Why do so many evangelical Christians support former President Donald Trump despite his decades of documented ungodly behavior?
An in-depth report from The Economist shows that it has a simple explanation: They believe that God personally appointed him to rule the United States.
In fact, the report cites a survey conducted by Denison University political scientist Paul Djupe that around 30 percent of Americans believe Trump “was anointed by God to become president.”
Does he though? He dramatically inflates the value of his properties and downplays his debts, preferring to declare bankruptcy than paying them. That doesn’t sound like he has a lot of money, that sounds like he has a lot of assets and debts, and it isn’t clear if his assets exceed his debts.
But maybe that’s what the “prosperity gospel” people are into, appearances over facts…
True. But him looking like he has money is enough. The guy very much acts like a poor person’s idea of a rich man.
Yup, he and “prosperity gospel” is all about appearances, which is hilarious since that’s exactly the opposite of Jesus.
Isaiah 53:2-5:
Jesus consistently didn’t want recognition and instead pointed people to heaven. Trump and “prosperity gospel” evangelicals are the exact opposite and want recognition for everything they do, and point to wealth as some kind of indicator of righteousness despite Jesus specifically calling out wealthy people.
It’s incredible the mental gymnastics they go through and somehow arrive at Trump = good, despite him looking like the exact opposite of Jesus…
Isaiah 53 does not refer to Jesus, full stop. It is an analogy for the people as a whole. At least newer translations of the Bible are admitting this.
Also if the NT is to believed he wanted all the recognition. No one could talk to God except thru him, everyone was to love him so much that they would hate their own family by comparison, people were to kill his enemies and drag their corpses infront of him, he claimed to control the basic facts of existence declaring himself not only king of the Jews but the sole person of understanding the law, the ruler of the Sabbath, and he sent people out while he was still alive to tell people of his glory. He was a massive narcissist willing to see his followers be killed, disowned, and their families abandoned.
Sources please?
Christians believe it does, and Jews believe it doesn’t, and both have decent arguments. We’re talking about Christians, so we take the Christian argument. If we were talking about Judaism or Islam, I’d agree, from a different perspective another explanation makes sense.
Isaiah isn’t alive, and we’d need more context to really understand what he was intending.
The rest of what you said is pure nonsense, so I’m not going to put any effort into refruting it. You obviously have a bone to pick with Christianity, so I’m going to assume you’re not talking in good faith.
Don’t need a source, I studied the biblical languages and can read it in the original. Christian “scholars” were depending on a Greek translation because Paul said the scriptures backed up the events. So really you should be talking to your boy Paul if you want sources since he made the claim.
Read Isaiah 52 and 54, read the passage in context using the newest translation you can find and get back to me.
He was talking about the forced relocation and genocides against his ethnic group. Which is very clear in context both textual and historical. Generally people in the midst of a genocide talk about the genocide. Besides which prophecy isn’t a thing so yeah no way he would be talking about some confidence game hundreds of years later where James makes up a brother.
Nah you got nothing. You seem like you know enough about the Bible to know how each clause I wrote comes directly from a biblical passage. I was nice btw, I could have started quoting the Gospel of Thomas at you. A book a scholar such as yourself is surely aware of.
Sorry your worship a narcissistic fantasy
So:
At least that’s how I read it.
There’s plenty of prophesy in Judaism, and even Josephus claimed the prophesies say that Vespasian would become emperor (this was obviously self-serving as he was a prisoner at the time). That’s one important, relatively modern indication that Jews believed in prophesy (and Messianic prophesy at that). Whether you do is kind of irrelevant.
Pfft, that book isn’t included in Christian canon for a reason. It’s probably just a collection of stuff early Christians wrote down that may or may not have come from Jesus. It’s certainly interesting from an early Christian history perspective, but not particularly interesting from understanding anything about Jesus himself.
The same goes for other apocryphal books, they may have some value, but shouldn’t be taken at face value, hence why they weren’t included in the biblical canon.
No, they come from a completely slanted misinterpretation of biblical passages.
For example, you mentioned Jesus sending people out to evangelize as some kind of narcissism. I instead take it as preparing the church for his death, they’ll need a lot more than the 12 to hold things together, especially as the early church is expected to be persecuted, and sending this group out is a way to prepare them for building up his church in his absence. The focus isn’t on himself, but on the church.
And for praying in his name, it’s clear that he’s secondary to the father. He doesn’t want people to worship the man Jesus, but God in heaven. However, by taking on our sins, he essentially becomes our intermediary, taking the place of the sacrificial lamb in times past. So it’s through Jesus that we have our salvation, but it is God who grants that salvation. So it’s kind of like talking to a travel agent to arrange a flight, you’re getting the flight from the airline, the agent is merely handling the transaction for you and getting you the best possible deal. Jesus paid for our sins, so he is the one who will negotiate on our behalf. Some related verses: John 14:13, Colossians 3:17, 1 Timothy 2:5.
We need Jesus because he paid for our sins. That’s not narcissism, that’s a statement of fact (obviously according to Christian theology). Jesus consistently redirected praise to his father, so he absolutely does not come off as narcissistic.
Like going to classical music concerts. There is this perception that it is a rich person thing. The reality is that the majority of performances will cost less than even the 2 drink minimum at a bar. About half the performances at Julliard are free and open to the public. Besides which think of the rich shits you know in life, do you know any of them who seem like they have any interest in it?
He isn’t buying the cheap can of tuna fish.