--- title: Donald Trump Inauguration: Read the Sermon He Heard Before description: Before attending the inauguration ceremony, President Trump attended a private religious service at St. John's Episcopal Church. canonical: https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-01-20T17:51:50.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T02:50:29.351Z article:section: Politics og:title: Read the Sermon Trump Heard Before Becoming President og:description: An exclusive transcript og:url: https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt27bdc104cdacd644/6988b663428a9ed437cd58ca/gettyimages-632185658.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump depart St. John's Church ahead of the 58th presidential inauguration in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Read the Sermon Trump Heard Before Becoming President twitter:description: An exclusive transcript twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt27bdc104cdacd644/6988b663428a9ed437cd58ca/gettyimages-632185658.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Read the Sermon Donald Trump Heard Before Becoming President by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jan 20, 2017 5:51 PM UTC  U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump depart St. John's Church ahead of the 58th presidential inauguration in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump depart St. John's Church ahead of the 58th presidential inauguration in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017.Bloomberg/Getty Images by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jan 20, 2017 5:51 PM UTC Before [attending the inauguration ceremony](http://time.com/4641156/donald-trump-inauguration-oath-swear-in-president/), President Trump attended a private religious service at St. John’s Episcopal Church, across the street from the White House, as part of a modern Inauguration Day ritual. The service was led by the Rev. [Robert Jeffress](http://time.com/4323009/donald-trump-southern-baptist-russell-moore-evangelicals-christianity/), a Southern Baptist who [campaigned hard](http://time.com/donald-trump-prosperity-preachers/) for Trump during the closing months of the election. Here is an exclusive transcript of Jeffress’ sermon, which drew on the story of Nehemiah, a historical figure described in the Old Testament for rebuilding Jerusalem. --- > “” --- ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/"},"headline":"Read the Sermon Donald Trump Heard Before Becoming President","datePublished":"2017-01-20T17:51:50.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T02:50:29.351Z","description":"Before attending the inauguration ceremony, President Trump attended a private religious service at St. John's Episcopal Church.","url":"https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/","keywords":["Donald Trump","faith","inauguration","Inauguration 2017"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt27bdc104cdacd644/6988b663428a9ed437cd58ca/gettyimages-632185658.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt27bdc104cdacd644/6988b663428a9ed437cd58ca/gettyimages-632185658.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump depart St. John's Church ahead of the 58th presidential inauguration in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017.","caption":"U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump depart St. John's Church ahead of the 58th presidential inauguration in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Jan. 20, 2017.","creditText":"Bloomberg/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4641208/donald-trump-robert-jeffress-st-john-episcopal-inauguration/","name":"Read the Sermon Donald Trump Heard Before Becoming President"}}]}] ```