Last week’s riot at the U.S. Capitol has ignited a civil war among many Christians.

Whereas white evangelicals are being creamed in the media for their (nearly) unwavering support of President Donald Trump, their Pentecostal/charismatic cousins have hardly been mentioned. The latter is an evangelical subset little known to the media, and many of its adherents remain fiercely pro-Trump.

Why is this important, besides the fact that Pentecostalism is the fast growing form of Christian faith in the world? Well, for starters, its most famous leader here in America, the Rev. Paula White-Cain, is Trump’s personal pastor.

Some have said that these charismatic and Pentecostal leaders are part of a New Apostolic Reformation, described in Holly Pivec’s and Douglas Geivett’s 2014 book. It’s not a creedal movement, but its basic tenet is that God has restored a cadre of apostles and prophets to lead worldwide Christianity in the 21st century.

Things are rocky, right now, among the NAR crowd. There’s a war going on in that group concerning the “prophets” who have set the tone for much of Pentecostal America. These are individuals who claim to have foretold Trump’s 2016 victory. For the past few years, almost to a person, their prophets said God had planned a 2020 repeat victory for Trump.

If you’ve not heard of those prophecies, that’s because you’re not monitoring their YouTube channels, Twitter and Facebook feeds or personal web sites. Their conversations generally are not available in the secular media, which they detest. There are ways to cover them, but you have to know the players.

One is Bethel Church, a mega-congregation in northern California that’s an NAR hotspot. Pastored by the Rev. Bill Johnson, it’s best known for its Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry, which draws thousands of students each year from many countries. Buzzfeed did a very decent profile on them in October 2017.

Its resident prophet, Kris Vallotton, had prophesied Trump’s victory, then apologized soon after the election when it became apparent that Biden had won.

Then on Instagram, he said he’d got “thousands” of responses saying “You shared that too soon” and “The media is what declared Biden president” and so on. “You folded, you’re a coward” others told him.

So Vallotton pulled back, saying he’d not issue another statement “until the official vote count is complete.”

Last Friday, Valloton reposted his Nov. 7 apology on Twitter.

Another player who’s unexpectedly emerged is Charlottesville, N.C. evangelist Jeremiah Johnson, who had also prophesied Trump’s win in some very famous passages from his “Trump and the Future of America” book. Read this link for his lengthy explanation of where he thinks he went wrong. I’m pulling one paragraph from it:

My aim in this public apology is twofold. First, I would like to repent for inaccurately prophesying that Donald Trump would win a second term as the President of the United States. I refuse to blame the saints and say, “It didn’t come to pass because they did not pray enough.” Nor will I proclaim, “Donald Trump actually won, so I was right, but now it has been stolen from him.” I believe the first statement seeks to alleviate the prophetic messenger from the responsibility of what he prophesied, and the second statement is filled with potential pride and an unwillingness to humble himself and admit he was wrong.

Without mentioning names, Johnson may be referring to the behavior of certain other prophets, such as Charlie Shamp, another North Carolina evangelist, who widely prophesied Trump would win and has not, as of this writing, backed down. I describe Shamp in this December ReligionUnplugged piece.

For Johnson, the real shocker has come over the weekend.

On Jan. 10, he posted an amazing passage on his Facebook account detailing the reaction to his announcement.

Over the last 72 hours, I have received multiple death threats and thousands upon thousands of emails from Christians saying the nastiest and most vulgar things I have ever heard toward my family and ministry. I have been labeled a coward, sellout, a traitor to the Holy Spirit, and cussed out at least 500 times. We have lost ministry partners every hour and counting.

After publicly repenting on January 7th, I fully expected to be called a false prophet etc in some circles but I could have never dreamed in my wildest imagination that so much satanic attack and witchcraft would come from charismatic/prophetic people. I have been flabbergasted at the barrage of continued conspiracy theories being sent every minute our way and the pure hatred being unleashed.

To my great heartache, I’m convinced parts of the prophetic/charismatic movement are far SICKER than I could have ever dreamed of. I truthfully never realized how absolutely triggered and ballistic thousands and thousands of saints get about Donald Trump. It’s terrifying! It’s full of idolatry!

This is amazing stuff, folks. This movement is having a major reckoning. Last I looked, Johnson had 1,900 comments.

Author and blogger Holly Pivec has a Jan. 10 blog post out explaining why these apologies just don’t cut it. She appeared at the 2017 Religion News Association conference in Nashville, so lots of reporters know who she is. Give her a call for some perspective.

If you want to get a glimpse of the holdouts, watch this broadcast from Kenneth Copeland’s ministry page on Facebook. Several in the prophetic movement are talking about why God is still going to come through and plunk Trump in the White House. Don’t miss Kat Kerr’s “vision” of God walking into her bedroom.

So far, very few reporters have caught on to this fight. Writing for Slate, Molly Olmstead didn’t cover the charismatics per se, but pointed out that rather than apologize many evangelicals were grasping for conspiracy theories instead.

Some evangelical figures attempted to dampen the support for the insurrectionists by equating Trump’s supporters to Black Lives Matter protesters. An unofficial evangelical adviser to Trump, Jentezen Franklin, declared that “violent protests and breaking the law is always the wrong choice no matter who does it … liberals or conservatives.”

The inflammatory radio host Todd Starnes called both BLM and the pro-Trump riots “criminal.” Sean Feucht, the Christian recording artist who has been criticized for holding mass worship events in protest of COVID restrictions, tweeted that opposition to violence “should be a shared and CONSISTENT value,” citing incidents in Portland, Oregon; Kenosha, Wisconsin; and Minneapolis. Robert Jeffress, another influential pastor, told his followers that “disobeying and assaulting police is a sin whether it’s done by Antifa or angry Republicans.”

She calls these folks “evangelicals” which they are, but Feucht also attends Bethel and Franklin is very much in the Pentecostal fold.

The Atlantic’s Emma Green concentrated more on some “Jericho march” rallies occurring in DC last month and right before the attacks on the Capitol.

The Jericho March is evidence that Donald Trump has bent elements of American Christianity to his will, and that many Christians have obligingly remade their faith in his image. Defiant masses literally broke down the walls of government, some believing they were marching under Jesus’s banner to implement God’s will to keep Trump in the White House.

Isn’t this kind of what Jeremiah Johnson was saying?

The group’s co-founders are essentially unknown in the organized Christian world. Robert Weaver, an evangelical Oklahoma insurance salesman, was nominated by Trump to lead the Indian Health Service but withdrew after The Wall Street Journal reported that he misrepresented his qualifications.

Arina Grossu, who is Catholic, recently worked as a contract communications adviser at the Department of Health and Human Services. (Weaver and Grossu declined to comment. “Jericho March denounces any and all acts of violence and destruction, including any that took place at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021,” a PR spokesperson for the March wrote to me in an email after the publication of this article.)

Still, they will have far more influence in shaping the reputation of Christianity for the outside world than many denominational giants: They helped stage a stunning effort to circumvent the 2020 election, all in the name of their faith.

But there’s a ton more going on that mainstream reporters are missing.

Cracks are showing. Charisma magazine openly calls the election “stolen” in its interview with Rodney Howard Browne, the first pastor in the country who was arrested for having mask-less services. But others are confronting those claiming to be prophets.

There’s hell to pay right now and folks are angry. This makes great copy and even greater interviews. I haven’t even gotten to Denver evangelist Loren Sandford’s Jan. 7 apology, a video of which which is at the top of this page. He ended with:

The hard reality here is that lots of us with sterling records of past accuracy got it wrong. I see this as a rebuke from the Lord as an imbalance the majority fell into. And I will take it to heart.

Because I am writing news features about this movement for other publications, I’m not giving away all of my sources. Still, reporters can troll Facebook. Maybe even Parler — if Big Tech has allowed it to remain online.

There’s rich stuff there and believe me, the knives are out in this crucial crowd of Trump supporters.

FIRST IMAGE: Screenshot from Red Letter Christians website.