Is Donald Trump Anointed?
Rev. Douglas Olds
2 January 2020
A significant portion of Evangelicals has come to claim that God has anointed Donald
Trump to be their deliverer from a corrupt and sinful society in the manner
that God anointed the Persian Emperor Cyrus in the 6th Century BCE
to liberate the captive Judahites from Babylon.
To this end, some of their pastors proclaim Trump an anointed agent for God’s Church
regardless of his faith or purity of lifestyle. As an epitome of this propaganda, televangelist Jim Bakker cashes in with a “Trump as Cyrus” coin and makes the blasphemous claim that support of "Trump is a test of whether you are even saved."
However, putting Trump's face on a coin equates his image
with Caesar, whom Jesus contrasted with God's rule:
Matthew 22:17–21: 17 Tell us,
then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”
18 But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why are you putting me to the
test, you hypocrites? 19 Show me the coin used for the tax.” And they
brought him a denarius. 20 Then he said to them, “Whose head is this, and
whose title?” 21 They answered, “The emperor’s.” Then he said to them,
“Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God
the things that are God’s.”
Believing that the Church needs (leadership salvation by)
another Caesar (or Cyrus) makes a mockery of this lesson of Jesus and His office as Mediating King and Son of God.
This evangelical equation of Trump with Cyrus is sophistry based on a misleading application from the Prophet Isaiah:
Isaiah 45:1–3 Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus,
whose right hand I have grasped to subdue nations before him and strip kings of
their robes, to open doors before him— and the gates shall not be closed: I
will go before you and level the mountains, I will break in pieces the doors of
bronze and cut through the bars of iron, I will give you the treasures of
darkness and riches hidden in secret places, so that you may know that it is I,
the LORD, the God of Israel, who call you by your name.
Isaiah goes on (at
45:13) to prophesy that Cyrus will restore the Jewish exiles to their native
land by fulfilling God’s call to him to capture Babylon, to free the Jews from
their captivity, and to allow them to return to Jerusalem.
Evangelical Trump supporters claim this typology for their
leader. Ever-asserting their political and cultural persecution, they believe they are
in some manner of Babylonian captivity from whence their “Cyrus” ( כֹּרֶשׁ Koresh)
will restore them to their vision of America made promised land (for white
Europeans) again.
In addition to the categorical conflict between Christ’s
rule and Imperial rule noted above, there are at least 2 other problems with this
contemporary narrative of Trump as Cyrus.
First, the Babylonian Captivity of God's people is described
in chapter 18 of the Book of Revelation.
That captivity is to the economic idolatry of material luxury. Trump fully embodies that idolatry. In their allegiance to him, many conservatives are
being captivated into that idolatry that worships and lives in luxuries and adulteries, not into the freedom of accountable faith
which is the promised garden of the Spirit.
Second, by seeking out an anointed leader (“messiah” מְשִׁיח) in the
form of a typological Persian king, Trump’s followers are recapitulating the blindness of the Israelites who preferred Saul to God as their king:
1 Samuel 8. 4-8: Then all the
elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him,
“You are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint for us, then, a
king to govern us, like other nations.” But the thing displeased Samuel when
they said, “Give us a king to govern us.” Samuel prayed to the LORD, and the
LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to
you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king
over them. Just as they have done to me, from the day I brought them up out of
Egypt to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so also they are doing
to you.
Contemporary Evangelicals who seek out an imperial leader to
lead them into a promised material destiny forsake the Gospel of Christ’s spiritual leadership and salvific power. They instead are promoting the so-called “Gospel of Prosperity,” a heretical announcement not reflecting the implications of Revelation 18 noted
above: the spiritual captivity to the idolatry of material luxury
and the diversion of economic resources away from the neediest saints. In strongest theological terms, Revelation 18 warns against commitments to the idolatries of pursuing wealth and commercial "dainties" absent concern for human lives:
18 After this I saw another angel
coming down from heaven, having great authority; and the earth was made bright
with his splendor. 2 He called out with a mighty voice,
“Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!
It has become a dwelling place of demons,
a haunt of every foul spirit,
a haunt of every foul bird,
a haunt of every foul and hateful beast.
3For all the nations have drunk
of the wine of the wrath of her fornication,
and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her,
and the merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her
luxury.”
4 Then I heard another voice
from heaven saying,
“Come out of her, my people,
so that you do not take part in her sins,
and so that you do not share in her plagues;
5for her sins are heaped high as heaven,
and God has remembered her iniquities.
6Render to her as she herself has rendered,
and repay her double for her deeds;
mix a double draught for her in the cup she mixed.
7As she glorified herself and lived luxuriously,
so give her a like measure of torment and grief.
Since in her heart she says,
‘I rule as a queen;
I am no widow,
and I will never see grief,’
8therefore her plagues will come in a single day—
pestilence and mourning and famine—
and she will be burned with fire;
for mighty is the Lord God who judges her.”
9 And the kings of the earth,
who committed fornication and lived in luxury with her, will weep and wail over
her when they see the smoke of her burning; 10 they will stand far off, in
fear of her torment, and say,
“Alas, alas, the great city,
Babylon, the mighty city!
For in one hour your judgment has come.”
11 And the merchants of the
earth weep and mourn for her, since no one buys their cargo anymore,
12 cargo of gold, silver, jewels and pearls, fine linen, purple, silk and
scarlet, all kinds of scented wood, all articles of ivory, all articles of
costly wood, bronze, iron, and marble, 13 cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh,
frankincense, wine, olive oil, choice flour and wheat, cattle and sheep, horses
and chariots, slaves—and human lives.
14“The fruit for which your soul longed
has gone from you,
and all your dainties and your splendor
are lost to you,
never to be found again!”
15 The merchants of these
wares, who gained wealth from her, will stand far off, in fear of her torment,
weeping and mourning aloud,
16“Alas, alas, the great city,
clothed in fine linen,
in purple and scarlet,
adorned with gold,
with jewels, and with pearls!
17For in one hour all this wealth has been laid waste!”
And all shipmasters and seafarers,
sailors and all whose trade is on the sea, stood far off 18 and cried out
as they saw the smoke of her burning,
“What city was like the great city?”
19And they threw dust on their heads, as they wept and mourned, crying
out,
“Alas, alas, the great city,
where all who had ships at sea
grew rich by her wealth!
For in one hour she has been laid waste.
20Rejoice over her, O heaven,
you saints and apostles and prophets!
For God has given judgment for you against her.”
21 Then a mighty angel took up
a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying,
“With such violence Babylon the great city
will be thrown down,
and will be found no more;
22and the sound of harpists and minstrels and of flutists and trumpeters
will be heard in you no more;
and an artisan of any trade
will be found in you no more;
and the sound of the millstone
will be heard in you no more;
23and the light of a lamp
will shine in you no more;
and the voice of bridegroom and bride
will be heard in you no more;
for your merchants were the magnates of the earth,
and all nations were deceived by your sorcery.
24And in you was found the blood of prophets and of saints,
and of all who have been slaughtered on earth.”
We’ve seen this hybridization of Persian typology and cultic leadership before. The Branch
Davidian leader David Koresh David Koresh claimed a leadership prerogative to sexual profligacy from
his self-identification as “David” (a prefigured Christ) and “Koresh” (God’s
anointed pagan emperor, the Hebrew name of Cyrus). Such a self-glorification
and -authentication led to tragedy for his gullible followers.
Moreover, the claim that Trump, by virtue of his placement in the seat of American executive power, has been anointed by God is dubious at best. He doesn't represent the majority will or spirit of Americans who voted in 2016. His placement in power derives from the Electoral College, a holdover of the institutional accommodation with slave-drivers. As Rev. 18.13 clearly lists, slavery is a marker of Babylonian (economic) idolatry. While a Holy and Just God's purposes may tolerate this electoral result, by no means does this suggest God's endorsement. Rather this result of a flawed human institution is marked with the historical and ongoing wails and blood of the abducted (Exod. 21:16!), enslaved and oppressed.
Finally, Trump's charismatic swashbuckling shows his genius for bullying and cruelty, his fibre of soul he shares in communion with his cult. The slavish devotion to leadership based on authoritarian hierarchy is ironic within a sect which continues to condemn the Papacy and Roman Catholic Church for far less controlling presumption and animus. Yet these mostly Protestant Evangelicals have turned their rejection of a hierarchical catholicity into (twitter) communion with a secular mobster exercising instinctual threats and manipulation of Constitutional traditions for his exclusive, personal aggrandizement, nepotism, and survival. His cult yields to him in their search for pre-emptive violence against their enemies, rather than love their enemies, so fearful of a changing world, so afraid of women and minorities, so afraid of today, so afraid of tomorrow.
I'm surprised that I even need to make this point, but evidently propaganda trumps norms of Christian education in certain circles: The test of salvation is not about supporting Trump, it's faith and reliance on Jesus's fulfillment of God's law and His sacrifice on the Cross (Gal. 2.16; Rom. 5.1) and the confession of Him as one's Lord (Rom. 10.9). And while forgiveness is important, it must be preceded by remorse and repentance, something that Trump has explicitly rejected as necessary in his case. Because he does not see the need to ask for forgiveness, he is not entitled to it, and because he has not repented, he has not earned trust.
The fear that some in his communion use to justify this leader is the definition of faithlessness. Faith is justified by trust in Christ's loving sacrifice, never justified by fearful cruelties. The same cult which Trump mobilizes as "Second Amendment people" has made idols of guns, the more lethal and uncontrolled the higher object of their image of security in which they place their trust and affection.
"But perfect love [in the experience of the Spirit] drives out fear...The one who fears is not made perfect in love." 1 John 4.18. Cf. Matthew 8:26.
No, Virginia (and Idaho, Michigan, Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana, and exurban locales around the country): Donald Trump is NOT anointed by anything other than by the cultic communion of guns and adulteries, manipulated by mammon (Matt. 6.24) who has an aeon of experience playing with economic resentments and sowing division and reveries of revenge. How can this be Christian in any sense, much less its anointed hope? It's not.
Finally, Trump's charismatic swashbuckling shows his genius for bullying and cruelty, his fibre of soul he shares in communion with his cult. The slavish devotion to leadership based on authoritarian hierarchy is ironic within a sect which continues to condemn the Papacy and Roman Catholic Church for far less controlling presumption and animus. Yet these mostly Protestant Evangelicals have turned their rejection of a hierarchical catholicity into (twitter) communion with a secular mobster exercising instinctual threats and manipulation of Constitutional traditions for his exclusive, personal aggrandizement, nepotism, and survival. His cult yields to him in their search for pre-emptive violence against their enemies, rather than love their enemies, so fearful of a changing world, so afraid of women and minorities, so afraid of today, so afraid of tomorrow.
I'm surprised that I even need to make this point, but evidently propaganda trumps norms of Christian education in certain circles: The test of salvation is not about supporting Trump, it's faith and reliance on Jesus's fulfillment of God's law and His sacrifice on the Cross (Gal. 2.16; Rom. 5.1) and the confession of Him as one's Lord (Rom. 10.9). And while forgiveness is important, it must be preceded by remorse and repentance, something that Trump has explicitly rejected as necessary in his case. Because he does not see the need to ask for forgiveness, he is not entitled to it, and because he has not repented, he has not earned trust.
The fear that some in his communion use to justify this leader is the definition of faithlessness. Faith is justified by trust in Christ's loving sacrifice, never justified by fearful cruelties. The same cult which Trump mobilizes as "Second Amendment people" has made idols of guns, the more lethal and uncontrolled the higher object of their image of security in which they place their trust and affection.
"But perfect love [in the experience of the Spirit] drives out fear...The one who fears is not made perfect in love." 1 John 4.18. Cf. Matthew 8:26.
No, Virginia (and Idaho, Michigan, Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana, and exurban locales around the country): Donald Trump is NOT anointed by anything other than by the cultic communion of guns and adulteries, manipulated by mammon (Matt. 6.24) who has an aeon of experience playing with economic resentments and sowing division and reveries of revenge. How can this be Christian in any sense, much less its anointed hope? It's not.
May God be merciful to us all, including the gullible communion of "Koresh" and his enablers.
