You ask me what my first response to the news that Joe Biden is the President-elect? Pray for him.

Yep, I plan to pray for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. They’re going to need prayers, as much as President Trump and Mike Pence did previously, as will the next two after.

I hope and pray they do well. I hope America does well. Wishing for the country to fail because you don’t like the President is like hoping the flight you’re on crashes because you don’t like the pilot. News flash– you’re on the same plane.

I’m also hoping that the American church can be less of a political voice and more of a prophetic voice. We’ve lost our way a bit recently, trading our gospel mandate for making a country great by voting for the “right” people.

We’ve alienated some of the very people we’re called to love through our politics. We’ve driven away the people for whom Jesus died by labeling them as the enemy (even forgetting that Jesus commanded us to love and pray for our enemies).

The message of the Church should be that no one is beyond saving. No one is too far gone or too bad for God to love and heal and restore and redeem. What matters above anything else is your identity, and beyond anything else — race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, income level — is knowing that you bear the image of God and are a child of God. Being in Christ is the ultimate identity of any believer.

Believers need to repent of putting their trust in Presidents, political parties and platforms. To adhere wholeheartedly to either of the main parties is to commit idolatry and betray the calling to share the whole gospel with the whole person any time, any place, anywhere.

May God bless America, even though we by and large deserve anything but God’s blessing. May God show us His lovingkindness once more.