Religious-right activist Ralph Reed appeared on Daystar’s “Joni Table Talk” program last week to promote his new book, “For God and Country: The Christian Case for Trump.” During the broadcast, Reed complained that evangelical Christians have repeatedly been “demeaned” for supporting President Donald Trump despite the fact that they have been completely “vindicated” as the president has systematically enacting their political agenda.
“I think what Christians saw was not a perfect man because none of us are perfect,” Reed said, repeating the standard phrase used by evangelicals in defending Trump. “Not someone who had never failed to sin or make mistakes. He’s acknowledged that he’s a sinner, as we all are.”
Reed’s claim that Trump has acknowledged that he is a sinner obviously conflicts with Trump’s own repeated declarations that he doesn’t ask God for forgiveness because he is a good person who doesn’t “do a lot of things that are bad.”
Nevertheless, host Joni Lamb agreed with Reed’s description of Trump, asserting that “there definitely is something that has happened to him spiritually because there’s no way that he would go through what he’s gone through to fight for these things that are important to us had he not had some type of encounter with the Lord.”
“The real message of the book is that citizenship is not an option if you’re a believer, it’s an obligation,” Reed stated later in the program. “And these tens of millions of Christians who prayed, who wrestled with Jacob, who struggled with a very difficult decision in 2016, and then 81 percent of them voted for Donald Trump, they were vindicated by what he’s done to advance the values and principles that beat in their hearts and give meaning to their souls. They were vindicated. And I for one am tired of seeing them attacked and demeaned for making the decision they made.”
