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Conservative Preacher Insists The Character Of A Leader Counts In Anti-Trump Diatribe
An influential conservative evangelical preacher has criticized Christians who are voting for President Donald Trump because he enacts conservative policies, insisting that a politician’s character matters, too.
John Piper, a popular author and speaker, made his disapproval of the president clear in a blog post on his website on Thursday.
Piper said he is baffled and bewildered over the fact that some Christians think they are “saving human lives and freedoms” by downplaying the destructive effects of a “self-absorbed, self-exalting” leader. Christians’ biggest priority shouldn’t be “saving America” but “exalting Christ with or without America,” he said.
“I think it is a drastic mistake to think that the deadly influences of a leader come only through his policies and not also through his person,” he wrote. “This is true not only because flagrant boastfulness, vulgarity, immorality, and factiousness are self-incriminating, but also because they are nation-corrupting. They move out from centers of influence to infect whole cultures.”
“The last five years bear vivid witness to this infection at almost every level of society.”
Piper also suggested that Christians’ support for Trump is doing a great disservice to one of the core goals of evangelism: bringing new believers into the fold.
“Christians communicate a falsehood to unbelievers (who are also baffled!) when we act as if policies and laws that protect life and freedom are more precious than being a certain kind of person,” he wrote. “The church is paying dearly, and will continue to pay, for our communicating this falsehood year after year.”
Piper didn’t refer to Trump or Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden by name in the blog post. He said he’s willing to vote for a “non-Christian” if he sees there to be enough overlap between the “visible outworking of his character and convictions” and biblical teachings. But Piper also didn’t...
