Evangelical Leader Dr. Michael Brown Opens Up About His Support For Trump And Where Christians Get It Wrong
Evangelical churches have faced controversy over their widespread support for President Donald Trump. That has been at the center of much consternation among the Left and the mainstream media who routinely criticize Christians who have thrown their hat in the ring for Trump.Christian scholar, radio host, and bestselling author Dr. Michael Brown addresses these issues and more in his upcoming book Donald Trump is Not My Savior: An Evangelical Leader Speaks His Mind About the Man He Supports as President.
The following is an interview with Dr. Brown about his stance on supporting President Trump, how Christians should look at politics, and his thoughts on the current White House Administration.
Q: During the 2016 GOP primaries, you did not support then-candidate Donald Trump, but in fact had endorsed Senator Ted Cruz. Is that right?
Dr. Brown: Yes, that is correct. To be honest, I strongly opposed Donald Trump in the primaries. In fact, when I was doing the audio reading for my new book, I was struck by some of the old articles I had written in opposition. I warned Evangelicals that we could not trust him. Because of his past, I didn’t trust that he was truly pro-life or truly conservative. I kept saying that I hoped I was wrong; that there was something I didn’t see. So, yes, I had grave issues with now President Trump.
Q: The title of your upcoming book is "Donald Trump Is Not My Savior." Even though you did not support President Trump in the primaries, when he won them, you did support him on a pragmatic level. Could you explain your logic when you took that step?
Dr. Brown: I had always said that if Donald Trump won the primaries, I would reevaluate my stance because I could not vote for Hillary Clinton. I had to vote against her. That was always my position.When President Trump won the GOP primaries, I did take seriously that there was something else going on. I could not discount that he was appealing to America in a very serious way.
Several of my fellow Christian ministers were saying that God was doing something through him. One of my fellow Evangelical leaders spent several hours with him and explained to me that Trump was listening to us.
I considered all of this and I knew that he could not have gotten this far unless there was something in his favor.When it was him versus Hillary, I had to hope for the best. I had concerns and fears, but I had to vote against Hillary and the way I can do that is by voting for Donald Trump.
Q: Would you say that you are satisfied with his leadership as President?
Dr. Brown: I’m thrilled with a lot of what he has accomplished and amazed by how steadfast he has been. I would say my fears are still there. His style can be divisive. He can lower the general discourse. I’m even seeing Evangelical leaders sinking to a certain level of nastiness.On the other hand, he has exceeded my expectations. The President has been more committed, more steadfast, and more conservative on the issues that matter to me.
Moving the embassy to Jerusalem, who he has nominated on the Supreme Court and federal courts, what he’s done to push back against LGBT extremism, exposing the media bias, and revealing how the Democrats are moving further to the Left are all things for which I give him a thumbs up.
Q: What would you say about the criticism of some Evangelical Christian leaders, who seemed to be using their spiritual influence to garner votes for Donald Trump?
Dr. Brown: There are three factors with this.One, there were some Evangelical leaders who thought Donald Trump was being raised up as some sort of "Cyrus" figure, similar to President Harry Truman when he voted to restore Israel as a nation. Cyrus was a pagan king who God used to restore Israel. There were some people who argued for that and I believe there is truth to it, but there’s a difference between what we are doing and what God is doing.
The second thing, for me, there are life and death decisions. I often challenge people about voting for a pro-abortion candidate. You cannot vote for a candidate who is for abortion and not share in the guilt of that.The third thing is, yes, we, as Conservative Christians, have gotten in bed with a political party. It is an error of the largely white Evangelical churches where we’ve become an appendage of the Republican Party.
We are overstating things when we say, "The country is on a path to destruction and Donald Trump is going to save us." Donald Trump did not die for my sins. I don’t owe him my life. Jesus died for my sins; I give Him my life. Donald Trump gets my vote.They are two very separate things. Politics is not the Gospel. Let’s not mix them.
Q: Then how should Christians approach this presidency?
Dr. Brown: We don’t want to divide on Donald Trump. We’re not going to be asked on Judgement Day, "Did you vote for or against Trump?" We can discuss our differences. If we have a unity around the Gospel, we have to say "Family first."
Donald Trump did not give his life for me and I do not owe him my life, hence the title of my book. However, Donald Trump has done a better job of fighting abortion than Hillary Clinton would have. There is a genocide against Christians in the Middle East. I think he can do a better job of fighting that than Hillary Clinton could have. Just go down the issues.That is a warning for Evangelicals. We can’t make America great again until it is good and it can’t be good without God. Everything else comes second to that.
Q: How do you want to impact the people who read your book?
Dr. Brown: I want them to get a healthy perspective on politics and the Gospel. I want them to get out in large numbers to vote in the mid-terms and the 2020 election. I want them to preserve their soul without getting into political divisions.I want them to have courage to say when the media says, “You have to renounce Donald Trump to have credibility.” I want them to reply, “You didn’t give me credibility before.”That is just a ploy of the Left to push us away.I want my readers to know that they can vote based on principles, not personality.