When the events of January 6th roared into US history, many in the crowds that stormed the Capitol that day hoisted an unusual flag like it was the Jolly Roger. While the Appeal to Heaven flag, a green pine tree on a field of white, was originally used during the American Revolution, in recent years it’s been repurposed as the de facto battle flag of the neo-Charismatic movement known as the New Apostolic Reformation. And the man primarily responsible for this transformation is a leader of this dynamic movement, Apostle Dutch Sheets of South Carolina.
The Appeal to Heaven flag. Image: Wikimedia Commons
Sheets and his brother, Apostle Tim Sheets of Ohio, both prominent election deniers, had meetings in the White House in the run up to the J6 insurrection, which Matthew D. Taylor and Bradley Onishi call “one of the most important—and perhaps shocking—untold stories of January 6.” Other top leaders in their movement such as Apostles Ché Ahn of California and Cindy Jacobs of Texas were also there on the day of and days before J6. These and other apostolic leaders have long been prominent in politics and have arguably made NAR the backbone of the contemporary Christian Right. Perhaps even more influential is Apostle Paula White-Cain, the longtime spiritual advisor to President Trump who leads the White House Faith Office.
These leaders aren’t household names, but when Dutch Sheets speaks, people affiliated with the NAR listen. Numbers are difficult to pinpoint, but a Denison University survey suggests that the growing movement, which primarily comprises Pentecostals and charismatics, numbers in the tens of millions of American Christians that belong to or are influenced by NAR-affiliated networks, churches, and ministries. Sheets’ podcast streams on numerous platforms including Rumble and YouTube (where he has 358,000 subscribers).
That’s why, when I saw that Sheets had devoted a podcast to an October event to be staged in Washington, DC, I listened. What I heard, buried in the middle of an otherwise unremarkable podcast, must have perked up the ears of his loyal followers as it did mine. Sheets prayed for God to “remove” federal judges, including members of the Supreme Court.
The longest communion table in history
The event, dubbed “Communion America,” scheduled to take place October 9–12, promises to be significant. Billed as four days of “nonstop worship,” with a tent for each of the 50 states, the third day of which will feature “the longest communion table in history, spanning the National Mall.” There will also be a “training tent” to teach “this generation to engage their campus and the nations.” Lou Engle of Colorado, a prophet and NAR impresario, will be a headliner.
But such pageantry may distract from Sheets’s call for the destruction of the judicial system as we’ve known it. On his May 23rd podcast, Sheets suggested that federal judges (even, as noted earlier, members of the Supreme Court) were obstacles to the third Great Awakening and the advance of the Kingdom of God on Earth. (He doesn’t go into detail, but it may not be coincidental that federal judges have been ruling against many of the initiatives of the Trump administration, from DOGE to ICE.)
Drawing on the opening of the imprecatory prayer, Psalm 68, he prayed that God “arise and scatter your enemies.” That would be threatening enough, but the next verse calls on God to “blow them away like smoke—as wax melts before the fire.”
He then called on God to “move upon the hearts of tens of thousands of people to attend and millions more to participate online,” and prayed for “Christ [to] take his rightful place in our nation as we partake of the bread and wine [of communion] that week.”
His prayer was in response to what he believes is an “out of order, out of control” judicial system, and he further declared that “many judges, including Supreme Court justices, oppose you, disrespect your word and ways, violate our Constitution, and reject common sense.”
“We ask you to stop this somehow,” he concluded. “Bring your redemption into rebellious elements of this branch of our government; remove those who oppose you, give us righteous and wise judges who honor you.”
Prayers like these may be startling to some, but they aren’t uncommon among NAR leaders. “Imprecatory prayer involves calling down a curse or misfortune upon perceived enemies,” André Gagné, a Professor in the Department of Theological Studies at Concordia University in Montreal, tells RD.
“In the Psalms, these prayers frequently use violent language, illustrating the desired fate of those believed to obstruct God’s work and His people,” he adds.
Arise and let your enemies be scattered
Psalm 68 is one of a number of biblical imprecatory prayers, popular in NAR circles, in which the faithful ask God to smite his enemies. A Pennsylvania-based group called the Shofar Army, for example, leads crowds in shouting a paraphrase of the opening of Psalm 68 that Sheets used on his podcast: “Arise, oh God, and let your enemies be scattered!”
Of course, some might claim that this is only “spiritual warfare”—prayers directed towards battles with demonic forces in the heavens. But, as Mark Clatterbuck demonstrated, the biblical stories usually told by NAR leaders are war narratives involving physical acts of killing people who were opponents of the Israelites and their god. Some NAR leaders are unambiguous about the End Times war for religious and political dominion in which they believe they’re engaged.
As Gagné clearly states: “The ultimate goal of such fervent supplications is often to wish for the complete downfall or even the death of their adversaries.”
Sheets believes “there is hope for America,” as long as listeners don’t put their destiny in the hands of “sinners, politicians, Satan, or demons.”
The NAR poses a radically different paradigm than traditional denominational Christianity of any stripe as most NAR leaders see the institutions of civil government, public education, academia and the news and entertainment media as demonic obstacles they must conquer to open the way for revival. Some are patient and methodical revolutionaries. Sheets is an accelerationist.
Return it to her righteous roots
Contrary to the broad, popular notion of Christian nationalism, which is generally understood as an essentially white and homogeneous movement, the organizers of Communion America say they seek to bring together all “races, generations, denominations,” to launch a campaign aimed at colleges and universities—which have long been targets for NAR, and which they view as demonic strongholds. (It’s probably no coincidence that, among its very first acts, the Trump administration declared war on universities, including Columbia and Harvard.)
Meanwhile, Lou Engle has staged smaller “communion” themed events this year in Pasadena, Redding, and other California cities—to build interest towards the Communion America gathering on the Mall.
Although the NAR movement is transnational in its networks and vision, it is Christian nationalist insofar as the US as a nation has a role to play in these, the End Times. As Sheets recently prayed: “We know you raised up America to promulgate the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the ends of the Earth,” he prayed recently, concluding:
Let history read that the government of America was impacted greatly by the Third Great Awakening. Change our government. Awaken it. Enlighten it. Return it to her righteous roots. And this we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Of course, the ambitions behind Communion America may exceed the current reach of NAR leaders. But Dutch Sheets’ malevolence towards constitutional democracy in general and towards his declared enemies of God—federal judges in particular—may not be as limited. And his followers are listening.
