Of Prophecy and Politicians

“We’re on a mission from God,” was a memorable line (or lines) from “The Blues Brothers.”

Elwood and Joliet were tasked with helping to save an orphanage by a nun “The Penguin,” in the 1980 film, but often these days we are confronted with politicians and political activists who claim to be on political missions from God. That was the case this week when the new Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, compared himself to Moses.

Speaking to the National Association of Christian Lawmakers (NACL), Johnson said, “The Lord told me very clearly to prepare. ‘You ready?’ ‘Be ready for what?”

“We’re coming to a Red Sea moment,’“ Johnson continued. “What does that mean?”

Johnson went on to explain that he thought that God was telling him that he would play Aaron to a “new Moses,” but when Steve Scalise and Jim Jordan failed to win the speakership, he understood differently.

“Ultimately, 13 people ran for the vote,” he said. “And the Lord had told me to wait, wait, wait. So I waited and waited and then, at the end, when it came to the end, the Lord said, ‘Now, step forward.'”

What should we make of it when politicians claim to have the endorsement of God or to at least be running on God’s instructions? Some people dismiss such notions out of hand and mock the claims. I wouldn’t be so quick to laugh.

The notion of God speaking to us is a core part of Christian belief as well as the beliefs of other religions. Mocking the belief that God communicates directly with us is to mock the beliefs of a majority of the world’s population, not to mention American voters.

I’d be willing to bet that most people believe they have had some sort of message from God. Five years ago I wrote about one such message that I received through a prophetic dream that warned me that a spot on my face was skin cancer. I went to the dermatologist and it turned out that I did have melanoma, but it was early enough to remove the cancer before it spread. Skeptics might scoff at such stories, but those of us who have had the experience are difficult to sway.

Messages from God are real, but that doesn’t mean that all such claims are real. In politics, there can be an obvious advantage to claiming to a crowd of believers that you are God’s anointed. As with jailhouse conversions, these claims might be real or they might be feigned. How do we tell the difference?

The Bible gives us advice for discerning true messages and messengers from God. 1 John 4:1-6 tells us how to test the spirits:

By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.

The first test of the validity of spiritual messages is that they affirm the divinity and humanity of Jesus Christ. Messages that contradict this basic truth of Christianity are not from God.

By extension, this test applies to other teachings of the Bible. As John Owen said, “If private revelations agree with Scripture, they are needless, and if they disagree, they are false.”

In other words, if your spiritual message is something along the lines of “kill the infidels,” then that message is not from God because it contradicts the plain teaching of the Bible, notably the sixth commandment.

In many cases, the message passes this test but is still questionable. For example, Mike Pence and Michelle Bachmann are among the people who say that God told them to run for president. You may notice that neither Pence nor Bachmann ever became president. Does this mean that they were lying? Not necessarily.

One possibility is that such people honestly think that God called them to be president but are honestly wrong. Because God typically speaks in still, small voices rather than through burning bushes, it is easy to mishear the message and substitute our own desires for what God is telling us. People can be honestly wrong without lying.

Like the Blues Brothers, we may take our own mission and believe that it is a task from God. When this happens, like the Blues Brothers, we may make a mess of things and end up in trouble, even though we might still accomplish our goal.

A second possibility is that God may have called these people to run but not necessarily win. Sometimes God’s plans are not what we think they are. The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah was called by God to preach a message but in his 40-year ministry, he only won two converts.

The point here is that obeying God is success in itself. Even though our human sense of success means winning, maybe sometimes we are called upon to fight a losing battle for some greater purpose.

The same cannot be said of the many prophets who explicitly say things such as “I want to say without question, Trump is going to win the election.” That was Pat Robertson back in 2020, but many other evangelical leaders made similar claims.

Another test that the Bible gives us is in Deuteronomy 18:22, which warns:

If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the Lord has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously, so do not be alarmed.

By the Bible’s own standard, if it says that they have a message from God and that message is not fulfilled, that person is a false prophet. In recent years, the evangelical church has done a poor job of calling out false prophets and holding them accountable for their lies.

Most people associate the term “antichrist” with the Beast of Revelation, but the Bible uses the term to describe a multitude of false teachers and deceivers who mislead people away from the true Gospel.

So is Mike Johnson a false prophet or new Moses or something in between? The proof will be both in whether he advances a biblical message and whether his prophetic claim is borne out in reality, but I’m skeptical of his claim.

One reason that I’m skeptical is that the Christian right has come to deify political power and has bastardized the Gospel in doing so. There is a focus on Supreme Court seats rather than saving souls. There is Christian Nationalism with its top-down, Big-Government theocratic edicts focusing on outward acts rather than the inward change of heart. Christian Nationalism is more akin to the heretical “prosperity gospel” than the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

There is a tendency to pick and choose which biblical teachings to obey. It’s easy for the modern Christian Right to preach against murder and abortion, but where are the Christian Nationalists who advocate for welcoming foreigners, turning the other cheek, rendering unto Caesar, and respecting government and praying for leaders, even if they happen to be Democrats?

Quite a few people on both sides don’t believe that Christians can be members of the opposite party. I believe that both sides are wrong. The Bible does not include a partisan purity test.

As Abraham Lincoln wisely said, “Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God’s side, for God is always right.”

Neither political party or ideology has a monopoly on God. I think the best advice is to mistrust anyone who claims that they do, but these people should be thankful that we don’t live in a theocracy where they might face accountability based on Deuteronomy 18:20.

CHRISTIAN NATIONALISM FILM: Rob Reiner, a movie director who is not a Christian, is releasing a new documentary film about Christian Nationalism that includes interviews with Russell Moore and David French. While I haven’t seen the film, I do believe that is not anti-Christian to say that Christian Nationalism is one of the largest threats to the American Republic and Constitution.

Sinclair Lewis is alleged to have said, “When Fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” Not long ago, I would have loudly argued with that notion, but now it seems eerily prescient.

The evangelical MAGA movement proves Jesus’s Matthew 24:24 warning that even the elect can be deceived. This phenomenon is hardly unique in Christian history, but I had thought better of America’s Christian leaders and church

The trailer for Reiner’s movie is available on the platform formerly known as Twitter: https://x.com/robreiner/status/1732884566879461422?s=20