Many evangelical Christians who already have declared Donald Trump to be God’s anointed choice for president see his near-assassination last Saturday as further sign of God’s favor and protection.
And other Christians who oppose Trump see his near-miss as a biblical sign of the antichrist as described in Revelation.
On both Facebook and X, some Trump critics quoted Revelation 13:3, which says the Beast understood to be the Antichrist heals from a head wound and is idolized worldwide.
Eric Metaxas and Franklin Graham promote two of Metaxas’ books lionizing Donald Trump.
But the most frequent spiritual references came from Trump’s evangelical supporters, including evangelist Franklin Graham, who is scheduled to pray at the Republican National Convention Thursday night. He told the Washington Post: “Trump came very close to having his brains spread over that platform but God, I believe, protected him.”
Another of Trump’s most consistent evangelical admirers is Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas. He began his sermon on Sunday morning, July 14, with thanks to God for sparing Trump.
“What happened in Pennsylvania is, first of all, a demonstration of the reality of evil in the world,” he said. “Evil is very real. It’s very present around us. And by the way, evil is nonpartisan. Evil is everywhere.
“But I think what happened in Pennsylvania is also a demonstration of the power of Almighty God. What happened was inexplicable apart from God. And President Trump, a friend of our church, said that only God alone can be credited with what happened.
Robert Jeffress
“We have a friend, a doctor who watches Pathway to Victory in another state, that wrote me and said, ‘By my calculation, from what I can see, a millimeter’s difference in the trajectory of that bullet would have ended up in a fatality.’
“It was that close. God did that.
“I think about what happened way back in March of 1981. Remember when President Ronald Reagan was shot? A few days later, he voiced the belief that God spared his life for a purpose. And for President Reagan, that purpose was to defeat the godless Soviet Union. I believe God spared Donald Trump’s life for a purpose. I don’t care whether you’re a Democrat or Republican — that’s not what we’re talking about here.
“I think Donald Trump has a purpose. My own feeling is God spared him for the purpose of calling our nation back to its Judeo-Christian foundation.”
Jeffress said God cares about U.S. presidential elections. Citing Daniel chapter 2, he said: “God establishes kings and he removes kings. Some people don’t believe God has anything to do with elections and with politics and with government. Make no mistake: God has everything to do with government. God cares about what happens in governments around the world.”
Even though Trump shows no outward signs of living a life of Christian faith and has a long record of business practices most Christians would declare unethical, Jeffress previously has said he’s not voting for a “Sunday school teacher in chief” but for someone who will do the bidding of conservative evangelicals like him.
Evangelicals like Jeffress are the most reliable part of Trump’s political base, so perhaps it wasn’t surprising that Trump appealed to them in his first public comments after the assassination attempt.
He posted to his Truth Social account: “It was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening. We will fear not but instead remain resilient in our faith and defiant in the face of wickedness.”
Emily Crews
University of Chicago professor Emily Crews told NPR: “How often have we heard Trump give credit or agency to God or really to anyone other than himself? Very rarely.”
She added: “That term ‘wickedness’ is unusual. It has a biblical conservative Protestant quality to it that we don’t hear him use often but that his conservative Christian followers do use and will recognize.”
NPR cited other Republican luminaries who saw Trump being spared as a miracle from God.
Former presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy: “I personally believe that God intervened today not just on behalf of President Trump but on behalf of our country.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott: “Trump is truly blessed by the hand of God being able to evade being assassinated.”
Rolling Stone was among the major national news outlets reporting on the “miracle” language ascribed to Trump’s near assassination.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio: “God protected President Trump.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson: “God protected Trump.”
Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick: “By the slightest turn of your head in a mere microsecond, or the shield of a teleprompter, your life was spared by the grace of a Merciful and Holy God. God has had his hand on you since you first ran for president. No man could survive all you have been through without the grace of God.”
Trump keeps surviving, his supporters believe, because he is God’s anointed.
Trump’s critics have said something similar for years: No other person could stay alive politically with all the scandals that have rocked Trump — from porn-star payoffs, to illegal business practices, to felony convictions, to multiple accusations of sexual abuse, to mismanaging the COVID-19 pandemic, to inciting a riot at the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
Trump keeps surviving, his supporters believe, because he is God’s anointed.
Former Trump cabinet member Ben Carson said after the assassination attempt: “They tried to bankrupt him. They tried to slander him. They tried to imprison him. Now they have tried to kill him. But if God is protecting him, they will never succeed.”
Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA went so far as to credit the Holy Spirit with blowing a gust of wind to save Trump from the full impact of the bullet that grazed his ear.
NPR quoted Kaitlyn Schiess, author of The Ballot and the Bible, who worries about Trump being given some special status among his religious base. This adoration “confuses what it means in Scripture to be chosen by God,” she said.
Amanda Tyler
Amanda Tyler, executive director of BJC and leader of Christians Against Christian Nationalism, also spoke to NPR.
“When one tries to imbue God’s providence or God’s blessing on a certain event like this where lives were lost and lives were forever altered, that is very problematic theology,” she said. “Christian nationalism, which tries to merge American and Christian identities, relies heavily on this mythological telling of American history and American present as being a ‘Christian nation,’ as being a country that has been singled out by God for God’s special providence and God’s special design in the world.”
But at the RNC in Milwaukee this week, Trump repeatedly was portrayed as finding special favor with God.
“If you didn’t believe in miracles before Saturday, you better be believing right now,” declared former Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina. “Because on Saturday, the devil came to Pennsylvania holding a rifle, but an American lion got back up on his feet and he roared.”
In Christian literature, the lion often is a symbol for Jesus Christ.
Related articles:
Trump needs to be stopped with ballots, not bullets | Opinion by Mark Wingfield
We can’t let political violence be used to silence concerns about rising political violence | Opinion by Robert P. Jones
More evangelical leaders on board Trump train for 2024
Jack Graham joins evangelical pastors in ‘emergency prayer call’ for Trump before tonight’s debate