Kirk Cameron Shares His Faith Story | Kirk Cameron on TBN

Takeaways: Kirk Cameron sits down for a special One-on-One digital exclusive to share how he found God. Kirk shares stories of the church, Growing Pains, and going from atheism to Christianity.

I didn’t want to be destroyed because of my, my immorality, my sin, my rebellion, and and wickedness, which my conscience convicted me of, and the word of god condemned me over, I wanted god’s forgiveness and his see, like that man said in the pulpit.
Hey, I’m Kirk Cameron. Thanks for joining me today.
Just one on 1. I wanted to take a few minutes today and share my testimony with you in this new year.
I think when you share your story of coming to know God, regardless of your background, what you’ve been through or how you’ve ended up where you’ve ended up when you choose to share your story, it’s powerful.
And there’s no better story than a story about building a relationship with the one who made you.
Experiencing his transforming love and his sustaining grace. When I was a little kid.
I don’t ever remember being taken to church. In fact, we never really talked about god in my family.
I think my mom went to church as a little girl, but but that didn’t translate into what we did together with my brothers and sisters.
And it wasn’t until I was about fourteen years old that I started working on growing pains.
And I think as a as a young teenager, I considered myself to be an atheist I didn’t believe in God.
I thought that that Jesus was part of a different trinity.
Uh, the Easter Bunny, uh, Santa Claus, and the tooth fairy To me, god was just, uh, a, a figment of people’s imagination, a crutch to help them along emotionally.
And it was for the intellectually weak.
Well, that was pretty arrogant of me as a young teenager, and it wasn’t until about seventeen and a half years old that someone took me to church.
And I went to church, not because I was interested in learning about God.
I was interested in learning about a cute girl who invited me to join her that Sunday morning.
And I sat in the back row of the church.
I think I had a baseball cap on some sunglasses to to conceal my identity and go incognito so that people weren’t asking for Mike Sievers Autograph in the back pew.
And I heard a message from the pastor. It was bold.
It was clear and it was articulated with such grace that I was captivated and he talked about the creation of the world by an almighty god who was full of grace and truth.
He was holy. He was light. And in him, he said there was no darkness.
And he created the sun and the moon and the stars to fill the sky and the animals to fill the land and the fish to swim in the paths of the sea.
And then he talked Contrary to the, uh, molecules to man story, he talked about god creating a creature out of the dust of the ground that he made that would bear the creator’s image and breathed life into mankind.
And he talked about how god walked together with his creature, Adam, and gave him this great job of taking dominion over all that he had made and gave him a companion Eve And together, they would populate the earth and and and that the will of god would cover the land like the waters fill the seas.
And then he talked about the great rebellion where Adam and Eve listened to the deceiving serpent and went down a path that led to their destruction and alienation from god.
And rather than god administering justice and wrath for these rebels, he employed a rescue mission that would culminate in a seed of Eve laying down his life and ultimately defeating the devil, crushing the Serpent’s head, which was precisely what Adam should have done in the garden generations earlier and that through that sacrifice, God and man would be reconciled, that god would redeem man out of the prison of sin would set him free and make him a new creature if he would put his faith in the savior who rose from the grave, ascended into heaven, and sends his spirit to dwell in those who repent and trust in him.
And they would be ambassadors of heaven they would be god’s reconcilers here on earth calling all the other rebels to turn back to the one who’s offered them terms of peace.
I was blown away by this story of the gospel, and I thought to myself, could any of this actually be true?
And the preacher was named Chuck Swendahl.
I didn’t know who he was at the time, but I went back to that girl’s house and spoke to her father He answered a lot of my questions.
He gave me a book by Josh McDowell called More Than a Carpenter.
And I read that book and it gave me the courage to pray for the first time.
And I was sitting in my sports car on the side of the road thinking about the fact that one day I would die, And if there really is a god in a heaven, I knew that I would, I would not be going to heaven.
And I didn’t want to experience the judgment of God.
I didn’t want to be destroyed because of my my immorality, my sin, my rebellion, and and wickedness, which my conscience convicted me of, and the word of god condemned me over, I wanted god’s forgiveness and his mercy, like that man said in the pulpit.
And so I just prayed. God, would you show me who you are?
Would you would you show me the truth? Um, I don’t wanna become a religious fanatic.
I wanna be the person that you created me to be, and I know I’m not him right now.
So would you, would you do for me what what I need you to do?
And from that day forward, I had a hunger to want to know more about God, and that hunger was satisfied when I would read the Bible.
And I would go to church and I would pray and I would take those words and apply them to my life, both on the set of growing pains in my personal life, in my relationships, and that led to a whole new path for me.
I ended up meeting my wife, Chelsea, on the set of growing pains.
Who would have thought that I could meet a a Godly, loyal, family loving, Jesus following woman in the heart of Hollywood, but I did.
She played my girlfriend on growing pains. And within about a year, we got married. We started a family.
We have 6 amazing, wonderful kids. They’re all grown now.
When they were little, there was 6 kids, seven years old, and under, uh, my my wife, I think, secretly, she’s an angel.
To be able to raise that many kids so young and close together that well.
And we’ve been married now for 32 years. God’s continued to direct our path as a family.
And I can tell you that of all the things that I’ve ever done in my life, of all the people I’ve met, of all the places that I’ve been nothing and no one compares to the value and the importance and the joy that I feel being in a right relationship with creator, knowing that my sins have been removed and washed away, and god is renewing me.
He’s transforming me on the inside by renewing my mind in the way I think through reading and studying his word.
I don’t know where you are with your relationship with god, but his his power is unstoppable, and his forgiveness is available.
And he’s writing a story for you right now.
And the most important thing you and I could ever do is make sure that we’re friends with the author.
We don’t get to choose where we started, but we do have something to do with making choices that lead to where we end up.
God is sovereign, and he’s writing the story. There’s some things we don’t choose.
But he does offer us the option to be wise or foolish.
We can choose to be humble or full of pride. And god makes us a promise.
He resists the proud, but he lifts up the humble I don’t want to go down in history as as a guy who played the role of a fool.
In his story, I want to make the wise choice of understanding that he is god and I am not.
And you and I are supporting characters in the great drama where the savior, the messiah, the king of kings, is the leading character.
This story, his story is all about him and his goodness and his kindness and his character.
And he’s been demonstrating that in every single chapter.
You may be filled with uncertainty about the future doubts and fears about your faith, not sure, why God put you here and what’s gonna happen to you after you die, but I can promise you this.
If you make friends with the author who’s writing your story, He will give you wisdom.
He promises that, and he never breaks his promise. But you gotta have faith.
Trust rely and depend with all of your heart on the one who hung the stars in the sky.
The one who knit you together in your mother’s womb, and the one who promises to never leave you or forsake you if you will lean your full weight upon his character and goodness, but it’s gotta be in a posture of humility.
You gotta come to him and say, lord, I’ve I’ve offended you.
I’ve I I’m I’m in desperate need of your forgiveness. I violated the moral code of light of stolen.
I’ve I’ve I’ve failed to love you with all of my heart.
I put things before people, instead of people before things.
And I need you to change me on the inside.
So that I can I I can be adopted into your family as your son, as your daughter?
And I believe in the one you sent to save me, the man who died on the cross, whose blood will wash away and remove my sin and rose from the grave, God, I don’t understand all of that.
I don’t have all of my theology straight, but I wanna learn. Would you have your way in my life?
I believe that god promises us in this word that if you’ll do that, your life will never be the same, and you won’t want it to be.
You’ll be headed in the right direction.
Christians aren’t perfect, but what we can say is I’m not what I could be, I’m not what I should be, but I’m not what I was.
Because god loves me so much that he’s changing me into who he wants me to be.
And he will use you for his purposes. To bring heaven to earth.
To fulfill Jesus’ prayer, lord may your kingdom come and your will be done on earth as it is in heaven, and he does it through you and me.
When I was sitting in my sports car at seventeen years old, I I didn’t have a clue how to pray.
I just saw people close their eyes and bow their heads.
I didn’t know if that was a little magic trick that sent the prayers all the way up to heaven.
But, um, I think now it’s just, it’s a posture that helps us to focus without distraction.
So, I’d like to pray with you. I’d like to pray for you. Uh, so would you join me?
And, um, let’s engage in some earth to heaven communication.
Father, in heaven, we thank you that you call us your children when we come to you in, in humility and in faith.
God, we wanna trust you. The same way, little children trust their parents, that you are for us and not against us.
God, we live in a world that is broken.
And I’m so thankful for your promise in your word.
You tell us that, uh, you say, Be not afraid for I am with you.
Do not be dismayed for I am your god.
God, I know that because you’re with us, we don’t need to fear.
And god, you tell us that you will strengthen us, you will help us, and you will uphold us with your strong honor.
God, we need your help. We need your strength. God, I need help to see myself.
Honestly, we need your strength to be able to treat others the way that we want to be treated, to love them with compassion.
And to be able to speak the truth with kindness.
God, would you would you hold us up during the trials and the challenges of our life?
And those who are praying with me, I pray that you will bless them and protect them.
Thank you for this lord. We love you, and we pray in Jesus’ day. Payment.
Hey, thanks for listening to my story. I want to hear all about your story.
And, uh, I hope you’ll share your story with others.
Because I know the author, and he never writes a bad story.
Sometimes the middle chapters can be nail biters and, uh, have you on the edge of your seat, but the best stories always do.
God bless you. Thanks for watching, and, um, I look forward to listening to your story.