Actress Kimberly Elise stunned fans when photos of her baptism went viral a few years ago, with “The Manchurian Candidate” star openly sharing her budding Christian faith.
Elise, 58, said her journey to Hollywood was a fulfillment of childhood dreams. She also shared her faith trajectory, noting she had initially come to Jesus early in her life, but walked away in her teenage years.
“We didn’t go to church, we didn’t study the Bible,” Elise told CBN News. “We were raised with Christian principles. However, I knew at a young age — ‘There’s something I’m missing.'”
And that missing piece started to come together when she was 16, got her driver’s license, and started bringing herself to church.
“I was going to church and got baptized when I was 16, and, unfortunately, I didn’t have the benefit of any discipleship, any development, any real understanding of what it truly meant to be a follower of Jesus,” Elise said. “So, I quickly went back into the world like teenagers do, and finished college, met my husband … at the time, got married, and then that segues into Hollywood and moving to California.”
Despite not being fervent in her faith while working in Hollywood, Elise said she knew God had blessed her with gifts and that those gifts needed to be used “in a certain way.”
“I didn’t know Jesus, I didn’t know the Holy Spirit, but I knew that God had blessed me and given me certain gifts,” she said. “And, so, when I went to Hollywood, I just knew there were certain things I would not and could not do because of the gift that God had given me.”
Elise, who grew up in the suburbs of Minneapolis, Minnesota, recalled having a deep passion for entertainment early in life — a drive that led her to start working in commercials both locally and nationally when she was in college.
Before long, she dove into theater and eventually made her way to Hollywood, where she studied at the American Film Institute, graduated, and transitioned into feature films. The rest is history.
Elise enjoyed a successful career, but in 2019, she said she realized something wasn’t quite right in her life.
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“Different things converged that made me realize I’m not making the choices that I should be making,” she said. “I’m not making good choices.”
Elise continued, “I was very into … the whole New Age thing. And, again, moved away from God and was like, ‘The universe and crystals.'”
The actress was “pretty deep” into these practices, and sounded the alarm about the dangers of devolving into such elements.
“The thing with New Age is it’s a constant search; it never ends,” she said. “You’re always looking for this other answer, and that’s why it’s … so broad and so wicked … it’s a bottomless pit and there is no truth in it, but you believe it is because it’s kind of close enough to sort of resonate in some way, but it’s all just a lie.”
Despite Elise’s best attempts to use crystals and other elements to fix her life, she knew something was amiss and that she still didn’t “have the truth.” One day, her pain and suffering came to a head.
“I literally got down on my knees in my kitchen, and I cried out to God, and I said, ‘Are you there? Do you see me? Do you love me? Do you know me? I can’t hear you,'” she recalled, noting she asked God to send someone who could tell her about Him.
Two weeks later, Elise said something incredible happened: she met with the mother of one of her friends — a Christian woman who said she had been waiting to meet with her. This woman prayed with her and then delivered a surprising message.
“The first thing she said is … ‘God loves you, God wants you to know that He loves you, and He hears you and He sees you,” she said.
It was the very answer to prayer Elise had sought in her kitchen just days before.
“It was an answer to that cry,” she said. “After that, she just called me regularly and would pray for me.”
Soon, Elise found herself wanting to know more about Jesus and she felt compelled to read the Bible.
“One morning, I woke up with just this strong calling to go get a Bible,” she said, noting she didn’t have a copy and had never read it. Didn’t have a Bible. “I went and I got a Bible, and I sat down, and I didn’t know where to start. I Googled, ‘Where do I start reading the Bible?'”
Ultimately, she ended up in the Gospels and started with Matthew. As Elise read through the genealogy, something clicked.
“It was just as clear as day — ‘This is truth,'” she said. “And I could not put it down. I could not stop reading, and the Lord just started filling me … and my understanding, and I could understand what I was reading.”
Elise started to see her sin, “pride and ignorance” — and it changed absolutely everything.
“God showed me my sin, and I just fell on my knees again, and just begged for his forgiveness,” she said.
Watch Elise share her journey and visit her website for more information on her work and ministry. Also, subscribe to her “Kimberly Elise Grace Truth and Love” YouTube channel.
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