Politics Trumped the Gospel

Reinahard Bonnke proclaimed the Gospel while Evangelical leaders ignored him and chose to pursue political activism.

In September 2013, something significant was beginning. 

Evangelist Reinhard Bonnke, the man God used to bring tens of millions to Christ across Africa, turned his attention to the United States. After proclaiming in Vero Beach that “America shall be saved,” Bonnke and Christ for all Nations launched major Gospel crusades, beginning at the Amway Center in Orlando on September 27–28, 2013. The campaign continued through Greensboro, Miami, Houston, Chicago, Atlanta, Oklahoma City, and beyond.  

From 2013 to 2016, Bonnke preached the same uncompromising message he had carried to the nations: America shall be saved! He preached like a man on a mission. The same Bonnke who called the Church a lifeboat, not a pleasure boat, roared his message across the US. America was to be saved, not through political strategy or cultural dominance, but through the raw, public proclamation of Jesus Christ. 

He was blunt about what it required. Bonnke said he was not called to be a “revivalist” who shakes sleeping Christians once a year only to watch them fall asleep again. He wanted a fire in people’s souls that would lift them out of their seats. Jesus, he declared, will lift a man from the deepest pit—but He will not lift him out of his easy chair. “You’ve got to do something,” Bonnke insisted. “Here am I, Lord. Send me.” The command was simple and non-negotiable: Go. Go in Jesus’ name. 

In another message, he was even more direct: “If you do nothing, then nothing will happen. Nothing begets nothing.” He affirmed the necessity of prayer: “Nothing works without prayer.” Yet he warned that even if every Christian in America prayed 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the nation would still go to hell until someone in the prayer meeting woke up, walked outside, and told a lost soul that Jesus saves. 

This was pure Gospel urgency. The same urgency of a blood-washed Africa that changed nations and brought tens of millions to salvation with mighty demonstrations of the power of God. The blind saw, the deaf heard, the mute spoke, and even the dead were raised.

What did many American Evangelical leaders do with it? 
They largely passed. Many churches and prominent ministers declined to fully mobilize behind Bonnke. The greatest living evangelist of his generation, a man whose ministry ranks among the most fruitful since the Apostle Paul, was met with polite distance or outright indifference by large segments of the American church. 
Then 2016 arrived. Suddenly, the same evangelical leaders who had shown little urgency about Bonnke’s Gospel crusades discovered intense political energy. They hopped on the Trump bandwagon with enthusiasm. Endorsements flowed. Rallies were packed. Prophetic words were spoken. The pursuit of political power became the dominant narrative. Later, the White House Faith Office became a symbol of that new alignment—evangelical access to the halls of power celebrated as a great victory. 
The contrast indicts evangelical leaders for failing to grasp the gravity of the spiritual moment. Jesus saves; political leaders do not save. What did America get? More hatred and division to the point that in 2026 we are far worse than we were in 2016.

When the pure Gospel was offered by one of the most anointed evangelists in the history of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, the response was lukewarm. When a political candidate promised influence, protection, and cultural leverage, the response was electric. The same leaders who could not find the time, platforms, or passion to help fill arenas for Bonnke found abundant time, platforms, and passion for political engagement. 
Has political activity by Evangelicals saved us yet? No, and it never will.

Look at the fruit. The nation is more divided, more secular, and more hostile to biblical Christianity in many respects than it was in 2013. Political victories can restrain evil for a season, but they cannot regenerate hearts. They cannot produce the repentance that alone makes an awakening a true revival. Look at abortion. Roe v. Wade was overturned, yet abortions are higher. 

Bonnke’s words still cut. Jesus will lift people from the pit, but He will not forcibly drag them out of the easy chair of comfort, distraction, or misplaced hope in political saviors. Prayer is essential, yet prayer that never moves us into the streets to declare that Jesus saves remains incomplete. 
From 2013 to 2016, America was offered a clear invitation to return to the primacy of the Gospel. Much of the evangelical leadership class chose a different priority. They traded the hard work of evangelism for the intoxicating promise of political power. 
The record is clear. They failed to rally for Bonnke. They did not fail to rally for Trump. 

True national hope has never rested in any presidential administration, any office, or any political movement. It rests in the same message Bonnke preached with fire: Jesus Christ came to seek and to save the lost. The call remains unchanged.

Get out of the easy chair.

Stop confusing political access with spiritual power.

Go.

Tell them Jesus saves.

If not, America will go to hell.