Most of the young people Victor speaks to have little patience for adult speakers offering life lessons, but he discovered that his story resonates with troubled young men and women because many of them have suffered physical and sexual abuse as children too.
“I had lived with so much denial, I didn’t realize I even had a story, and I wasn’t sure I should be telling it,” he said. “One day in the early going, I was doing a nun-chucks demonstration for a group of juvenile offenders, and I accidentally hit one of my volunteers in the chin and split it open! I thought God was trying to tell me to stop, and I was worried about ending up in jail for assault, but that day, fifty-three of the seventy-five inmates in that prison gave their lives to Christ.”
To Victor’s surprise, many churches also requested that he speak to their congregations to share his story of redemption. His story offers testimony to the power of faith in action through his victory over a tragic childhood and his pursuit of a passion to serve troubled young people.
Now, Victor understands why God called him to leave a comfortable life in Hawaii. There are very few people who can reach at-risk youths and violent offenders like Victor can, in part because a high percentage of them have also been emotionally, physically, and sexually abused. When a man like Victor speaks openly of his pain, he brings others to healing.
“God supernaturally has given me a heart for these people. I understand what is behind their pain,” he said. “I encourage them to get help by giving them permission to open up and seek counseling.”
Once he began sharing his story publicly, Victor could not keep up with the requests for speaking engagements. To his great surprise, unsolicited donations also began arriving in the mail. In 2003 he and his wife formed a nonprofit evangelistic organization, All Things Possible, and two years later they received a surprise $250,000 donation from a couple who’d heard of their work and wanted to support it.
“We were worried that we’d never be able to support ourselves doing this type of work, but we’ve seen unbelievable things happen since we committed to it and put our faith in God,” Victor said. “We think God loves these kids who are locked up and hurting. There are few folks reaching them on a national scale, so we plan to keep doing this until God says I’m done.”
CHANGING COURSE
While both Victor and I were led to become evangelists, there are many ways to make a contribution while pursuing your passion. Your unique package of talents, education, and experience may be suited for business, public service, the arts, or other fields. The important thing is to recognize what God has put in you and to build your life around those gifts and passions by taking action even when you may not fully understand what drives them or where they will lead you.
I abandoned plans for a career in accounting to pursue my passion for speaking. Victor gave up a comfortable and secure life as the owner of a successful martial arts academy to follow God’s plan. You, too, may one day come to a life-changing fork in the road. It is never too late for that to happen.
The Bible offers us the story of Saul, a noted persecutor of Christians, who was blinded by a bright light while on the road to Damascus. Jesus then spoke to him and directed him to proceed into the city where he would learn of his new path in life. After three days, God restored his sight. He was then baptized and given the name Paul. He became a major Christian evangelist, driven by a passion for spreading the good news of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. God showed him his purpose, and Paul acted upon his faith, pursuing it passionately for the rest of his life. You can make a mark in this world by doing the same thing. Believe it, and know that it is always possible to change the course of your life for the better. Paul’s transformation from a persecutor of Christians to leading evangelist was deemed a miracle. I believe that such dramatic transformations are possible for any of us.
My message for you is that no matter where you are right now in life, you should never think all is lost. You may have strayed from the righteous course. You may even have done terrible things, but that does not mean you cannot turn your life around, find a new passion, and become a force for good in this world.
I didn’t mention this earlier, but the person who led Victor Marx to Jesus Christ was his birth father, Karl. Yes, the man who had abandoned him before Victor was born, who had been a drug dealer and pimp, turned his life around and then reached out and brought his son to God.
Victor was in the marines when he received a letter from Karl. Previously Karl had denied that Victor was his child, abandoned Victor’s mother, and rejected any responsibility for him. Karl first met Victor when his son was six years old, but he still had little contact with him over the years. Then he wrote a letter to Victor. When Victor opened it, he was disgusted that the handwritten letter began “Dear Son,” because this man had never been a father to him. Nevertheless, he read on.
His father wrote of his remorse over his decadent life and lack of involvement with Victor. He had been a criminal and even spent time in a mental hospital. This news did not shock Victor, but the next sentence did. “I know you’re going to think I’m crazy, but I’ve gone crazy for Jesus Christ,” Karl wrote.
Victor’s father had discovered that “our God is a God who brings hope to the hopeless” and that no matter what sort of life you’ve led, “Somebody loves you just the same. Somebody is waiting patiently for you to find peace for your anxious soul. God’s forgiveness and love is powerful enough to cover a world of sin and shame.”
In his letter, Karl invited Victor to visit him on his next military leave. Victor agreed. They went to church together, and there Victor felt the love of God more intensely than ever before. He was filled with a passion for bringing others to God, and he has acted upon that passion ever since.
A FORCE FOR GOOD
One of the dangers of modern society is that so many people value what they do or what they own more than they value who they are. We all have to make a living, but too often we lose perspective on what is truly most important to our eternal salvation. Job status, the amount of money earned, possessions accumulated, and notoriety are false gods. I advocate pursuing your passion, but only if that passion uses your gifts to glorify God, not to exalt the self. I’ve known misguided people who pursue a passion that is all about feeding their egos and building status. Instead of taking joy in expressing the gifts that God gave them as a way to honor Him and be a blessing to others, their focus shifts to accumulating money, status, and power. In the process they neglect their relationships and their spiritual development.
Yet faith in action has changed many lives, often in incredible ways. Your God-given passion can drive and define your purpose. One of my favorite examples is my friend Eduardo Verástegui, whose story just keeps getting better and better.
Eduardo threw himself into the fame-and-fortune vortex at the age of seventeen. He followed that path from humble beginnings in a small Mexican village all the way to Hollywood. I met Eduardo on the movie set where I had my first acting experience. I was making the short film The Butterfly Circus. He was a well-known actor on the film, particularly well known in Latin America. He portrayed the benevolent ringmaster who welcomes me into a special circus that celebrates all people and their unique gifts.
When we began filming, I was a little intimidated to meet Eduardo, especially because our first scene together—which was supposed to be the first scene filmed—called for me to spit in his face! I begged the director to postpone that scene until I felt a little more comfortable on the set. He agreed, but delaying that scene may have been a mistake, because the more I came to know Eduardo, the less I wanted to do such a nasty thing to him. He is an inspiring man of faith.
I didn’t know his story until we became friends, which proved easier than I’d thought. I was shocked to learn in our first conversation that this well-known actor was a fan of my videos.
FINDING A TRUE PASSION
Eduardo’s life had undergone an incredible transformation by the t
ime we met. He’d grown up in a poor village, the son of a sugarcane farmer. His father wanted him to be a lawyer, but Eduardo quit law school after the second semester “because I realized I was not passionate about it,” he said.
He’d already had a taste of fame and fortune as a teenager, and Eduardo decided to continue on that path. “I wanted to become an actor, singer, and model, but for all the wrong reasons,” he said. “My reasons were selfish. I loved performing, but I was immature. I wanted success, everything that society pitched—the money, fame, and women, and all those things that were supposed to make me happy. I wanted to be somebody.”
In the early 1990s he had joined two other guys in a singing group called Kairo. Their Latino “boy band” experienced major success in Latin America, selling records and performing concerts in fifty countries, usually to audiences of screaming girls. Despite their success Eduardo left the band in 1997 to pursue acting. Soon he was a leading man in Mexican television soap operas known as telenovelas, performing in five consecutive series.
Then, in 2001, he moved to Miami and signed a recording contract as a solo artist. He’d already released an album when he was chosen to star as Jennifer Lopez’s love interest in a steamy music video. That same year, he landed his first major film role in the Latin comedy Chasing Papi as a playboy dating three women at the same time. He also was named one of the hottest Hispanic stars in People magazine’s Spanish edition.
“I was inside a bubble of vanity, ego, and lust, and sooner or later, if you don’t wake up, it will kill you mentally and emotionally,” he told me.
One day on a flight from Miami to Los Angeles, Eduardo was seated next to the casting manager for 20th Century Fox Studios. After they’d introduced themselves, the executive said that his studio was looking for a Spanish actor with a thick accent for a new film. He invited Eduardo to read for the part, and he won the role.
Eduardo then moved to L.A., where he hired a tutor to improve his English. She did much more than that. She changed his life.
At twenty-eight years old, Eduardo appeared destined for stardom as an actor and singer. Hollywood proclaimed him “the next Antonio Banderas.” He hired agents, managers, and lawyers—more than fifteen people—to help guide his career. But he was not at peace. “I was lost and very confused, which translated into an anger that made me difficult to work with,” he said.
Eduardo did not feel the happiness he’d expected because he had strayed from God’s plan. He thought his passion was to be a performer, but as he matured, Eduardo realized that using his talents to glorify himself was not the path for him. He was not living a godly life, and this inauthentic existence ate at him.
This is what happens when we stray from our true purpose. Our actions do not match up with our values and principles, and so our passion fades. We lose enthusiasm and energy. We feel out of sorts because we are off the path God has chosen for us. You may have felt that way at times or even now. When you have a deep and abiding unhappiness like Eduardo’s, it is usually because you are not living as you were meant to live; your gifts are being used for the wrong purpose.
Do not ignore these feelings. Examine them and trace them to the source so you can get back on track. Often in situations when you have strayed from where God wants you to be, He will send someone to put you back on course. In Eduardo’s case this person was his English-language instructor. During their sessions she picked up on his unhappiness, helped him trace the source of it, and encouraged him to pray for guidance.
“I still thought of myself as a good Catholic person because I went to Mass on Christmas and Easter,” he said. “I gave myself license to do anything I wanted as long as I didn’t hurt anyone or steal anything.”
In his talks with his English instructor, Eduardo realized that in his misguided quest for fame and fortune, he’d lost his way spiritually. He’d mistaken excitement and hedonistic self-interest for true, God-given passion. He compared himself to a greyhound chasing a fake rabbit on a dog racetrack. If a dog actually catches the rabbit, he bites into metal and hurts himself, so he never chases it again.
“I was chasing a lie,” he said. “When I attained what I’d been after, I only felt pain. My English tutor was a wonderful Christian lady who made me examine what was really important to me, what true success would be, and what I’d been doing with my talents.”
He had bought into the macho attitude that “the more women I was with, the better man I was.” But when his English instructor asked him if he was the sort of man that a mother would want her daughter to marry, “I realized how stupid I’d been.”
She helped Eduardo see that he wasn’t just living a macho stereotype, he’d also allowed himself to be cast in roles that only fed the negative stereotypes of Latino men as either Latin lovers obsessed with sex or cutthroat drug dealers and violent thieves.
“My instructor said that I had become part of the problem instead of glorifying God with my talents by promoting family values and positive images,” he said. “She blew me away. It broke my heart that I was not using what God had given me to make a positive contribution. What I had been doing reflected badly on my faith and on the Latino culture.”
Eduardo went through a period of remorse over the life he’d been leading. He went to confession for the first time in years, promising God that he would begin putting faith into action by living it. He vowed to honor God and his heritage in all that he did. This included honoring women and their dignity.
“I realized that a real man identifies with the life of Jesus Christ and is therefore respectful of women,” he said. “I recognize now that sex is a gift from God. It is sacred, and that gift is to be protected and shared with the most important person in my life—apart from God—and that is going to be the mother of my children, if that is my vocation. I discovered the value of chastity, and I made a promise to God that I would never again be with a woman until I marry.”
LOOKING WITHIN
Eduardo’s reawakening was triggered also by comments from his mother. She told him that she’d said to his father one day, “I don’t know what to do with our son. I am afraid he will end up in jail, in the hospital, or dead. Nothing good can come of his lifestyle.”
In his desire to change his life, Eduardo walked away from an acting career that was just taking off. He fired his entire team and declined all roles offered him for the next four years. No longer was he interested in being a celebrity. Instead, his passion became to know, love, and serve God. He vowed to never again use his talents except for those purposes.
“If that meant the end of my acting career, then so be it,” he said.
In the weeks and months that followed, Eduardo’s income plummeted, but he saw that as necessary to his renewal. He attempted to clear out all material distractions so he could once again hear the voice of God in his life. He said this purification process was painful at first. He wept in sorrow over the sinful life he’d led, the women he’d hurt, the lies he’d told, and the time he’d wasted pursuing his own glory instead of glorifying God.
Eduardo worked on putting his faith back at the center of his life. He read the Bible and spiritual books for inspiration and to educate himself on his faith. “I had no money to pay rent. I had nothing, but I had everything,” he said.
Eduardo considered joining a church mission to serve the poor in the Amazon rainforest for two years as a way to cleanse his soul of past sins, but his priest told him, “Hollywood will be your jungle. It belongs to God, not the studios, and we need to take it back. You need to be the light in the darkness, because Hollywood has such a large impact around the world, and our Lord touched your heart here for a reason.”
His priest advised him to use his talent and connections to make films with a positive message. Mother Teresa once said that we are not called to be successful, but we are called to be faithful to God. If success comes with being faithful, then thanks be to God. With that in mind Eduardo created his own film company, Metanoia, which is Greek for
“repentance.” His goal is to make movies that are positive and inspirational and also serve God’s purpose.
Metanoia Films’s first major movie project was Bella. This powerful drama with a positive pro-life message was made for three million dollars and took in more than forty million dollars worldwide. The best results of the film were the e-mails, phone calls, and letters Eduardo received from women who reported that the movie changed their lives. In addition, more than five hundred women contacted his staff to say the movie convinced them to have their babies rather than have abortions.
The success of Bella allowed Eduardo to make even more positive and inspirational movies, including his latest, Little Boy. As his resources have grown, so has his passion for using his talents for the greater good. His most remarkable creation may well be his international aid organization Manto de Guadalupe (Mantle of Faith) that promotes human dignity and relief for those suffering. His work there includes mission trips to places where there is great need, including the Sudan (Darfur), Haiti, and Peru.
Another of his guiding passions is to steer young women away from abortions. He is so dedicated to this that he began spending his free time on watch outside abortion clinics in the poorest areas of Los Angeles. There, he would intercept and talk to pregnant girls and women, offering them solutions and helping them with medical care, food, and jobs. His efforts to put faith into action do not end there. Through his Mantle of Faith organization and tireless fund-raising, Eduardo built a medical center in Los Angeles that provides free high-quality care for pregnant women and their unborn babies. It is situated in a Latino barrio area that has ten abortion facilities within a one-mile radius.
“It drove me crazy and gave me headaches to see how many abortion places were in this Latino barrio, and after a year of being there on Saturdays to encourage women not to get abortions, I decided to provide them with an alternative that would help them deliver their babies and care for them,” he said.