In a political rally in North Carolina Saturday night, called “Save America,” former President Donald Trump exclaimed to the crowd, “I’m the most honest human being, perhaps, that God ever created.” At least he added the qualifier “perhaps.”
I’d like to reply to Mr. Trump about that. You probably think I would make some statement arguing that he is not very honest, which fact checkers determined of his presidency. For instance, The Washington Post Fact Checker team claimed President Trump made over 30,000 “false or misleading statements” during his four-year tenure.
But that’s not foremost what I’d like to say. I’d like to tell Trump that God didn’t create him, the devil did! “What,” you say! Sure, I know, Trump meant God created human beings. Yes. But I mean anyone who lies as much as he does, God is not creating him, meaning working in his life; rather, Satan is. How do I know?
When Jesus taught crowds, which were always Jews, he sometimes had listeners who opposed him by arguing with him. Once, some Jews said to him, “We are descendants of Abraham” (John 8.33 NRSV), as if that is enough to make them right with God.
(John the Baptist had earlier said to people who thought like that, and probably most Jews did, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham” [Matthew 3.7-9].)
To those previous interlocutors Jesus then said, “I know that you are descendants of Abraham; yet you look for an opportunity to kill me, because there is no place in you for my word” (John 8.37).
Then we read, “They answered him, ‘Abraham is our father.’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing what Abraham did, but now you are trying to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did. You are indeed doing what your father does'” (John 8.38-41).
Then we read, “They said to him, ‘We are not illegitimate children; we have one father, God himself.’ Jesus said to them, ‘If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God'” (John 8.41-42).
Jesus continued, “Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot accept my word. You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8.43-44).
By comparing what Jesus says here with how much Donald Trump lies, I must conclude that it is the devil who has created, that is, has been working in, him. For, I say in my Trump book (p. 15), “Donald Trump is the biggest liar I have ever seen.” According to Jesus, such a man has been created by “the father of lies.”
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