TRUMP AS MESSIAH by Esther Nelson
As soon as upon a time lengthy, way back, I recognized as an evangelical Christian. The time period “evangelical” has advanced over time, nonetheless, evangelicals can in all probability be present in each department of Protestant Christianity. Wherever you discover them, they emphasize the authority/ inerrancy of the Bible, a “born-again” expertise into the Kingdom of God, and a private relationship with Jesus Christ. Usually, evangelicals are socially conservative and infrequently does their pondering transcend the borders of their insulated theology.
It comes as no shock to me that many (most?) evangelicals embrace Trump with a fervor akin to their enthusiasm for Jesus. Trump supporters, particularly those that establish with the Non secular Proper might love Jesus, however Jesus will not be the Messiah they yearn for.
As is the case with many evangelicals, I grew up afraid of what my neighborhood known as the “world.” The world and all the things in it’s polluted and “we” wanted to guard ourselves from its affect. My missionary mother and father taught their youngsters “…we’re all as an unclean factor and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags…” (Isaiah 64:6). There was nothing to be completed about that besides “imagine in Jesus” if we needed to keep away from God’s wrath coming down on us on the “finish of time” when Jesus returns triumphant to this corrupt world, gathering all of the “saved” souls collectively whereas the unsaved writhe in Hell for eternity. Greatest to keep away from all the things this evil and momentary world affords for the reason that world will in the end destroy you.
Most evangelicals see themselves as a beleaguered minority that the world doesn’t love nor perceive. They typically really feel condescended to and ridiculed by individuals who don’t assume like they do. They imagine they’re on God’s aspect so, subsequently, they’re proper. Enter Donald Trump. He affords to go to bat for them and rid the nation of “new-fangled concepts” and get again to a pristine yesteryear. No federally-protected abortion providers. Put homosexual and trans folks again within the field. Immigrants—return to the place you got here from!
Trump’s demeanor is pugnacious and confrontational. It’s us versus them. If “we” don’t win this November, he threatens the nation with a “massacre.” I’ve heard church pastors excitedly talk about Armageddon, the ultimate battle of fine versus evil that brings an finish to the evil world in a massacre. Revelation 14: 19-20 says, “So the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and threw it into the good winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trampled exterior the town, and blood got here out of the winepress, as much as the horses’ bridles, for one thousand 600 furlongs.”
Evangelicals simply see the likeness between Trump’s agenda for the “world” and God’s demise plan in a bloody warfare that ushers in the long run of time. These evangelicals, stuffed with lustful fury, root for Messiah Trump to emerge victorious. So in contrast to Jesus who instructed his disciples, “My kingdom will not be of this world: if my kingdom had been of this world, then would my servants battle…” (John 18:36). Jesus condemned violence on His behalf, saying that His kingdom was religious, not materials. As I see it, Jesus was disillusioned in a few of His disciples for not “getting” Him, pondering salvation is about Jesus overthrowing the oppressive Roman authorities.
Unbelievable as it might appear, Trump is a Messiah-like determine to many evangelicals. A Messiah is any individual who comes to avoid wasting the folks from issues they discover overwhelming and unsolvable. A Messiah makes all issues “proper” by placing the “evil” world out of fee—a world that’s out to get them.
Click on right here to see a podcast the place Robert P. Jones, president and founding father of Public Faith Analysis Institute, speaks with Steve Inskeep from NPR about Trump, the Messiah determine. (The podcast was made earlier than Nikki Haley dropped out of the Republican presidential race.)
This is a crucial and glorious excerpt from the podcast:
ROBERT JONES: “[I want to explain] why white, evangelical Protestants have been some of the stalwart supporters of a candidate and president similar to Donald Trump. We see this presentation of Trump as a form of messiah determine, however it’s notable that it’s not likely Jesus that we’re getting the comparability to however, you realize, the one you hear in evangelical circles extra typically is a comparability to, like, the Persian king Cyrus from the E book of Isaiah within the Hebrew Bible. And that’s necessary as a result of there, Cyrus is offered as an ungodly king who nonetheless frees a gaggle of Jews who’re held captive in Babylon. So by comparability, Trump right here is the highly effective, robust, authoritarian liberator, somebody who by definition and perhaps even by necessity is even above the legislation and who alone is able to liberating conservative, white Christians from their oppressors.”
The “love affair” many evangelicals have with Trump is nothing new. Non secular zealots have combined with political opportunists all through human historical past. Inside Islam, the loudest voices heard as we speak are based mostly on the religio-political alliance between Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab and a neighborhood chief, Muhammad bin Saud within the Arabian Peninsula (1744). Al-Wahhab held an especially conservative, literal, and “mounted” understanding of the Qur’an. Muhammad bin Saud promised to “endorse al-Wahhab’s austere type of Islam.” In return, the Home of Saud would get political legitimacy and common tithes from al-Wahhab’s followers. (Wikipedia). In different phrases, energy!
Sadly, many Westerners solely know Islam by means of the favored lens of Wahhabism—a ugly type of austere Islam that endorses honor killing, chopping off arms, public stoning, and hangings. Doesn’t Trump lengthy to wield this sort of energy? His alliance with the Non secular Proper sector has the potential to carry that about had been he to get elected President in November.
Rousas Rushdoony, an Armenian-American (1916-2001), was an influential pastor and writer who needed to reconstruct society “below the lordship of Jesus” (Wikipedia). He thought sure Biblical legal guidelines similar to stoning disobedient youngsters ought to be heeded.
Trump leans closely in that path.
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