Faith without works is dead — and so is hope without prayer and action
A book with “God” as part of its title — such as “God, Trump, and the 2020 Election”—must contain a spiritual point of view.
The Bible says to pray for those in authority so we may live quiet and peaceful lives in all godliness (1 Timothy 2:2). Elsewhere it says to seek God first, and these things will be added to you (Matthew 6:33). God also promises that if His people will pray and turn from their wicked ways, then He “will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14).
It’s hard to document and measure spiritual things, but millions of people have been praying in groups large and small, believing for a shift in the very serious situation in America.
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One prayer warrior named Mary Colbert started the daily National Prayer Call in 2016, making her one of the earliest voices urging believers to pray for Donald Trump. The movement she started has not diminished since his election. Her pre-election prayer conference calls reached as many as 100,000 people, and frequently she had to turn away listeners because the conference call was too full.
Now, to continue to bring as many people as possible together in prayer, Mary has set up a new system of having local spiritually vetted leaders run conference calls in their community. These hosts, called nation builders, set up prayer calls, and the number continues to grow. The calls emphasize praying for those in leadership, whether here in the US or abroad.
Recently Mary had a powerful insight about what it means for believers to “turn from their wicked ways” so God would “hear from heaven, and ... heal their land.” The answer came with the parable of the talents, in which two servants invested their talents and were called “good and faithful.” The third servant was afraid he’d get in trouble if he lost what he’d been given, so he did nothing. The master called him “wicked.” Mary believes Christians who “do nothing” because they fear being ridiculed as politically incorrect are “wicked” and must repent.
Mary also believes “everyone has a voice,” and she is doing everything she can to mobilize the church with this truth. It must be working, because Mary says she is stopped in airports by people who recognize her and feel they have been given back their voices as they have begun to pray and to be involved in turning back the tide of evil in our nation.
I believe Mary’s focus on the 2020 election is important, including her new strategy to pray for the Democratic Party — a party many Evangelicals have given up on, measured by the 81% of white Evangelicals who voted for Trump. One day in prayer, Mary said she felt the Lord tell her that He set up a two-party system — Democrat and Republican — for a balance of power. The reason, she believes, is that if one party had absolute power, it would be absolutely corrupt. And while God favors neither party, one has drifted from godly principles and gone so far as to even take any mention of God out of its platform.
A century ago the Democrats were so conservative that William Jennings Bryan, a strong Evangelical, ran for president on its ticket. I personally know Democratic politicians who claim to be born-again Christians. But why do they seem like anomalies? Where have the others gone?
In 2019, Mary began to pray for righteous people in the Democratic Party who will stand for biblical values. Impossible? It seems so, considering the way this book has documented that the Democratic Party has almost gone off the rails. But Mary Colbert believes God wants believers to pray for the Democratic Party.
When she began saying this on her prayer calls and in appearances on Christian TV, she was accused of supporting Democratic Party positions. She told people her political positions haven’t changed. Rather, she sees herself as praying as Jesus said for those who persecute you and say all manner of evil against you — persecution that, unfortunately, happens too often against evangelical Christians because of the positions we hold. But she also believes there are godly Democrats who are intimidated and staying silent instead of trying to move their party toward righteous principles and platforms.
As much as I want to see Trump win in 2020, I also believe we must pray for righteous Democrats to take back their party. Pastor John Kilpatrick also believes Christians must pray to stop “what the enemy is doing. It’s as if Satan has done everything to keep a born-again experience away from this generation. It’s going to take a moving of the Holy Spirit, and I believe we’re getting close to it.”
As I pointed out earlier, Kilpatrick says he’s not a “Trump man,” but he prays for him regularly and believes a coming spiritual renewal depends on his being reelected. Kilpatrick believes we are experiencing “spiritual warfare for the soul of this nation,” and he says “it’s time to quit discussing things about the president. It’s time to quit discussing what’s going on in Washington — it’s time to start praying. The people of God need to pray right now.”
The Bible says, “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:26). So we can pray, but we must work, and we must vote. God’s people are called to be “wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Matthew 10:16). We must be like the gentle Jesus even as we fight battles for the soul of our nation.
So I encourage you to get registered to vote, if you haven’t already, and encourage others to do so. Get involved in your local community and help turn the tide. I believe with what I outlined in “God, Trump, and the 2020 Election,” there is hope for the future. But we must act now. None of this matters if we don’t vote. We cannot assume that others will do it. Each of us must do our part. God demands no less.
Stephen E. Strang is an award-winning journalist, Charisma founder and author of the best-seller “God and Donald Trump.” This content was excerpted from his new book, “God, Trump, and the 2020 Election.”
