"To All Who Call on Him in Truth": Divine Authority and Enregisterment in the New Apostolic Reformation

The New Apostolic Reformation is a neo-Charismatic, non-denominational Christian nationalist movement that has come to the forefront of American politics in the past two decades. As a non-denominational movement, NAR churches encounter a "problem of authority," as the sites of authority generation are moved from traditional sites. How this problem is resolved has yet to be investigated thoroughly. Using Robert Brubaker's frameworks of religious nationalism and positing them as theories of semiotics, this project will investigate the problem of authority encountered by non-denominational Christian movements. Through a mediated ethnographic analysis of register use by four New Apostolic prophets and apostles in service contexts, I will explore how divine authority is derived through the speech habits of New Apostolic leadership as they take on particular registers when engaging in reportive speech from divinity. By employing a particular register that is socially oriented toward a quality of divineness, the prophets and apostles employing this register are then too invested with a quality of divineness. This functions as a source through which the problem of authority is resolved. Through this register use, prophets and apostles are able to reinforce their claims to direct connection to divine authority.