A disturbing sign of the state of American evangelicalism has appeared in the seventh year of the 21 st century in a Townhall.com article dated October 18,2007 entitled, "Why Evangelicals Should Support Mitt Romney" by Wayne Grudem. One of America's most popular evangelical theologians, Grudem is trying to persuade evangelicals to vote a Mormon for president. Wayne Grudem's "Systematic Theology" is the gold standard of evangelical doctrine and a sacred fixture in evangelical seminaries, pastor libraries and Bible studies.  

In it, he defines Mormonism as "clearly a false church." He shows why Mormonism has never been included in the Christian Church: It contradicts major Christian doctrine regarding the person of God, Christ and His work and salvation plan. A cornerstone of the Mormon Church, Grudem writes, is the classic heresy of Saint Paul's day – angel worship. In his book, Grudem insists that an orthodox Christian must practice the theology he reads. So why would he step forward to become part of the Mitt Romney propaganda blitz trying to mislead evangelicals into doing what would shock most evangelicals in American history: elect a Mormon for president?  

It goes from strange to bizarre, considering Romney opened his campaign posing as the uber-evangelical Ronald Reagan while suggesting Reagan's evangelical base are bigots. Romney's evangelists, conservative talk show hosts Sean Hannity and Hugh Hewitt, among others, were much more outspoken. They angrily and repeatedly characterized evangelicals' lack of support for Romney as ugly bigotry.  

Why would a major evangelical leader jump aboard a political campaign that views evangelicals as bigots? Here are 10 important things for evangelicals to consider about Grudem's letter.  

1. Grudem's epistle shows how mesmerizing liberal propaganda has become to the American Right. He buys a lot of liberal myths, including Hannity's bigotry charge. Sounding like Hillary Clinton, Grudem writes: "Have we come to the point where evangelicals will only vote for people they consider Christians? I hope not..." The evangelical bigotry charge comes right out of the 50 year Democrat playbook – "Evangelicals are bigots, racists and anti-Semites!" Why do we need the fairness doctrine when conservatives are making Democrat talking points? The evangelical bigotry indictment is a phony mountain-out-of-a-molehill argument. The immense sacrifice of white lives for black freedom and the fact that no nation has treated Jews and immigrants better than America is evidence that must be balanced against the phony liberal charge of bigotry. The Mormon Church could not have thrived as it has anywhere else in the world.  

2. Grudem would be a heretic in the history of American evangelicalism. The vast majority of Christians for most of American history would have been outraged at an evangelical Christian wearing a sandwich board for a Mormon candidate. As they saw it, America was a Christian nation to be led by a Christian president, who would be led by the God of the Bible. Grudem is out of step with the founding fathers. Voicing the majority opinion of the day, the first Supreme Court justice, John Jay said, "Americans should prefer Christian presidents." Washington wanted to be sworn in on the Bible, which he then kissed and said, "so help me, God." Even the "deists" Grudem cites, Jefferson and Franklin, agreed with Justice Jay. They thought Jesus was the ideal president. Grudem's reasoning is right out of the historically apostate Southern Baptist logic today: we're electing a president not a pope.  

3. Grudem is clueless to the fact that in the 230 year history of American elections, Americans have overwhelmingly chosen conservative Christian presidents. Apparently he's unaware that even in America's most liberal era, the last 40 years, voters elected conservative Christian presidents – or people posing as one. It was Democrats, not Republicans who began the religious right phenomenon with Jimmy Carter who they portrayed as a "born again evangelical Bible teacher." The only way Democrats won the presidency over the last 40 years was with phony evangelicals. We now know Carter and Bill Clinton are as evangelical as Hillary.  

4. Grudem's letter is as shocking and clueless as his book is brilliant and well reasoned. The foundation of his argument for Romney is almost identical to the left wing Newsweek's March announcement of Romney's candidacy: (1) Romney's a brilliant Harvard grad (like Grudem), (2) a successful investment banker and manager, (3) a great governor, and (4) he was savior of the 2002 Olympic games. Grudem says he "disagrees" with Mormon teaching, except that much of their ethical and value teaching is similar to the Bible's. The same could be said for the Koran and the Communist Manifesto.   Continued...