This Movie Star Stays on God’s ‘Front Lines.’ She Explains Why.
Movieguide® Contributor
THE FORGE actress Priscilla Shirer opened up about her chance encounter with Billy Graham’s daughter — a meeting she’ll never forget.
“She walked over to me and started talking to me. Anne Graham Lotz is like just this astute, dignified, 5 foot 10, maybe, you know. So I’m just 23, and I’m just standing there looking up at her like, why is she talking to me, right?… She came over to me that day, and in the five minutes she talked to me, I said nothing,” Shirer told Candace Cameron Bure on Bure’s podcast.
“I just listened to her because I was completely stunned that she was talking to me, and I can remember what she said like it was yesterday. That’s how impactful it was,” the actress and author recalled. “She said things to me like, ‘Priscilla, I know you know who my dad is, Billy Graham, and I know who your dad is,’ and she said, ‘I want you to know that no matter the ministry the Lord calls you to or calls me to, whether it’s just like our daddies to millions of people or it’s to three people, we’re supposed to do it to the glory of God. So don’t look at what your parents have done. Ask God what you’re supposed to do.'”
There were many well-known people in the hotel lobby where they stood. Lotz gestured to them.
“She said, ‘Priscilla, so many people in here have huge followings, and they’ve amassed all of these accolades,’ and she said, ‘Half of these people are going to get to heaven and find out they’re not even on the front lines because they’ve had the applause of people…They’re doing what the people want instead of doing what God has asked them to do,’ and so she looked at me and she said, ‘Priscilla, ask God what are the front lines for you, and then when he tells you to get on the line, don’t get off.’”
Lotz became a mentor for Shirer, who calls Lotz’s guidance a “compass.”
“If there’s a project that comes to me that’s a great opportunity, but it’s not on the front lines, it doesn’t matter what money is attached to it. It doesn’t matter that everybody around me thinks it’s a good opportunity,” she said. “If I feel like it’s not on the front lines for what God has called me to do in this season, it’s a quick no. Not always an easy no, but it’s a quick no because I heard what this woman said to me 25 years ago and so she’s one of the main ones that the Lord has put in my life through the years that were brave enough to say what needed to be said.”
Shirer never knew why Lotz spoke to her that day. She found out why only this year, five years after her mother passed away from cancer.
“You know, for all these years, I’ve never known why she talked to me that day. She happened to speak at our church this year for Mother’s Day, and for the first time in our 25 years of relationship now, she told me it was…because my mother had pulled her aside that day and said, ‘I think Priscilla has ministry in her life. Will you talk to her?’” Shirer said tearfully.
Priscilla Shirer, an actress and author known for her roles in WAR ROOM and OVERCOMER, appeared on PRAISE to discuss her book, “Discerning the Voice of God: How to Recognize When God Speaks”…
READ MORE: PRISCILLA SHIRER: HOW TO KNOW WHEN GOD SPEAKS TO YOU
Shirer’s movie, WAR ROOM, earned a Movieguide® Teddy Bear Award®. The actress also recently released her first book in five years, called, “I Surrender All,” which explains what it means to truly live as a follower of Christ on God’s front lines.
Next year, Shirer will speak at the national Lifeway Women’s conference in four cities, where she’ll lead women in “Bible teaching to experience the truth of scripture and power of prayer.” Her brother, Anthony Evans, is slated to lead worship.
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