Yesterday’s memorial service for Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk was a rally for evangelism in America. It was among the largest, most high-profile openly religious political events in American history.

Kirk was at the nexus of politics and religion. An influential conservative activist with close ties to the White House, the 31-year-old built a vast youth-focused network, mobilized voters, and raised tens of millions for the maga movement. He was also unapologetic about his religion, an open advocate of allowing the Bible to guide private and public life, even public policy.

Now he is a martyr for millions of people who are determined to use his assassination as a call to arms in a spiritual fight for the country’s future. Speech after speech at his memorial—attended by President Trump, Vice President Vance and many other officials—spoke of this being a turning point back to God for America.

We are witnessing the greatest revival of Western values in American history and it is burning with the fury of 1,000 suns.
—Matt Van Swol

Among the most powerful statements in the speeches was Erika Kirk forgiving her husband’s killer. It was an extraordinary demonstration of why the Bible’s teachings are the way forward for a nation bristling with hatreds that threaten to explode into violence.

Several of the speakers talked about the need for repentance. Perhaps the most prominent was Tucker Carlson, who praised Charlie Kirk for “doing the thing that the people in charge hate most, which is calling for them to repent.”

“Politics, at its core, is a process of critiquing other people and getting them to change. Christianity—the gospel message, the message of Jesus—begins with repentance. Christianity calls upon you to change.”

Referencing Christ’s model prayer in Matthew 6:9-13, specifically the statement “forgive us our debts,” Carlson said,

In other words, forgive us our sins. Meditate on what we’ve done wrong, how we’ve fallen short. … That is a call to change our hearts, from Jesus—and that is the only way forward in this country.

That is absolutely true. America’s greatest need today is repentance, a turning from our sins. And sin is the transgression of God’s law—a specific code of conduct outlining a way of life, a way of love, summarized in the Ten Commandments.

That was the way Jesus lived. When He announced the gospel of the Kingdom of God, He preceded it by saying, “Repent ye, and believe the gospel” (Mark 1:15). And the gospel was a message about the coming Kingdom, the very government of God administering that law all over the Earth. You can learn all about this transcendent message in our free book The Incredible Human Potential.

The lasting effectiveness of this swell of religious fervor depends entirely on how much it turns people to truly obeying the God of the Bible—to repenting and believing the true gospel of Jesus Christ. The Bible has many warnings about false Christianity, and Christ Himself cautioned against people calling Him “Lord, lord” but not doing what He said, living His teachings (Matthew 7:21; Luke 6:46).