Donald Trump is returning to the White House. As I write this he is about 4 million ahead in the popular vote, and in the electoral college he won every swing state. The Senate will have the GOP with a decent-sized margin, and the House looks like it might be red as well.
A lot of us are stunned and angry. A lot have created negative answers about the losers in this race: 'The Democrats are incompetent.' Yep. 'People are tired of liberal wokeness'. Ok. 'Joe Biden waited too long to not run.' Agreed. 'Kamala Harris was a bad candidate.' Not sure about that, but I can see how some think it. 'America won't vote for a woman.' Likely. 'Inflation and housing costs have made Americans mad.' Sure, but Biden inherited Trump's Trainwreck of an economy and was fixing it. 'Nations around the world in recent elections have been casting out the incumbents.' Absolutely. 'Josh Shapiro should have been VP instead of Tim Walz.' Whatever.
I won't get into the positive answers some are spouting about the greatness of Donald Trump and how he is rightfully coming back to his proper throne, because I don't want to break my computer. I'm guessing that many people voted for him for that reason, even as many more were simply anti-democrat, anti-incumbent, anti-Harris and voted for him while holding their nose.
But most of the talk I have heard has not gotten to the real point: the United States of America is a morally and spiritually bankrupt country. The leaders for whom we vote are in many ways expressions of who we are. If we vote for a person who is corrupt, immoral, and idolatrous, what does that say about us as a nation?
This summer I finished 25 years of full-time preaching. I have become increasingly convinced that one of the primary themes of Scripture is the Kingdom of God. I'm not the first person who knows this, of course, but I do think that the church has become increasingly heretical by forgetting about the Kingdom. We have a God who reigns, and we are his subjects. And if we know that Jesus is Lord, what does that demand about us as his people? In recent weeks I have seen a lot of 'Jesus is my King, and Trump is my president' flags. I really want to ask the people who fly them what they mean by that, because Donald Trump is the antithesis of Jesus Christ. If Jesus is his king, I'm guessing that Donald Trump is not his wingman.
Of course, there's one other point that may be more troubling than anything. What if God is returning Donald Trump as a punishment upon us? We talk of being one nation under God, and Donald Trump has loudly boasted to his supporters that 'I am your retribution.' What if this is true, that God is choosing to punish us as a nation by giving us such a wicked and immoral man as a leader? What if he really is the object through which God is bringing about retribution, even as he doesn't even know this?
I have no hope that the next four years are going to go well for our country or the bigger world around us. Likely NATO will crumble, and Ukraine (and other eastern European countries) will fall because we abandon them. The middle east will continue to be a fiasco. RFK Jr. in charge of health means that public health programs will be greatly hindered. Raising tariffs and lopping off the bottom of the workforce through mass deportations (who do you think builds houses, works in slaughterhouses, and picks labor-intensive crops?) will drive up prices to the point that we will crave 2022 inflation. Our hatred of migrants will be a dark stain upon us for generations as the best and brightest will no longer feel safe in coming here.
I said during his first presidency that it might take a decade or more to undo the damage he does to our country, even with good leadership. I'm not sure that we will recover from his return this time. Could it be that God has finally lost patience with us? For years I have heard his supporters think of Trump as a new 'Cyrus', God's chosen instrument (cf. Isaiah 44:23-45:1). On the one hand I was happy to see that they recognized him as the pagan that he is. But I think that their Biblical identification of Trump is wrong. He is much more likely Belshazzar, the foolish king who partied hearty and found destruction the next day (cf. Daniel 5).
I have seen signs all over for years that speaks of America's need to repent. While I would likely disagree with the ones putting up as to the reasons we need to repent, I do think that turning back to the God of the Bible and the Jesus of the gospels is our only hope. Only if we live in the ways of his goodness will we find a way to get out of the black hole we are finding ourselves entering into.