Phone a Friend | Week 2 | Daniel Goulding | Echoes Church

I I have to warn you today, we are talking about politics in church, and so just a fair warning, this is not I don't normally talk about politics, but we're we're in a series called phone a friend where we're talking about questions that you had that you asked us. Hey, we'd love to know biblical response. How do we respond through these things? And without a doubt, the most the most submitted question was how do we, as Christians, engage with politics in 2026?

And so my attempt over the next couple minutes is to talk about church

and politics. And I know even when we hear the word politics, we start to cringe from the inside out. So just a couple caveats. Let me remind you. Okay. Politics is a two part word made up of poly, which means many, and ticks, which means blood sucking organisms. Okay? That's what politics is.

It is a death trap. You gotta know from the start. I I and I also just I also just wanna let you know this is probably not gonna be the message that you think it's going to be. I'm not gonna be political enough for some of you. I'm gonna be too political

for others of you but either way if you need to send a critical email, my email is joshuaechos dot church. You can feel free to send all of those to me and I will make sure I respond to every one of them.

Again, as much as I I don't love the conversation but I think it's one that we have to have because I don't I don't love the trajectory of where politics is taking us as a country. Right? I don't love where it's taking us as a people. And so the question that was asked primarily was how do we vote? How do we engage with this as followers of Jesus in the cultural moment we find ourselves in? And I will get to how to vote but I will I wanna start with why we vote and who we are as followers of Jesus. You gotta remember, the bible talks about one thing more than anything else and that that's the condition of our soul before God. Right? God cares more about who you are than what you do and the truth is is what we do will always be an overflow of who we are. And so before I can get to how do we vote, how do we engage with this stuff, I've gotta kinda lay a bit of a foundation for us to agree upon. So we've gotta first stack hands

on who we are biblically

if we're gonna have a conversation of how do we engage politically. K? Here's the first thing if you're taking notes. There's three biblical realities for navigating politics that you gotta start with. The first one is that you and I are citizens of heaven. K? Above everything else, the bible says that we are citizens of heaven And I need you to hear me. My my goal as the pastor of Echoes Church is to make better and more disciples of Jesus and Jesus alone. K? I'm not I'm not here to try to make disciples

of a certain politician or a certain political party. My my job is, my assignment is to remind us, guys the scripture says above everything else, we are citizens of heaven. What does that mean? Paul says in Philippians chapter one verse 27, he says above all, k, above everything

else, you must. He doesn't say I encourage you to, you should consider. He says you must, it's a command, you must live as citizens of heaven. What do citizens of heaven do? They conduct themselves in a manner worthy of the good news about Christ.

I will be honest with you. What I am more concerned with as we are heading into important midterm elections this November

is I'm I'm less concerned with who we're going to vote for and I'm more concerned with what our conduct is going to be leading into them and coming out of them. The bible tells us that our conduct as followers of Jesus, it matters. Paul continues and says, then whether I come and see you again or not and if I only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose. What is the purpose of citizens of heaven on the earth today? To fight together for the democratic party, the republican party. That that's not what it says. It says you are to fight together for the faith which is the good news.

Our fight is a spiritual one first and foremost. We are citizens of heaven and I just need to remind all of us here today. K? Though this world, it is not our home. We are what the bible says is temporary

residence. We are aliens passing through here. Now again, I promise you I'm gonna get to how do we vote because we need to. It's important and what we do with this life, what do we do with our citizenship, it matters a ton but we first have to lay a foundation

and remember above everything else, we are citizens of heaven and our conduct

matters. Paul continues in Philippians chapter three and he kinda goes down the rabbit hole of what happens when you forget that your residency is in heaven and not on this earth. What you and I will be tempted to do is we will make more out of this life than it's supposed to be. We will think that politicians are saviors when what they really are is a means to an end, that they're not a savior and Paul says in Philippians chapter three verse 17, dear brothers and sisters, pattern your lives after mine

and learn from those who follow our example For I've told you often before and I say it again, with tears

in my eyes. Paul is writing in prison with passion in his heart reminding the church this letter is not to non Christians, this letter is to the church. He says, I remind you with tears in my eyes that there are many of you whose conduct shows

that they are enemies of the cross of Christ. They're headed for destruction, their God is their appetite, they brag about shameful things and they think only about this life here on earth but we we are citizens of heaven where the Lord Jesus Christ lives and we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our savior.

Church, you got to hear me. Paul says that if you forget your heavenly residence, you will try to make too much out of this life and what you will be tempted to do, what you will unintentionally slide into is allowing yourself a conduct that actually makes you what Paul says is an enemy of the cross. That you are actually an enemy to the good news of the gospel and we have to remember that the battle that God has called us to fight primarily

is one that is spiritual. Again,

don't hear what I'm not saying. It doesn't mean that our our our political system and how we engage with what's happening around us civically that it doesn't matter because it does but we have to keep it in its proper order. K? Wrote it down this way if you're taking notes. Citizens of heaven as citizens of heaven, our primary assignment is an eternal one. It's not an earthly one.

You gotta remember if Jesus wanted to, if he wanted to bring a political revival to change the world, he could have done that but it's not what he did. Jesus in John chapter 18 says that my kingdom is not an earthly kingdom. If it were, my followers would fight to keep me from being handed over to the Jewish leaders,

but my kingdom is not of this world. Jesus reminds all of us, guys, we are citizens of heaven before we are citizens of America

and the order matters. Again, don't hear what I'm not saying. It doesn't mean that what we do here in America doesn't matter because it does, but this is how citizens of heaven engage with our country. We love our country but we live for God's kingdom. K? You will not find a more pro America person than me. I love this country. My undergraduate degree is in political science. I thought it was the direction that God was taking my life. I wanted to. I wanted to be a part of the political system, but God had a different plan for my life. I love this country more than almost anybody out there but but I don't I don't live for it. My hope is not rested in a political system or a certain politician staying in office. Why? Because I have a I have a higher calling. I have a a higher citizenship

and we have to remember that that citizenship, it defines first and foremost who we are and then what we do. K. This is what we've got to remember as people who are residents of of heaven before we are residents of this earth. Our assignment is one of ambassadorship.

K. Paul says, second Corinthians chapter five, we are Christ's ambassadors. What mean what it means is that we have been sent from heaven, our citizenship that we will inherit one day, We have been sent as ambassadors to this world, into this life, into this kingdom

to do a couple things. What are they? To remind people that God is making his appeal through us. What is God's appeal that he's making through us as his ambassadors? It is that we speak for Christ when we plead, vote for fill in the blank. That's not what we plead. We plead, come back to God.

The bible says that our primary message as ambassadors of Christ is to run after the thing that Jesus ran after. The things in this world that are lost and our primary mission is to seek and save that which is lost. And my challenge to you sitting here today friends is don't let your passion for your earthly residence override your heavenly responsibility.

I feel like there's a lot of us who have allowed the passion that we have for our earthly residents to override and overcome our heavenly responsibility. The first thing we've got to remember is that we are citizens,

we are citizens of heaven. Secondly, the bible says that we are the body of Christ. Again, I wish I had two hours to unpack all of these because the the implications are huge but we have to remember that the scriptures call you and I the church, the ecclesia, the body of Christ. What it means is that when the world looks at us, they should see Jesus

and not as g not see Jesus as we've defined Jesus or who we we think that he should be or what his representation is supposed to be. No. They're supposed to see the Jesus that he said, this is what my body looks like. This is what you should be known for. This is what the world should look at the church and glaringly

see. John chapter 13 verse 34, here's where Jesus tells us what the body is supposed to look like. He says, so now I'm giving you a new commandment, love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.

It's not lost on me that the primary identifier of what the body of Christ is supposed to look like is is a body of people that is marked by one thing above everything else. Love.

And it's not just love for people that think like us, vote like us, behave like us, belong like us. No. No. No. It's for it's for everybody. And what's amazing is what's happening in 2026 is we can't even be in the same church with people that politically disagree with us. It's heartbreaking.

We can't even disagree inside of the church any longer. We can't disagree here. Where can we disagree?

Where can we talk about these issues because we have to talk about them. Right? There's some nuance to the conversation. There's some things we've got to be able to process through but we've started to turn what used to be like discussions into dividing lines. And I'm just here this morning to remind all of us that we are the body of Christ and it's a big deal how the world sees us. And I just wanna remind you that you don't look like Jesus unless you love like Jesus.

What did loving like Jesus look like? You realize Jesus loved the people that ultimately crucified him? He loved the people that beat him and mocked him, scorned him, put him on a cross, killed him, tortured him. He loved those people. So I'm I'm just saying it's possible

for you to love somebody that voted for Trump even though you think he's a terrible human. It's possible for you to to love somebody that's a that's a Democrat even though you think that the Republican Party is the only way forward. I'm just here to say that love has to supersede

everything. And if you look at the data and what is happening in our country and in our world and inside the churches, it is absolutely

heartbreaking. And I'm telling you, is not of God. It is of what I believe is a demonic influence. They say that one in five Americans have literally cut off family members over political disagreements in the last two years. One in three say politics have strained some of their closest relationships.

One out of four people have ended friendships in the last five years over political disagreements.

There's a cultural message that is being spread and normalized and popularized about cutting people off who disagree with you because it's somehow some type of self care. And I'm just telling you, we're living in this weird moment where we've gone from disagreeing to disconnecting. We've gone from debating to dividing.

We've gone from, okay, we see this differently to we can't talk anymore. And it's not a trend. There's a cultural shift that is happening, and I'm telling you, we have to be the ones to step in and remember who we are, and we can't just slide with the culture. What used to be disagreeable has now become a dividing line, and you gotta hear me. This next point is not gonna give you the warm and fuzzies, but it's true, and it is true on both sides of the political aisle. If your politics cause you to cut people off, your politics have literally become your god.

And I don't mean it. It's not just on one side. I've seen it on both and again, there are things that you and I can't control. I have friends and family members that won't speak to me because I'm a pastor and they assume with being a pastor that that that puts me in certain camps. K? I can't control what they wanna do but as long as it's up to me, the scripture says that it's my job to live peaceably among all people, that it's my job to forgive

freely, and it's my job to keep the main thing the main thing. And if you're here and there's people in your life that you've cut out and you're the Christian in the relationship, I'm telling you, you are sacrificing the platform to witness about the kingdom that matters the most for a kingdom that is temporary

at best. This thing is going to pass away. Politicians are going to come and go. I promise you I'm gonna get to how we vote because we need to. We've got to engage but we gotta keep the main things the main things. Here's the second thing is the body of Christ that we need to remember.

We have a responsibility as the body of Christ to reach the marginalized, to help the orphans, to help the widows. We don't look at government to step into what God has assigned us to do. We're not sitting back as the body of Christ hoping

that government is going to accomplish what God has called us to do. We are the hands and feet of Jesus. It is our assignment to love the unborn, to protect widows and orphans, to give help to the immigrant that's here. That's our assignment.

So stop thinking that government is gonna step in. Again, there's a place, there's a there's a reason that government exists. It's not it was not man's idea. Government was God's idea. Go read Romans chapter 13. It tells us why government exists but we've got to remember we have a purpose. We've got to live into it and part of our assignment is to be the hands and feet of Jesus on this earth. The first two things we got to remember is that we are citizens of heaven. We are the body of Christ. And thirdly,

we are called to be salt and light. Why does the scriptures refer to us as salt and light? Again, gotta remember this is written to a first century culture that didn't have refrigeration. One of the primary purposes of salts into the earth in that day is that salts salts primary responsibility was to slow

decay. And you gotta realize that that's part of why we are in this world. It's part of why God has left us here. And when we give our life to Jesus, we're not just beamed up to heaven because there's other people that we are supposed to seek and save. That's our primary responsibility. And then secondly,

we are supposed to slow the moral decline that our culture is experiencing. Hey, you gotta remember, our culture is gonna continue to slide morally. It's gonna continue to decline. It's been happening since the Garden of Eden, but we

are the salt of the earth. We are the ones that are supposed to slow that decline and we are also the light of the world. What does light do? Light illuminates the solution. And let me just remind everybody here, the solution that we illuminate is not a politician.

His name is Jesus and the reason that we are here is to illuminate that the thing that plagues the human soul, the thing that people are searching for in politicians, what they're searching for in government systems can ultimately only be found in the person of Christ. But again, here's my fear. The church has forgotten who we are and I think so many well intended Christians have just thrown their hands up in the air and gotten frustrated

and completely checked out of the process. And let me just tell you that I I think that it is an absolute dereliction of duty and that you and I have a responsibility as the representation

of God on the earth today to remember that we are the salt in the earth. Again, I wrote this point down. Let me explain it. The Christianity doesn't depend on America, but America depends on Christianity. Let me explain this. There's so many people running around right now terrified, Christians terrified

that if the wrong person gets put into office, that America's gonna change and all of sudden Christianity is gonna disappear. Let me just tell you, Christianity has survived some brutal dictators.

If we have to survive in the back of caves, we can. Now again, I'm not saying that we're gonna vote in people to oppress Christians because that's just that's stupid. Alright? Like that's go ask anybody that had to live under oppression. Nobody was self selecting.

No Christian is in Nigeria right now super pumped that people are trying to kill them for their faith. K? That's dumb, but I also I also have to remind us that our faith is not conditional on this thing called America, this beautiful experiment called America.

But I do wanna remind us that this thing that we have, this constitutional republic that we've been given, this really bizarre form of government where we as people, we vote in politicians that go and represent us and they they rule and reign on our behalf. They represent the people. It is one of the most brilliant

brilliant systems that is out there. Is it perfect? No. Is it broken? Yes. But we have to work within the system that we have and I'm telling you what the enemy is gonna try to do is remove the Christian voice from it. But America, if we're gonna make it another two hundred and fifty years, I promise you it will not happen without the Christian influence and the Christian voice. Our entire government system was founded on a bunch of guys that believe what the bible said to be true about every human being, that there is dignity and worth inside of every human soul. Why? Because you carry the imago dei. You have the image of God alive and active in you, and you got again, go study history. Almost every other democracy that has existed self implodes within a hundred to two hundred years.

It's never from a conquering army that comes in from the outside and destroys them. What happens is is eventually people get really comfortable and they begin to focus on the wrong things and they've imploded from the inside out. Part of my fear is I wanna make sure that my kids and my grandkids and my grandkids' grandkids have a country to grow up in like I did. A country where you could stand in a public high school and talk about the good news of Jesus and nobody was gonna run-in these doors and try to arrest us for doing that. That is not a guarantee though. That is not something that is just going to continue to happen. If you look at where some politicians and some parties wanna take our our government system, I'm telling you the tide is turning, and you and I as Christians, we need to realize that we are the salt and the light, and we have a responsibility. So what do we practically do? How how do we vote? Three things I wanna remind us of this morning of how you and I as Christians who understand the biblical foundation I just talked about, here's how we engage with politics. The first one is that Christians should vote for biblical values.

I could've just made the point Christians should vote because what's happening is is Christians statistically are not voting. They say in the last presidential election, 30 to 40,000,000 Christians stood out and didn't even cast a vote for the election.

You gotta realize that the last presidential election, most key states were decided by less than 50,000 votes, and yet we've convinced ourselves that our vote doesn't matter. And I'm here this morning to remind you, I care less about who you vote for, though I do care about who you vote for,

and I care much more that you vote. Now again, I I wish we could have conversation, but if you told me, hey. I voted and I I I read the scriptures and you can defend biblically why you voted for whoever, I will have that conversation. I will agree I will agree to disagree on certain points, but I'm pumped that you at least engaged in the process, but we can't check out this beautiful experiment called America is dependent

on Christians continuing to vote with our conscience, to search the scriptures and to show up to the polls and vote policies and vote politicians in that will allow us to still be the church.

And here's again, here's the danger is for so long what we've had is the separation of church and state, which again just hear me. People often will mistakenly think the separation of church and state means that people like me can't talk about politics because there's a separation of church and state. That's not what separation of church and state is. Separation of church and state means that the government can't tell us who to who to belong

to, who to vote for, who to who to worship, that the government has to stay out of the church and for so long, we've just assumed

that that's gonna be a part of our system but I'm telling you, go look at what's happening in Canada right now. You realize Canada just passed a law that's about to get signed in? The church planter buddies of mine up there are literally having to get lawyers to try to figure out what are the implications of this law. They just voted in a law that says that included

in hate speech is quoting from religious text. What that means practically is I could get up and say, hey Jesus said that marriage is between one man and one woman for life. That's it.

That is now allowed to be included in hate speech. Are they gonna get arrested or are they gonna close churches? We don't know. That's to be determined but the idea that there's a separation of church and Satan, there's a place for people to go to hear about the good news of Jesus, that's an assumption that we've always operated from that I'm here to remind us friends, that's not a guarantee

and we need to show up and we need to vote and we need to step in and be a part of the process that we've been given. K? We are not in a country where our voice doesn't matter. It does. This beautiful thing begins to erode and fall apart as we begin to step away from it. We as Christians need.

We need to vote. We need to search the scriptures and vote with our conscience and vote. I think primarily the number one issue you should be asking is which policy and which politician

is going to stay the heck out of the church? What policy, what politician is going to allow the church to be the body of Christ so that we can care for the orphan, so that we can care for the widow, so that we can take care of the immigrants, so that we can love the unborn? That's our responsibility,

but I need the government to stay out of our lane. I need the government to stop stepping into what has always been a spiritual conversation.

The government build roads, produce schools, but when they start stepping into our lane and they start defining what gender is, what marriage is supposed to be, it's not that the church is becoming more political. Politics have stepped into a lane that was never theirs

and my encouragement is to go, we have to rise up again and say, no, we need politicians that let us be the church But as long as we just stay out of it, we throw our hands up in the air out of frustration going, out of all the billions of people, these are the only two people we could find and we're just frustrated.

Hear me. The void that you and I leave in the system, the enemy is more than willing to fill it. Darkness is more than willing to fill the void that you and I leave. The first thing that we do is we vote, and we vote for biblical

values. If you wanna know where I land on those issues, we can have a private conversation about it, but secondly, Christians should consider public service, and I mean this wholeheartedly that all throughout history, Christians have played an important role in being engaged with politics

at the local level, on school boards, on city councils, at the federal level, at the state level, at the national level, that we need Christians to actually begin to heed the call of God in their life to walk away from that which is comfortable to step into what is the absolute viper pool pit snake world of politics.

Why? Because if we don't, all we're leaving it for is for darkness to step in. And again, there's a guy in our church, Jay Feeley, who I've gotten to know and I love this guy. And when I first had conversations with him and he was saying he was gonna run for congress, I was like, bro, you're nuts. Like, what is wrong with you? You know? Like, he's not sitting around twiddling his thumbs going, I need more stuff to put on my calendars. Like, I I need a way to make money. Like, he's had a really successful career and built a great life for himself yet he felt a calling to step into the brokenness. And every conversation I've had with the guy goes, man, if we don't do it, who will?

And I'm not saying you gotta run for congress, but I am saying maybe there's a school board you can step onto. Maybe there's a city council that you can be a part of because Christians, our voice matters. You can't study the bible and separate the Christian influence from politics. God put Joseph as number two in charge of all of Egypt to save a nation. He put Daniel in Babylon to influence a pagan king. He put Esther inside of Persia to again save the nation of Israel from being completely annihilated. He appointed David to be the greatest king that Israel ever had. Nehemiah was set to rebuild the walls around Persia, which was a government task up until that point. Paul stood up and he preached the most important theological book that we have, which we're gonna go through all of this summer. He preached the book of Romans to the Roman government understanding

that as goes Rome goes the world and Christians have always had a voice in politics. And I'm begging you. I'm begging some of you to allow the spirit of God to encourage you, to challenge you, to step into political office

because we need spirit filled bible believing Christians to fill and infiltrate every single part of this world because if not, I'm telling you what we are handing our kids and our grandkids is going to be a shell of what this country used to be. Christians are people that realize we need to consider public service. Here's my last point and I I don't mean this as like a Christian platitude.

Christians should pray more than they post. And I I follow you guys on social media. You post a lot. You know? Like a lot. A lot. And I just wonder, here's my gentle correction, my gentle challenge to you. Do you pray as much as you post? Do you pray for politicians as much as you critique politicians?

Do you pray for the people you disagree with as much as you comment on their posts about why you disagree with them? You gotta realize as Christians, we're a pray first people. Prayer is not something that we do as a last resort. No. Prayer is our first response.

And as followers of Jesus, we have a mandate to pray for the people who are in leadership over us. And I used to say this when Joe Biden was in office, and people in Arizona liked it a lot But God put Joe Biden in office for a reason. I don't know why, but he did. And our job is to submit to him, to honor him, to respect him, and to pray for him. In the same way, if you think Donald Trump is the worst person on the face of the planet, the bible says that there's not a single person that's in leadership over you that was not appointed there to to be there by God. And what we have is a responsibility

to pray for him, to pray for wisdom, to pray for somebody to take his phone away so he stops sending messages in the middle of the night. Right? Sorry. I I'm not gonna say that next service. I I mean it as a joke. We have a responsibility

to pray for people that are in political office because we know that we know sitting here today that the most powerful way to preserve a country is to pray for it. And hear me. I'm telling you, if you let me choose, you let me choose a 100 times over what country,

what system of government would I raise my kids and I choose America a 100 times over? It's

broken. It's flawed. It's messy. It needs correction. It needs help. But I'm telling you, it's the best of the options that we have. And what are we gonna do? We have to work within the system that we have. And the best way to preserve this country is we need a bunch of bible believing, spirit filled Christians

interceding on behalf of our leadership going, God, would you move? Would you heal our land? Would you fill congress? Would you fill the White House with the spirit of God? Would you give them wisdom? Because wisdom comes from you and you alone. And if we prayed half as much as we posted about things on social media, I'm telling you, I think we'd begin to watch the spirit of God move again on our land. Let me make this really simple. A couple takeaways for this whole thing. Let me kinda just boil this down to a couple points for you to walk out of here with. Friends, don't win an argument

and lose your witness. Don't so don't don't go get so defensive about a party that you forget the kingdom of God. Don't let political passion outpace Christ like conduct. And don't ever forget that America needs more than just better politics. America needs Jesus.

The thing that is ultimately going to heal our land, the thing that ultimately is gonna bring the hope back to a generation, it's not the right political party and the right political system. But what I'm gonna vote for is I'm gonna vote for a political system and politicians

that understand the important roles that the church plays in the moral landscape of America today, and they're gonna stay out of our lane, and they're gonna let us do our job. They're gonna let us be the salt and the light. They're gonna let us be the body of Christ. They're gonna let us be the hands and feet of Jesus into the world today. But Christian, hear me. You can't just check out of the process. Your role is too important. Your vote is too significant. These midterm elections coming up in November, they are they are massively

important. And I wanna remind you, a vote is not like a a Valentine that shows that you love somebody. Right? It's it's us showing up with a biblical responsibility saying, I'm I'm voting out of biblical conviction for politicians and policies that I believe are going to further the church's ability to impact the world with the gospel.

That is what primarily drives us. Let me pray for you before you yell at me. So father, God I thank you. Lord I thank you so much that you love our country so much that you you have put all of these people in it. And God we know that our government system is not perfect. It's far from it.

Our politicians aren't perfect. They're far from it. But God, I pray right now in the presence of your spirit that you would genuinely you would speak to each of us right now. And I don't know who it is that's sitting here that has literally cut off friendships and cut off family members over political disagreements,

but God, I just pray that we would have a moment with you. And I know there's things that are out of our control, but God as much as it is in it as much as it is in our control, would we let you spirit of God convict us? Holy Spirit, would you challenge us to pursue reconciliation

where we need to pursue it? To forgive where we need to forgive? And, father, we do. We pause right now this morning, and we pray for our country. Father, we thank you for the privilege and honor that it is to get to live in America. Of all the countries in the world, we were born here.

And God, it's not lost on me. Every time I travel internationally, every time the plane land back in Miami or Atlanta and I'm back in The USA, there's something about my soul that just is it's relieved because God, there's at least freedom here. There's the opportunity to worship you openly here.

And so, father, we ask right now that you would you would divinely direct

what is happening in our government system right now. God, we pray for direction in these midterm elections coming up. We pray for politicians to rise up. We pray for the spirit of God to move in power and might, and Jesus, we're asking for you to heal our land.

Jesus, we love you. It is in your holy and awesome name that all God's people said. Amen and amen. Guys, thank you so much.