Following the rise of U.S. President Donald Trump's political career, a new fad quickly rose across the world: Trump shaming. There are memes, jokes, articles, satire pieces, and opinions that all predict an impending doom for the Trump presidency. For many willing to openly show their support for Donald Trump, waves of abuse and mocking quickly build up online.
As Christians, how do we respond?
The key to understanding leadership is this: We'll never have a leader who will be able to please everyone. That's because we'll never have a perfect leader.
I've been reading a lot lately of the first and second Kings. The sequence of leadership that Judah and Israel had was nothing short of dismal and appalling. Leader after leader doing the wrong things just deepened the nation's problems. Sure there were a few good ones every now and then, but even they made the wrong decisions.
If there's one thing that we can learn from leaders — even Godly ones sometimes — is that we cannot put our full trust in them. The temptation to criticise, shame and refuse to submit to them is always there.
But then Jesus changed everything. In Mark 12:17, He says, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's."
What seemed to be Jesus' simple comment to one political issue — taxes — turned into a principle that would govern all thoughts on leadership and politics.
Give to Trump What Is Trump's
Romans 13:1 commands us, "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God."
At the time of this writing, the Christians were struggling with the tyrannical rule of Emperor Nero. Paul responds the same way Jesus did: urging people to give leaders what was due them.
Respect is due towards President Trump, not because of who he is, but because of the seat he holds. God urges us to submit to authority because that authority was authored by God. God has worked through both bad and good leaders and will ultimately have his way and continue to guide the history of man no matter who is in charge. What He asks us to do is to trust Him and subject ourselves to the authority of the land.
God Is in Charge
I am no Trump fanatic. I know that there are things about him that are hard to respect and that he fails to hit the mark in so many ways. But so have all leaders who have come before Him. At the end of the day, however, we can trust that through his weakness, Christ's strength can still manifest.
If God wanted to, he could take any leader out of position right then and there. But He has His own ways and they are higher than ours, and He has His own timing, which is different to ours. At the end of the day, He is in charge and we can trust that His plans will always be good, pleasing and perfect.
God only asks that we do our part and submit to authority and to give leaders what is due them.
