Worship artist Sean Feucht explains why he's running for Congress
Worship artist Sean Feucht is running for Congress, a move he did not see coming but now says might be a fulfillment of his many prayers, hoping to inspire millennials to engage in politics.
In a Wednesday phone interview with The Christian Post about his decision to run for office, Feucht recounted that he has spent the last 15 years traveling the world, approximately 50 countries doing everything from ministering to people in war zones in Iraq to facilitating rescue operations to save children from sex trafficking and child labor camps in India.
"But in the last year, God began to give me a burden like never before for my own nation," he told CP.
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"I have four little kids and I've been looking at them recently and just thinking and wondering and honestly worrying a little bit about what America is going to look like when they grow up."
Feucht is running as a Republican for the seat in the 3rd Congressional district in California, which is currently occupied by John Garamendi, a Democrat who is a former lieutenant governor of California. Garamendi has served in Congress since 2009.
Concerned by what he sees as a heavy-handed push for control over many decisions pertaining to family, education, and medical vaccinations, everything started to feel like the opposite of the society in which he was raised, Feucht observed.
"I'm doing this because I've been praying for so many years that God would bring revival and that he would bring an awakening to America, that government officials would be elected that would be righteous," he said, noting that he never thought he would potentially become the fulfillment of many of his own prayers.
"But I think what happens is that you reach a point to where your prayers don't carry a lot of weight unless there is action behind them. And that's the place where I am right now."
He will face a primary contest in March where the top two finishers regardless of party — due to the "jungle" primary system in California — will compete in the general next November.
"Worship is my primary calling, and it's the primary calling of every believer, and whether it was in a season of where I had a real estate investment company and business out of college. When I started three non-profit organizations and we went after the marginalized and the hopeless I was still a worship leader," Feucht elaborated.
"I understand that some people do worship leading full-time as a vocation but I think part of our calling as believers is to take that heart of worship and bring it into whatever sphere and whatever culture and mountaintop of influence that God has called us to," he said.
Worship leaders as politicians are not new, he points out.
"If you look at the life of King David, for example, he was a rancher and a farmer and then he was in the infantry and then he was a politician and he led an entire nation. And all through those phases and seasons of his life he never lost the heart of worship. That's really my desire, to carry that heart into everything that we're called to do."
"I'm very philanthropic, justice-oriented," he said, when asked how he sees himself in today's political landscape party, "and I've probably been to more countries than most anybody in Congress."
"I've got a huge heart for refugees, for those in these countries fleeing persecution," he added.
He added that he hopes to redefine the philanthropic end of the Republican Party.
Feucht is the founder of Burn 24-7 and Light A Candle. He is best known for his work with Bethel Music.
"I know it's a crazy thing, I know it's a shock to many people," he said of his candidacy. "It's a shock to me. Every morning I wake up and realize I have to fund-raise and I have to mobilize. I didn't ever dream of this. I didn't ask for this. I didn't ever want to do this. I just feel it's the call of God.
"More than anything else, my heart is to inspire people in my generation to engage in the political world. I know that it's dirty and has a bad reputation but I also know that we are called to be the salt and light and so I want to do my best to do just like what we do when we are in Iraq or India, bringing the light, love, hope, and salt of Jesus in the mix."
He concluded: "Hopefully, out of my attempt, whether it is successful or not, that we would get millennials to engage in this election cycle and that we'd get future people to run for office."
