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Raif: Is Trump listening to the best advisor?

Longview News-Journal - 5/20/2017

It's no secret America is in trouble. We have angry people on both sides shouting that their rights are being trampled and they are being deprived of constitutional privileges.

The elderly, sick and disabled wonder in fear how they will survive a catastrophic illness with no insurance and no money to pay for coverage even if they could get it.

We have an opioid epidemic, more armed robberies and sexual and domestic assaults. Mass shootings and murder are on the rise.

Donald Trump was elected to Make America Great Again. How is that going for us?

Of course we expected criticism from liberals, but it also is coming from conservatives. George Will (Opinion, May 3) wrote that our president has an inability to think or speak clearly, which is not a distraction but a disability. The columnist suggested Trump's is an untrained mind bereft of information and married to stratospheric self-confidence.

What is white evangelicals' assessment of Trump? In a 2011 poll, only 30 percent of white evangelicals agreed with the idea "an elected official can behave ethically even if they have committed immoral acts in their personal life." By October 2016 that figure had jumped to 72 percent. It would seem evangelicals approve of a president (whom they wanted to be a moral example) who is a thrice-married serial adulterer, ultimate materialist, casino owner, habitual liar and unprincipled deal maker.

Jerry Falwell Jr., a self-proclaimed leader of evangelicals, said a conspiracy of GOP establishment leaders was to blame for the leak about Trump bragging about his ability to commit sexual assault with impunity. Sorry. I saw the video where he said it.

Jim Wallis, writing in Sojourners earlier this month, said there is a moral hypocrisy among evangelical leaders who are causing divisions in people of faith, dividing American Christians along racial lines. The international majority of evangelical Christians are people of color. Trump has called immigrants "rapists" and "criminals." Many if not most of them are Christians trying to escape brutal dictators, horrific wars and miserable living conditions where they are dying of starvation or violence. Falwell explicitly and proudly said white evangelicals voted for Trump not in spite of his racist and xenophobic rhetoric about undocumented immigrants, but because of this rhetoric.

How are we as Christians who are horrified at what is happening supposed to meet what we see as an assault on Scripture? First, Jesus did not discriminate against anyone because of heritage or gender. The woman at the well was a Samaritan, detested and discriminated against by Jews. The disciples were shocked Jesus would talk with a Samaritan, and a woman at that. Because he did so, the entire village came out to meet him. How many immigrants could we bring to Jesus if they met him through us?

Micah 6:12 says, "The rich among you have become wealthy through extortion and violence. Your citizens are so used to lying that their tongues can no longer tell the truth." And Matthew 15 :8: "These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me;" verse 13: "You are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth" and verse 19: "For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying and slander."

White House spokesman Sean Spicer, trying again to spin the president's words, said, "I can't do this anymore." It seems he is not the only one who has to continually explain what they think Trump really meant - especially in his tweets.

Evangelicals I have talked with keep saying Trump is God's man as president. When I point out all the ways he is unfit they say that God will change him. When Trump will not listen to his advisors why should we think he will listen to God? His ego is too great, he always has to be right, he says he is intelligent and does not need security briefings every day, tries to get the head of the FBI to drop his investigations into his appointees and himself. It seems that if he knows what he is doing - truly being led by God - then there would be nothing to investigate.

It may be that in order for God to change Trump, he will first have to knock him off his pedestal. Maybe a hard fall on his head would knock some sense into him and make him realize he has available the greatest expert he could consult. It remains to be seen if Trump can truly humble himself to listen and follow this expert.

- Gayle Raif, a Longview resident, is a regular contributor to the Saturday Forum. Find her blog "Limiting God" at news-journal.com.

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