The Theudas Problem

Deliberately or otherwise, modern-day Evangelical grifters are misleading untold millions. But it's not their politics - it's their inability to accurately identify Biblical Israel

Almost every Evangelical knows them by name, yet only two of them (at most) are actually Bible-believing Christians.

“Men of Israel,” he said, “consider carefully what you are about to do to these men. Some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody, and about four hundred men joined him. He was killed, all his followers were dispersed, and it all came to nothing…So in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone. Let them go! For if their purpose or endeavor is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop them. You may even find yourselves fighting against God.”

Acts 5:35-39

“Follow me!”

Is that not the cry of every Substacker and would-be social media profile out there?

Is that not the deep-seated desire of every content creator? To be followed? Emulated? Exalted, even?

If I’m being honest, the answer is unequivocally in the affirmative.

This dude Theudas was the equivalent of a first-century social media influencer.¹

He riled up the people, gained about 400 followers and was summarily killed.

In fact, scholars tell us Theudas was decapitated, and his head was carried to Jerusalem as a trophy of victory.

His followers dispersed.

It all came to nothing.

These influencers, from Theudas on up, these podcasts, these Substacks, these ministries, even the ministry of Holy Spirit itself - if they do not originate with and are not sustained by the God of Jacob Himself, they will come to naught.

Like this cast of characters we’ve all come to know as “Christian media” - many of whom are openly anti-Christian - Theudas claimed to be somebody worthy of listening to and following.

While we don’t know all the details, Theudas apparently made some sort of unspecified truth claim which “riled up the people” of Israel and gained him hundreds of followers in the process.

At a time when the Post Office did not yet exist, Theudas’ message spread to the extent that hundreds of individuals laboring daily under the yoke of Roman rule thought it inspirational enough to join him - at least temporarily.

Eventually, Theudas and his pseudo-messianic movement both met their end, and these followers went back to whatever it was they followed beforehand.

What a damning depiction of these faceless masses of folks who blindly consume the teachings of men like the Four Hoarse Men pictured above.

You know these Four Hoarse Men: they shout louder, their megaphones are bigger, their messaging just generic enough to incite apathy rather than ignite any real transformative movement.

Like, how mentally stunted do you have to be to consider what folks like the Four Hoarse Men depicted above think or say? Knowing full well nature abhors a vacuum, and each one of them performing a similar function of said vacuum - that perpetual sucking sound of Big Eva at the teat of churchgoers who can barely pronounce “Deuteronomy”.

If I told you I could teach you to become a professional NBA player by virtue of you simply spending the time and money to subscribe and follow and pay and just heed my words, and then I took to a basketball court and could barely dribble the ball or shoot a layup, would you still consider me to be a legitimate source for basketball training or knowledge?

Or would you have no choice but to proclaim, Donnie Brasco style, “Buddy, you are fugazi”?²

Folks, we have a plague of fugazis in the Evangelical community.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably at least passingly familiar with the Four Hoarse Men in the cartoon above. Maybe you know their names, maybe you don’t.

In fact, the majority of Christians can name all four of these men, not knowing anything about their Biblical literacy or theological grounding.

What’s important to remember is these Four Hoarse Men and others like them are knowingly - that is to say, deliberately, maliciously - playing a game of three-card Monte with their income-generating audiences.

They know fully well, for example, the star on the State of Israel’s flag has nothing to do with King David. They know fully well that the Scriptures they profess to believe (with the exception of antichrist Shapiro³) condemn Israel for their national worship of the star of Remphan in the days of the Exodus.

The thing is, their hands are tied. If they tell the truth, they lose the backing of the “Judeo-Christian” lobby (and thus access to that seemingly infinite financial spigot).

If they don’t tell the truth, they risk throwing away their establishment credibility with Christian media - a process which, like it or not, is currently underway.

We know who these people are. They’re out there in the streets, in the trenches, supposedly contending for the truth in a world, we’re told, which hates them for their bold support of Israel.

Except, it’s all misdirection, commentator sleight of hand.

Let’s put aside antichrist Shapiro and homosexual Rubin, both of whom no serious disciple of Jesus Christ should ever consider a reputable Christian source for any topic, including politics.⁴

Besides, we all know Shapiro, who, along with Jordan Peterson, loves to disingenuously conflate the modern-day political state of Israel with the people of the Bible, identifies as an Orthodox Jew.

That leaves us with Crowder and Kirk. Of these two, Kirk, as founder of Turning Point USA, has positioned himself to be a nationally recognized mouthpiece for young Evangelicals who take their faith seriously and want to engage in the “culture wars” that just coincidentally are perpetually waged and unceasingly profitable for those who wage them.

More on that shortly.

An actual cover image for a Charlie Kirk video dated Oct. 29, 2023.

Kirk, who admittedly takes flack from both sides of the political aisle in his self-described mission to win “culture wars” in the hopes of winning elections, recently hailed Israel as “the only place in the Middle East that has any appreciation for LGBT rights whatsoever, the only country in the Middle East that doesn't throw homosexuals off the top of buildings when they find them, it is the only partner that we have against radical Islamic terrorism.”

I don’t recall ever seeing the headline “Christian activist touts LGBT rights” after this speech. One would think it would be everywhere, at least in Christian media.

To be clear, there is no stream of orthodox Christianity nor any passage in the New Testament which advocates for the rights, blessings or privileges of homosexuals. Not one. Not anywhere.

Feel free to search for one. I’ll wait.

But for some reason, in his impassioned defense of the political state of Israel, Kirk thought praising the State of Israel as a haven for gay sex and gender ideology would make for a convincing Evangelical talking point.

Odd, to say the least, for a “Christian influencer.”

Maybe it’s because the state of Israel has what is widely considered to be the most developed sexually deviant rights society in the Middle East.

It wasn’t the first time Kirk has attempted to shoehorn the defense of the political state of Israel in the context of Biblical Christianity.

In a speech delivered at TPUSA's Young Jewish Leadership Summit on December 16, 2022, in Phoenix, Arizona, Kirk said, “A Christian that's not pro-Israel, I doubt they actually love their Bible.”

Here are his comments in context:

A Christian that's not pro-Israel, I doubt they actually love their Bible, and I will stand by that statement. If you are a Christian that doesn’t love Israel, then you take your Bible way, way way too much for granted.

American Christians, of which I speak to churches all the time, need to continue our support for Israel and the Jewish people. The idea that Jews are the chosen people, which you are the chosen people … You happen to be the messenger, the community, the nation, the people that God saw fit to bring his divine and transcendent commands.

My charge for you is to be more confident, more proud, and, dare I say, even more evangelistic to bring Jewish values to the world.

Whoa.

Imagine, just for a moment, living in the first century as a newly-converted follower of Jesus Christ, and hearing that. Being told by a 21st-century version of Theudas that the primary objective of your Christian identity was to bring “Jewish values to the world.”

Imagine the Apostle Paul, instead of proclaiming “neither Jew nor Greek,” now proclaiming “Jew over Greek.”

Or to take it to its inevitable conclusion, imagine Paul telling the assembly at Thessalonika that instead of describing the Jews as those “who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and…are displeasing to God and hostile to all men,” they should be proclaiming not the Gospel but rather “Jewish values to the world.”⁵

With these kind of comments, Kirk betrays his own ignorance - willful or otherwise - about what the whole counsel of Scripture says on this subject.

He confuses and conflates in order to avoid offense, even as the the prophets and the apostles declared Christ would be a “rock of offense” and the message of Him crucified would be “a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Greeks.”

Why weren’t we told about these “Jewish values” in the New Testament?

Why didn’t Jesus command us to go out into all the world and preach “Jewish values” instead of the Good News foretold in the Law and the Prophets?

Why, instead, did the authors portray these “values” as antithetical to the Gospel and, indeed, anti-Christian in their intent?

Is this how Kirk “loves his Bible”? By teaching error?

In the wake of the Candace Owens/Daily Wire debacle, TPUSA actually created a page on their site to help their followers “fully understand Charlie’s and Turning Point USA’s unapologetic support of Israel and the Jewish people. Charlie is one of the most vocal supporters of Israel in this country.”

Here’s what that page looks like:

There’s that star of Remphan/Moloch again. Front and center on the website of an organization led by a “Christian influencer.”

Not surprisingly, it turns out Turning Point USA prioritizes its ties with the State of Israel, even going so far as to appoint a “director of Israel affairs” as recently as 2021. 1n 2018, TPUSA also tapped Andrew Borans, the former executive director of Alpha Epsilon Pi, the largest Jewish fraternity in the U.S., to reportedly “to influence student government elections.”

TPUSA is also inextricably linked with former President and presumed GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has given speeches at four TPUSA conferences since 2019.

Since Trump first took office in 2016, TPUSA has seen its funding soar exponentially, according to tax records cited by NBC News:

Turning Point USA, which received just $8 million in contributions in 2016, has raised $138 million over the last five years, according to the organization’s Form 990, a tax document filed by nonprofit groups. And while the organization’s reach continues to grow, its funding base remains relatively small. Roughly half of its 2020 income came from 10 anonymous donors.

The Arizona-based nonprofit saw its revenue jump to $55 million in FY 2020 - a 40% increase from the previous year, while contributions to Turning Point Action, the organization’s political arm, soared from $2 million to $11 million in that same year, according to the report.

All of this, of course, will eventually raise questions about any ties, official or otherwise, between TPUSA and the State of Israel.

In October 2023, Kirk clearly felt compelled to address the issue head-on.

The whole thing is pretty ugly and highly indicative of where we are as a nation.

But here’s my question: how does Charlie Kirk, whose organization draws millions of dollars in donations from Christian and conservative stalwarts, get away with erroneously identifying the “Jewish state” of Israel with the Biblical believing people of God in the Scriptures?

Isn’t this a glaring theological oversight for someone who chastises Christians for not blindingly loving the State of Israel, a place where Christian missionaries are routinely spat upon, harassed and even arrested?

Where is the outrage or condemnation from Kirk and his ilk? Is it because the vast majority of Christians have no idea what the Bible says on this foundational topic?

The truth is, pundits like Kirk and a million more like him may be followers of Christ, but that does not necessarily qualify them as teachers of the Word.

How can I sit here and say that? What makes me qualified to say that?

Only the Holy Spirit-led ability to read and understand the Bible, which clearly defines Israel not as a “Jewish state” but as a particular land with borders belonging not simply to the descendants of Jacob, but to the God of Jacob Himself.

Rejoice, O ye nations, with his people: for he will avenge the blood of his servants, and will render vengeance to his adversaries, and will be merciful unto his land, and to his people.

Deuteronomy 32:43

The land must not be sold permanently, because it is Mine, and you are but foreigners and residents with Me.
Leviticus 25:23

…therefore thus says Lord Yahweh, “Surely in the fire of My jealousy I have spoken against the rest of the nations and against all Edom, who gave My land to themselves as a possession with wholehearted gladness and with scorn of soul, to drive it out for plunder.”
Ezekiel 36:5

…then I will uproot you from My land which I have given you, and this house which I have set apart as holy for My name I will cast out of My presence and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples.
2 Chronicles 7:20

That I will break the Assyrian in my land, and upon my mountains tread him under foot: then shall his yoke depart from off them, and his burden depart from off their shoulders.

Isaiah 14:25

In fact, only once does the Bible refer to Israel as “the land of the Jews” - and in fact it is a reference to Judea and not the entirety of the land promised to Abraham and his descendants.

And this reference involves the Jews hanging the Son of God on a wooden cross, our Tree of Life.

We are witnesses of all that He did, both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem. And although they put Him to death by hanging Him on a tree,
Acts 10:39

Of course, for every Charlie Kirk in the world of Big Eva, there is a Nick Fuentes, that articulate, witty, and theologically infantile Catholic who regularly slanders the name of Israel - the name of Jacob’s descendants, a name which literally means “he will rule as God” - based solely on the dealings of the political state.

The truth is, neither side is accurate when it comes to what Israel actually is: both a land and a people that go together, whom the Scriptures tell us will one day be reunited and resurrected, not through political means but through a divine act of Yahweh when He brings them back unto the land and brings foreigners to kiss their feet.⁶

That's a strikingly different scenario than the one playing out in the Middle East as of this writing.

Meanwhile, here’s what Evangelical churches across America are busy doing.

I mean, just look at these nice people. They’re so sincere. It’s all over their faces.

They truly believe, as their pastors no doubt teach, that this flag of the State of Israel and all that it represents, is a fulfillment of Bible prophecy and not a symbol which is explicitly condemned by Yahweh in Scripture.⁷

Look, the grace is God is all-sufficient to cleanse us from all sin, even those done in ignorance. But what of those who know this star is evil, that’s it’s explicitly condemned twice in Scripture, and still do this kinda stuff?

Does He accept this as worship? Is this offering of praise acceptable in His sight?

How can anyone believe this is OK? That this worship of a star - and save it with the semantics, that’s what this is - somehow exalts the name and person of Jesus Christ?

We have all this hand-wringing about Trump idolatry in the Church (however justified) and yet this is kosher?

This question regarding the identity of the 12-tribed nation of Israel is central to any systematic theology.

Without answering this fundamental question, the Bible, as so many apostates in the deconstructionist movement have alleged, indeed becomes a contradictory and deeply disjointed book of writings.

And yet, there is an answer for all who seek to know it.

One cannot claim to believe the Bible is inspired by the God of the Universe and simultaneously, that He just happened to inspire a confusing, poorly written book.

Yet we have these influencers and leaders who, like ol’ Theudas himself, are Pied Pipers leading followers of Christ away to the ultimate end of Christian deconstruction, which, if taken to its logical conclusion, will result in their eternal destruction.

As the American “culture wars” go from a vague antipathy toward Christ and His people to outright hatred and derision, we can no longer afford to look the other way as these so-called leaders mislead and so-called influencers subvert the influence of Scripture.

I, for one, want to spend whatever time the Lord has left for me pointing myself, my family, and anyone else who will listen to what the Scriptures say about the Israel of God, not the modern-day political entity, but a “peculiar people” and a Promised Land belonging to Him.

No more influencers. No “movements.” Just Him.

I just want to understand, as much as humanly possible, the revelation of the glory of God in Jesus Christ.

And the only way to have more of the Father is to have more of the Son, and the only way to have more of the Son is to bathe in His Word and His Spirit.

Everything else is clickbait.

1. https://www.gotquestions.org/Theudas-in-the-Bible.html

2. fugazi, adj. & n. meanings, etymology and more - Oxford English Dictionary -. A counterfeit item; a forgery. Hence more generally: anything that is not genuine; a pretence, a sham.

3. 1 John 2:22

4. Read that again.

5. 1 Thess. 2:15

6. Isaiah 14:2, 49:23; 60:14; Revelation 3:9

7. Amos 5:26; Acts 7:43