How support for Trump is causing a rift in the evangelical church

How support for Trump is causing a rift in the evangelical church

"Evangelical Christians are perhaps the most polarizing—and least understood—people living in America today."

In his seminal new book, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory, journalist Tim Alberta, himself a practicing Christian and the son of an evangelical pastor, paints an expansive and profoundly troubling portrait of the American evangelical movement.

Through the eyes of televangelists and small-town preachers, celebrity revivalists and everyday churchgoers, Alberta tells the story of a faith cheapened by ephemeral fear, a promise corrupted by partisan subterfuge, and a reputation stained by perpetual scandal.

For millions of conservative Christians, America is their kingdom—a land set apart, a nation uniquely blessed, a people in special covenant with God. This love of country, however, has given way to right-wing nationalist fervor, a reckless blood-and-soil idolatry that trivializes the kingdom of Jesus Christ.

Alberta retraces the arc of the modern evangelical movement, placing political and cultural inflection points in the context of church teachings and traditions, explaining how Donald Trump's presidency and the COVID-19 pandemic only accelerated historical trends that long pointed toward disaster.

Reporting from half-empty sanctuaries and standing-room-only convention halls across the country, the author documents a growing fracture inside American Christianity and journeys with readers through this strange new environment in which loving your enemies is "woke" and owning the libs is the answer to WWJD.

Accessing the highest echelons of the American evangelical movement, Alberta investigates the ways in which conservative Christians have pursued, exercised, and often abused power in the name of securing this earthly kingdom. He highlights the battles evangelicals are fighting—and the weapons of their warfare—to demonstrate the disconnect from scripture: Contra the dictates of the New Testament, today's believers are struggling mightily against flesh and blood, eyes fixed on the here and now, desperate for a power that is frivolous and fleeting.

Lingering at the intersection of real cultural displacement and perceived religious persecution, Alberta portrays a rapidly secularizing America that has come to distrust the evangelical church, and weaves together present-day narratives of individual pastors and their churches as they confront the twin challenges of lost status and diminished standing.

Sifting through the wreckage—pastors broken, congregations battered, believers losing their religion because of sex scandals and political schemes—Alberta asks: If the American evangelical movement has ceased to glorify God, what is its purpose?

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From the interview with the author

"Yes. I think, in many ways, when people ask, well, where does this story begin?

I think it starts with Jerry Falwell Sr., and I think it starts with his Moral Majority. I think, perhaps even more to the point, Terry, it starts with the founding of a small Christian college in Lynchburg, Va., that was later renamed from Lynchburg Baptist College into Liberty University.

And that period of time in the mid to late 1970s, when Jimmy Carter is president, when the culture wars are beginning to rage around abortion and prayer in public schools and pornography and drug usage and all of these things, Jerry Falwell Sr. senses an opportunity to use these massive organizations - his Christian school, his large Christian church and this new organization, the Moral Majority - to use them in concert to apply pressure on the secular left and to enlist like-minded religious conservatives to join his cause.

And what he discovered was this incredibly explosive, dynamic formula for raising money, for mobilizing the grassroots to vote Republican.

And I think what was so dangerous about it was that there's ample evidence to suggest that Jerry Falwell Sr. himself did not believe in most of this fear that he was peddling, this fear that he was using to exploit the masses of evangelicals who he was raising, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars from and buying a private jet and flying around the country, saying that the end is nigh. Falwell Sr. himself did not personally believe that, but he was planting this...

(Note: Sound familiar?)

GROSS: But how do you know?

ALBERTA: Well, I've spoken with a lot of people close to him. I've read some of his correspondences. There is ample evidence to suggest that Falwell and his contemporaries at the time, some of whom spoke to me for this book, they knew that what they were doing was dishonest, that it was duplicitous, and they didn't particularly care because they saw this as sort of a means to an end, the end being a conquest of the secular culture. And so once you justify things that way, then it's fair game.

 

(Personal note and observation This mistaken and congregation destroying notion of mixing far right politics with Bible literalism also infects relationships in the splits, splinters and slivers of the defunct WCG as well as on the GMF, i.e the Ambassador Alumni Forum 'General Message Forum')

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Remember when a common bond in our WCG experience was:

John 18: 36 

"Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: ( or the "Liberals" "Communists", "Marxists and "Woke") but now is my kingdom not from hence."

Well those days are over. Now the Kingdom of many fundamentalist churches is indeed of this world and fighting in church over it is emptying churches, destroying friendships and trashing classic Christian priorities. 

It divides the GMF as well into the constant rants of point and counter-point, exchange of insults and reactions to them, all revolving around conservative, dare we say, Trumpian adoration and liberal disgust with it all. 

Personally, "once and done' with the WCG experience was the best decision I personally ever made in my naive view that perhaps as a more liberal thinking pastor by personality, I could help mature the church and get it off the majoring in the minors as well as leadership by the one man show. How wrong I was. 

I can't imagine pastoring in any of the debris left over from WCG, old school or "Jesus worked a miracle" and "liberated" us. 

Some individual's gods, evidently, are the authors of confusion and chaos. 

Dave Pack: All Eyes On Passover (Eight Years And Counting...)

 

All Eyes on Passover

David C. Pack of The Restored Church of God has made a career of teaching dates for the arrival of the Kingdom of God and blowing them off before they pass. For his Abib 1 private interpretation, he proclaimed the discovery of Jesus Christ’s birthday as proof of the legitimacy of his latest biblical illusion.

Was that knowledge from God, or did David C. Pack make it up?

Inside RCG, enabling revisionists lure questioning brethren away from reality with a soft brush of manipulative words to coax them into passive, forgetful submission. This insults discerning members who remember what the human idol said.

Part 559 – February 22, 2025
@ 04:18 But, I’m more certain this week than I was last week. In fact, it’s just so utterly, absolutely, totally, and completely impossible that it is not Abib 1.

@ 37:28 But the important thing to understand is we’ve absolutely got the right day. We have it even named. [Pounds on the table] We absolutely have Christ’s birth date right. [Pounds on the table] We’ve got it right. It’s Abib 1.

Part 558 – February 15, 2025
@ 2:02:45 And we found it. We were seeking the truth, and we found it. Abib is a great discovery. A long time coming. WHAT God is going to do is now joined by an absolute WHEN.

As March 29 approached, Abib 1 turned out to be not-so-absolute. It was not the truth despite what David C. Pack preached while invoking God’s name and authority.

Part 564 – March 22, 2025
@ 1:16:57 I’m gonna just tell you: Nothing’s gonna happen next week because I I always I sh–wrestle–I’ve got too much material. I can’t finish it.

David C. Pack magnanimously dissolved twelve sermons spanning two months in just eleven seconds. But since he cannot remove the false carrot from the manipulation stick without attaching another lying carrot, he shifts all eyes onto Passover.

@ 1:17:11 I I became convicted about Passover and decided not to wait. But rather to eliminate all doubt for us all. If Passover can be proven absolutely, the 1335, if ya never did understand it, must fall inside the Kingdom. It has to.

@ 1:40:28 This is why you guard Abib. Not because Abib 1 is important. But, observe the month of Avib and keep the Passover. That’s the immediate emphasis. That’s the immediate emphasis. It points to Passover. That’s why you’re watching Abib.

Jesus Christ Returns on Passover
April 11 at 8:02 PM ET

RCG brethren comfort each other, repeating the lie, "Mr. Pack only has to be right once." He will never be right because David C. Pack is a blaspheming hypocritical liar, a false prophet, a false apostle, and a biblical fraud.

Dave can refine his malarkey seven times, but it is still just worthless malarkey.

Foolish members are again distracted from deleavening their hearts because their Pastor General arrogantly imprints himself into the annual myth that the Kingdom of God will arrive when he says.

All eyes are now on Passover.

Passover and Days of Unleavened Bread are annual events as much as David C. Pack inserting himself into the Holy Days to keep the brethren at the edge of their seats with naïve anticipation and feigned excitement.

The lies have been piled so high for so long that even David C. Pack cannot remember them all.

Part 558 – February 15, 2025
@ 02:43 First, WE thought maybe it was from Pentecost, and WE might've even wondered if it was Passover. I can't recall. We have thought Passover in years past, but that's when WE thought there were two or three muh-more kingdoms.

He also cannot remember disproving the day he will shortly thereafter reclaim.

Part 560 – March 1, 2025
@ 1:27:40 Try to make it Passover to Passover, and God just absolutely trampled His own Passover. Trampled His Son say, "You come right on into the Night To Be Much Observed.”

@ 1:28:08 You make it Passover to Passover, and it just as false.

Despite the trampling falsehoods, Dave gave himself wiggle room with the Abib 1 or Passover conundrum.

Part 563 – March 15, 2025
@ 35:59 But, I’ve come to believe it is going to be either the 29^th 15 days on top of 2,580, and that takes you to bang, Passover to the minute. Or, or it’s going to be Passover to Passover, which would be a real simple kingdom.

David C. Pack shouts, pounds his fists on the table, leans back in righteous certainty, and waves pages of listed notes proving how much his god is revealing to him. If only his god had been a better communicator, years of confusion and doubt could have been avoided.

But all eyes are now on Passover 2025. For now.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Passover 2019 in Retrospect

Part 175 – March 29, 2019
@ 1:29:13 I had a couple wrong dates. Been hearing wrong dates for decades, but you know, I had a couple wrong dates: Esther’s Fast and Passover. God either allowed them or maybe even inspired them.

Part 177 – June 6, 2019
@ 1:50:27 You gotta wash your mind clean. This isn’t Esther’s Fast revisited or “Mr. Pack thinks Passover’s when Christ is coming.” I didn’t know enough yet. We’re way ahead of where we were, and I hope I get some credit for that. This is kind-er hard. But I think I got it.

Passover 2020–No Way

Part 242 – March 28, 2020
@ 19:33 Now, I don’t believe for two seconds that Christ is coming on the Passover or on the Night To Be Much Observed.

Passover 2020–Yes Way

Part 246 – April 4, 2020
@ 10:31 It’s telling you that day is the Passover. It’s indisputable, unassailable, inarguable. You cannot see it any other way. And we barely started. That just locks it down.

Part 247 – April 9, 2020
@ 00:56 The number of proofs goes on and on and on and on that Christ is coming on the Passover.

Passover 2020-Plus in Retrospect

Part 269 – October 3, 2020
@ 52:52 I thought over the past two years about the Kingdom coming on a feast day. I I thought Pentecost is it. Is it a couple of years ago? Is it is it Passover? Is it Unleavened Bread? I could see feast tones here and there. Last year, I thought it might be on the Sabbath during the Feast [of Tabernacles]. And then I thought it might be the Last Great Day last year, but there was so much I didn’t know.

Just because David C. Pack cannot learn from his past mistakes does not excuse the brethren. Keeping all hopeful eyes on Passover again this year is not very wise.

Passover 2021

Part 297 – March 17, 2021
@ 13:37 I’m gonna throw some knock-out punches here that removes all doubt about Christ arriving on Passover.

@ 18:14 I’m gonna give you what I would call another locked-down proof that the Lord Jesus Christ comes the night of the Passover.

Passover 2022

I resigned as a Headquarters employee and member of The Restored Church of God in March 2021.

My personal year of release ended in May 2022, and the exrcg.org website launched in June. From the accounts of brethren who attended RCG during that time, David C. Pack taught Jesus Christ would return on Passover, but no transcripts are currently available.

For those interested in listening to Parts 342 through 366, write exrcgwebsite@gmail.com.

Passover 2023 On Time

Part 432 – April 1, 2023
@ 40:00 So, Christ comes to start Passover. Goes back to get His own Kingdom for the second half of the week. And then comes with His own Kingdom at the end of Passover. Now, that’s simplicity in Christ. And it’s utterly and absolutely inarguable.

Passover 2023 On Delay

Part 435 – April 15, 2023 
@ 06:38 So, you may have thought, and I hope just with this first couple points, I’ve alleviated all doubt about whether the Passover is gone and it’s too late. It is not. In fact, I will show ya this was never ever going to be the Passover of Abib 15. That’s impossible.

Passover 2023 On A Bigger Delay

Part 479 – November 11, 2023
@ 1:23:40 And on the next Tuesday, April 16^th, God accepts them. And, then six days later, they’re keeping the Passover on April 22^nd next year. It’s inarguable. I tried to be faithful to when I thought years began.

When David C. Pack is wrong, it is best to blame God.

Part 479 – November 11, 2023
@ 1:24:29 And, obviously, God allowed me to go down that road, or we’da we’da been looking for the wrong year or the year we could say, the right year at the very, very wrong time.

When David C. Pack is wrong, it is best to accuse Jesus Christ of blasphemy.

Part 488 – December 30, 2023
@ 1:48:59 I’ma tell ya. This list is ironclad. There’s no shifting it anymore. Or Christ’s first great act is to break the law of God and blaspheme the Passover. Virtually slander His own day.

Passover 2024 To And Fro

Part 489 – January 6, 2024
@ 1:06:43 Okay. Now, let’s imagine. Let’s imagine that everything started on Passover night. Just WHAM! That’s it. Here’s the here are the here are the problems with that. Let’s just imagine. This is just Abib 15 Passover to Abib 15 Passover. WHAM! Here that's so fraught with problem, I could I could go another hour.

Part 490 – January 13, 2024
@ 50:44 What was never clear to me is the Passover locks everything. Forever. And we’d been it all the way back to the Garden… Every year will start at Passover. That’s why God had to, over these recent weeks, get me to see that.

Part 492 – February 3, 2024
@ 00:28 When do years begin? Were WE right to think that it’s Passover? Is this right? Or is it close?

@ 06:13 And I it bothered me terribly. But I was trying to be faithful to the Passover.

@ 11:14 And that bothered me terribly. How could that be? Utter chaos. Utter chaos on the Passover.

Passover Admission With Denial

Part 505 – April 6, 2024
@ 04:29 Okay, for a long time, often muh-more muh-maybe a couple times couple years, WE believed that this would happen on Passover.

@ 1:15:37 My enemies will say, “He prophesied this date.” I did not. I taught you that as surely as I taught you, I teach you to keep the Sabbath.

Sooner Than Passover 2024

Part 506 – April 9, 2024
@ 15:44 So we we we can't get beyond the Passover. We know that. You know that. That's impossible. But the question becomes, do we get to the Passover? We can't get beyond it. Impossible.

@ 34:01 So believe me, believe me, [chuckles] I'm telling you, and I’m we're nowhere near done. But believe me, you can lock this down as Passover. That's what can't tarry.

@ 1:01:10 I'm glad, in a way, I got it wrong because it allowed me to go back and look much more deeply at some exciting things we're gonna get into.

Later Than Passover 2024

Part 509 – April 20, 2024
@ 42:40 But, you want the truth. My job is to tell the truth. And I and I'm just gonna tell you you know enough now if I stop, there's no possible way every iteration of God's Kingdom doesn't come on a New Moon. So, God shifts the Passover to what looks like Iyar 1.

Brethren experiencing great discomfort with what David C. Pack teaches are not being tricked by the devil, suffering from a lack of faith, or wrestling with a stubborn heart. They are aware that what is presented from the Main Hall at Headquarters is saturated in confusing deceit in overwhelming amounts.

Rediscovering A Previous Discovery

Part 506 – April 9, 2024
@ 29:30 So I I. It struck me just like a ton of bricks. Wait a minute, observe the month of Abib, and keep the Passover of the Lord... You're guarding the month because of the Passover. Now, that hit me like a ton of bricks.

Part 564 – March 22, 2025
@ 1:40:28 This is why you guard Abib. Not because Abib 1 is important. But, observe the month of Avib and keep the Passover. That’s the immediate emphasis. That’s the immediate emphasis. It points to Passover. That’s why you’re watching Abib.

Passover 2025 All Over Again

Part 560 – March 1, 2025
@ 25:50 Now, I could stop in a in essence and just say, “Look. We we’ve proven that the Day of the Lord is Passover.”

Part 564 – March 22, 2025
@ 1:17:11 I I became convicted about Passover and decided not to wait. But rather to eliminate all doubt for us all.

@ 1:22:59 And you you just a as ya as the as the evidence piles up, see if you think it’s remotely possible. I mean the [mumbles] that it’s not Passover.

The evidence that David C. Pack is not led by God to teach any of this continues to pile up. What the brethren perceive is fair, accurate, and authentic, but fear keeps them locked into their seats.

Some value the social club aspect rather than RCG being “the one true church." As long as members continue paying their tithes and Common, their reason for remaining makes no difference to the hirelings at Headquarters. A doubter's money spends just as well as blind zealots.

Brethren of The Restored Church of God, hear and remember the words of your Pastor General.

Part 206 – September 30, 2019
@ 58:22 I could hope it was Trumpets. I could hope it was Pentecost or Passover, but it we didn't know, and I I don’t ever try to say the day anymore.

The members of The Restored Church of God desperately seek comforting counsel from their field mollusks or remotely honest answers from the cowardly hirelings at Headquarters, but no words are of any satisfaction. There is a reason for this.

David C. Pack is a documented blaspheming hypocritical liar, and the enablers at Headquarters knowingly support his prophetic fraud. Their apologetics are thin and lack substance because what they protect lacks substance and biblical truth.

All eyes are on Passover 2025, but only the foolish believe David C. Pack.

Marc Cebrian:

See: All Eyes On Passover

Will Aaron Dean, who is responsible for the spiritual condition of the Church today, truly repent this Passover and return to the one True Church?

 

The sun is shining brightly in California as another crazy day in the wackiness of Armstrongism marches forward in all its heretical glory.  Currently, Samuel Kitchen, the self-appointed overseer of the one true Worldwide Church of God, is galavanting around Jerusalem, preparing for the arrival of the true faithful to stream into the holy land as they seek protection in Petra before the coming calamities soon to hit the world, particularly to those sinful heretical losers in the United States where Germany will soon be setting up concentration camps.

Despite the Kitchen family's posturing to be the true church and to claim they are NOT its leaders, they essentially are the leaders, but yet are rudderless in a sea of heretical splinter groups who are in direct apostasy from the true church. Someone needs to arise to lead the wayward followers of Herbert Armstrong OUT of the hundreds of splinter groups back into the one true faith, the Worldwide Church of God.

Sadly, the man most favored to do this is committing spiritual adultery by being a member of the United Church of God, a fornicating harlot of the one true faith. That man, Aaron Dean, needs to be cleansed of his sins and it just might happen this Passover if he takes it in true humility and deep repentance.

If Aaron does this, then we will see the emergence of the greatest work the world has ever seen as the TRUE Worldwide Church of God marches forth in power and authority with the TRUE church government power structure in place. The world will receive a witness never seen before.

This Passover promises to be HUGE!!!!!!!!

The leading man of the two witnesses, is following after Zerubbabel, who had the seat of Moses, and was NOT A PRIEST. He was used to restore the ministry!

So you see Christ cleaning up the ministry, who vacated the Worldwide Church of God, through an individual who will lead the other Witness when he is cleaned up.

God is still working one man at a time. It is the second witness who leads the Laodicean era(those who repented too late), during the tribulation and brings the close of the church era.

This is why you see through Joshua in Zechariah 6, along with the faithful, finishing the temple or church age.

Also remember, Joshua was the assistant to Zerubbabel. Like Aaron was assistant to Moses.

Although Aaron was the elder.

So for me, for the man who will fulfill the second witness, it has to an assistant to Mr Armstrong at some point.

So the only one I can think of is Aaron Dean. He is attending with another church, committing fornication with this world, and unable to fulfill ministerial duties in the Worldwide Church of God because he is in another group.

It was Aaron Dean, if you believe his testimony, that Mr Armstrong said “God wants you” concerning the next Pastor General, and it was Aaron Dean who moved things towards Tkach Sr.

Now back to what I believe Tkach Sr seemed to be a Thyatirian, God said the latter work would be greater than the former(Rev 2 says this).

Aaron Dean wrote the January 10, 1986 letter that appeared to have come from Herbert W Armstrong! Mr Armstrong didn’t write it. Aaron Dean wrote it, and in that letter Aaron Dean wrote “the greatest work lies ahead”. It is this sentence that motorized Tkach and every splinter group! They all use it for the reason they Incorporated a new organization!

So Aaron Dean is responsible for the spiritual condition of the Church today.

So he stands in filthy clothes as in Zechariah 3. But he cannot be used until he repents and comes back.

If it isn’t Aaron Dean, I don’t know who it would be. It would be someone of the ministry. Let is examine the fruits.

The first witness God used is outside of the ministry like Zerubbabel was outside the priesthood! The second witness represents the ministry, like Aaron the brother of Moses.

Aaron Dean also cowrote with Mr Armstrong the book Mystery of the Ages. Which I feel is the greatest book outside of the Bible.

So I’m just a laymember of the Worldwide Church of God, but I’m advocating for the restoration of the ministry that has vacated, because they learned through Tkach to fornicate with the civil governments and create new churches.

So I warn the people of God and call for their repentance.

I’m not setting out to start a new group. But I am calling people to return to the original group that Christ organized through Herbert W Armstrong. That Spiritual Temple called the Worldwide Church of God!

Will God soon clean up the individual destined to fulfill the Joshua type in Haggai and Zechariah prophecies?

God points certain things out, and the necessity of REPENTANCE, and the necessity of Christ’s blood to make one clean and ready for the job!

Perhaps Passover 2025 is that year?

Concerning God inspiring Mr Armstrong to choose Tkach Sr as Pastor General…we must examine what was stopped through Tkach Sr.

Under this man in Church Administration, his son Joe Tkach Jr and assistant Victor Kubik, added a new REGIONAL STRUCTURE above the field ministry, designed for the purpose of giving the ministry a voice, plus input towards church decisions. That is something Victor Kubik admitted in his “Ground Zero” series on Kubik.org.

This new structure had a roadblock. Through the concentration of power and authority to one man, which Jesus Christ gave to Mr Armstrong and passed on to Joseph Tkach Sr, that “regional structure” was unable to take over the Worldwide Church of God! Yes, Tkach sinned against God and departed from Jesus Christ, but he was chosen for a purpose.

When Victor Kubik ran into this roadblock, he exited and vacated the Worldwide Church of God, taking that regional structure and forming a new church called the United Church of God!

And so we see the roots of every departure the United Church of God has came from this new regional structure!

They were forced to exit and form a separate church using such a structure! Otherwise it would have taken over the Worldwide Church of God! Made it more democratic, just like the liberals in the 1970’s attempted to accomplish through GTA!

We can’t ignore the fruits of this tree.

And Mr Dean has been seduced into this group, unable to perform his ministerial duties within the Worldwide Church of God, and only dealing with the younger next generation as Dean of a College.

It’s something to discuss, pray about and to remember.

Because Satan has been clever! He wants to destroy this Church! But let us remember and always recall, that God is restoring, and building! His Word can never be broken!