Speaking in an interview with The Christian Post, actor and singer Dennis Quaid spoke about his path to faith and the church after growing “disillusioned” with the church as a young boy, and how he sees there as being a religious awaking coming for society, as turmoil has driven people to the faith.
Explaining, in the interview, how he turned from the church after he was chastised in Sunday School for forgetting his small donation, a quarter, for the offering plate on Sunday, Quaid added, “The subject matter turned me off.” He added, “There were probably some other things, too. I started asking questions that didn’t have answers. … I started to question my faith.”
Building on that point, he added that he had trouble reconciling the Old Testament and New Testament, saying, “I read the Bible cover to cover as well, back then, and I got hung up in the Old Testament, how violent it was. God seemed like a punishing God back then to me. A lot of it just didn’t make sense.”
So, unable to find answers and finding himself “disillusioned,” Quaid drifted from the faith and found himself using a mountain of cocaine and living a dangerous life of vice. But then, after having a moment where he envisioned his death after a disappointing life, he found his way back to God through the Bible. “I went back, and I read the Bible again, cover to cover, and what really struck being that this time were the red words of Jesus and who He really was,” he explained.
Continuing, he noted that through the Word of God he built a relationship with God, saying, “That was the beginning of my personal relationship with Jesus Christ. And that’s really what it’s all about. From there, it’s grown, and it does fill up that hole inside me. I was there all along; my mother taught me that, but we have to learn things for ourselves. It led me right back to where I started.”
Later in the interview, he discussed his new faith album, Fallen Gospel, saying, “I wanted the album to reflect me; I didn’t want it to seem like churchy, or preachy or, ‘everything is just wonderful.'” He added, “I thought it would work to reach people that aren’t in that world and are in that world because we’re all sinners. And it’s by grace that we’re saved, and that’s free, redeemed. We actually don’t deserve it, but we get it by grace anyway. How that’s what I want the songs to reflect. This record is really the story of my spiritual journey.”
Then, explaining how he sees things as changing in the world due to chaos and turmoil, Quaid said, “I think there’s a spiritual awakening actually going on in our country right now. There’s been a lot of turmoil, and that’s what spiritual awakenings look like because of what it takes to get there. I think we’re right at the beginning of it.”
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