Dr. Ben Carson on Tuesday highlighted a biblical principle of restoration, even double for your trouble blessings, that appears to be playing out in former President Donald Trump’s life.
Trump’s former housing and urban development secretary opened his remarks at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee by recounting the horror he felt as a would-be assassin shot the 45th president.
“I saw President Trump, a dear friend, escape death by mere inches, and my thoughts immediately turned to the book of Isaiah that says, ‘No weapon formed against you shall prosper,’” Carson said.
The full biblical passage from which he quoted — Isaiah 54:17 — reads, “No weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their vindication from me, declares the Lord.”
The whole chapter is about God restoring, both materially and spiritually, what was lost during a very difficult season in life.
“Well, let me tell you the weapons that they used,” the renowned neurosurgeon continued. “First, they tried to ruin his reputation, and he’s more popular now than ever.
“And then they tried to bankrupt him. And he’s got more money now than he had before.
“And then they tried to put him in prison, and he’s freer and has made other people free with him.
“And then last weekend, they tried to kill him. And there he is over there, alive and well.”
Everything Carson said is true.
President Joe Biden was always ahead in polling in 2020 versus Trump, according to the Real Clear Polling averages.
This election cycle, the former president has been ahead of Biden — and the margin is the largest it has been since January.
A YouGov poll published Monday found the Republican nominee is ahead in all seven major swing states that will likely decide the election: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Biden carried all of them but North Carolina in 2020.
Four years ago, Biden led Trump in all seven swing states, and he went on to win six of them in November 2020. Today, he trails in all seven. https://t.co/LOpXyA90n9 pic.twitter.com/bN63IuasUJ
— The Brookings Institution (@BrookingsInst) July 12, 2024
To Carson’s second point, Trump is wealthier than he’s ever been, despite Manhattan Judge Arthur Engoron imposing a $454 million judgment against him in February in a civil fraud suit brought by Democrat Attorney General Letitia James’ office. She threatened to seize Trump’s assets in Manhattan to satisfy the judgment.
However, a New York appeals court stepped in and lowered the bond amount he had to post to $175 million while the former president pursues his appeal.
Meanwhile, USA Today reported in March that because of the merger of Trump Media & Technology Group with Digital World Acquisition Corp., the former president’s net worth went up by more than $4 billion to $6.5 billion, “catapulting him into the world’s wealthiest 500 people on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index for the first time.”
His previous high had been $3.1 billion.
It’s like something right out of the Bible’s Book of Job, when God restored twice as much materially to the afflicted man following multiple attacks by Satan.
“And the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning,” the Scripture says.
God also talks about restoring double to those who have been through affliction in Zechariah 9 and Isaiah 61.
And as Carson noted, Trump is not only wealthier, he is also freer than he has been for months with the dismissal of special counsel Jack Smith’s classified documents case on Monday.
Further, the Supreme Court ruled this month he has immunity for official acts that he took as president, putting a major wrench in Smith’s election interference case.
The SCOTUS ruling also might end up causing Trump’s New York business records conviction to be thrown out or retried, because some of the information presented at trial would fall under official acts shielded from prosecution.
Judge Juan Merchan has delayed sentencing in the case from this month to September while Trump’s attorneys and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s prosecutors respond to the development.
“The postponement sets the sentencing for Sept. 18 at the earliest — if it happens at all, since Trump’s lawyers are arguing that the Supreme Court ruling merits not only delaying the sentencing but tossing out his conviction,” The Associated Press reported.
In addition, following the conviction, the Trump campaign took in a record level of contributions — making the former president’s campaign coffers greater than Biden’s for the first time during the election.
The Supreme Court also determined that the Department of Justice improperly charged defendants in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol incursion with a federal obstruction crime that does not apply to them. Smith has indicted Trump on the same crime, so it likely will go away too.
That leaves Fulton County District Attorney Fanni Willis’ election inference case in Georgia, which an appeals court recently paused to determine if Willis’ conduct has disqualified her from overseeing it. No new trial date has been set, according to the AP.
A recurring theme in Scripture is that people for whom God has a plan can go through persecution and trials (in Trump’s case, literal ones) but come out better in the end. Joseph, David and even Jesus Christ himself all went through it.
The Apostle Paul wrote in Corinthians that had the rulers at the time known God’s plan with regards to Christ, to resurrect him and launch the Christian church, they would have left him alone.
As Moses chronicled in Exodus, the more the Egyptians afflicted the children of Israel, “the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad.”
The same appears to be true in our day as all the Democrats’ efforts to bring down Trump and his “Make America Great Again” movement have only made them stronger.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
