“I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name. But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death.” You may say to yourselves, “How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the Lord?” If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the Lord has not spoken. – Deuteronomy 18:19-22, NIV
Ironic, isn’t it, that the folks—many of them pastors who declare themselves to be prophets—who want to transform the USA into a theocratic Christian nation gloss over the dire warning seen above?
Do as I Say, Not as I Do
These folks want America’s inhabitants to submit to Old Testament laws—except when those laws apply to their own transgressions. Especially notable among those transgressions are their numerous false prophecies, particularly about this nation’s elections. Kat Kerr, Kenneth Copeland, Steve Strang, Greg Locke, Paula White, Jeremiah Johnson, Cindy Jacobs, Robert Jeffress, Pat Robertson, Johnny Enlow, Jeff Jansen, Sid Roth, Robin Bullock, Mark Taylor, Mario Murillo, Hank Kunneman, and Lance Wallnau are among the thousands of “Christian leaders” who have repeatedly been wrong in their prophecies about election results.
Notable among that list is Jeremiah Johnson, the lone exception who admitted his error and did as the Bible prescribes—he repented; he quit “prophesying.” The others continue their false prophecies with impunity. None has been penalized or even sanctioned. However, a few have ceased prophesying, not because they repented, but rather because their obstinate refusal to be vaccinated against the Covid virus cost them their lives.
Covid Calculations
Speaking of Covid and false prophets, I’d be remiss if I failed to mention “prophets” who made wildly false claims about that potentially deadly virus. For example, Pastor Rick Wiles was one among many pastors who refused to be vaccinated against the Covid virus, and on his “TruNews” website and podcast encouraged others to do the same. He went so far as to claim that the vaccine introduces an egg that hatches inside the body and turns into a parasite. (Perhaps he’d spent too much time ogling Sigourney Weaver in the Alien movies.) Wiles and many within his “TruNews” crew were infected with the Covid virus and needed months to recover—though none had any evidence of parasitic infections.
Dr. Sherri Tenpenny probably is the most prominent purveyor of Covid vaccine conspiracies. You might remember her congressional testimony where she made a fool of herself by claiming that the vaccine magnetizes those who submit to it. Like the kitchen utensils her followers tried to attach to their bodies, none of the doctor’s claims stuck.
In the summer of 2021, a friend asked me to join her in ghostwriting a book. The clients would be a Christian book publisher and the "author"—Dr. Sherri Tenpenny. I was happy at the prospect of another new ghostwriting project, so I did what I usually do in such an occasion; I googled “Dr. Sherri Tenpenny.” Oh my! What a crackpot. Bonkers! A total quack!
Then I began to peruse the files the publisher sent. Among the crazy assertions was one that predicted that every person who received the vaccine would die by the end of the year. That, apparently, was the reason for the rush to complete the book by the end of September. They had to get it on bookshelves in time to turn a profit before the majority of Earth’s population kicked the bucket. Fortunately, the whole project fell apart.
And now, more than a year later, how does Dr. Tenpenny justify her prediction of mass deaths? It seems she was correct; we who received the vaccine did die. We’re not really here; we’ve been replaced by avatars that look and sound like us.
Yes, these nutso claims seem too bizarre for anyone to accept. But these crazy conspiracy-spouting false prophets still have more than enough followers to continue living a life of ease and opulence. Gullibility rules in MAGA land.
Outmaneuvered by "Demoncrats"
Meanwhile, all the “leaders” listed above “prophesied” that Donald Trump would be re-elected in the 2020 election. Following Trump’s loss, nearly all of them became prominent election deniers, shouting from their pulpits that the election was rigged. That’s how they excuse missing the mark with their prophecies. It seems God tried to bring about Trump’s re-election, but apparently the evil, Satan-inspired “Demoncrats” outmaneuvered the not-so-sovereign Sovereign.
Worse yet, all those “leaders” who are still alive—except Jeremiah Johnson—have continued to make false prophecies. Like so many others, they were sure God told them He would stir up that massive red Tsunami in the 2022 mid-term election. So, again, they have no recourse other than to claim election fraud. Again, it seems God was unable to overcome the evil machinations of the “commie Demoncrats” who are, apparently by their reckoning, grossly incompetent at governing but startlingly prodigious at rigging elections.
Amplifying white evangelicals’ culpability in these false prophecies and the resultant damage done to the entire nation as well as to the gospel message they claim to esteem is the deafening silence of many evangelical leaders who abhor the MAGA movement but who are too cowardly to speak up. Deitrich Bonhoeffer, the German pastor who openly spoke against the Nazis, was right when he declared, “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”
Rational, non-MAGA evangelical pastors and leaders have a duty to speak out—openly and forcefully—against the MAGA push for a white Christian nationalism. That so few have done so is a disgrace not unnoticed by our unbelieving neighbors. White evangelical churches will continue to decline in numbers and in influence until—or unless—they repent of this noxious MAGA movement and hold to account the false prophets within their ranks.