From a Biblical perspective, why I believe Trump will not succeed in stealing the election, and the alt-right fascist movement will be set back a few years. By W. D. Penfield. Originally published October 20, 2020.
This is the final weekend before the November 2020 presidential election, and I’m seeing a lot of anxiety and despair on social media. People are afraid Trump will succeed in staging what Umair Haque called a “soft coup,” and that American democracy will fall.
I’m sure Trump will attempt something outrageous, probably a court challenge seeking to overturn the election results. But I’m also sure that ultimately he won’t succeed. Why am I so sure? It’s in the Bible.
The prophecy about Babylon in Jeremiah 50 and 51 is about America. In chapter 51, we learn there will be two “rumours” or astonishing announcements in Babylon.
46 And lest your heart faint, and ye fear for the rumour that shall be heard in the land; a rumour shall both come one year, and after that in another year shall come a rumour, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.
It looks like Trump will make the first of those two astonishing announcements next week, that he will challenge the election results in court, hoping that judges he appointed (and the Republican Senate rushed to confirm) will overturn the election and hand him a second (and thereafter endless) term. Chaos—or at least a lot of uncertainty—could ensue until it gets sorted out. And that may take a while.
The second of those two astonishing announcements will occur “in another year” and will be followed by a second American civil war—“violence in the land, ruler against ruler.” That sounds a lot like a result of a contested or cancelled election, doesn’t it?
The first astonishing announcement, the one Trump or someone in his administration is likely to make, however, is not followed by a civil war. That’s very good evidence that Trump won’t succeed.
I believe the alt-right fascist movement that suddenly flourished in America under the Trump candidacy and presidency will suffer a major setback. We’ll get a break. But the alt-right fascist movement won’t go away. Not for long.
How long a break will we get? Let’s consider a few things and see if we can get some idea.
We learned in the 20th century that the world gets its fill of fascist autocracies pretty quickly. Fascist Italy lasted only a little over twenty years, and Nazi Germany lasted only a little over a decade before they both were destroyed in World War II.
The world will likely get its fill of a fascist America pretty quickly too, especially since a fascist America will be history’s first fascist superpower.1 It will have plenty of muscle to rub faces of the world’s people in their powerlessness. It will be able to indulge in bullying and intimidation and violence and abuse around the globe—and here at home in America too. No one is spared under such regimes.
And it will be able to do such things with impunity—right up to the point the rest of the world, and especially God, in whose hands the world is, have had enough.
So a fascist America could be short-lived, lasting only ten or twenty years.
Now let's consider this: Our current dispensational age, the age of grace, is due to wrap up around 2070, about fifty years from now. This age is pictured in the Bible as lasting a full two-thousand years, and it began with the fall of Jerusalem in A.D.70. And since this age ends with the destruction of America (Jeremiah 50–51), and America's existence as a fascist nation might be short-lived, America might not go full-on fascist for another two or three decades.
But there’s no guarantee of that. The second “rumour,” or “astonishing announcement” (the one to be followed by a civil war in that same year) is said simply to come “in another year.” There’s no solid indication of how many years later it will come. It could happen sooner, and America could be the first major fascist autocracy to last four or five decades.
Don’t take what I'm about to say as encouraging complacency, but I think we will get a break for now. I think ultimately Trump will fail, and the Republican party and the current alt-right movement will be set back for a while.
If America’s conversion to fascism is kicked two or three decades down the road and there is a twenty or thirty-year lull, America will likely breathe a big sigh of relief, but also get complacent.
During that lull the alt-right will be working on its ground game, its branding, and its messaging. It will recommit to unifying evangelical support, recruiting and radicalizing followers, stacking the courts or preventing them from being unstacked, roadblocking effective reform (with the help of stacked courts that may spike anything effective), and politically and socially destabilizing the country.
And it likely will work on increasing its representation and influence in police forces and other law enforcement institutions, and especially within the military.
And when it comes roaring back, it will probably return with a smarter, more popular leader. I grabbed this screen shot while browsing Reddit a few months ago. Click to enlarge:
The types of reforms that would be needed to prevent a rerun will not be enacted, probably due to a combination of lack of will and tremendous resistance. The door will be left open. The fascist right will have everything in place for a second attempt.
And the second attempt will succeed. We know this because, again, the second “rumour” will be followed by a civil war.
And that civil war will be relatively short, since the wording suggests it too will occur “in” that same year. That suggests the military will support the new regime and make short work of the war. And we might also infer there won’t be a big turnout to resist the new regime. Some might not want to fight a big military, seeing it as a good way to get killed. It’s likely some people won’t participate because they support the regime, whether overtly or indirectly—a reason God will be judging America, not just a few select people in it.
And speaking of God judging America as a whole and not just a few “bad actors,” here’s a timely Twitter thread by @TheRealHoarse, posted October 29, 2020 (lightly copyedited):
When this election is over, win or lose, we Dems need to reckon with something.
We—me included—have spent endless time spotlighting the immoral and corrupt things Trump has done, as if people seeing them is enough to change their minds.
For some people, it is.
We haven’t reckoned with a thornier reality though:
Too many people aren’t swayed by bad things because they don’t think they’re actually bad.
Having a crime on tape isn’t compelling to a jury that doesn’t believe it’s a crime. And, being blunt, I’m primarily talking about white people here. The array of comments I’ve seen in the past day from white people who still support Trump has really been something.
And it isn’t the virulent MAGAs I’m talking about. It’s the “nice, polite folks” under posts like Jack Nicklaus’ endorsement of Trump. People who use “tolerance” to mean “not holding things against shitty people.”
We have a morality and character problem. We’ve tried to solve it by showcasing Trump’s immorality. Thankfully, I think there are enough Americans to carry an election that way. But it shouldn’t be close like this.
When this election is over, we need to reckon with that and take a good, long look at how we go after the root problem of a selfish electorate that lacks the foundation to see morality, ethics and character as virtues.
And the irony ringing in my head as I type this is that the problem accelerated dramatically when bad actors said almost the exact same thing. Newt Gingrich and the right hijacked the language of morality.
We need to take it back. And we need to root out the moral rot of the past forty years. There can be no sustained renewal until a community agrees on its social contract.
We’ve been trying desperately to show enough evidence of bad acts to enough good people to win an election. And we haven’t really reconciled with the fact that the problem isn’t a shortage of bad acts; it is a surplus of shitty people.
That needs addressing.
This resonates with the frustration a lot of people—myself included—have felt when alt-right evangelicals are unresponsive when confronted with Bible quotes and passages, including the words of Jesus, that clearly show the alt-right movement is unbiblical. They brush it off and stay set on supporting the movement and its leader or leaders.
There’s no shortage of terrible Christians as well as terrible people in general. We tend to be surprised by what seems to be a sudden appearance of so many terrible people, but they were here all along.
That’s a point Jared Yates Sexton makes in his book American Rule: How a Nation Conquered the World but Failed Its People. Despite America erecting a self-comforting, convincing false front that “this is not who we are,” it’s actually who America is and has always been.2 The false-front curtain has grown worn and threadbare, and America’s ugly true colors are showing through. I think of how my own “Woodstock generation”—you know, the peace, love, harmony-and-understanding generation—aged into a bunch of Fox-News-watching, alt-right-media consuming, war-loving, cruel, sadistic, self-centered, white supremacist bigots. (Disclaimer: Not all of them of course!) It’s who they were all along. The ugly within them got brave enough to come out of hiding, and the role-playing and pretense that kept it covered up got tossed aside.
So I’m not hopeful that what @TheRealHoarse suggests will gain much traction, since scripture indicates such efforts will fail. The fascists will eventually succeed. They'll end American democracy and consolidate power. Antisemitism will flourish, and America will even attack Israel. That will seal America’s fate. God will step in to judge America and end this current age.
Incidentally, a twenty or thirty-year lull would be one explanation as to why the prophecy about Babylon will sink out of sight and go disregarded in the mainstream (Jeremiah 51:63–64).3 The prophecy will seem to lose its urgency or relevance, and a lot of people might assure themselves, when Trump is eventually out of the political picture, that the attempt to end democracy is all behind us now—until American fascism comes back, succeeds, and gains a lock on power.
But the prophecy will be recalled or rediscovered near the end, as Lot got the message just before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
A brighter note
The Bible presents a gloomy outlook for America. But there’s much better news: Everyone who has believed on Jesus Christ will be delivered safely out of the destruction. And God is certainly capable of seeing us through whatever domestic turmoil and unrest may happen between now and then.
The first sixteen verses of Genesis 19, the famous chapter about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, is about America too. And in that passage, Abraham’s nephew Lot is a type of the church of this age—meaning all who have believed on Jesus, not just certain religious denominations. And Lot was delivered “out of the midst of the overthrow” (verse 29).
Consider verses 15 and 16:
15 ¶ And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying, Arise, take thy wife, and thy two daughters, which are here; lest thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city.
16 And while he lingered, the men laid hold upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and upon the hand of his two daughters; the LORD being merciful unto him: and they brought him forth, and set him without the city.
The “iniquity of the city” was not that Sodom and Gomorrah had a run-of-the-mill, statistically small gay community. It was that the country had a pervasive culture of abuse, the strong sticking it to the weaker, a culture of violence and bigotry. And it was participated in by all the people of the city, “both old and young, all the people from every quarter” (verse 4). Violence and abuse includes violence and abuse in all its forms: spiritual, emotional, social, economic, as well as physical.
Claiming the sin was statistically occurring homosexuality just diverts and distracts from recognizing the real sin—it was hurting other people, sticking it to them, and depriving the poor of support and representation despite having the means and plenty of wealth with which to provide it. See Ezekiel 16:49 and Isaiah 10:1–3.
Ultimately, the “sin of Sodom” with regard to this American Babylon, the act that will seal America’s fate, will be antisemitism and an attack on Israel. You’ll find that detailed in Jeremiah 50–51. The caution to nations in Genesis 12:1–3 crosses dispensational boundaries.
I did say that Lot is a type of the Christian church, which is comprised of all believers in Jesus in this age. But in the passage, Lot is more specifically a picture of what has become the public face of Christianity these days: the Christian right.
Note in the verses 15 and 16 above that Lot was delivered, “the Lord being merciful unto him,” despite Lot having sat in the gate of Sodom (see verse 1), a prominent political position. That is a good indicator that he had supported the system up until then. But the movement, in a figure, turned antisemitic. The people of the city sought to abuse the men who had brought the word to Lot, and even turned against Lot to abuse him when he tried to resist them.4
It was then that Lot came to his senses. He realized that God did not approve of the movement, had not approved of it, and that “the LORD will destroy this city” (verse 14).
Lot tried to warn his sons in law (who are a picture of unbelievers who are still under law). But they thought he must be making a joke. He had supported the movement and had been a big part of its rise and its locking down power. He had seemed so convinced (whether he convinced himself or was convinced by others) that God supported the whole thing. His sudden 180-degree turn seemed like a prank to them.
We might think it an outrage that Lot was spared and delivered. We might feel that because Lot facilitated and participated in the rise and empowerment of the movement, he should have perished with the rest of them. But Lot was delivered. Lot’s deliverance was due to God’s mercy and faithfulness, despite Lot’s behavior. And that harmonizes with how salvation works in this age. Anyone who believes on Jesus in this age is forgiven of all sins and will be delivered. It’s to God’s glory. He won’t go back on His word.
The era does not end with a Christian revenge story, as many have portrayed it in such things as Rapture fantasy novels and movies. It ends with what is basically a Christian failure story, but a victory for a gracious and merciful and faithful and righteous God.
And I want to point out that our current age, this age of grace, does not end with a Rapture. The Rapture will end the Tribulation, which follows this age. This age ends with a Translation of believers, which will occur almost simultaneously with the great destruction of Babylon. “Translation,” as used in Hebrews 11:5, means transferred, or transported. Remaining believers will simply vanish, as Enoch, who “walked with God,” “was not; for God took him” (Genesis 5:24). Enoch vanished from the earth and transported instantly to be with the Lord. And that’s how believers will be delivered “out of the midst of the overthrow” of this present Babylon, when that time finally comes.
The Translation of believers will mark the end of this age, and the return of observable and evident Divine and supernatural activity to the earth. And the period generally known as the Tribulation will begin.
With Divine and supernatural activity again in open evidence, the terms of salvation will change. People will not get full credit for believing like we do in this age. People will have to endure in the faith to the end in order to be saved—whether the end of the Tribulation when Jesus returns, or to the end of their lives. That’s a high-risk existence. Fortunately, believers will have the support of God Himself, and that age will be shortened.
I’ll cover more details in future articles. But for now, just remember there is always good news for anyone who has believed on Jesus Christ. If you haven’t believed yet, won’t you make that simple decision and believe on Him today? It will be the best and most important decision you will ever make.
Credit to scholar and author Sarah Kendzior for making that observation.↩
I borrowed that wording from a review blurb credited to Marie Claire, Best Political Books of 2020.↩
A big reason is the myth of American exceptionalism. Most people simply don’t want to believe God could be displeased and disapproving of America. And they want to believe God backs them up in whatever meanness and lust to rule or dominate others they want to indulge in.↩
It's also notable that in verses 7 and 8, in a disgraceful and telling move, Lot attempted to appease the people of Sodom by offering them his daughters to abuse. “You can abuse our women. You can take away their rights and demean and degrade them for your pleasure. We're okay with that.” Lot also lied in saying they were virgins, when both were married. But that does picture that they were believers too, pure in God's eyes, evidenced in that they too were delivered from the destruction along with Lot.↩
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