This was my day. Author Tim Alberta came out with a new book this past Tuesday. I stopped in my nearest Barnes & Noble a couple of days ago but it was already sold out. It was a busy week....but I finally had a chance to call around for the book today. I called four Barnes & Nobles....a couple of them over an hour drive away....for I wanted the book....today....and all of them were sold out already. So I began calling some independent bookstores....with the same result. My wife just kept rolling her eyes and I kept calling bookstores....and then the libraries. I tried one last Barnes & Noble....and they were sold out also but said that the store closest to me....that I had been in just two days ago....should have five copies. I thought this must be a mistake but called the close-by B&N....and sure enough they just got an order in....but it was still in the back in boxes. Well...the clerk had heard my story....and said that she would go back and find the copies. I showed up two hours later.....and the the book was waiting for me at the counter!
OK....now for the book....sort of. Tim Alberta published his first book back in July of 2019. I have to continue to segue a little. I voted for Trump in 2016....and celebrated....but within a few months I found out that there was something terribly wrong with this man that we evangelicals really knew little about. So I started reading about him....books against him....and books for him....and even books by him. A few months ago I was up to 98 books on Trump. That's not a typo....98 books! One of those was that 2019 book by Tim Alberta....American Carnage....On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War....and the Rise of President Trump. I thought it was a very well-written book....so when his new book came out this week....I wanted to read it right away!
The title of that book that is in my hands is....The Kingdom, The Power, And The Glory....American Evangelicals In An age of Extremism. I have only read the prologue so far. We all know that we do not know what a day brings....so I can only say that....Lord willing....I will try to publish a post on this book after I read it....but I want to put something in from the prologue. Tim Alberta's father was a long-time pastor of an evangelical church in Michigan...and thus Tim the son was raised in it. His first book had just come out....and his father passed away suddenly....and the author was back home to give the eulogy at the funeral....and he was confronted by people in his church....this at the funeral....because of this book critical of Trump.
I post on this topic often. Pastors are in general not warning at all on Donald Trump....and the effect he has had on the church....even after so many years of carnage. This Christian nationalism as it is called had so infiltrated the church....that if a pastor warns about it....the church might be disrupted....and even split. I had dinner with two evangelical friends just last evening and asked them about this concerning their own churches....and it seems that the topic is never broached. Consequently years pass....and the sheep are not warned. I have seen the results of this....Ichabod....the glory has departed the church....along with discernment on the nearness of the return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ....or even the hope of the nearness of the return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Ultimately....we have followed this errant path....because....primarily....we want the glory that does not lead to eternal life. The title of this post is James 4:1.
