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Russell Brand Confronts This Common Faith Struggle

Russell Brand Confronts This Common Faith Struggle

By Movieguide® Contributor 

In a recent social media post, new believer Russell Brand shared about a struggle that many Christians go through in their faith journey — feeling distant from Jesus. 

“I’ve been a Christian now for three months. Sometimes I find it quite difficult. What I mean by that is I feel that Christ is far away, and I don’t feel that intimate connection with Christ,” Brand admitted. 

The actor/comedian shared from 1 Corinthians 3:1-3 which talks about spiritual maturity. It reads: 

“Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ.  I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans?” 

Brand related closeness to God to that of spiritual maturity, while sharing that God’s presence is not always evidenced by feelings. 

“I heard yesterday in church that even when I can’t feel God, God is working on me,” the 49-year-old said. “God is working me into the shape that he needs me to be in.” 

He added that emotional highs are not the end game of one’s walk with God. 

“Surely, there’s more to this than just feeling okay,” he said 

Brand, who has been open about overcoming past alcohol and drug addictions, sardonically added, “You know, if you want to feel okay, drink a bunch, or take a bunch of drugs or eat a load of candy, for temporarily, at least, that will offer you some sort of salve or at least distraction.” 

Brand has been outspoken about his faith journey, especially since his baptism in late April this year. He shared a month after his baptism what he learned about mercy and repentance. 

“[R]epentance, to repent, means that you have to continually change and acknowledge that I am in a battle against myself,” he stated. “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” 

While Brand admits the journey of repentance has been “rearing and exhausting,” he says it is also “beautiful.”  

“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,” he added. “In my failings, in my failures and in my fallibility, there is strength to be broken.” 

The Recovery: Freedom from Our Addictions author says he’s not surprised by the spiritual awakening that he is witnessing given the state of current affairs. 

“People are so cynical about the increasing interest in Christianity and the return to God, but to me, it’s obvious,” he said. 

“As meaning deteriorates in the modern world, as our value systems and institutions crumble, all of us become increasingly aware that there is this eerily familiar awakening and beckoning figure that we’ve all known all of our lives, within us and around us. And for me it’s very exciting,” Brand continued. 

Movieguide® has previously reported on his growing relationship with Christ: 

Since becoming Christian, I am learning in my choices to recognize that, as Rick Warren, says, ‘It’s not about you,’” he began. “I’m reminded that if my aim is self-fulfillment and if I am the center of my universe, then I am probably going in the wrong direction.” 

Brand then talked about some of the pushback he has received since announcing his conversion to Christianity. 

“Obviously, the choice I’ve made is because I believe it to be the right choice,” he continued. “It’s something that I’ve deliberated over, and actually curiously, it wasn’t just a choice that I actually made. It was a series of things that unfolded. I was reading about Christianity, I was learning about Christianity, and something really hit me in my heart hard.” 

“It has to do with humility. It has to do with loss. It has to do with suffering,” Brand added. “But I don’t automatically assume that because I’ve become Christian everyone that’s interested in my content should immediately become Christian. I’ve just done what I believe to be right.” 


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