Kenneth Copeland - Why Donald Trump Is Right for America?
Kenneth Copeland: Hello everybody, I'm Kenneth Copeland. This is the "Believer's Voice of Victory" broadcast. Let's have a word of prayer. We'll get right into today's broadcasting message.
Father, we thank you, we are so grateful to you. We're grateful for the demonstration of your power, in this great nation. And we know that our nation has serious, serious problems in it, but we also know that this is the only nation ever, ever founded on the planet for the express desire, to worship and praise you. And we thank you Sir, that you will never forget it. We praise you for it, we honor you in it. And it's in the Name of Jesus we pray, Amen.
Kenneth Copeland: We have a very special guest here today. You may not recognize him just when you see him. But when you say Charisma Magazine, oh yeah, I know that guy, well, this is the guy Stephen Strang. Stephen, God bless you sir.
Stephen Strang: And God bless you.
Kenneth Copeland: Amen.
Stephen Strang: Thank you for having me.
Kenneth Copeland: A partner to this ministry for a long, long lot of years, we've been together, 40 years. I remember the cover, my Lord, I don't know why you wanted a mug like this on the cover of the magazine, but that's your problem. The 40th anniversary of the magazine. And I thought, look what this guy has done. And you just blessed me for a long, long, long, long time.
Stephen Strang: And you've blessed me. I was a young journalist Charisma Magazine wasn't very big. I flew out here to do an interview with you. And your ministry was just starting to explode. You were on the radio, but you weren't yet on TV.
Kenneth Copeland: Oh those were the days.
Stephen Strang: And you didn't have these nice facilities here back then.
Kenneth Copeland: I didn't have any facility...
Stephen Strang: But people were talking about what God was doing and also the message that you are preaching and the lead of my story, 'cause I pulled it out and re-read it, was that faith was something that you could use, like a workman uses a tool. Maybe a hammer, and I had never thought of that and it impacted me. And years later, when I re-read the article, I saw that I thought that's where I heard it. Because I had never thought, even though I grew up in Pentecostal church, that faith was something that you could use. And we're not here to talk about me or Charisma, but literally I had to believe it off the ground. Like lift on an airplane, if that makes sense.
Kenneth Copeland: Oh, I remember.
Stephen Strang: And I got a lot of that from you and your ministry and also observing and being inspired by what I saw.
Kenneth Copeland: Praise God. Well, I learned that from my father in the faith Oral Roberts, that because it was so obvious that he used faith as a tool, like a mechanic would go to his toolbox and get the right tool for that job. And my first day in the invalid room and he walked in there and he said, "You're gonna do the praying. You're gonna do the laying on of hands". And he kinda laughed, he could see all the color leaving my face suddenly. 'cause these are the sickest of the sick in there. And we've got very, very, very sick people, crowds. We just really make them nervous and they're uncomfortable and in pain. And he said, "Now don't touch them until you're ready to release your faith". You use it, it's a spiritual force, but you use it. I'd been studying the power and authority in the Name of Jesus. And he preached that day on the point of contact. Ah, I said, my point of contact is the Name of Jesus. And I will speak that Name when I touch them. We had miracles that day that just, oh dear Lord. I mean, I can still see it in one woman, just spit a stomach can... malignant tumor out on the floor. And that was my introduction to the ministry of faith.
Stephen Strang: Well, Oral Roberts is a great man. One of the greatest of our entire generation.
Kenneth Copeland: And became very, very close over the years. And I just get to talking about him, I miss him a lot. Stephen, you and I, are extremely passionate about this country. I was in the United States Army and it kinda irritated me 'cause I didn't have a war to go to. It really did, I'd still give my life for it in a heartbeat. And I've given my life to the Kingdom of God, but I've also given any kinda little influence that I can have in any way to this nation. Let's open our Bibles, our golden text for this week will be first of all, obviously from Proverbs 29:2. "When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice, but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn". That word translated wicked comes from twisted. Wicker, wicker furniture. It's like twisted rope or something. It's twisted. Well, that's what that's indicating, twisted thinking, twisted ideas in a lot of ways that don't even make sense. Now, the Democratic Party... "Are you, Brother Copeland, and you saying it's a wicked party"? No, I'm not. But they have continued, and continued, and continued over the years. Now, I've been doing this a long time. Like I said, I'm almost 84 years old. I've seen a lot of things and been a voting age a lot of years, I've never seen anything like this before, nothing that even comes close. It became twisted. When the leadership, I'm not talking about the Democratic Party, I'm talking about the leadership of the Democratic Party. You go over here to this eighth chapter of Romans, 13th chapter of Romans, "Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil will thou be afraid of the power or the authority, do that which is good, you shall have praise to the same for he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if you do that which is evil, be afraid for He beareth not the sword in vain. He's the minister of God". But wait a minute, the leadership of the Democratic Party decided we don't want anything to do with God. Passed resolution to that effect, but we wanna support baby murder, we wanna support perversion where it is it's twisted thinking. Now, on the other hand, that's all I wanna talk about Democratic Party. They're irrelevant anyway. Mr. Trump, now you have as an investigative reporter, of course, I look at everything like this and he looks at everything. with a magnifying glass. Thank God, he does. And this by the way, as you know, I read this while it was still a manuscript. I studied this book, "God, Trump, and the 2020 Elections". This ought to be required reading for every Christian in the United States. I was most particularly, and on this first broadcast, to me this is there's two things here that are so predominant. When you spoke of black Americans, Democrats and Donald Trump, that's chapter three, of course. And what's happening there? I mean, talk to us about that and as a reporter, how did you see that and how did you report on it?
Stephen Strang: Well, I was trained to be a secular journalist and the press was very liberal even back when I was in college, but there was at least a semblance of truth and trying to get facts right. Back in that era, it was also a very difficult era in our nation's history. We had riots at the Democratic National Convention in 1968.
Kenneth Copeland: I remember the...
Stephen Strang: Several very prominent assassinations, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The cities were burning, it was a very difficult time, not unlike this. And I was always interested in political science, but I was also a turned on Christian, newly filled with the Holy Spirit and on fire for God as they say, and I quickly lost interest in secular journalism. And why was I as a journalist? How was I gonna serve the Lord? Well, the way, the door that the Lord open to me was Charisma Magazine plus all the other things that we've done. And so during this time, we have tried to document the moves of God in our various revivals, but we also documented what's happening in the bigger culture. And the bigger culture has been getting farther and farther from God, as you were just saying. Now, it's not new, it's been going on for a long time, in some ways has been going on since the beginning of time. But we've seen an acceleration since World War II and it's getting worse and worse and worse. So, I've tried to bring this Christian perspective to help understand what is going on. And our country ever since shortly after Washington has been two-party country. The Democrats were founded by slave owners. They were the ones that wanted to keep slavery. The Republican Party was actually started, the Whig Party collapsed. And so the Republican Party kinda rose to fight slavery in its place. And we had a bloody Civil War, 600,000 Americans on both sides died, and we got rid of this curse of slavery. But when that happened, the freed slaves got all their rights, the 12th, 13th and 14th Amendments, et cetera, et cetera, they were elected to Congress back during reconstruction. All this stuff happened. All of the freed slaves, all of them were Republicans because it was a party of Lincoln. The Democrats wanted to keep slavery. Even the Democrats in the North wanted to make peace with the South. And as if had been two countries, America would have never been the great country it is, had there been the United States of America and the Confederate States of America.
Kenneth Copeland: Not any...
Stephen Strang: We would have been like Canada or something, with Quebec and the rest of Canada or something like that. And so I believe that in that horrible era, God raised raised up Abraham Lincoln and others to save this country. And look what has happened in terms of sending the gospel around the world and all kinds of things that have happened since then, America saved democracy for the world, not once but twice, that would not have happened. And so you get back to the whole Democratic thing. The Democrats were for slavery. They were the ones that passed all the laws to take away voting rights and all that, we called 'em in South, we called him Jim Crow Laws.
Kenneth Copeland: Mm-hmm, I remember that.
Stephen Strang: There were segregated schools. I mean, I can remember going to segregated schools in Florida. And it was the Democrats and the whole South was Democrat because it wasn't the party of Lincoln. So this is...
Kenneth Copeland: Ku Klux Klan was Democrat.
Stephen Strang: You're exactly right, it was a terrorist arm of the Democratic Party. These statues that people are pulling over these Confederate statutes. Every single one of them was a Democrat. Every single Jim Crow Law was passed by Democratic Legislature, and signed by Democratic governor, every single one, no exceptions. So, somehow it almost seems illogical that all these years later, the black community mainly votes Democratic because it was the party of slavery. And in some ways I've heard people make arguments. And I think they make sense that even now the way they kinda control the population is trying to keep African Americans on the plantation. Now, you could probably argue both sides of that, but I mean, in a manner of speaking. So, let me be quick to say for many years I was a Democrat. It was 'cause I lived in the South. And our governor, and senators and all those people were Democrats and in Florida where I live, you have to be in one party or the other. And a lot of the elections were decided at the Democratic primary. I'd left, it was like Ronald Reagan said he didn't leave the Democratic Party, the Democratic party left him.
Kenneth Copeland: Now, that happened to my dad, exactly that same thing.
Stephen Strang: And I left over the abortion issue, in the 1990s. And of course a lot of other things have happened. Now, I wanna be quick to say, I do not defend the Republican Party. The Republicans are part of the problem too. I mean, was it that much difference between Bush and Gore? Between Clinton and Dole? I mean, I don't think so. This has been part of the problem and I believe that God has raised up this disruptor, to disrupt the status quo in lots of ways. This isn't just the Democrats nominate somebody, the Republicans nominate somebody. I mean, that happens on the calendar every time an election rolls around, but this is more than that. God raised up a disruptor, somebody from outside the system, somebody who had never held political office, he didn't owe anything to anyone 'cause he paid for his campaign himself in the early days, of course he doesn't anymore, but he didn't owe people things. And what happened was, as things evolved, Christians actually used to be more Democratic, William Jennings Bryan who ran for president as a Democrat, I think it was 1912, was a strong evangelical. He was the one who remember the "Scopes Monkey Trial" in Tennessee.
Kenneth Copeland: I remember that.
Stephen Strang: He was the one that pled case and lost. But he was a strong Christian, that's just one example. And so it really until...
Kenneth Copeland: Now, Stephen, I mean, he would never have believed that the Democratic Party would support abortion.
Stephen Strang: You're absolutely right.
Kenneth Copeland: He would never have accepted it.
Stephen Strang: It wasn't even thinkable back then.
Kenneth Copeland: No, it was unthinkable thing.
Stephen Strang: And there was wickedness back then and there, you can say good things or bad things about both parties, but as it evolved, at least the Republicans said they were for life and they for constitutional. Now, they would say that when the election was on and then when they were in power, they wouldn't do anything about it. I mean, look at George W. Bush, said he would move the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem his first day in office, he never did it. And neither did Obama after him. And neither did Clinton before him. It was Donald Trump who said he would do it and did it. And now he's come up with this peace plan with the UAE, or the UEA and has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. I mean, it's just absolutely amazing that he makes promises and he keeps his promises.
Kenneth Copeland: That was gonna be the next thing I wanted you to point out. If he said he's gonna do it, he did it.
Stephen Strang: And that is such that it is so unusual. It is stunning, because nobody does Republicans or Democrats at governors, mayors I mean, we're exaggerating a little bit, but that is the norm instead of the exception, Donald Trump is an outsider. He's a businessman, he sees that regulations and all these different things hold back businesses. He just gets it. He gets it on lots and lots of levels. He's a great leader. There's lots of reasons to like Donald Trump, him being a great leader, him not being afraid of the establishment, him not being afraid of political correctness. All of those things are very, very important reasons to vote for him. But as Christians there's even more, and it's more of the moral issues and it's things like life, the sanctity of marriage. But it also goes with honesty, character throughout the culture, popular entertainment as you know, and the internet and everything else is filthy. We don't talk about it much anymore in the church, but I mean, there's just lots of things besides those two issues that Christians need to be concerned about. And the latest one of course is our religious liberty. For, ever since our constitution was put into place, we have had freedom of religion. That's why many people, my own ancestors came to America for freedom of religion. And they knew what it was like in Europe, with the State church and the Protestants fighting the Catholics and everything else was going on. And we have had it's in our First Amendment, the freedom of religion and the freedom of assembly. Now we're seeing with this COVID-19 pandemic that you've got governors and mayors who are saying the church isn't essential, that our pastors actually being arrested for holding church.
Kenneth Copeland: Stephen, our good friend in Minneapolis, he had church, he had to sue the governor and the mayor to have church. Well, of course he won it, but that's.
Stephen Strang: We would have never thought we would live long enough to see that. And here's what's happened. The pandemic created unusual circumstances where these people had more power than normal, to make people stay home from work and all that kinda thing. So, they showed their true colors, okay? It isn't just that they disagree with us on a woman's choice or something. They showed their true colors, not every single one, but most of them are hostile to the gospel. They think people like us are dangerous. And I've said immediately.
Kenneth Copeland: They have said so.
Stephen Strang: They think so.
Kenneth Copeland: They've said so.
Stephen Strang: They call us haters because God hates sin.
Kenneth Copeland: Undesirables.
Stephen Strang: Deplorables.
Kenneth Copeland: Deplorable was the word, well it means the same thing.
Stephen Strang: Same thing. And we've sort of known it, but they've shown their true colors. And when it gets right down to it, that's what's at stake in this election because these problems are gonna go on for a long time. The Church, we're gonna have our work to do after this election. But if the other side gets in, we see what they want to do. And there are this legislation, like the Equality Act that you and I were talking about earlier.
Kenneth Copeland: That's atrocious.
Stephen Strang: That he says, he's gonna try to get passed on day one, which will absolutely take away our religious liberties and actually make us persecuted. And I have always tried to be very measured in what I say and what I write. My books like this one, for example, full of footnotes. If we couldn't verify it, we didn't put it in there. I don't, I'm suspicious of people that are alarmists. I just have been my whole career. We know the story about the little boy that cried wolf.
Kenneth Copeland: That's right, I was just saying that.
Stephen Strang: And I feel that sometimes alarmism is like that. But listen, I'm out there in the street now yelling "Wolf" at the top of my lungs because I see what's happened. We can't ignore this anymore. And I've been active in these things for many years, but I ask myself, what could I have done more? What could other Christians have done more? But right now, I'm standing up and saying, we have got to reelect this president. I do believe he'll be reelected, but we're gonna have our work cut out for us afterwards 'cause you know the other side is going to come back even stronger to try to get their own version of a Donald Trump in the sense of somebody that's maybe out of the mainstream or whatever that people would rally to and we have our work. So, this isn't a one and done, but the thing is we cannot be passive. Let them get into power. If they get into power, it's game over, we might as well pack up and go home. The only thing is there's no new world for us to go to, to get religious freedom. Like there was with the Europeans 300 years ago and the Church needs to wake up because we've been asleep at the wheel. These things have happened on our watch and they don't maybe affect us personally. And or our little church, and we're having a revival or whatever's going on and all that's good and all that's important. But we have turned the culture over to the other side and they flipped everything around. Good, the Bible talked about it. Good being evil and evil being good. And that has happened. And we see it with our own eyes and it isn't just a theory anymore. It's documented, in fact, I have in here, in this little book that I wrote as a sequel, I have a whole chapter on how we're losing our religious freedoms as a result of COVID-19.
Kenneth Copeland: And we're out of time. We'll just take it up there tomorrow. Along with a lot of other things to, praise the Lord, in that good, come on.