This Pastor Criticized Trump When Pence Visited His Church

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Christianity Today

Religion, Christianity, Religion & Spirituality

4.3 • 622 Ratings

🗓️ 5 June 2019

⏱️ 48 minutes

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Summary

Popular Southern Baptist pastor David Platt learned that President Donald Trump was on the way to his church in the middle of the service, as he prepared to take communion. When the president arrived, Platt put his arm around Trump and prayed: “We pray that he would look to you; that he would trust in you; that he would lean on you; that he would govern and make decisions in ways that are good for justice, good for righteousness, good for equity, every good path. Lord, we pray that you would give him all the grace he needs to govern in ways that we just saw in 1 Timothy 2 that lead to peaceful and quiet lives, godly and dignified in every way.” Last year, Vice President Mike Pence visited Metropolitan Baptist Church several days after Trump reportedly referred to Haiti and African nations as “shithole countries.” At the service, Maurice Watson, the senior pastor of Metropolitan Baptist Church, pushed back on that characterization. "I stand today as your pastor to vehemently denounce and reject such characterizations of the nation’s (inaudible) and of our brothers and sisters in Haiti and I further say whoever made such a statement and whoever used such a visceral and disrespectful, dehumanizing adjective to characterize the nations of Africa,” Watson said. “Do you hear me, church? Whoever said it is wrong and they ought to be held accountable.” Watson’s actions came out of Paul’s exhortation in Ephesians 4 to speak the truth in love. “It literally means truthing in love, and sometimes truthing in love means that one has to do as Pastor Platt did, and that is to pray for someone even if that person is someone with whom one disagrees,” said Watson. “But also truthing in love is what I believe I did, to speak in a very measured, in a very respectful way, to say if someone made those remarks about these people groups, whoever that person may be, is wrong.” Watson joined digital media producer Morgan Lee and managing editor Andy Olsen discuss what it’s like to have the executive branch show up in your congregation, the challenges of pastoring in DC, and what happens after you push back against the Trump administration while the VP is in the house. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode is brought to you in part by The Apologetics Guy Show, the podcast that helps you find clear answers to tough questions about Christianity.
0:11.1	Learn to explain your faith with courage and compassion.
0:14.5	Join Moody Bible Institute professor Dr. Mikhail del Rosario at apologeticsky.com.
0:22.5	Today is Wednesday.com. Today is Wednesday, June 5th, and you're listening to Quick to Listen, where each week we go be on hashtags and hot takes discuss a major cultural event.
0:32.8	Today we will be talking about praying for presidents.
0:47.3	Yeah. will be talking about praying for presidents. My name is Morgan Lee, and I am Christianity Today's digital media producer.
0:52.4	I am here with Andy Olson.
0:56.6	Andy is our managing editor of our magazine. Hey Morgan, good to be here. I'm really glad that you're here, Andy. It's great to have you as well.
1:02.5	And who else is joining us? Morgan today, we're going to be speaking with Dr. Maurice Watson. We're so
1:08.0	thrilled to have him with us. He is the senior pastor of Metropolitan Baptist Church in Largo, Maryland,
1:14.4	which is a northern suburb of Washington, D.C. He's a well-known name in many ministry circles.
1:19.9	He has over three decades of pastoral experience, leading churches from Arkansas to Nebraska to Georgia,
1:26.1	and now the D.C. area, of course. He holds degrees from
1:29.0	Philander Smith College and Creighton University, and he earned a doctorate of ministry from
1:33.6	Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama. He and his wife, Janice, are the proud parents
1:39.3	of two daughters, so we're very grateful to have you on the show, Dr. Watson.
1:43.2	Thank you very much. I'm glad to be invited.
1:46.5	So question for you, out of all the places that you lived, which one will you admit is your
1:51.0	favorite? Oh, you really put me on the spot. I really did. It's going to be the hardest
1:55.9	question I ask you now. I'm a son of the South, and I know D.C. is technically south, but there's no city
2:04.7	like Atlanta, Georgia. I loved being in the greater Atlanta area. That's awesome. I will be
2:13.5	going there in a couple weeks, so I'm looking forward to spending some time in that part of
	...

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