Former President Donald Trump delivered a video message Monday to the Danbury Institute, a Baptist group devoted to pro-life and religious liberty causes, a day before the start of the Southern Baptist Convention in Indianapolis.

“Hello to everyone at the Danbury Institute and to all of the wonderful pastors and faith leaders, very respected people, gathered for the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting,” Trump said in the video played on a screen at the group’s meeting.

“That’s a big deal,” Trump said of the Southern Baptist Convention. “I want to thank each and every one of you for your tremendous devotion to God and to country, and your tremendous support of me.”

“I hope I’ve earned it, because we’ve done things nobody thought were possible, and I’ve gotten it done,” Trump said.

“These are difficult times for our nation and your work is so important. We can’t afford to have anyone sitting on the sidelines. Now is the time for us to all pull together and to stand up for our values and for our freedoms. And you just can’t vote Democrat. They’re against religion. They’re against your religion in particular. You cannot vote for Democrats and you have to get out and vote.

“We have to defend religious liberty, free speech, innocent life and the heritage and tradition that built America into the greatest nation in the history of the world, but now as you know we are a declining nation. And I might add, we are a seriously declining nation. Seriously, seriously. It’s so sad. I know that each of you is protecting those values every day and I hope we’ll be defending them side-by-side for your next four years.

“These are going to be your years, because you’re going to make a comeback just about like no other group. I know what’s happening. I know where you’re coming from and where you’re going, and I’ll be with you, side-by-side.

“So, again, thank you once again for everything you do and you have to get out and vote. Our religious leaders have to get their incredible people that love them so much and respect them so much, have to get them out to vote. God bless you, and God bless America.”

Scott Colter, the CEO and chairman of the Danbury Institute, which invited Trump to speak, said he voted for Trump in hopes that Trump would appoint U.S. Supreme Court justices that would vote to overturn Roe vs. Wade. That happened, he said.

“Our decision to vote for Donald Trump was vindicated in that moment because of what he did,” Colter said in introducing the Trump video. “We took a risk on what he said he would do and he came through and delivered.”

He said Christians who voted for Trump were vindicated by the overturning of Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationally. Now, the issue is being decided state-by-state.

“We can debate all day long who Donald Trump is and the merits of his personality,” Colter said. “But he did what he said he would do. And for Christians, that brought the step that we had been praying for and that we really never thought we’d see in the pro-life movement, and I’m tremendously grateful for that.”

Earlier in the Danbury Institute meeting, Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler said the Alabama Supreme Court was correct in its ruling on in vitro fertilization when it said all embryos should be protected as human life.