Palin was asked to address the graduating class of students at her one-time church, Wasilla Assembly of God. In the speech, she says God’s will was to build her proposed $30 billion pipeline, saying God’s will “has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that.”

She said:

I can do my part in working really, really hard to get a natural gas pipeline, about a $30 billion project that’s going to create a lot of jobs for Alaska. … [but] I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that," she said. “I can do my job there in developing our natural resources, in doing things like getting the roads paved and making sure our troopers have their cop cars and their uniforms and their guns, and making sure our public schools are funded. But really that stuff doesn’t do any good if the people of Alaska’s hearts aren’t right with God.”

Weeks later on ABC News, she told Charles Gibson she would never presume to know God’s will.

View her original speech and a clip of her interview with Gibson here:

She also talks about God’s role in U.S. military action overseas, and asks the students to pray that the Iraq war be “a task that is from God.”

View the clip here:

Watch her full talk here.

A McCain operative said the campaign did not know the video existed.

“It’s pretty uncomfortable stuff,” said the political operative, after watching the video online. “It’s bad. It’s really bad. … It’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out.”

The seven-minute speech is posted on the Web site of Palin’s former church, the Wasilla Assembly of God, though according to the operative, the campaign did not know it existed when it picked her.

After Palin speaks, the current pastor of the church, Ed Kalnins, comes out to take the microphone. Palin asks for the microphone back to talk about Paul “Moothy” Riley, the founding pastor of the church:

“We forgot to talk about Pastor Moothy, as I was mayor and Pastor Moothy was here and he was praying over me, you know how he speaks, and he’s so bold he’s praying ‘Lord make a way. Lord make a way,’ and I’m thinkin’ this guy is really bold, he doesn’t even know what I’m going to do, he doesn’t know what my plans are, and he’s praying not ‘O Lord, if it be your will, may she become governor,’ but he just prayed, ‘O Lord make a way and let her do this next step.’

After that, Kalnins, standing next to Palin, says that Alaska is “one of the refuge states,” where thousands of people from the rest of the U.S. will go in “in the last days,” a reference to end times and Armageddon. He says they have to be ready to minister to people from the “lower 48” who flee to Alaska:

… There was some things about the natural resources, about the state, there were some things that God wants to tap into to be a refuge for the lower 48, and I believe Alaska is one of the refuge states. C’mon you guys, in the last days, hundreds and thousands of people are going to come to the state to seek refuge and the Church has to be ready to minister to them. Amen.

He then puts his hands on Palin and asks Riley to say a prayer for her.

View the video here:

On September 7, The Anchorage Daily News reported:

State records show that Palin submitted a travel authorization for a quick round-trip visit to attend the June 8 graduation of the Master’s Commission program at the Wasilla Assembly of God.

The plane tickets cost the state $519.50, and she claimed an additional $120 for meals and other expenses … Palin’s spokeswoman in the governor’s office, Sharon Leighow, said the state paid for the trip because Palin was invited to the events as the governor, not as a private citizen.

(During her speech, Palin said) "I can do my part in doing things like working really, really hard to get a natural gas pipeline. Pray about that also. I think God’s will has to be done, in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that.

“But really, all of that stuff doesn’t do any good if the people of Alaska’s hearts isn’t right with God. And that’s going to be your job,” she said. “As I’m doing my job, let’s strike this deal. Your job is going to be: to be out there, reaching the people, (the) hurting people throughout Alaska, and we can work together to make sure God’s will be done here.”

The speech was recorded and posted to the Wasilla Assembly of God’s Web site. The speech can be seen here.

Here are excerpts from the Chicago Tribune:

A review of recorded sermons of Ed Kalnins, the senior pastor of Wasilla Assembly of God since 1999, also offers an "eyebrow-raising sketch of Palin’s longtime spiritual home,’’ the Post reports.

Kalnins has preached that critics of Bush will be banished to Hell, questioned if people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to Heaven, charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Iraq were part of a war “contending for your faith,” and that Jesus “operated from that position of war mode.”

During the 2004 election, Kalnins praised Bush’s performance in debate with Sen. John Kerry, then offered a not-so-subtle message about his own preference: “I’m not going tell you who to vote for, but if you vote for this particular person, I question your salvation. I’m sorry,” Kalnins said. “If every Christian will vote righteously, it would be a landslide every time.”

Kalnins later bristled at the criticism Bush was facing for the government’s handling of Hurricane Katrina: “I hate criticisms towards the president, because it’s like criticisms towards the pastor — it’s almost like, it’s not going to get you anywhere, you know, except for hell. That’s what it’ll get you.”

…

Palin “has maintained a friendship with Wasilla Assembly of God and has attended various conferences and special meetings here,” Kalnins’ office said in a statement reported by the Post.

In a June address at the church, Palin said: “Having grown up here, and having little kids grow up here also, this is such a special, special place,” she told the congregation in June. “What comes from this church I think has great destiny.”

The Tribune reported:

Palin was baptized at the Wasilla Assembly of God at 12, the Post reports, and has attended the church for most of her adult life. When she was inaugurated as governor, the founding pastor of the church delivered the invocation. In 2002, Palin moved her family to a nondenominational church, but she continues to worship at a related Assembly of God church in Juneau.

“It was so cool growing up in this church and getting saved here,‘’ Palin told the church audience in June, praising "the umbrella of this church… God has sent me from underneath the umbrella of this church throughout this state.’’

Kalnins has preached that the 9/11 attacks and the invasion of Iraq are part of a “world war” over the Christian faith:

What you see in a terrorist — that’s called the invisible enemy. There has always been an invisible enemy. What you see in Iraq, basically, is a manifestation of what’s going on in this unseen world called the spirit world. … We need to think like Jesus thinks. We are in a time and a season of war, and we need to think like that. We need to develop that instinct. We need to develop as believers the instinct that we are at war, and that war is contending for your faith. … Jesus called us to die. You’re worried about getting hurt? He’s called us to die. Listen, you know we can’t even follow him unless you are willing to give up your life. … I believe that Jesus himself operated from that position of war mode. Everyone say “war mode.” Now you say, wait a minute Ed, he’s like the good shepherd, he’s loving all the time and he’s kind all the time. Oh yes he is — but I also believe that he had a part of his thoughts that knew that he was in a war.

CBS reported:

Gov. Sarah Palin’s church is promoting a conference that promises to convert gays into heterosexuals through the power of prayer.

“You’ll be encouraged by the power of God’s love and His desire to transform the lives of those impacted by homosexuality,” according to the insert in the bulletin of the Wasilla Bible Church, where Palin has prayed for about six years.

Palin’s conservative Christian views have energized that part of the GOP electorate, which was lukewarm to John McCain’s candidacy before he named her as his vice presidential choice.

….

Gay activists in Alaska said Palin has not worked actively against their interests, but early in her administration she supported a bill to overrule a court decision to block state benefits for gay partners of public employees.

At the time, less than one-half of 1 percent of state employees had applied for the benefits, which were ordered by a 2005 ruling by the Alaska Supreme Court.

Palin reversed her position and vetoed the bill after the state attorney general said it was unconstitutional.

But her reluctant support didn’t win fans among Alaska’s gay population, said Scott Turner, a gay activist in Anchorage.

In a story titled “Nation examines Palin’s beliefs,” The Anchorage Daily News reported:

The Wasilla Bible Church has made waves as well. Two weeks ago, a guest speaker, David Brickner — a conservative Christian who condemns Jews who fail to accept Christ as the Messiah and tries to convert them through his Jews for Jesus ministry — suggested that terrorism in Israel is God’s judgement against Jews.

The McCain campaign has acknowledged that Palin was in the audience. But in a press statement, campaign spokesman Michael Goldfarb said the governor did not know Brickner would be speaking, and Palin does not share the views he expressed.

“She and her family would not have been sitting in the pews of the church if those remarks were remotely typical,” Goldfarb said.

Although her spokesman notes that those remarks aren’t typical of the church, Palin and her family did not choose to leave while Brickner was speaking.

ABC News quotes Brickner as saying:

“When Jesus was standing in that temple, He spoke that that judgment was coming, that there’s a reality to the judgment of unbelief. … Judgment is very real and we see it played out on the pages of the newspapers and on the television. It’s very real.”

Brickner described when his son Isaac recently "was in Jerusalem, he was there to witness some of that judgment, some of that conflict, when a Palestinian from East Jerusalem took a bulldozer and went plowing through a score of cars, killing numbers of people. Judgment — you can’t miss it. "

Here’s an audio link to Brickner’s speech.

In a CNN interview, reporter Randy Kaye spoke to Wasilla Bible Church pastor Larry Kroon and asked him about Brickner:

Kaye: Would David Brickner be invited to speak here again, after making those comments?

Kroon: Yes, yes he would be.

In his introduction of Brickner before the sermon, Kroon said an encounter with Jews For Jesus in the 1970’s first drew him to Christianity.

Jews for Jesus reported in a newsletter that Kroon, while at Wasilla Bible Church said “If it were not for Jews for Jesus, I would not be standing here.”