I’ve never formally endorsed a candidate in any presidential primary. This time the stakes are too high not to. Look around. The world is on fire and the party of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, not to mention the GOP’s Obama-enabling RINO establishment, are playing with gasoline.

And so, while he’s been among my top picks all along, I am now proud to publicly endorse for president of the United States Sen. Ted Cruz, the man who best personifies the anti-establishment, principle over perceived pragmatism, survival over political correctness mood of the American electorate. I believe, God willing, that Sen. Cruz, a constitutional stalwart and steadfast statesman, is here “for a time such as this.” He alone, in the spirit of Reagan v. Carter, can, in my estimation, mop the floor in the general election with Hillary Clinton (aka, Obama in a pantsuit).

Jesus warned: “If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand” (Mark 3:25). Nothing has borne out this reality in recent decades like that exasperating spectacle called the Republican presidential primary. These last few GOP horse races have been jam-packed with would-be conservative and faithfully Christian presidents who, after infighting with largely simpatico opponents, have canceled each other out, limped off to lick their wounds and left the perpetually underwhelmed GOP base to stay home and not vote for “imminently electable” establishment paragons like Presidents Dole, McCain and Romney. Divide and conquer. That’s how the “moderate” GOP establishment plays the primary.

And then they lose the general.

Albert Einstein famously quipped that the definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” In that sense, we conservatives are insane.

How about trying something new?

This 2016 GOP presidential primary is shaping up to be a three-way race between Ted Cruz, Donald Trump and Marco Rubio. With Jeb Bush languishing in the low single digits, the Republican establishment is clearly poised to throw its weight behind Rubio, leaving Cruz as the lone principled conservative with a shot.

And Donald Trump? Well, Steve Deace, my friend and fellow Cruz supporter, recently summed up Trump’s conservative bona fides on CNN: “I know the establishment hates Trump, but Cruz was right to welcome him to the GOP. We’re trying to grow the party. And in Trump, here’s a lifelong Democrat and progressive who has given more money to the likes of Al Sharpton and Rahm Emanuel than anyone watching this will see in a lifetime. Yet now, with the country at its tipping point moment, he’s chosen to come over to our side and adopt conservatism. So we welcome him into the fold.”

As Ted Cruz quipped in Tuesday’s debate on CNN, “If I’m elected president, we will secure the border, we will triple the border patrol, we will get a wall that works, and I’ll get Donald Trump to pay for it.”

Trump laughed and replied, “I’ll build it!” I suspect there’s a place in a Cruz administration for Donald Trump.

Indeed, while there remains a handful of other honorable, eminently qualified and actually conservative men in the GOP primary, any of whom I’d be honored to support under different circumstances, it has now become clear, in my humble opinion – an opinion supported by the polls – that the window of opportunity has closed for them. Now is the time for them to bow out and throw their support behind Cruz. Moreover, conservative and Christian leaders around the country, as well as voters of every stripe, should put aside personal friendships and loyalties to other candidates and, likewise, rally behind the Texas senator.

Let’s beat the establishment at its own game.

Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume, a Washington insider who’s made no secret of his disdain for Ted Cruz,recently gave him a backhanded compliment: “Cruz has so alienated his Senate colleagues, Republicans perhaps more than Democrats, that he’s well positioned as an outsider. But his rise in the polls will put him in the spotlight. Iowa voters will have the holidays and all of January to ponder why Cruz is so disliked by his Senate colleagues. The question then will be this: Will they still feel the same way about him when they find out.”

Mr. Hume, you’re playing dumb. You know full well that Iowa voters, indeed most voters, understand completely why Ted Cruz is hated by many of his Senate colleagues on both sides of the aisle. Unlike his establishment contemporaries, he often stands alone, resolute and unwavering, in keeping the promises he’s made to those who elected him as their Senate representative. The political establishment, whether it’s got a “D” or an “R” behind its name, hates Ted Cruz with a white-hot hatred because he threatens the status quo. They’re politicians hell-bent, first and foremost, on maintaining political power. Sen. Cruz, on the other hand, is a servant leader, a true statesman, determined to do what’s best for America no matter the cost to his personal and political standing. No, Mr. Hume, the fact that Ted Cruz is hated by Washington insiders such as yourself is not a mark against him. It’s a big part of the reason he’s gaining steam.

Indeed, candidate Cruz is the right man for right now. Of course, while our ultimate hope can rest in Christ Jesus alone, He does appoint men and women on earth to act as his hands and feet. Ted Cruz is immovable, fearless and dogged in his determination to do the right thing. His integrity, character, remarkable communication skills and extraordinary persuasive powers, as evidenced by his five landmark victories before the U.S. Supreme Court as Texas solicitor general, have, among other things, uniquely qualified this fine man to become the leader of the free world.

Proverbs 4:18 says, “The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter till the full light of day.”

These are dark times. Ted Cruz is a righteous man. As president, he’ll shine bright. He’ll light the path. He’ll help make America that “shining city on a hill” once more.