ is a thing no one else in politics is held to, especially Bob Good.
Part 2 A Biblical Pledge has order and formality.
-The so-called pledge is little more than a casual, non-binding statement made in an informal setting ten months before the events unfold, justifying McGuire’s change of mind. A change of mind Good repeatedly reserves for himself. McGuire’s ‘pledge’ is a thing no one else in politics is held to, especially Bob Good.
So, what is the standard for a biblical pledge, and did McGuire violate it? Let’s look at examples of pledging from a literal translation, such as the Authorized Version. Text examples are at the bottom of the post.
• Pledges were binding: Nu 30:2 See also Nu 30:3, 15 In certain cases, pledges made by daughters or wives could be nullified by fathers or husbands respectively. Pledges can be nullified by extenuating circumstances.
• Pledges were solemn promises: 2Ki 23:3 pp 2Ch 34:31-32 See also 1Ch 29:24; Ezr 10:19; Eze 17:16-18; Mic 7:20; 1Pe 3:21 They require the parties to understand what is being asked in good conscience.
• Pledges were guarantees that a promise would be kept, and items must be deposited to secure the pledge: Ge 38:17-18 See also Ex 22:26-27; Dt 24:10-13; Pr 20:16; 27:13. Pledges must be sealed through the material offering.
• The unjust exaction of pledges is condemned by Scripture: Dt 24:17 See also Job 22:4-6; 24:2-3; Am 2:6-8 Compelling a pledge when one is not due or reasonable.
• Warning against making pledges on behalf of others: Pr 11:15 The foolishness of pledging to secure someone else’s ‘debt.’ See also Pr 6:1-5; 17:18; 22:26-27
• Pledges and betrothal: Mt 1:18-19 Betrothal was a pledge to marry and more binding than modern Western engagements. Broken by divorce- a willful deception. See also Ex 22:16; Dt 22:23-25; Lk 1:27 Covenant.
If you read these verses (below), you will notice several commonalities in an actual pledge:-
• They are made before God or witnessed by someone with God’s authority.
• An actual biblical pledge has some material deposit as a seal to show good faith. Think of the Incarnation and the New Covenant.
• A pledge is not to be used to bludgeon, blackmail, or in deceptive trickery for political or any undue gain.
• One cannot pledge on behalf of another. Pledges are covenants where both parties understand the parameters and the conditions being entered in and are bound by mutual agreement. Good was not present as a party to the oath and offered no mutual guarantee. The woman attempts to act in his place. McGuire has made no intention to ignore all future actions by Good.
• If one breaks their pledge, the covenant is dissolved, and the other party is at liberty. Bob has broken many pledges by the standard set for his opponent by his campaign in this deception. He has no moral standard by which to hold another to a pledge.
It is easy to see McGuire did not ‘pledge’ as claimed. Yet, many imply he has somehow offended God by challenging Bob Good, who endorsed Ron DeSantis before Desantis finished his pledge, which is his term as Governor. Double standards are a type of lie, and pledges are nullified by deception in the Bible. Their motivation is not calling unto sanctification; it is a grab for raw political power- like Judas’.
“I got people out to vote for Bob Good. I know I worked hard to get out a ton of Bob Good signs. My pledge to you is state senate, and I'm going to support Bob Good for re-election." ~ John McGuire
• The woman asking the question does not claim Godly authority or frame her question as a Godly oath. It fails in Form to rise to a biblical pledge.
• There is no item given to signify and seal that a biblical pledge is in effect. It fails on Matter to rise to a biblical pledge.
• If a party to the pledge fails to perform or lies, the pledge holds no bond on the other party. It fails on Intention to rise to a biblical pledge. Pledges have a formal order- as in a courtroom.
-Unjustly exacting a pledge where there is none will bring judgment (as they judge) for self-righteously spreading a false allegation.
-Redefining a pledge for gain is Simony and malicious gossip. These evil wolves ignore the many reneged ‘pledges’ by Good. Read on.
Good says that going after an incumbent is patriotic (see video).
Coming up in Part 3: Bob’s standard is to vacate those reneging on their pledge, except him. He admitted on national TV he regularly reneges on us- saying one thing in public and another when his constituents are listening.
The Bible speaks frankly to the doctrine of pledges. Context matters and was ignored. Perhaps running superficial entertainment centers offering Moralistic Therapeutic Deism or Dominionism in search of celebrity, pastors have little time to possess an orthodox theological foundation- the money is in new winds of doctrine, which seems popular these days.
Right Doctrine, like primaries, disrupts the income stream with controversy. The faithful, attending entertainment-focused or error-driven churches, find themselves ill-prepared to weigh every vain claim in the media or Facebook- the philosophy of men or the Holy Spirit coming through the operation of time into all remembrance. The Gospel of the Soundbite often wins in the absence of sound and ageless teaching.
As such, people fall into self-interpretation, cherry-picking scripture, and presuming upon faith and appointing oneself (ignoring warnings in scripture) an oracle is very popular today, the motive often being some form of personal gain. Add dynamic equivalent bible versions, which render the Bible to a 3rd-6th-grade reading level and the oracle assumes he is an expert while oblivious that the DE bible transmits complex doctrine exceedingly poor and we end up with claims like this one. The ‘oracle’ isn’t reading the Bible so much as what a committee decided, often resulting in competing contradictions, Isaiah 7:14 is a great example. All sorts of notions arise in this manner and this issue is the tip of the iceberg.
This result, coming from celebrities and pastors alike, is spreading falsehoods, such as this skewing the nature of a pledge- because they do not understand the driving philosophy of translation of DE Bibles they quote is relativism; framing the narratives in today’s culture without their historical context, which is what BLM and Antifa do by tearing down statues and shaming history! Separating us from the context of our history to remove the landmark of contextual knowledge and wisdom. This is evident in that these people see BLM’s agenda while blind to the same in their easy-read theme or celebrity thinline translation.
Are they ill-informed, gullible, or willing accomplices? Is their idea of Biblical truth applied to the philosophy of politics that the means justify the end? This claim calls the question.
Part 3: Bob Good Speedily Reneges on Pledges, But As Fast As The Trump Train Barreling Down On Him?
Scriptures listed above:
Pledges were binding:
Num. 30:2-3 If a man vow a vow unto the LORD, or swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond; he shall not break his word, he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth. If a woman also vow a vow unto the LORD, and bind herself by a bond, being in her father’s house in her youth;
Pledges were solemn promises:
Mic. 7:20 Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old.
1Pet. 3:21 The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Pledges were guarantees that a promise would be kept. Items are deposited to secure a pledge:
Gen. 38:17-18 And he said, I will send thee a kid from the flock. And she said, Wilt thou give me a pledge, till thou send it? And he said, What pledge shall I give thee? And she said, Thy signet, and thy bracelets, and thy staff that is in thine hand. And he gave it her, and came in unto her, and she conceived by him.
Ex. 22:26-27 If thou at all take thy neighbor’s raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down: For that is his covering only, it is his raiment for his skin: wherein shall he sleep? and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious.
The unjust exaction of pledges is condemned:
Deut. 24:17 Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow’s raiment to pledge:
Job 22:4-6 Will he reprove thee for fear of thee? Will he enter with thee into judgment? Is not thy wickedness great? and thine iniquities infinite? For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for naught and stripped the naked of their clothing.
Job 24:2-3 Some remove the landmarks; they violently take away flocks, and feed thereof. They drive away the ass of the fatherless, they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.
Amos 2:6-8 Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes; That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek: and a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name: And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every altar, and they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their god.
Warning against making pledges on behalf of others:
Prov. 6:1-5 My son, if thou be surety for thy friend, if thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger, Thou art snared with the words of thy mouth, thou art taken with the words of thy mouth. Do this now, my son, and deliver thyself, when thou art come into the hand of thy friend; go, humble thyself, and make sure thy friend. Give not sleep to thine eyes, nor slumber to thine eyelids. Deliver thyself as a roe from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the fowler.
Prov. 17:18 A man void of understanding striketh hands, and becometh surety in the presence of his friend.
Pledges and betrothal
Matt. 1:18-19 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily.
Five & Dime VA/HCC is an opinion blog. I employ satire, commentary, and fact to entertain and convey my opinions on religious, cultural, and political issues. I expect you to know the difference.
LINKS:
