S.O.S. Ministries

During the Columbus Day weekend I had the good grace of God to have met some brothers from the S.O.S. Ministry.  The outreach took advantage of the good weather and staked out various spots around famed San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf, handing out tracks to passers-by and preached about the acceptance of Jesus Christ as their personal savior.  They even set up a tent manned  by two former hippies singing Creedence Clearwater Revival type folk rocks infused with Christian lyrics.

God bless the Good News

And good music

I made friends with these brothers-in-Christ in short order and had good conversations with them since we are of the same wavelength as far as the teachings of Christ are concerned and we are all born-again Christians.  Furthermore, we carried the same missionary spirit in our zeal to share the Good News of Christ to bring people to Christ's family.

we are all good folks

Our conversations invariably turned to this year's presidential election and my concern its outcome to the people of this country, democratic institutions, and the role Christians play in this election.  Here is where I and my Christian brothers diverge.  Ours was a fruitful and friendly conversation and I laid out my concern for the spread of Christianity in our support of Donald Trump and these brothers explained why they are Donald Trump fans.  The common thread was that while they questioned Donald Trump's faith and personal behavior, they are voting for his policies and they love all his policies.

I gave my deep appreciation for these brothers to spread Christ's message because otherwise I would have join them as well.  God is giving the opposite calling - by calling out that evangelical Christians are walking the wrong road not only in their support for Donald Trump, but also in their actions and practice the past forty years heeding Satan's siren calls.

In this encounter with the brothers' effort my question is that by associating Christianity with Donald Trump we are actually driving the people we tried to save away from what we are trying to preach, that is, the Good News of love, hope, faith and salvation.  I told these brothers that Donald Trump is the face of American Christianity and no matter how we cut it, his ugliness and hypocrisy is what people see in us.  Nobody would listen to us and the passers by could only see us as obnoxious fools and the perpetrator of Donald Trump's presidency and not as Christ's disciples.  In fact, Donald Trump is seen not as the President of the United States of America but of the Evangelical Confederacy.

I found it surprising that these S.O.S. brothers did not find objectionable to my characterization that Donald Trump is the Christians President (a simple calculation would show that 90% of Trump supporters are evangelical Christians of various creeds and denominations, Catholics included), even though none of us consider him born-again.  The fact is that God did not worked miracle making Donald Trump the King Cyrus of modernity.  It was evangelical Christians who anointed him to be King in 2016 and may very well doing so again this year.  The only reason Donald Trump ascended the throne is that American evangelical Christians went wholeheartedly for him.  To evangelical Christians Donald Trump is the best President we ever had.

The tragedy behind evangelical Christians is that outwardly they convinced themselves of their disavowal of Donald Trump's unsavory personal behaviors and expression, they only love him for all his policies and political orientations (I wouldn't call political philosophy because Donald Trump has none but whatever he likes at the moment).  That says it all.  Christians are too proper to say the f-words but profess all of Donald Trump profanities-laden ideas.  My S.O.S. brethren also justified their Trumpian politics by that they are separating Christ from politics, telling the world that personal salvation is gain solely thru our final act of proclaiming the name of Jesus Christ as our Savior.  We don't even want to mention Donald Trump at all.

They tried to tell non-believers and convinced themselves that personal salvation is distinct from our evangelicals politics of loving and abetting Donald Trump.  Thereby they are asking non-believers and passers-by that it's perfectly okay to embrace the ugliness and mean-spiritedness of Donald Trump and whatever evils he is doing to people and political institutions.  Yet at the same time they could go to heaven just by dipping into water and proclaim our acceptance of Jesus Christ as Savior.  If you don't heed our call for your salvation, you would be thrown into Hell for eternity.  We evangelicals of course will not suffer such fate because through our born-again experience and baptism we had profess and proclaim Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.

Well, that's not how it works, in the world nor in the realm of God's Kingdom.  That's call Cheap Grace and to anybody who have any common sense, cheap words.  The scenario as it'll work out is that the Trump evangelicals will ended up more like the Rich Man looking at the beggar Lazarus he once disdained and undocumented workers on the side of the Lord and they are the one who left behind with moaning and gnashing of teethes. In their lifetime they met Jesus Christ asking for help and they turned Jesus away. 

Even though he is not born-again, in his very gut and nature Donald Trump is an evangelical Christian and that's why evangelical Christians love him.  I'm not saying that Donald Trump every week piously going to church or know the creeds and dogma of evangelical Christianity and that he actually believes in Jesus Christ, but his worldly convictions, psychological make-up, personal behavior are what American evangelicals are really like and want to be.  Christians are too proper to exhibit Donald Trump behaviors.  But given the opportunities and non-opprobrium evangelical Christians are like Donald Trump.  That Donald Trump went ahead with his exhibition was indeed wonderful to evangelicals since they all want to say what he's saying but the words of teaching of the Scripture inhibit Christians from acting that way.  He is the very sinner that evangelicals are but could not exhibit by their propriety as exhibited by Mike Pence.

What the non-believers see evangelical Christians is that our profession of faith are merely fig leaves that covers up our shames to justifies our sense of sanctification.  While Adam and Eve realized their shames and went about to cover them with Paradise's leaves, American evangelicals unfortunately could not even see our own nakedness and we exposed our shames and call that glories. We could sing, praise, or studied the Scripture all we want, but in our core we are little Donald Trumps and Donald Trump personifies who we truly are.  The world had seen through our hypocrisy even as we could not bring ourselves to admit it.  We saw ourselves only thru the lens that the world could not see our holiness because of their worldliness.  After all, we Christians are in this world but not of this world.  That they could not see the goodness of Donald Trump is really their fault and not ours.  And yes, in Donald Trump the world is seeing evangelical Christian and all that we stand for.

This November 3 is the reckoning of American evangelism.  We had four years of Donald Trump and praise God he showed all of us what he's like.  He wouldn't deign to use any fig leaves to cover himself but unashamedly exhibit all of who he is.  To Donald Trump, his shames are his glories.  This November evangelicals are to show God and the world whether Donald Trump's glories are evangelicals' glories as well.  And when rest of the folks in America witness that Donald Trump's glories are indeed the glories of American evangelicals, you can be sure no matter how long and enthusiastic my brothers at the SOS Ministry going out to preach, hardly anyone will listen because their political actions so contravene what they are preaching. The world can see the fruit of the Christ these brothers professed to love so much was Donald Trump and to him and not Jesus Christ we are serving.  Why listen to the S.O.S. Ministry at all?

And when the assets of Donald Trump become evangelicals glories, you can tell our preaching of the Good News of Jesus Christ goodbye because all the people see and hear, and rightly so, are the Bad News of Donald Trump.  People are seeing Trump's shameless glories radiating from evangelical Christians.  It will be these SOS brothers who will need SOS even more than those others whom the Ministry tried so hard to outreach.

My evangelical brethren, God is waiting for us to change our wicked ways.  God does not like our sacrifices and offerings because we are not done out of a good and conscionable spirit.  In the Book of Genesis before Cain killed Abel God had a patient conversation with him "Why are you angry?  Why is your face downcast?  If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?  But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door, but you must master it."

For the past forty years, evangelicals were always angry and downcast.  Even with their anointing of Donald Trump as their King, they are still angry and downcast, rejected by the world they tried to shape it as their own, never humble enough to take ownership of their sins and defects but attributed their rejection to the worldliness of others.  Evangelicals want more political power and never received enough.  They are angry at the world for not receiving their message of personal redemption.  They are angry for all their sacrifice and preaching people were turning away.  Even young people who grew up in evangelical churches turned away from the teachings of their childhood.

God's message to evangelical Christians is telling them to master their sin and turn away from their worldliness and un-Godly ways to live the full life of the Lord.  Make peace and not enemies.  Have patience and act out with love and not condemnations.  And most of all, walk away from the lures of Satan and all the serpent's temptations of money, immoralities, and political power.

Just like to Cain, God is providing a way out.  The first thing is to turn away from the worship of the Devil's Apprentice.  It will be hard but it's the first step for evangelical Christians' redemption.  Like addicts who struggle to turn away from their drug habits, it will be hard for evangelicals not to give up their crutch for Donald Trump.  But in the story of Cain and Abel they must before they descend into the situation in Genesis 4 verse 8 when Cain planned for and finished off Abel.

And who is Abel?  American Democracy but that's another story. 

What the world sees now is the fruit of the evangelical spirit is Donald Trump and not of love, patience, and perseverance.  It is high time that evangelical Christians start mirroring the image of God and not letting themselves bearing the images of Donald Trump.

 Vote for "Jesus Christ", NOT "Donald Trump"