Four Takeaways from Trump’s Attempted Assassination
On Saturday, July 13th, the 45th President and republican nominee, Donald Trump, was struck by an assassin’s bullet that grazed his ear during a rally in Butler, PA. This shocking attack, the first of its kind in 40 years, has left many scrambling for answers to difficult questions while processing their own fear and anger. Rather than speculating about deep state conspiracies, the corrosive effects of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives on government agencies, and potential social and political fallout of the attempted assassination, I offer four takeaways to people trying to make sense of a senseless act of violence.
1. We live in an evil world. Why would a 20-year-old man load a rifle, climb up to a rooftop, crawl into position, train his crosshairs on an unarmed man surrounded by unarmed men, women, and children? Why would he unleash a barrage of bullets in cold blood, injuring three and killing one? The postmodern sophisticate will blame a lack of education, or childhood trauma, or violent video games, or a mental disorder. But the ultimate answer is, evil. Saturdays’ shooting is proof that we live in an evil world. The Bible explains how God’s good world was ruined by Adam’s sin. Paul said, “…sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men…” (Romans 5:12). Apart from the restraining hand of God, our world and each person in it is, “full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness” (Romans 1:29). So, while evil ought to grieve us, it should not surprise us. While we cannot live in fear, we must walk wisely for the days are evil. And while we must condemn wickedness in the world, we must recognize the same seeds of wickedness in our hearts and run to Christ who alone can save us and make us new by the transforming power of his grace.
2. Words matter. At this point, we don’t know what motivated the shooter’s attempted assassination, but an assassination attempt of Donald Trump was tragically inevitable. Since 2016, the historically vitriolic rhetoric against Trump has been heated to a boiling point. Celebrities like Madonna, Johnny Depp, and Kathy Griffin have joked about exploding, shooting, and decapitating him (respectively). Talking heads and headlines label those who supporter the former president as domestic terrorists. Even President Biden has made countless Hitlerian reference to Trump and called him the “primary threat to freedom and democracy.” It was a matter of time before a deranged individual took those words seriously.
That ought to serve as a wakeup call, especially to Christians. Our words (spoken, preached, printed, or posted on social media) matter. As the Westminster Divines biblically articulated the sins forbidden in the sixth commandment, “Thou shalt not murder,” they included “sinful anger, hatred…all excessive passions…provoking words,”(WLC 136), because they knew that “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34). Angry words are the exhaust of an angry heart, which, if left unchecked, could lash out in violence or prompt someone else to sin as James marveled, “How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire” (James 3:5). Seeing the bloody results of rage enflamed by words should inspire each of us to strive to purify our speech and the heart from which it flows in view of God’s mercy, by his gracious power, and for his glory. “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear” (Ephesians 4:29).
3. The measure of a man is not his willingness to take life, but to give it for those he loves. While Donald Trump escaped the assassination attempt with only a bloodied ear, one man, Corey Comperatore, was fatally shot. A devoted Christian, husband, father and volunteer fire-fighter, Comperatore died as he lived: in heroic service to those he loved. When gunshots began ringing out, his reflex was to blanket himself across his wife and daughter beside him. That reflex saved the lives of his girls but cost him his. His daughter Allyson wrote afterwards, “…he died a real-life superhero… he threw my mom and I to the ground… he shielded my body from the bullet that came at us.” Comperatore’s heartbreaking death paints a heartwarming portrait of the greatest love of which Jesus spoke, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13). Jesus would know. For it was the same love that drove Christ to sacrifice his body and blood on the cross, to shield us from the just wrath of God for our sins.
How would you fathers and husbands react if you were sitting in Corey’s seat, Saturday evening? In the face of immediate danger, would your instinct be self-preservation or the protection of those entrusted to your care? We can prepare to give our lives for those we love by dying to ourselves and living for their wellbeing today. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, the Union officer whose steadiness under fire turned the tide of the Battle of Gettysburg said, “We know not the future and cannot plan for it much, but we can hold our spirits and our bodies so pure and high we may cherish such thoughts and such ideals and dream such dreams of lofty purpose that we can determine and know, what manner of men we will be whenever and wherever the hour strikes that calls us to noble action. No man becomes suddenly different from his habit and his cherished thought.” God help us, men in particular, to hone the instinct of self-sacrifice.
4. God is sovereign. If the killer’s bullet, shot from a football field and a half away, had been a fraction of an inch to the right, we’d be talking about an accomplished, not an attempted, assassination and our country could be in chaos. What force preserved Trump’s life and prevented greater devastation on that day? Scan the headlines and you’ll read all about “luck;” blind, unthinking, unfeeling, amoral, chance: “Trump Extremely Lucky to Have Survived,” “Trump Very Lucky,” “He’s Lucky the Bullet Hit His Ear,” “Luck Saved Trump.”
But luck had nothing to do with it! We live in a world governed by the almighty hand of God, who ordains the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:10), in whom we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28), who feeds each bird and clothes each flower (Matthew 6:26-30), who appoints storms, fish, winds, and worms to do his bidding (Jonah), who causes nations to rise and fall (Job 12:23), who knit us together in our mothers wombs and who wrote down our days from before our birth (Psalm 139:15-16), who numbers the hairs on our heads (Luke 12:7). The Westminster Shorter Catechism says it so well, “God’s work of providence is his most wise, most holy, and most powerful preserving and governing all his creatures and all their actions” (WSC 11).
God, not luck, is the one who controls the flight path of bullets. The 45th President said it best, “It was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening.” So next time you look at the iconic photograph of the blurry bullet streaking by the former president’s face, remember, that there is a God in heaven who watches over us and orders the affairs of men. Remember that our world and your life, are not strings of accidents but a series of heavenly orchestrated appointments. Remember that the one who holds you and the world in his hands is as mighty as he is good. And you can trust him.
Jim McCarthy is the Senior Pastor of Trinity PCA in Statesboro, GA.
