Chuck Darwin<p>Walking across the bleak, hot parking lot to my rental car afterward, <br>I could understand how people were drawn into their realm. </p><p>After that, I started seeing the futuristic world of the NAR all over the place. </p><p>Sprawling megachurches outside Atlanta, Phoenix, and Harrisburg <br>with Broadway-level production values; </p><p>lower-budget operations in strip malls and the husks of defunct traditional churches. </p><p>Lots of screens, lots of flags. </p><p>Conferences with names like "Open the Heavens". </p><p>A training course called "Vanquish Academy"<br> where people could learn “advanced prophetic weaponry” <br>and “dream intelligence.” </p><p>Schools such as "Kingdom University", <br>in Tennessee, <br>where students can learn their “Kingdom Assignment.” </p><p>In a way, the movement was a world with its own language. </p><p>People spoke of convergence and alignment <br>and demon portals <br>and whether certain businesses were Kingdom or not.</p><p>In 2023, I met a woman who believed that her Kingdom assignment was to buy an entire mountain for God, <br>and did. </p><p>It is in northwestern Pennsylvania, <br>and she lives on top of it with her husband. </p><p>They are always finding what she called “God signs,” <br>such as feathers on the porch. </p><p>Like many in the movement, she didn’t attend church very often. </p><p>But every day, she followed online prophets and apostles <br>such as <a href="https://c.im/tags/Dutch" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Dutch</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Sheets" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Sheets</span></a>, <br>an acolyte of Wagner’s who has hundreds of thousands of followers <br>and is known for interpreting dreams.</p><p>In 2016, Sheets began embracing prophecies that God was using Trump, <br>telling fellow prophets and apostles that his victory would bring <br>“new levels of demonic desperation.” </p><p>In the aftermath of the 2020 election, <br>Sheets began releasing daily prophetic updates <br>called "Give Him 15", <br>casting Trump’s attempt to steal the election as a great spiritual battle against the forces of darkness. </p><p>In the days before the insurrection, Sheets described a dream <br>in which he was charging on horseback to the U.S. Capitol <br>to stand for the Kingdom. </p><p>Although he was not in Washington, D.C., on January 6, <br>many of his followers were, <br>some carrying the APPEAL TO HEAVEN flag he’d popularized. </p><p>Others from Wagner’s old inner circle were there too. </p><p>Wallnau streamed live from near the U.S. Capitol that day and, <br>that night, from the Trump International Hotel. </p><p>Cindy Jacobs conducted spiritual warfare just outside the Capitol <br>as rioters were smashing their way inside, <br>telling her followers that the Lord had given her a vision <br>“that they would break through and go all the way to the top.” </p><p>In his most recent book, <br>"The Violent Take It by Force", <br>the scholar Matthew Taylor details the role that major NAR leaders played that day, <br>calling them <br>“the principal theological architects” of the insurrection.</p>