The following was written by Pastor Shea Oakley to open a prayer meeting today at noon. 

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I had a specific topic I was looking forward to sharing with you today. But based on what happened in Washington D.C. yesterday I feel there is something more important for me to communicate. 

As this is a prayer meeting I believe the most important thing which we can pray for right now is that the divisiveness that has engulfed our culture should, by the grace of our God, be steadfastly resisted in our church. If there was ever a time to put our devotion to Jesus Christ and His Kingdom before our devotion to any other worldly ideology (and, yes, any other kingdom or nation) it is now. As someone once wrote, a Christ-follower should ultimately be “a patriot only to Heaven.”

It is my personal belief that what this country needs is not some kind of “political salvation,” what it needs is a massive spiritual revival leading to millions of individuals coming to know what the only real salvation truly is, and Who offers it to us. Historically, such revivals have always begun in the church and spread to the surrounding culture. This is how the Holy Spirit appears to work, but we cannot be of help in that work if we potentially tear ourselves apart as a church body over temporal, secular politics.

There has ever and only been one Christian nation in the history of humankind, and that is the Universal Church of true believers in every nation. My prayer for today is that we put that nation, our true country, first and, by the grace of God, maintain the unity in diversity that is one of the cornerstones of True Life Church. We must (and I very much include myself here) allow the bond of the Holy Spirit to transcend even our deeply held political convictions, and we must do this intentionally, openly, and unequivocally. I believe this is what God expects of His true children. If you agree with me that this is the truth then may we all recommit ourselves to obeying our only King, Jesus Christ, resolve to love each other during even such a time such as this, and pray fervently to that end.