Country Star Curtis Grimes Shares Journey To Christ: ‘God Never Gave Up On Me’
By Movieguide® Staff
For Country star Curtis Grimes, his early success led to a life of sin. However, when he turned back to Christ, his label abandoned him.
The award-winning artist, who had once performed on stage with legends such as Kenny Chesney and LeAnn Rimes, had to choose between fame and faith.
But the decision was a no-brainer for Grimes, who recalled a promise he made as an 8-year-old to his parents.
“Growing up, I remember telling my dad, ‘Hey, when I’m big, I want to play major league baseball and I want to use that platform to tell people about Jesus’,” he told CBN.
Grime’s initial passion for sports and success led him away from his early childhood faith.
“At that point, it was just to fit in, to be cool, to hang out with the boys,” he said. “I wanted them to respect me, feel like I was as, as cool as them at the time. And then fast-forward, four or five years, and now like I couldn’t tell you the last time I went to church.”
Despite his life of sin, Grimes still experienced success. Grimes led his high school to the baseball state championship and even earned a scholarship to Centenary College.
But after quitting baseball for who he thought was his future wife, the couple broke up, and Grimes felt lost.
“The drinking, partying, playing the guitar, trying to play and sing and write these Texas country songs was what I replaced everything in my life that I had known up until then with,” he said.
Grimes turned away from his dream of playing in the MLB and picked up a guitar. Again, Grimes felt the thrill of success, winning a radio contest to open for Kenny Chesney and making it to the quarter-finals of THE VOICE in 2011.
“I got a national booking agent and management and started pushing radio singles with a promoter. The natural thing to do was to chase this as long as it lasted,” he said.
Although he still professed to be a Christian, his life was far from honoring to God.
“Just drinking and partying, the hanging out and hooking up with girls on the road. I knew how I was living was wrong. So, I had that internal battle going on as well,” he said. “I was just so ashamed of what I’d done that I didn’t want to face reality. I didn’t want to fess up and instead of facing it, I just ran from it.”
“I was really a horrible representation of a Christian in pretty much every aspect: my lifestyle, the songs I was putting out, the lyrical content, and I had changed so much from where I was,” he continued. “Here I was with the platform, with the opportunity to influence and reach people, and up until this point, I hadn’t done that at all. I had actually done the complete opposite,” he says.”
But in 2015, Grimes hit his breaking point after listing to Andre Crouch’s song, “Through it All.”
“That’s what spurred the thought of through all this, through all of how I was living, God never gave up on me,” he said. “He still loves me, and he just wants me to make things right and live my life walking with Jesus. It was the breaking point. That was the moment to where I said, ‘You know what? I messed up and I’m genuinely sorry about it. And I don’t want to keep doing that.’ I remember laying on the floor praying and just asking God to forgive me of how I’d been living the last several years. Just getting it all out there was a huge weight lifted off my shoulder and a huge burden removed.”
But when Grimes wanted his music to reflect his change of heart, his label cut him.
“I said, ‘Hey guys, I’ve made a lot of changes in my life lately. Stopped drinking, sobered up, put God first, and I want my music to reflect that.’ I didn’t want to continue doing drinking, partying music, I wanted to do positive, faith-based, more traditional sounding country music,” he explained. “On the surface, it looked like I had lost everything, but in reality, the road had been cleared for me to really go in and do it exactly how I want to with the songs I wanted to do it. And there wasn’t anything in my way.”
With faith as his foundation, Grimes recorded over a dozen hit singles and earned the top spot among country Christian artists at the Texas Country Music Awards.
“The message that I want everyone to take home every night is, ‘Hey, Jesus loves you, no matter where you are or what you’ve been through, Jesus loves you.’ I’m going, “Hey, I get it. I was there. I know what it’s like and I know what Jesus did for me. And I know what Jesus is doing through me. And that’s the good news I have for you.”
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Now more than ever we’re bombarded by darkness in media, movies, and TV. Movieguide® has fought back for almost 40 years, working within Hollywood to propel uplifting and positive content. We’re proud to say we’ve collaborated with some of the top industry players to influence and redeem entertainment for Jesus. Still, the most influential person in Hollywood is you. The viewer.
What you listen to, watch, and read has power. Movieguide® wants to give you the resources to empower the good and the beautiful. But we can’t do it alone. We need your support.
You can make a difference with as little as $7. It takes only a moment. If you can, consider supporting our ministry with a monthly gift. Thank you.
Movieguide® is a 501c3 and all donations are tax deductible.
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