Arkansas ranks as the 8th most impoverished state in the USA.

I don't think those MAGA right wing policies are working out so well for people there.

Christian Nationalism is in control of all three branches of the US federal government.
It's very "now" and quite sinister.

I think a sword is a clumsy metaphor for something nonviolent, because a sword exists for no other purpose than violence. It's like a gun that way.
Christians could have depicted Jesus talking about an axe, or an adze, or a plow, or something else that has some nonviolent utility.
They didn't.
Why?

The metaphors are violent. I think that choice reflects something important about the ideological foundations of the religion. That violent outlook has been reflected in the religion's history as well as in the religion's texts.

When Jesus stormed the temple in Jerusalem and physically attacked people there with a whip, it may be thought of in a context as like MAGA Christians storming the US Capitol on January 6, 2020.
Both were intolerant acts in the name of religion.

When Jesus threatened in Book of Revelation chapter 9 to send hordes of locust scorpion monsters out onto the earth to torture non-Christians for 5 months straight until they all beg for death, was that letting the love in? I'm not feeling the love for that.

Jesus would disappear every non-Christian on Earth. Chapter 19 of the Book of Revelation.

Jesus was not a nice guy.

I read in the Book of Revelation chapter 19 how Jesus will lead every non-Christian on Earth to get shoved into a gigantic winepress and crushed to death until their blood all flows into a huge lake stretching out hundreds of miles.

I don't want to be lead by that kind of cruelty, thank you.

"King of kings, lord of lords" is totalitarian.
New Testament.

The God of the Bible, and his Jesus mini-me, are fascists.

That's why the majority of American Christians voted for Donald Trump in 2016, 2020, and 2024.

The most reliable bloc of anti-Trump voters? American non-Christians.

Data.

Do you understand where the phrase "grapes of wrath" comes from? Jesus tells John of Patmos that he will "harvest" all the non-Christians in the world, and crush their all their bodies in a gigantic winepress until their blood makes a red lake the size of Lake Erie. Book of Revelations 19.

Jesus was into absolute religious dominion, no freedom allowed. Classic Christian Nationalist fascism, like Francisco Franco's fascist Spain.
"If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned." John 15:6

More fascist torture fantasies from the Gospels:
"The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." - Matthew 13:41

Then there's the time Jesus totally flipped out, and started violently assaulting people in the Temple of Jerusalem, whipping people until they ran away, just because they didn't practice Judaism as he thought they should. Doesn't that sound fascist to you?
Very January 6 of Jesus.

Then there are the Tyre and Sidon passages of the New Testament, in which Jesus threatens the genocidal annihilation of entire cities if the people there don't worship him as a god king. Sometimes Jesus said nice things, but other times, Jesus was a fascist maniac!
Have you actually read it?

Book of Revelation Chapter 9, in which Jesus orders a swarm of monsters with tails of scorpions, bodies of locusts, teeth of lions, human faces, to go and torture everyone on Earth who God does not approve of! The torture will go on for 5 months, and be so awful people will beg for death.

How about Book of Revelation Chapter 2, in which Jesus praises a church for hating another Christian church because that other church allows people to have sex with the people they want to?
"You hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate!"

Jesus the controlling, fascist hater.

Let's go to town with the Gospel of Matthew Chapter 10 verse 34: "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword."

Oh, I'd love to, Skip. How many do you want?
Let's start with Gospel of Luke chapter 19, "Those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and kill them in front of me!"

This strong streak of nationalist cruelty in Christianity goes all the way back to the late Roman empire, and beyond that, to the church politics in Asia minor. Jesus the nice vs. Jesus the violent maniac is not a new conflict within Christianity. Both are "true Christianity".