Singer Granger Smith opened up about ending his musical career to serve the Lord.
In an interview with Fox News Digital, Smith, 43, spoke about pursuing a bigger purpose.
“I wrestled with the idea for a long time that this doesn’t feel right. A lot of people will probably think, ‘Why don’t you just sing country music, but talk about God on the stage?’ Or, ‘Why don’t you sing a couple of hymns on the stage?’ And that fixes everything,” he said.
However, Smith admitted this decision did not come easily for him.
“I wrestled with that for a couple of years… A lot of pastors and preachers told me, ‘Country music is your ministry, brother. You’re in a dark world. You’re bringing light to a dark world,'” he continued.
He added, “‘You’re going into bars and stages where people might not have heard the message of Christ and you get to speak it – that is your ministry.’”
John 3:30 says, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”
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Smith said he realized he needed to humble himself and let his platform go so that he could devote his life to God.
He shared:
“I believed it. And part of me still does believe that. But here’s the deal – it wasn’t ever about that. It wasn’t ever about finding the best platform to tell people about Christ. The first thing that needed to happen was I needed to make myself smaller because I was exalting myself on the stage. I was glorifying myself. I was seeking praise from people. And by doing that, it doesn’t matter if I was proclaiming Christ because I was doing it the wrong way. I was proclaiming Christ from a self-exalting platform. And that was the contradiction I finally had to come to terms with. I might have a stage down the road, but right now I need to completely surrender that and give it over to God.”
On April 11, Smith posted a video on his Instagram page announcing he would be performing his final tour this summer. He stated he wanted to focus on ministry at his local church with his family.
“I am so encouraged and hopeful and excited and joyful about the next chapter, but to a large extent, I have no idea what it will look like. I just want to glorify God the best way that I can. I want to learn and grow and serve my local church and allow my pastors to equip and affirm those next steps,” he wrote in the caption.
He concluded, “Lord willing, I want to be used to help people find their purpose.”