NC pastor calls Trump’s ‘God Bless the USA’ Bible ‘blasphemous’

A North Carolina pastor has gone viral after urging his congregants not to embrace the “God Bless the USA Bible,” which was endorsed by former President Donald Trump and contains documents critical to the founding of the United States.

Pastor Loran Livingston of Central Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, condemned the “God Bless the USA Bible” in a sermon delivered on April 14. Excerpts from the sermon have been viewed millions of times after several users shared them on social media in recent times. to dawn.

During Holy Week, Trump endorsed the “God Bless the USA” Bible in a video posted to Truth Social last month. The special edition of the Bible retails for $59.99 and includes copies of the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Pledge of Allegiance, along with the handwritten chorus of the Lee Greenwood song “God Bless the USA’, which is often played during Trump’s rallies.

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Livingston warned that “people who do not read the Bible and pray will mix politics with church.”

“Some of you are bringing politics into the church,” he complained. “You think politics are spiritual things.”

Livingston pushed back on this idea, claiming that “politics is of this world.” He addressed a message to people of whom he said, “Bring politics into the Church,” he told them, “You think it is your duty to be political about this, that and the other.”

“No!” he exclaimed. “It is your duty to serve the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, body and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself.”

Livingston urged the council not to tell him about his “spiritual responsibility to vote” because “I have no spiritual responsibility to vote.” Instead, he characterized voting as a “civil privilege.”

He claimed that the belief that voting is a “spiritual responsibility” stems from an inability to read the Bible.

“If you’re not reading and praying, you’re saying, ‘Wow, there’s a Bible out now that has the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, isn’t that great?’” Livingston said. ‘No! It’s disgusting, it’s blasphemous, it’s a trick. Are you joking? Some of you are so encouraged by that?”

Livingston said, “The gospel is not an American gospel; it is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.” He argued that it is inappropriate to juxtapose historical, foundational U.S. documents with the word of God, as the “God Bless the USA” Bible does.

He compared the U.S. Constitution’s use of the phrase “of the people, by the people, and for the people” and the repeated use of the term “the people” with the Biblical message “from Him, through Him, through Him, to It’. , from Him are all things,” suggesting that the dueling ideas were incompatible.

“If you glory in things like that, you don’t have a prayer life. If you glory in that kind of mess, political mess, you don’t know what the word of God says,” Livingston emphasized. “This is not my home. This world is not my home.”

“My true citizenship lies in heaven, from which we look for the Lord Jesus Christ, who is going to change our vile body so that it can be made… into His glorious body,” he added.

Trump made headlines and drew mixed reactions from Christians after he appeared in a video saying, “This Bible reminds us that the most important thing we have to bring America back and make America great again is our religion.”

The former president suggested that having the founding documents next to the Bible was a good way to draw attention to the influence of Judeo-Christian teachings on America’s founding documents. He also encouraged his followers to read the Bible, suggesting that many of the problems facing the US stem from the fact that “we have lost religion in this country.”

Livingston is not the first religious figure to express concern about the God Bless the USA Bible.

Andrew Walker, a professor of ethics and public policy at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kentucky, wrote an op-ed emphasizing that “the merging of America’s founding documents with the Word of God is a syncretistic expression of civil religion that goes beyond what those who love their country—and, more importantly, for those who love their Bible—should ever allow.”

“To put it bluntly, a Bible like this should never have been made,” he added. “That’s not because I’m anti-Bible or anti-Constitution. In fact, I’m a big believer in both. They fuel both my heavenly and my earthly citizenship. But the conflation of the two in the name of religious-civil identity can quickly becoming a form of identity politics for the political right.”

Tony Perkins, president of the Washington-based Christian conservative advocacy group Family Research Council, told The Christian Post in a statement that he is okay with Trump promoting the Bible if it encourages someone to read it.

“The truths of the Bible change lives,” Perkins said. “A daily dose of the Bible is the best anti-anxiety drug you can find.”

The Trump campaign does not make any money from the Bible as it is “not owned, operated or controlled by Donald J. Trump, The Trump Organization, CIC Ventures LLC or any of their respective principals or affiliates,” according to the website of the Bible.

“GodBlessTheUSABible.com uses the name, likeness and image of Donald J Trump under paid license from CIC Ventures LLC, which license may be terminated or revoked according to its terms,” the site said.