Posted on 06/24/2018 9:00:00 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
The history of evangelicalism in America is shot through with fear—but it also contains an alternative.
White conservative evangelicals in America are anxious people. I know because I am one.
Our sense of fear, perhaps more than any other factor, explains why evangelicals voted in such large numbers for Donald Trump in 2016 and continue to support his presidency.
The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and essayist Marilynne Robinson once wrote, “Fear is not a Christian habit of mind.” The great poet of the Jersey shore, Bruce Springsteen, sings, “Fear’s a dangerous thing. It can turn your heart black you can trust. It can take a God-filled soul, and turn it to devils and dust.”
Robinson and Springsteen echo verses in nearly every book of the Bible, the sacred text that serves as the source of spiritual authority in evangelical life. Moses told the Israelites to “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today.” The Hebrew God told Job: “At the destruction and famine you shall laugh, and shall not fear the beasts of the earth.” The Psalmist wrote: “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff they comfort me.”
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Cuck.
Every time the liberal media and/or Democrats say these kinds of things they demonstrate that they have nothing to offer the American people.
I like it. You don’t pick up any new votes with this kind of tactic. You simply harden existing positions.
Fake Christians. Fake news.
Okay, so right off the top you know the writer is FOS.
Evangelicals are not supposed to hate. But many hate Hillary Clinton. …Oh brother. Pointing out one’s multifarious unrepented-of sins, as Christians are supposed to, is only called “hate” by the left.
This clown thinks Springsteen is a “great poet” ?
Stopped reading right there.
You're right.
PS. Isn’t “fea” one form of the Portuguese word for “ugly”?
What has occured here over the past decade is the creation of a couple of ‘lobby’ groups who recruit ministers and bring them to luxury ‘retreats’, talking over social justice. In a humorous way, they convince the minister of a higher calling, and that by being a participant in their social religious group....they are working for the ‘Lord’.
There’s a particular lobby group out of Charlottesville, VA that does this type of work. I would imagine across the US....maybe twenty of these operations exist.
These ministers attending are gullible enough to fall for the propaganda and the five-star hotel deals.
I am an evangelical, and it is was not fear that motivated me. It was a long simmering, deep seated sense of anger at the slime bags who were running the country into the dirt. It really IS that simple.
I’m not an evangelical and yet I fear the loss of my great country. Fear is reasonable.
Hillary Clinton was openly hostile to evangelical voters and cemented this hostility in her policy positions. The "race-baiting, xenophobic, lying adulterer" Donald Trump embraced these voters and respected evangelical beliefs (even if he didn't personally practice them).
That's the difference.
The Hebrew God told Job (5:22): “At the destruction and famine you shall laugh, and shall not fear the beasts of the earth.” …“The Hebrew God”?? as if Jesus was not the same entity? This Fea guy sounds like an antisemite. If he is exemplary of Messiah College’s faculty, that institution is in serious trouble.
Well said.
I would add, that Hillary was a pathetic candidate propped up by the then ruling class democrats.
The result was that millions of Obama voters who voted during the Presidential cycle voted for no one for President.
Trump won by action, but Hillary lost by inaction. They both caused the result.
Obama himself tried to prop her up, saying at one point that he would be personally insulted if any of his voters would not vote for her. (That sure worked well, didn’t it?)
“Fear is not a Christian habit of mind.”
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all those who practice it have a good understanding.” - Psalms 110
OK, the Psalmist isn’t “the great poet of the Jersey shore”, but I’ll take him over Bruce.
Jesus wasn’t a Republican, but the Democrats would have tried to abort him! The GOP doesn’t stand for God, but Democrats publicly revile God! Democrats HATE Christians.
Then they get upset we don’t vote for them.
Booing God at the Charlotte convention in 2012 said it all.
True. Looking back, wasn’t Obama’s support of Hillary half-hearted?
I don’t think Obama really ever had the traction in the black community that has been portrayed. My black friends, liberal and conservative resented the fact that he wasn’t from the “neighborhood”, had no heritage “cred” with American blacks.
More Fake News from the Atlantic posing as real news!
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