DETROIT, MI — A Detroit pastor has been chosen to offer a prayer at President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
Rev. Lorenzo Sewell, a Detroit native and the leader of 180 Church in the city, will be one of four faith leaders to deliver a benediction prayer at Trump’s inauguration on January 20 in Washington, DC.
“For me, the benediction or the blessing coincides with the dream, with King’s dream, being fulfilled,” he told me. “That someone like me would have an opportunity to pray at the 47th president’s inauguration surely fulfills King’s dream.”
King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, given in Washington, D.C. in 1963, envisioned a future of racial equality and justice in which people are judged based on their character rather than their skin color.
Sewell first met Trump in June, when he welcomed the former president to his church for a campaign stop and roundtable discussion.
During the event, Sewell impressed Trump so much that the then-presidential candidate promised to attend the pastor’s inauguration.
“He said that in the context of the prayer that we prayed for him, because the prayer was not scripted,” Sewell told me.
“Because the prayer wasn’t scripted, it was impromptu, which impressed him because he said he always asks pastors to pray for him, but many of them feel caught off guard, as if they couldn’t pray off the cuff, so to speak. He shook my hand and simply said, “At the inauguration, you’ll be there.”
The pastor claimed he never thought about the promise again until Trump won. And, to his surprise, he said, the president-elect remembered, with Trump’s team contacting him a few weeks ago to offer him the role in the inauguration.
Sewell’s hosting of Trump at his church propelled him from, in his words, a relatively well-known pastor in the region to an internationally recognized name, with visitors from all over the world.
Since the visit, Sewell has traveled throughout the United States and Michigan, opening prayers for Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance, attending a variety of Republican events, and even giving a speech at the Republican National Convention in July.
Sewell grew up on Detroit’s east side. He stated that his father is in prison for murder, and that before discovering Jesus and his calling as a pastor in 1999, he was a “street pharmacist,” a slang term for a drug dealer.
While the journey has not been perfect or easy, he sees it as proof of God’s existence that his beginnings have led him to a role at the inauguration.
“That one day I would be praying the benediction at the inauguration of what some consider to be the greatest political comeback in history? Fairytales. Movies. Come on, you can’t make that up,” he said, laughing.
Sewell previously told MLive that he is a lifelong Republican who supported Trump in 2016 and 2020, despite many of his parishioners identifying as Democrats.
