Ted Cruz says Body of Christ needs to lead America, urges evangelicals to vote in 2016

Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz believes that it is high time for the Body of Christ to lead America so as to save the country from the moral decline it is steadily going under.

"Nothing is more important in the next 18 months than that the Body of Christ rises up and that Christians stand up—that pastors stand up and lead," he said during an interview with the American Family Association.

His own father, Pastor Rafael Cruz, has always encouraged Christians and church leaders to be the salt and light that the nation needs, and he hopes to do the same thing now. "He will tell pastors, 'Listen, God really laid upon my heart that no one bears greater responsibility for the condition of this country today than the pastors,'" Cruz explained. "Because if the flock stumbles into a ditch, you don't blame the sheep; you blame the shepherd."

During the previous elections, 54 million evangelical Christians chose to stay at home, so it's no wonder that the country has unbelievers for its government leaders now, the senator from Texas said.

Cruz prays that more Christians would vote in next year's elections.

Should he be elected president, he said he already knows what he will be doing.

"There are five things I intend to do on Jan. 20, 2017," Cruz said. "Number one, rescind every unconstitutional and illegal executive action taken by President Obama. Number two, direct the Department of Justice to open an investigation into Planned Parenthood and prosecute any and all criminal conduct. Number three, direct every agency of the federal government that the persecution of religious liberty ends today. The federal government will defend religious liberty, not attack it."

"Number four, I will rip to shreds this catastrophic Iranian nuclear deal and defend this nation against the threat of a radical Islamic ayatollah with a nuclear weapon," he added. "And number five, on the first day in office, I intend to begin the process of moving the American embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, the once eternal capital of Israel."

Cruz might be the most underestimated political candidate for the 2016 elections, but he has been rising in some polls and attracting more attention after the Republican debate held last Aug. 6 in Cleveland, according to Newsmax.