The assassination of Charlie Kirk left me stunned. I grieved and felt uneasy about what his murder said about the state of public dialogue regarding politics and social issues. 

I had just wrapped up work that day in my home office. I went to check my timeline on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter and there I read the news: “Conservative activist Charlie Kirk assassinated at Utah university.”¹ Source: https://apnews.com/article/charlie-kirk-conservative-activist-shot-546165a8151104e0938a5e085be1e8bd I didn’t know much about Kirk outside of his advocacy for conservative political agendas. I learned Kirk left behind a wife, who courageously forgave her husband’s killer, and two young children. In reading about his family, I whispered out loud: Lord have mercy. 

In the days that followed I saw several people reflecting on Kirk’s social impact and heralding his death as one of a Christian martyr, which surprised me because I didn’t know Kirk claimed to be a Christian. After a quick Google search, I found that Charlie Kirk is indeed my Christian brother. As I worked to understand why so many saw Kirk as a Christian martyr, I looked with some depth into the organization he founded.

Turning Point USA, the non-profit organization he founded in 2012, serves to “identify, educate, train, and organize students to promote the principles of fiscal responsibility, free markets, and limited government.”²Source: https://tpusa.com/contactus/. This mission statement is consistent with the limited knowledge I had of Kirk before his death. He worked as a right-wing political activist focused on college campuses where he would openly debate students on issues related to politics, social justice, and religion.

I discovered that Turning Point USA has an initiative called “TPUSA Faith” which works to “equip the church to stand for ‘biblical truth,’ combat cultural compromises, and inspire a return to foundational Christian values.”³Source: https://tpusafaith.com/about/. This equipping includes online courses like “Politics Easy as PIE,” “Faith in the Public Square,” “Who Is the King in America?,” “Should Christians Be Involved in Politics,” as well as other courses on freedom from pornography, Christian apologetics, and marriage. 

The stated purpose to “return to foundational Christian values,” and the emphasis on political activism, made it clear to me that this organization, as well as its founder, exhibit tendencies found within Christian nationalism, which for me is not in harmony with the gospel or the mission of the church. I don’t doubt the authenticity of Kirk’s Christian faith, but the blending together of right-wing political activism with the Christian faith is perhaps why I did not know much about him until his tragic death.

I’m very much interested in the development of Christian faith. I have little to no interest in political activism. 

Defining Christian Nationalism 

I don’t consider the phrase “Christian nationalism” to be an immediate pejorative. Moreover, I don’t equate Christian nationalism with patriotism. which I define as love for one’s political nation. 

Glenn Packiam, Lead Pastor of Rockharbor Church in Costa Mesa, California, recently published an insightful article on his Substack entitled “What is Christian Nationalism, Actually?” He indicates that describing Christian nationalism is nuanced because some people and ideas that get labeled “Christian Nationalism,” are in fact something else. He lays out five categories in which to describe the mixture of politics with Christian faith, which creates a spectrum with Christian nationalism on one side and Christian patriotism on the other. 

Glenn draws from Andrew Whitehead and Samuel Perry’s 2020 book Taking America Back for God (A must read!) to form the following definition. For Glenn, Christian nationalism is “the belief that the Christian God is responsible for America’s history, is central to America’s identity, and is invested in America’s destiny.”⁴Source: https://glennpackiam.substack.com/p/what-is-christian-nationalism. Christian nationalists believe America was founded by the Christian God and therefore Christian values must be predominant in American culture. While this is a good summation of Christian nationalist’s beliefs, it doesn’t address Christian nationalist’s actions.

While there is not one exact definition among political scientists and religion experts for Christian nationalism, most would define it as a mixture of some form of Christian faith with a given political ideology. Dr. Corwin Smidt, senior research fellow at the Henry Institute for the Study of Religion and Politics at Calvin College, defines Christian nationalism as “seeking to privilege the Christian faith within American social and political life through governmental action.”⁵Source: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/15/11/1364

The important part of Smidt’s definition is found at the end: “through governmental action.” Those who subscribe to Christian nationalism seek to bring glory to God (a religious motivation) by advocating for Christian values and “biblical truth” by means of legislation, political lobbying, campaigning, and seeking to win culture war battles, which are all political actions.

As far as I’m concerned, Christians living in a modern nation state with a republican form of government are free to vote according to their consciences and advocate for whatever forms of legislation they feel aligns with their understanding of Christian faith. But Christian nationalism, as a form of partisan political activism, has nothing to do with the gospel of King Jesus. Seeking to proclaim the Kingdom of God through the force of government is a complete misunderstanding of the Kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus. 

N.T. Wright and Mike Bird write in their book, Jesus and the Powers, that Christian nationalism “leads to a superficial Christianity rather than to sincere faith and deep discipleship.”⁶N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird, Jesus and the Powers: Christian Political Witness in an Age of Totalitarian Terror and Dysfunctional Democracies (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Reflective, 2023), 132.  In the end Christian nationalism benefits the nation at the expense of the Christian. Rather than strengthening the church, it weakens the church and dulls the edge of our prophetic witness to the counterintuitive way of Jesus. 

Wright and Bird continue,

“Christian nationalism is impoverished as it seeks a kingdom without a cross. It pursues a victory without mercy. It acclaims God’s love of power rather than the power of God’s love. We must remember that Jesus refused those who wanted to ‘make him king’ by force just as much as he refused to become king by calling upon ‘twelve legions of angels.’ Jesus needs no army, arms or armored cavalry to bring about the kingdom of God. As such, we should resist Christian nationalism as giving a Christian façade to nakedly political, ethnocentric and impious ventures.”⁷Wright and Bird, 136.

Christian nationalism has nothing to do with the gospel of King Jesus. Seeking to proclaim the Kingdom of God through the force of government is a complete misunderstanding of the Kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus. Share on X

Christian Nationalism and the Prosperity Gospel

I do not deny that many who subscribe to Christian nationalism are sincere Christians. I will not stand in judgment over their relationship with God. My critique of Christian nationalism as a distorted view of the Christian gospel is not a criticism of a person’s personal faith in the Christian God, but of an ideology that does damage to Christian faith. In much the same way, when I critique the prosperity gospel, with its emphasis on material wealth, “success in life,” and avoidance of suffering, I’m not denying that those who hold that view have a genuine faith in Jesus. Rather, I am critiquing a misrepresentation of the gospel of King Jesus. 

Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel are problematic, and they share a lot in common in how they undermine true Christian faith. It may seem strange to group them together in the same theological neighborhood, because one is draped in a flag and the other is clothed in designer suits. Nevertheless, if we look beneath the surface, we find the same theological misconceptions that wrap the faith once delivered to the saints.

I can identify at least five misconceptions that Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel both share, leading to the creation of dangerously false gospels:

1. Both have mistaken American values for Christian virtues.

One is distorted by power; the other is distorted by wealth. One misappropriates God’s kingdom; the other misappropriates God’s blessing. Christian nationalism baptizes the American ethos of superiority, imagining that God’s purposes are uniquely tethered to one single nation’s flourishing on the global stage. The prosperity gospel baptizes the American dream of upward mobility, imagining that God’s favor is measured by material wealth. Both conflate God’s purposes and God’s power for personal gain.

2. Both misunderstand the purpose of the church.

One sees the church as a voting block; the other sees the church as the seedbed of wealth. Both fail to see that the Sermon on the Mount not only reveals the Jesus way of social interaction but plants the seeds for an alternative community, a people governed by an alternative politic. According to Stanley Hauerwas, “The church, therefore, must be a paradigmatic community in the hope of providing some indication of what the world can be but is not.” ⁸Stanley Hauerwas, Jesus Changes Everything: A New World Made Possible, Edited by Charles E. Moore (West Chester, PA: Plough Publishing House, 2025), 59.

Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel both reverse this truth. Instead of following Jesus into something other than the world, they end up turning the church into a sanitized version of the world. The church’s calling is not to make America great or to make believers rich. Rather it is to preach the gospel and make disciples of the Jesus way.

3. Both redirect Christian faith from the triune God to the interest of another.

One seeks national interests; the other seeks personal interests. In Christian nationalism, the language and imagery of the Christian faith is conscripted for the sake of political power. It replaces the kingdom of God with the kingdom of modern nation-states and assumes that national identity and divine activity are one and the same. In the prosperity gospel, faith is reduced to a spiritual investment strategy. It treats God as a cosmic vending machine dispensing blessings for those who deposit enough faith and money. Both redirect the gaze of worship away from the Father, Son, and Spirit toward lesser gods, whether that’s the flag, the dollar, or the almighty individual. The true gospel draws our attention to King Jesus. 

4. Both promise what Jesus never promised.

One promises national dominance; the other promises financial success. Christian nationalism imagines that if the right people are in power, then God’s purposes and plans will be done. The prosperity gospel imagines that if you have enough faith, then your bank account and body will always prosper. When Jesus invited his followers to take up their cross, he wasn’t offering a slogan for political rallies or fundraising campaigns. He was describing a way of dying to self, to ambition, and to every worldly definition of success. The cross isn’t a metaphor for power and wealth. Jesus’ death on the cross is the undoing of both. It promises eternal life—the life of the age to come— but that life begins in dying to one’s ambition and agenda. The gospel is not an advertisement for control or comfort. The gospel is the announcement that Jesus is King. 

5. Both trade discipleship for triumphalism.

One desires the defeat of political enemies; the other desires to deny the reality of suffering. Christian nationalism thrives on an “us vs. them” antagonism. It views people with different views on politics and religion as enemies to defeat, instead of neighbors to love. It sees the role of the church as conquering culture rather than bear witness to the love of God within it. The prosperity gospel denies the cost of following Jesus altogether. It treats suffering as a sign of failure, as if the cross were something to be avoided rather than embraced. Both movements resist weakness. They see humility as a liability, not a virtue. The church is not built on a foundation of winning and acquiring. It’s built on loving one another, especially our enemies.

Christian nationalism baptizes the American ethos of superiority. The prosperity gospel baptizes the American dream of upward mobility. Both conflate God's purposes and God's power for personal gain. Share on X

Rejecting the False Gospels of Our Age

Both Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel promise greatness without humility. They confuse self-determination with discipleship, and success with sanctification. We must courageously, and with great clarity, reject the false gospels of both.

In stark contrast, the gospel of King Jesus invites us to:

1. Reject the idea that God’s Kingdom depends on who holds political office.
2. Reject the idea that God’s favor can be measured by your level of comfort.
3. Reject the idea that following Jesus will make you powerful, prosperous, or popular.

Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel are opposed to the Kingdom of God, because God’s Kingdom is the way of the beatitudes, the way of the Spirit, the way of self-giving love. To follow Jesus in this way is not to retreat from public life or ignore issues of injustice. It is to engage them differently, not as those grasping for control, but as those bearing witness to a crucified and risen King.

Let’s courageously, yet graciously, reject the false gospels of our age.

Let’s follow Jesus.

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Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel are opposed to the Kingdom of God, because God’s Kingdom is the way of self-giving love. We follow Jesus in this way not to control, but to bear witness to a crucified and risen King. Share on X