Famous actor Russell Brand recently shared with his followers on social media part of his journey through the Bible, where he recently did a deep dive into the New Testament book of Ephesians. Within Paul’s letter, Brand particularly honed in on Ephesians 6:12, which discusses the spiritual battle in the lives of believers.
Brand said, “This has been what I’m looking at in the Bible today. You know, Ephesians 6:12, one of Paul’s letters — Paul’s letters to the Ephesians — he wrote a lot of letters Paul, he done a lot of miracles, he got a lot done but he still had time for correspondence … I’ve liked this, ‘For our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.’”
Brand proceeded to apply Ephesians 6:12 to the modern age, speculating on what Paul’s writing entails for global issues such as war, geopolitical tensions, and corporate influence. The actor points out that the unseen spiritual forces, as described by Paul, could undoubtedly be playing a factor in much of this.
“What do you consider that to actually mean in terms of the global struggle? The geopolitical wars that spill across the world right now? The sense that there are corporate geopolitical forces corrupting and co-opting democracies and sovereign nations everywhere we look? How does what Paul’s writing to the Ephesians in 6:12 relate to what all of us feel, that our leaders have become corrupted, that there is a need for a significant spirit to infuse and empower us that we may oppose them?” he added.
As demonstrated by this video update earlier this month, Brand is diving head-first into Christianity after placing his face in Christ and getting baptized just a couple of months ago. The Christian Tribune previously reported on an update from Brand one month after his baptism.
“I’ve been a Christian a month now and it’s been a big change,” he stated 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 expressed his understanding of repentance, realizing that one must confess their sins before Christ and turn away from the lifestyle. He also demonstrated a crucial point in Christian theology that one cannot achieve salvation through their own good deeds, but only through the grace of God when one’s faith is placed in Jesus.
“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.”
Featured image credit: Featured image credit: Eva Rinaldi, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arthur_Russell_Brand_(5622506846).jpg