Ted Talks Jesus at Liberty University

on March 23, 2015

Sen. Ted Cruz officially announced his intention to seek a presidential bid on Monday morning at Liberty University, the largest Christian university in the world. The announcement by Cruz was preceded not only by a political platform, but a testimony about the “transformative love of Jesus Christ.”

Cruz began his address to nearly 11,000 evangelical students, faculty and staff by sharing the testimony of his mother and father. “Imagine a young married couple living together in the 1970s, neither one of them has a personal relationship with Jesus. They have a little boy and they’re both drinking far too much. They are living a fast life,” said Cruz.

At age three Cruz’ father, Rafael Cruz, abandoned him and his mother. While his parents were separated, a colleague invited Rafael to a Bible study at Clay Road Baptist Church in Houston, Texas. “There my father gave his life to Jesus Christ,” Cruz recounted. “God transformed his heart. And He drove to the airport, bought a plan ticket and he flew back to be with my mother.”

Unashamed of his born-again background, Cruz continued, “There are people who wonder if faith is real. I can tell you, in my family, there is not a second of doubt. For were it not for the transformative love of Jesus Christ, I would have been raised by a single mother without a father in the household.”

Continuing on, Cruz outlined his platform with a heavy focus on religious liberty as a fundamental value. Cruz also told the crowd that he will seek to support Israel, protect the sanctity of unborn life, repeal Obamacare, uphold Second Amendment rights and cut Common Core.

Cruz’s decision to highlight faith and freedom seems an appropriate choice. Religious liberty and will be in the forefront of topics highlighted by the 2016 U.S. Presidential election.

“God’s blessing has been on America from the very beginning of this nation,” Cruz told the crowd. “And I believe God is not done with America yet.”

  1. Comment by John on March 24, 2015 at 10:30 am

    An event such as this (as well as this article!) makes me wonder if “evangelical” simply means political conservatism and no more these days.

    “I’m pretty sure, here in New Hampshire, y’all define gun control like we do in Texas: Gun control is when you hit at what you aim at.” – Ted Cruz

  2. Comment by JClarke on March 24, 2015 at 4:40 pm

    So you’re against self-defense? That seems to be what you’re getting at.

  3. Comment by Leigh on March 25, 2015 at 9:57 am

    Jesus sure was. He allowed himself to be insulted, flogged and nailed to a cross to die without any effort at defending himself.

  4. Comment by JClarke on March 25, 2015 at 1:55 pm

    Except that was his objective. Fighting back against the people who did that to him would defeat his purpose for being on this earth.

  5. Comment by Leigh on March 25, 2015 at 3:24 pm

    Jesus advocated peace to his followers, and loving your enemy. “If someone strikes you on one cheek, offer him the other as well.” Or don’t your remember that verse of the Bible? Sounds like anything but advocating self-defense, doesn’t it?

  6. Comment by Paul Hoskins on March 25, 2015 at 5:12 pm

    People own guns so as to protect their loved ones. Anyone claiming to be a Christian who would stand by and let his wife or child be harmed is no Christian, he’s a spineless wimp. Turn the other cheek is about an individual not going the path of vengeance, it has nothing to do with protection of other people.

  7. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 27, 2015 at 10:38 pm

    Defending one’s family is not exclusive to any one particular faith.
    And I pray the NRA doesn’t underwrite any candidates this next election cycle!

  8. Comment by JClarke on March 25, 2015 at 7:44 pm

    There’s a difference between loving your enemies and defending yourself and others from evil.

  9. Comment by Leigh on March 26, 2015 at 9:26 am

    So then, Jesus got it wrong?

  10. Comment by JClarke on March 26, 2015 at 12:14 pm

    No, you are getting it wrong.

  11. Comment by Leigh on March 26, 2015 at 1:23 pm

    *shrugs* Mmmkay. I only know what I read, and Jesus specifically said certain things that do not support killing or hurting your enemies. You say differently.

    Guess your word is gospel and not his.

  12. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 28, 2015 at 3:23 am

    If you only know what you read, you clearly haven’t read enough.

    “Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword. For I have come to ‘set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’”

    “For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil.”

    The Word came and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah in fire before incarnating as the Christ. He sent the Israelites to smash the evil of Canaan. How much have you ACTUALLY read and understood?

    He who bears the sword against evil is doing God’s work. That is in the word of God, and if you actually read it, you would know that. But then, you are just twaddlizing, aren’t you? You don’t have the slightest idea what Jesus meant when He talked about doing good to those who persecute you, or laying down life for an enemy. He was talking about Himself, what he would do. Couldn’t you be bothered to read the whole thing?

  13. Comment by Leigh on March 30, 2015 at 10:03 am

    Love that cherry-pickin’ Mark. Good job!

  14. Comment by Mark Brooks on April 3, 2015 at 11:46 am

    You might want to get that stick out of your eye before replying next time. Or figure out what “cherry-picking” really means, since that is what you did. But then, as I said in my previous comment, you are just engaging in anti-Christian twaddle.

  15. Comment by Leigh on April 7, 2015 at 9:43 am

    Oh please. Any time you Christian extremists disagree with something immediately you screech “I’M BEING PERSECUTED, WAHHHHH!!!!”

    Crying wolf too many times, dear.

  16. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 27, 2015 at 11:36 am

    When he comes back, that changes. Whoo-boy, does that change. Hope you are on the right side then.

  17. Comment by Leigh on March 27, 2015 at 11:53 am

    Yes I know. A pumped-up Rambo Jesus he will be, slaying all who refuse to convert. Hope the Jews of Israel know exactly why groups like CUFI revere Israel so much. Jesus needs Israel to “return”. At which point, they better convert or else.

  18. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 27, 2015 at 5:17 pm

    LOL. Clearly, you haven’t ACTUALLY read Revelation at all. Rather than point out your mistakes, I suggest you go to the source.

  19. Comment by Russ Neal on March 25, 2015 at 11:32 am

    Maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe “conservatism” is slowly realizing that the order it seeks to conserve is a Christian order. The left has certainly accepted that its mission is to destroy the Christian order.

  20. Comment by Fran Brunson on March 24, 2015 at 9:46 pm

    I’m cynical about politicians of both parties, but as Christians we obligated to vote, even if it means choosing the lesser of two evils. The GOP is not the God party, but on a practical level it is less anti-God than the other option.

  21. Comment by Russ Neal on March 25, 2015 at 11:42 am

    There is a big difference between our modern concept of “freedom of religion” and the founders’ concept of “Christian liberty.” Freedom of religion holds the government must be secular and hence “neutral” with respect to religion, which is to say everyone can have their imaginary friend, be it Jesus or Allah or Buddha or Krishna or no imaginary friend at all, provided all recognize the secular human government as the true God with unlimited power over the individual. This is similar to the Roman Empire’s model. Christian liberty accepts the ultimate government of the biblical God and his law-word as a given, and the civil government as “under God’ with a limited ministerial role, resulting in a large area of individual freedom for Christian and non-Christian alike. Such an order can only exist when the Christian population exerts a dominant de facto influence on the nation.

  22. Comment by brookspj on March 27, 2015 at 5:18 pm

    Except that’s not what the founders believed at all. Many of them were deists and Unitarians. Benjamin Franklin believed claimed Jesus wasn’t divine and Jefferson wrote his own Bible, removing all references to the supernatural. And when they wrote about freedom of religion, they didn’t just mean for different sects of Christians, but all religions including Jews and Muslims. Jefferson specified the later in several letters and correspondents. And none of them ever claimed only Christians should hold power. You need to learn your history.

  23. Comment by Byrom on March 28, 2015 at 9:44 pm

    I listened to Ted’s speech on our local Fox broadcast channel, the only one in my city to carry it. Sure, there was a political component there. But that totally misses the impact of the early part of Ted’s speech. It was a PUBLIC testimony about the power of God and Jesus Christ to heal broken lives and broken families. Ted’s wife is the daughter of Christian missionaries. “Freedom of religion” is not part of the Constitution of these United States of America. The First Amendment says that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” That means that Congress cannot establish a “Church of the United States” or any other federally-sanctioned church, nor can it prohibit me from freely exercising my Christian faith. The bottom line for me is that this speech by Ted Cruz made me proud to be a follower of Jesus Christ and a citizen of these United States of America.

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