Recently, famous actor Russel Brand initiated a significant life change when he decided to become a Christian and put his faith in Jesus Christ. One month after his baptism, Brand took to social media, documenting his journey in walking with Christ.
According to Brand, while he doesn’t feel that he has become an entirely new person, he has absorbed many new ideas that have begun to shift his thinking. “I’ve been a Christian a month now and it’s been a big change,” he said in a video uploaded to X. “Not that I’ve entirely changed as a person, of course I haven’t, but I’ve taken on a lot of new concepts and it changes you to accept that it’s not like you’re in a game show and by doing really, really good things you can get redeemed.”
Brand discussed the concept of repentance to Jesus Christ, confessing one’s sinful nature to the Lord and Savior. This acknowledges that one must submit oneself to Christ in realization that one cannot be saved through one’s own works but only by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
“No, repentance, to repent, means that you have to continually change and acknowledge that I am in a battle against myself,” he added. “That I need to surrender myself to an ever-present eternal and accessible Jesus. That mercy is something that’s been given to me, been granted to me, that I live with through love, not something that I can sort of win or achieve by doing good deeds.”
The actor highlighted that, amid uncertainty, he has guidance as to how he should act. “When I am in doubt, I feel the instruction there is accessible and I know what I am supposed to do and when I don’t do what I am supposed to do, that is even clearer. When I feel myself being selfish or inconsiderate or putting myself first or not thinking about how I can be better to other people, it is as if there is an inner illumination available to me now.”
“I love the simplicity of the idea of God coming to Earth as a man to experience what it is to be human and to sacrifice himself because that is the only sacrifice that could bring us home, that could give us the opportunity for redemption,” he continued.
Brand further praised God’s redemptive nature, which is always accessible and available to those who seek Him. He stated, “I like the idea, when I am in prayer and in communion just alone, that there is a figure available, wounded and coronated, available to me. In my failings, in my failures and in my fallibility, there is strength to be broken. Not just broken by life in the sense, it is rearing and exhausting, but to be broken in the same way that you have to train an animal to behave itself, to be broken into better conduct. It is a beautiful journey to go on.”
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.