Blue tsunami, no panic: Josh Howerton says the church is ‘the hope of the world, baby!’
BlazeTV host and Lakepointe Church Pastor Josh Howerton isn’t sugarcoating last week’s blue tsunami that installed Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate, flipped multiple governorships to blue, expanded abortion access up to birth in Virginia, and elevated a wave of progressive, DSA, and Islamic candidates. “I'll just be honest. It was sad and very grievous,” he says bluntly. “A significant amount of national sin was chosen in that moment.” Howerton visits Romans 1’s warning about what happens when societies turn their backs on God. “The passive wrath of God is when God looks at people who have decided, ‘I hate you. I hate everything that you call good. I'm gonna call what you call good evil and what you call evil good,’” he summarizes. “God looks at them and he goes … ‘I'm gonna let you have all the evil things that you have always wanted, and I'll just give you over to those things and you will destroy yourself and your culture will destroy itself’ — and that, in and of itself, is the wrath of God.” This is where America finds herself right now, Howerton argues. “You're watching Romans 1 play out before your very eyes. And I will give a final warning: You cannot do Romans 1:21 through 1:27 and not think that your culture will eventually end up in Romans 2:9 that talks about the day when the wrath and fury of God will no longer be passive; it will be active,” he warns. But as much as Howerton hoped midterms would go differently, he knows “there is no political solution to a spiritual problem.” “Politics cannot fix what politics did not break. And mankind was broken long before any political solution,” he says. And that’s why a blue wave doesn’t shake him. “The church that preaches the gospel of Jesus Christ — we're the hope of the world, baby!” he exclaims. “We are not people of fear. We are people of hope,” fellow pastor and “Live Free” co-host Carlos Erazo echoes. “In Luke 21, Jesus is speaking to his disciples and he's talking about destruction and persecution and wars and earthquakes and global chaos, and he says this: ‘When' — not if — 'when these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads because your redemption is drawing near.’” Even in times of “despair,” Christians can take heart, he says, because they “know how the story ends.” “We speak up. We get involved. We vote. We labor so that righteous leaders can sit on earthly thrones, but we also rest and we trust that no matter what, we know that there is one that sits on a heavenly throne and that's Jesus,” Erazo says. Howerton points out that Christianity thrives when the darkness looms. “We've been flipping nations for 2,000 years. That's our thing,” he says. “There was a time when there was no such thing as a country that was full of a bunch of Christians, and now I got 2.6 billion brothers and sisters all over this planet. If you're freaking out because of this one little thing, did you read your Bible and have you ever heard about church history?” he asks. He concludes by quoting globally celebrated Christian apologist G.K. Chesterton: “At least five times in human history it has seemed that Christianity has gone to the dogs, and every single time it was the dog that died.” “Our country was formed out of a revival and an outpouring of God's Spirit that swept the entire nation and changed everything,” he says, “and listen, dude, He did it once. He's going to do it again.” To hear the “Live Free” panel’s full midterm breakdown, watch the episode above. “Live Free with Josh Howerton” is available on BlazeTV+, YouTube, and major podcast platforms. Join BlazeTV+ and start watching Josh today at blazetv.com/JOSH. Use promo code JOSH to get $20 off your subscription.