On the Sunday after the recent presidential election, Allen Jackson got up to recognize the many veterans in his Murfreesboro, Tennessee, congregation and to give thanks for the election results, to applause from many in the white evangelical megachurch’s sanctuary.
But Jackson, 67, the church’s longtime pastor, known for his conservative values and outspoken support for Israel, characterized the election’s outcome as more a reprieve than a victory. “I really did feel like the Lord showed us mercy, when, in truth, we deserve judgment,” said Jackson.
Much work is still to be done in restoring what Jackson called “a biblical worldview” to the nation’s culture, he said, and he made clear that his congregants could not depend on elected officials to do that work for them. “We will have to have more courage than the people that you voted for,” he added.
While Donald Trump’s faith advisers were elated that voters returned him to the White House, some evangelical pastors in Tennessee were more muted in the days after the election. Like their congregants and voters around the nation, who said in exit polls that the economy determined their vote more than any other issue, the pastors interviewed by media were focused more on the cost of day-to-day items like gas and food than a revival of Christian power.
Brownsville, Tennessee, a 40-minute drive east of Memphis, is the seat of Haywood County, one of three counties in the state that went for Harris. But unlike Harris’ sweeps in the metro areas of Memphis and Nashville, the vice president beat Trump by just 25 votes in Haywood.
Your tax-deductible gift supports our mission of reporting the truth and restoring the church. Donate $50 or more to The Roys Report this month, and you can elect to receive “Days of Fire and Glory: The Rise and Fall of a Charismatic Community” by Julia Duin, haga clic aquí.
Ben Cowell, the 42-year-old pastor of Brownsville Baptist Church, said he remains concerned about polarization in the wake of another election that left half of the country elated and half despondent.
Much of that he blames on social media echo chambers that pit Americans against each other. “I would joyfully welcome a mass crash of multiple servers, where X is brought down and Facebook is brought down, and all of these social networking sites,” he said. “I think people have now grown full jobs out of making people angry at and mistrusting people who hold different ideas.”
While glad about Trump’s win mostly for economic reasons — “I’d like to see milk not be $6 a gallon,” he said, “or gas, $4 a gallon” — he worries that rather than listening to experts, Americans are more likely to be influenced by social media influencers who have no real knowledge about the subjects they talk about.
“People wondered why we’re more divided than we’ve ever been,” he said. “Well, we did it to ourselves.”
Mike Waddy, pastor of First Baptist Church in tiny Maury City, Tennessee, half an hour north of Cowell’s church, also said that most of his people voted based on economic rather than ideological concerns. Because of inflation, Waddy said that retired folks and those on a fixed income were more likely to turn to the local food pantry for help in recent years. Those folks had been OK under recent presidents but in the last three years have struggled with the price of food and gas.
“Our people watched some of their friends fall under their ability to make it,” he said. “Food pantries like ours wound up heavily supplementing some people’s ability to eat.” In Maury City’s Crockett County, Trump took nearly 80% of the vote.
But Waddy, whose church shares a building with a Hispanic congregation, said issues such as immigration have not been a focus in the community, where Spanish is spoken in about a third of homes, according to U.S. Census data. The pastor said that Trump’s promise of mass deportations has not come up but that if it comes to pass, the town would be ripped apart and close friendships would be destroyed.
There would also be economic consequences, he said. “With 30-something percent of our population being Hispanic, if they were all to be gone, you can imagine what that would do to our economy.”
First Baptist Church in Covington, Tennessee, a small town 12 miles from the Mississippi River, has both Democrats and Republicans in its congregation, and its pastor, Cliff Marion, didn’t address the election on Sunday, feeling it was time to move on. He calls unifying the country “the million-dollar question,” adding, “I don’t think either party has it figured out because it seems like each party has different views of the kind of America they want.”
Marion said he has avoided falling into partisan divides so far but said political activists have made inroads into churches and seem intent on making disciples to their causes, rather than followers of Jesus.
“Charlie Kirk and Tucker Carlson, they’re the greatest disciplers in the Southern Baptist Convention,” said the pastor. “They make better disciples than Lifeway (the Southern Baptist Convention’s publishing arm) does, because all our people do is turn them on all day long.”
In response, he said, he has tried to remind the 500 or people who attend services at First Baptist that political opponents are not enemies.
“We will not be a church that curses the darkness,” he said. “We will go into the darkness and light more candles.”
Erik Reed, pastor of Journey Church in Lebanon, Tennessee, east of Nashville, where Trump beat Harris by a ratio of 2-to-1, was more enthusiastic about a second Trump term. Reed hopes to see reforms in the nation’s educational system, a better economy and an end to U.S. involvement in overseas wars.
He did not endorse a candidate before the election or talk about it the Sunday after, but earlier this year he did run an all-day seminar on faith and politics, where he laid out some reasons why Christians might support Trump — and why some could not.
Reed suspects people have grown tired of the changes of modern life, of dealing with pronouns and issues of gender. They also worried about the cost of living. “At the end of the day, I think what people were voting right now is a return to some common sense. That’s not a Christian or non-Christian thing,” he said. “That’s just people trying to live and survive.”
That strikes Jackson, the pastor whose World Outreach church and its sprawling campus in Murfreesboro claims 15,000 members, as a waste of an opportunity. If the election was a reprieve from judgment, he believes America still faces judgment for defying God’s boundaries on issues such as marriage, abortion and gender.
But he doesn’t look to Washington to save the nation. “I don’t think the problems that we face as a people were fundamentally political,” he said. “So I wasn’t looking for a politician or an election to fix us.”
Instead, he said, “I think the question is, is there still enough residual biblical worldview in the character of America to shape our future? If there is, I think that’s a better future.”
Bob Smietana es reportero nacional de Religion News Service.
Spanish 
English 
15 Responses
Jackson held gatherings before his services where election deniers Eric Metaxs and Kaleigh McEnany were allowed to speak from the alter in support of Trump.
And now we see wide swaths of people on the Left that are election “deniers.” Are you calling them out as well? If you are not, then your internal values are not consistant and you would also be a hypocrite.
David – I ask this sincerely – what is the goal of your comment?
I understand Jon’s goal, which is to question how a pastor like Jackson can say he wants to focus on returning to a Biblical worldview, and have such political figures speak at events. (I don’t believe the answer to restoring a Biblical worldview will come out of either political party.)
But I’m trying to understand the goal of yours. Is “the left does it too” going to get us back to a Biblical worldview? Is it going to help us move foward?
I agree with the closing sentiment of the article: the problems we have been facing are NOT fundamentally political. But how can we address them if we are stuck in political back and forth? The church needs to get the politicians out of the pulpit (Harris, MeTaxas, McEnany, all of them), and get the pastors up there (quoting scripture, not their political friends) to move us forward. Maybe then we can follow them out of the political muck and mire.
David can you provide a source? I have not heard anything about large swaths of election deniers. Most of what I’ve heard is reflection on why Trump won.
TR
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/election-denialism-emerges-left-trumps-win-rcna179797
Your article is references the days following the election: “a familiar strain of denialism and conspiracy thinking began to emerge in the corners of some social media platforms”
I don’t think that says anything beyond the typical content you expect to find on those platforms. (It also spoke to skepticism on both sides)
I came across this today:
2024 marks a 21st century rarity: Almost everyone thinks the election results are legitimate
https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/20/politics/2024-results-legitimate-analysis
What in the world are you even claiming? I’m a straight ticket Democratic voter, and I have not seen one Democratic election denier, no demands for vote recounts, no threats towards election workers and not one lawsuit filed.
I live in Idaho, number 3 state in the US as milk producer. It is projected that 30,000 of the dairy workers here are illegal immigrants(85% of the total workers). With mass deportations coming, milk will be a lot more than $6/gallon. Tariffs under Trump will also add $2500 per average family in cost per year. As an evangelical myself, we need to stop worshiping politicians and the USA, and focus on the two commandments Jesus gave us….love the Lord and love your neighbor as yourself.
So you advocate letting illegal aliens (they are not immigrants) stay in the country so milk will stay cheap? I am amazed by the number of people in this country who see it as somehow punitive and immoral to enforce our laws. I have to obey the law, but millions of people in the country illegally don’t. Do you believe that is a good way to govern? it is not “worshipping” the USA to expect laws to be followed and enforced. It’s simple common sense unless you are a Liberal.
THIS is part of the problem. We turn EVERYTHING into an “either/or” argument rather than looking at “yes/AND” or other nuances.
Acknowledging that tariffs (which are eventually paid by the consumer anyway) and a subsequent labor shortage that could come from deportations will raise costs (of not just milk, but MANY staples) is NOT the same as “advocating for letting all illegal aliens stay in the country”. That was not said. It may be the only solution you see, but that was NOT said. (I also don’t believe acknowledging immigration laws is “worshipping the USA”, yet I have concerns about Christian nationalism that are unrelated).
Perhaps instead of accusing someone of something they did NOT say (which turns into a defensive back and forth), we can have a conversation that is something like: “I don’t see how what you said is possible without ignoring immigration laws. Do you have another idea? Please share.”
Ultimately, we need to focus on our common objectives (lowering prices and costs, adhering to labor and immigration laws, filling in labor gaps), and collaborate on a solution that does the best to meet as many as possible. Yes, I said collaborate. That requires coming together and hearing out other respectfully.
Comments like “it’s simple common sense unless you are a liberal” won’t help us collaborate OR bring us together. And to sling them back and forth amongst believers just…whew….help us, Lord.
This is why I’ve said we need our pastors more than ever to help us move and look past politics and candidates to find our way forward. The election is over. How can we (the church) lead the way in helping our nation come together and move on?
Marín,
I sure like you!
I do not always agree with you anymore than any of us ALWAYS agrees with anyone. However, you generally speak with wisdom and understanding, and never moreso than with this comment. It rings true like a bell!
In the common vernacular in my part of the USA, when you wrote that comment, “You done good!”
Gracias,
David Till
The restrictive and slow immigration system incentivizes people who are desperately in need of safety and money not to even try the legal way. In fact, I imagine the agriculture sector likes having a large undocumented workforce because they are easier to exploit than work visa holders and citizens. That should be the biggest priority for immigration reform, not mass deportation of millions. In Haiti the gangs that have taken over the country are even shooting at planes landing at the major airport. Is it ethical, or even Christ-like, to send people who have committed no crime to that? I think not.
Have you ever gotten a speeding ticket or other traffic citation? Or any other misdemeanor?
Because that’s the criminal level of being undocumented. It’s a misdemeanor, not a felony.
And immigrants are much more likely statistically to toe the line on not committing serious crimes because they know it would mean getting sent back to what they were fleeing.
Only 4% of Americans now have a Biblical Worldview. Evangelical Pastors have failed overall.
I do not look to Evangelicals Pastors for much anymore unless one is talking about Church Hymnals or Bible stories.
And how many pastors have a Biblical CHURCH view? Jesus said HIS house – not the pastor’s house – was to be called a house of PRAYER! The church is full of sin, ( over 50% look at porn ) and what are so many focused on? Cleaning up the culture! The church is in worse shape than the culture!