Christian nationalists are world-class experts in seizing power by taking Bible verses out of context. Growing up, my independent Baptist high school constantly used Philippians 4:13 as proof we could win the state championship, Jeremiah 29:11 as proof God would let us get married and have sex someday, and 2 Chronicles 7:14 as proof God would spread the wildfires of revival and solve all our nation’s problems and make us rich if only the Republicans could control the government.
So when House Speaker Mike Johnson equated “the ministry of reconciliation” in 2 Corinthians 5:18 to the GOP passing the so-called “big beautiful bill” during a budget reconciliation process, none of us who grew up in this environment were surprised.
In light of this latest example of biblical nonsense, I decided to come up with a list of the Top 10 Bible verses Christian nationalists take out of context. Of course, while this list may be exhausting, it is by no means exhaustive.
“Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
—Matthew 6:10
With a “Don’t Mess With Our Kids” banner overhead and an “As It Is In Heaven” banner hanging stage left, Russell Johnson and Ross Johnston waged worship as a weapon in Seattle’s Cal Anderson park. The phrase “As it is in heaven” comes from the Lord’s Prayer, when Jesus prayed that God’s kingdom would come and God’s will would be done “on earth as it is in heaven.”
For white evangelical nationalists, this happens through a concept called the ekklesia. In the Roman Empire, the ekklesia was a term for “a governing body.” When the Christian New Testament was being written, the authors co-opted certain imperial terms to provide a Christian alternative vision. One of the terms they used was ekklesia, which meant “assembly” or “congregation.”
“For authoritarian Christians, God ruling on earth means God putting Christians in charge of their neighbors.”
One might assume the biblical authors had something different in mind than the values of the Roman Empire. But for authoritarian Christians, God ruling on earth means God putting Christians in charge of their neighbors, who must bend the knee. This is why one of the leaders at the Battle of Seattle commanded the supposedly demonic protesters, “You bow at the name of Jesus right now! … You’re silenced! Your voice is cut! … Fall to the ground!”
“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
—2 Chronicles 7:14
During the “A Million Women” march on the Day of Atonement in Washington, D.C., last October, more than 380,000 people gathered for 10 hours of singing, blowing shofars, waving flags, praying and weeping.
After they took sledge hammers and smashed a stone altar to smithereens in front of the U.S. Capitol as the worship band raged and the warriors sang about God reigning, one of the leaders directed the masses to stretch their arms forward “and just begin to command a mass beholding of the Lamb of God!”
Then all 380,000 people stretched their arms forward toward all four directions and commanded the United States to “Behold!” seven times.
Then they referenced 2 Chronicles 7:14, which says God will heal the nation if God’s people “will humble themselves.” And without any explanation of this verse’s context within the story of the ancient Israelites processing their relationship to Babylon, they instead found a way to use the passage to become Babylon themselves, interpreting the phrase “will humble themselves” as meaning, “rising up to humble this nation.”
In other words, to these people, Christian humility is rising up in power to humble your neighbors.
“Then I said to them, ‘You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer suffer disgrace.’”
—Nehemiah 2:17
On a Fox Business Network episode of Lou Dobbs Tonight, First Baptist Church of Dallas Pastor Robert Jeffress said, “I reminded the president on Inauguration Day during my sermon that God’s the one who thought up the idea of walls. God told Nehemiah to build a wall around Jerusalem to protect the citizens. Walls are God’s ideas to protect nations.”
Ironically, while Nehemiah said he believed God put it in his heart to rebuild the walls around Jerusalem in the fifth century B.C., there is no explicit record of God commanding Nehemiah to build the walls. Even if God did, once again, Jerusalem was on the underside of the empire and this biblical account was about a specific place in time, not an eternal command.
“Jeffress acting like the strongest military superpower ever is on the underside of an immigrant empire is laughable.”
So Jeffress acting like the strongest military superpower ever is on the underside of an immigrant empire is laughable.
But according to Jeffress, based on the book of Nehemiah, “Until the Mexican diocese is willing to call for the removal of the walls around the Vatican, the removal of metal detectors from St. Peter’s square, and the unlocking of the doors of the Vatican at night, until they’re willing to do that, they need to keep the heck quiet about our country’s wanting to protect itself against evildoers.”
“Go and make disciples of all nations.”
—Mathew 28:19
“He commanded his apostles to baptize the nations,” argued Andrew Isker, co-author of Christian Nationalism: A Biblical Guide for Taking Dominion and Discipling Nations. “Since America is a nation, America needs to be baptized and discipled into obeying Jesus.”
New Apostolic Reformation leader Lance Wallnau agrees, claiming, “The command here is to disciple nations. Paul … targeted cities to make disciples of nations.”
In this mindset, pursuing the Great Commission is a power grab that would look nothing like the values taught in the Sermon on the Mount or in the fruit of the Spirit. But as Wallnau says, “If you want to capture the flag, you have to go to key cities.”
“May God arise. May his enemies be scattered. May his foes flee before him. May you blow them away like smoke as wax melts before the fire. May the wicked perish before God. May the righteous be glad and rejoice before God. May they be happy and joyful.”
—Psalm 68:1-3
“Welcome to ‘Let Us Worship’ on the National Mall!” worship leader Sean Feucht begins. “We are the army of God! We are the family of God!”
Earlier, the gathering was welcomed on video by none other than Donald Trump himself. “Religious liberty is under siege. We are fighting back and fighting back like never before. … So to ‘Let Us Worship,’ thank you very much.”
With the worshipers identified as the army of God, one of Feucht’s questions was, “Who can defy the armies of the living God?”
“He’s asking is, ‘Who can defy us as we support Trump?’”
When set in this context, the question he’s asking is, “Who can defy us as we support Trump?” But again, social location is everything here. An oppressed people on the underside of power rejoicing over their liberation due to their imperial oppressors fleeing is completely different than a bunch of Trump supporters claiming they’re God’s army and nobody can defy them.
“Wherever the corpse is, there the eagles will gather.”
—Matthew 24:28
Remember when the solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, supposedly signaled the Rapture was going to start in Texas? The theory started when Troy Brewer claimed, “The sun is 400 times further from the earth than the moon. The sun is 400 times larger than the moon,” and that the Hebrew letter ‘tav’ has a numerical value of 400. Then he said a one hour and 33 minute eclipse in 1776 aligned with Psalm 133 and declared God talking to Moses in Exodus 4:8 was actually a prophecy about the Rapture on 4/8/2024. The fact that Bible verse numbers weren’t added to the text until 1551 seems lost on him.
With all that background assumed, Brewer turned to Matthew 24:28. “Jesus Christ is coming to set people free. And I’m telling you he is coming back for the church. And where will we meet him in the air? Jesus just refers to it as ‘where the eagles gather.’ Wow! Where does this thing begin? It begins at Eagle Pass.”
For Brewer, Jesus was going to set evangelicals free from the Democrats by starting the Rapture in Eagle Pass, Texas, where the National Guard was keeping immigrants from entering the U.S., thus signaling a new Civil War and the return of the Confederacy.
“Zeal for your house consumes me.”
—Psalm 69:9
On his “Hold the Line” podcast, worship leader Sean Feucht takes inspiration from Jesus confronting the moneychangers in the temple.
“He waited 30 years to sit on the side of the road and weave a cord of whips, which takes about three to four hours, according to my research, so that he could go into the temple and wreck shop,” Feucht claimed. “That’s how Jesus wanted to start his ministry. And I guarantee you people were hurt in that process.”
Then Feucht asked: “But what compelled him and drove him to do that? It says that as he was in the middle of this thing, just whipping everywhere and going crazy in the temple, it says that the disciples looked upon him and they remembered Psalm 69:9. ‘Zeal for your house consumes me.’ They saw the embodiment of that promise in the book of Psalms that Jesus was actually manifesting the reality of what zeal looks like — passion, love. And so I feel like today, like we need some leaders to rise up and clean house in America right now.”
Of course, Psalm 69 actually describes the Psalmist’s zeal as a humbling of the soul with fasting and as a wearing of sackcloth. But to Feucht, it means he can be so overcome with zeal that he wrecks shop in the United States, even if it hurts people.
“The kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and violent people take it by force.”
—Matthew 11:12
Pastor Greg Locke was one of the most vocal pastors pushing conspiracy theories and calls for the cavalry leading up to the January 6 insurrection. Then he morphed into a demon slayer. But whether he’s fighting demons or Democrats, he seems to think there’s no distinction. “You can get out, you demon!” he yells to any Democrats attending his church, calling them election thieves. “You cannot be a Christian and vote Democrat!”
And for him, it’s all about power.
“Whether he’s fighting demons or Democrats, he seems to think there’s no distinction.”
“What God’s looking for are people under this tent, people online, that he wants to put in charge of some stuff,” he preached. “There’s no reason the church of the living God and the kingdom of Jesus Christ should not rule this nation. The Bible says that the kingdom of God suffereth violence, and those that truly follow Jesus Christ take it by force!”
Of course, the passage seems to indicate those in the kingdom are the ones suffering at the hands of violent people, rather than the ones causing the violence.
But Locke wields it as a weapon, warning during a sermon: “I’ll take this microphone and bust you in the mouth with it in the name of God ’cause we ain’t playing your stupid Democrat games up in this church. You hear me? If you gonna play games, you might as well pull your shirt off and be a big boy and do it right now. Huh? Go ahead big girl! Come up here right now!”
“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.”
—2 Corinthians 5:18
“Soli Deo Gloria,” House Speaker Mike Johnson posted on X after the House approved the so-called “big beautiful bill” on a 218 to 214 vote. As I covered on “Highest Power: Church + State,” Penn Wharton found the bill awards the wealthiest 0.1% at least an extra $290,000 per year, while it takes $165 a year away from those who make less than $18,000 annually. Additionally, it adds $170 billion to ICE in order to further deportations.
Because the bill was passed during the budget reconciliation process, Johnson gave the glory to God alone and included a picture of 2 Corinthians 5:18, with “THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION” in all caps, underlined and highlighted.
How a reconciliation bill that takes from the poor, gives to the rich and funds a virtually unaccountable police force that locks people in rickety cages surrounded by alligators and pythons is somehow a fulfillment of God “reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them” is anyone’s guess.
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’”
—Isaiah 6:8
Just as I was trying to narrow my list down to 10, the department of Homeland Security swooped in and posted one of the creepiest examples I’ve ever seen.
“Here’s a Bible verse I think about sometimes,” the reel opens with a very intense, creepy-sounding voice in a Southern accent narrating as helicopters prepare to fly. Then after a pause, “Many times.”
As soldiers gear up in the red glow of the night, the voice continues: “It goes, ‘Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send and who will go for us?”
With the soldiers pulling on gloves and the helicopter hovering over a city, an old Johnny Cash song begins playing with the line, “Sooner or later, God’ll cut you down.”
Then the voice more on-edge adds, “And I said, ‘Here am I. Send me.’”
Suddenly, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection badge fills the screen as the music immediately intensifies and images continue of helicopters flying overhead, and heavily armed border patrol agents wearing night vision goggles, using lasers and looking at vehicles and people through scopes.
Of course, Isaiah 6 is dealing with a vision of God in the year King Uzziah died, around 740 B.C. It has nothing to do with God cutting down immigrants. But if you center yourself when reading the Bible, instead of learning about what the actual people were dealing with, you can turn verses like this into justification for anything you want to be sent for.
Rick Pidcock
Rick Pidcock is a 2004 graduate of Bob Jones University, with a bachelor of arts degree in Bible. He’s a freelance writer based in South Carolina and a former Clemons Fellow with BNG. He completed a master of arts degree in worship from Northern Seminary. He is a stay-at-home father of five children and produces music under the artist name Provoke Wonder. Follow his blog at www.rickpidcock.com.