In a speech he gave at Dordt College in January of 2016, Donald Trump told his audience, nearly all of whom were evangelical Christians, that, if they elected him as president, Christianity "will have power."

     But what's true power?  It's not to dominate, socially, culturally, politically, or even religiously.  It's not to engage in aggrandizement.  And it's not to win or finish first.

     Besides, what does finishing "first" really mean?  As Zeno, the Greek Stoic, observed in one of his famous paradoxes many millennia ago, even if the hare finishes first, he really does not:  the infinitude of the division of the space between start and finish guarantees it.  The tortoise will still prevail.

     True power is to serve.  At the height of a physical affliction from which he was suffering, the apostle Paul received a message from God.  It said that God's favor, God's grace was sufficient for him, that "power is perfected in weakness."  It is when we humble ourselves to serve others, when we recognize and acknowledge our faults and limitations, when we set aside our own needs and ambitions to ensure the same for others:  it is at this point that we are most powerful.  In weakness is strength.

     American Christianity will never browbeat or politically overwhelm anyone into agreeing with it.  That's a fool's errand.  Jesus didn't beat people over the head with his message.  He served them.

     Religious power is a misguided delusion.  In the end, final purpose eludes us all.