Baptist Press
Vice President Mike Pence addresses the Southern Baptist Convention on Wednesday morning, June 13, in Dallas. Photo credit: Brent Barker, Emmanuel Baptist, Grenada, Miss.
DALLAS — Vice President Mike Pence shared his Christian testimony with the Southern Baptist Convention and commended the SBC as “one of the greatest forces for good” in the world during the Wednesday morning (June 13) session of the annual meeting in Dallas.
During an address that included several Scripture quotations, Pence also noted some of the Trump administration’s accomplishments, including President Trump’s summit this week with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Pence drew standing ovations when he noted the opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem last month, Trump’s commitment to the sanctity of human life and the courage of First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, after it experienced last summer the worst attack on a house of worship in American history.
Pence also noted Trump’s efforts to promote religious liberty in America and internationally.
“I’m a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican in that order,” Pence said.
Forty years ago, Pence said, he heard the gospel after having grown up in a nominally Christian home. “I walked the sawdust trail that night” and “gave my life to Jesus Christ.”
Pence thanked Southern Baptists for carrying the “timeless message” of the gospel “every day with such faithfulness to the American people.”
No podium Trump or Pence stand behind, the vice president said, “will be of greater consequence than the pulpits you stand behind.”
Trump’s preliminary agreement with North Korea, Pence said, is a wonderful step toward peace. But complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula will require much more work and prayer, he said.
When three American hostages returned home weeks ago from North Korea, Pence said, one gave Pence an index card that thanked Pence for his prayers on one side. On the other side, the former prisoner had written a portion of Psalm 126 that celebrated Israel’s release from captivity in Babylon.
Pence asked Southern Baptists for their ongoing prayers for peace on the Korean Peninsula.
Toward the close of his address, Pence returned to the SBC’s role in American life, thanking the convention for “the essential, irreplaceable role you play” in America. He promised that the Trump administration “will always stand with you.”
In divided times, “your values and your ministries are more needed than ever before,” Pence said.
