I’m just like Trump and Clinton.
You are too.
Let me backtrack a bit, and I’ll come around to those statements again.
Trump has committed some terrible acts- or at least claimed to. The video of his “locker-room talk” is disturbing, and it only piles more fuel on fires Trump started ages ago, with his racist and sexist comments, offensive language, etc. Clinton also has a tainted reputation, with her countless coverups of Bill Clinton’s mistakes, and her viciousness that equals Trump’s, though she may present it more eloquently.
What if Clinton were to organize parties to hunt down, torture and kill Christians? What if Trump were to sleep with a married woman, get her pregnant, and assassinate her husband? How much more hatred would that reap from the people?
Now replace the names Clinton and Trump in the above paragraph with the names Paul and David, accordingly. Or with my name and yours.
The fact is, Trump and Clinton should go to hell.
But Paul and David should have too. And you and I as well. We’ve all sinned and filthied ourselves.
The only thing that differentiates me from Trump and Clinton is that I’m covered by the blood of Christ, taken up from the cesspool of my sins and bathed in his grace. If I weren’t, I might be as they. Who knows what messes I would have made by now, and how many more by the time I reached their age.
I’ve heard many Christians say they’re praying that something will happen to either or both candidates, such as a heart attack or a car accident.
But let me point out something: God does not wish harm on them.
In Jeremiah, God foretells the destruction of Moab due to her sin, but says “…I wail over Moab, for all Moab I cry out, I moan for the people of Kir, I weep for you…” (Jeremiah 48: 31-32) and “…my heart laments for Moab like the music of a pipe” (Jeremiah 48:36 NIV). God grieves over the pain of a nation that has defied and hated him.
As for a New Testament example, consider Jesus. Even as he hung on the cross, his murderers pointing fingers and mocking him, Jesus prayed for God to forgive them “for they [did] not know what they [were] doing” (Luke 23:34). He didn’t ask God to wreak suffering on his killers. Obviously the soldiers and Jews knew they were doing wrong, but they didn’t have the hope and guidance we as Christians have now. It was easier, if you will, for them to sin as they did, just as it is for Trump and Clinton. And Jesus found this far more tragic than his own suffering.
Do Trump's and Clinton's words anger me, both before the election and after? Certainly. But I don’t hate them or wish them harm. I grieve for them. Think what sad lives they must lead that they have become what they are today. Sure, they may have wealth, luxury, power, but they don’t have the transformation we can claim, nor the hope, nor the joy, nor the peace, so they can only grasp at thin air and stumble time and again.
There are consequences to our sin, but God does not rejoice in them. He weeps over the fact that we had to come to that place. He may be angry with Trump and Clinton, but I believe more than anything, he is shaking his head in grief.
And I can’t help but wonder if he’s shaking his head at us too…
The church’s job is to love, but our human nature takes over too often and instead leads us to criticize and judge instead.
I’m sure you’ve heard all this before, but just consider, should we not apply it to our candidates? Our cries of anger are not going to change anything- not for the elections, not for the candidates, not for the country. Our prayers could. But I encourage you: don’t pray harm over them, but blessing- the blessing of redemption. If there was redemption for the mass-murderer Saul, for the adulterous murderer David and for the deceptive, selfish, proud, disrespectful Ana, that is, myself, then can there not be for Trump and Clinton as well?
Jesus didn’t say, “love your neighbor, but if he screws up big time, pray my wrath on them.” No, he said, “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39 NIV, italics added). Do you pray a heart attack on yourself when a lustful thought pops into your head or when you lie?
If God is going to punish Trump and Clinton or anyone else, that’s between him and them. We don’t get a part in that here and now. “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” (Matthew 7:1 NIV). Jesus simply told us to love the Lord our God with all our being and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves (Matthew 22: 37-39 NIV).
I think this is a good a time as any for the church to step up and play its role. Certainly, it’s harder to love and empathize for people so far gone as Trump and Clinton than it is to criticize them or wish them dead. Trust me, I know. But Jesus never was about doing the easy thing, was he? I mean, look at what he did for us. I think we can thank him with at least a little bit of effort on our part to love.
