Award-winning country singer Granger Smith says a personal tragedy in his own life inspired him to take the lead role in a new faith-based movie, Moonrise, that tells the story of a young father who also is facing a personal loss.
In 2019, Smith's three-year-old son, River, died in a drowning accident.
Smith saw parallels between his story and that of his character, Will Brown, a country singer who is grieving the death of his wife. A soundtrack for the film features new music from Smith. The Affirm movie can be viewed on Pure Flix, a faith-based streaming platform.
He told Christian Headlines he was attracted to the story "right off the bat," wanting to "become this character so that other people that are dealing with grief and they're stuck, and they're spinning their wheels, and they don't see a way out" can be encouraged.
In Moonrise, Smith's character is depressed and unable to be the father his children need.
"Grief is good," Smith told Christian Headlines. "... It's a natural reaction to the love we have for someone that we lost. But when it turns into depression, that's when it becomes self-deprecating, that's when it becomes harmful to others and to ourselves. It goes beyond the actual cause of the loss in the first place. And it puts us in a holding pattern. That's what we need to break, and we need to pull away from. And so yes, drawing on my own life experiences. I wanted to be able to become this character for others for that."
Smith was nominated in 2017 as Best New Country Artist for the iHeartRadio Music Awards. In 2020, he won the CMT Music Awards' Quarantine Video of the Year Award (Don't Cough on Me).
The 2019 family tragedy, Smith said, sparked a major growth in his Christian faith.
"[Before that,] I was a cultural Christian. It was heritage for me. I could defend the faith. I understood the story of the gospel. I would have told you that I was saved by grace through faith. I would have told you who Jesus is. But I had never tested that. I'd never put that through the fire. I didn't know what that meant to actually stand on that. And so when I first started putting that to the test, and first started standing on that rock, I realized later as the grief got worse, and not better over time – and I ended up hitting rock bottom – I realized I was a cultural Christian."
Smith had read plenty of devotionals but had never dove into God's Word, he said. It wasn't until hearing a pastor preach out of John 14 that Smith realized: "I am loved. And I love Jesus.
But I don't know His Word. I'm not keeping it because I don't even know it.' And so I went home, and I just threw aside the devotionals, and I opened up the Bible."
He read through the New Testament, followed by the Old Testament.
"And I still do that every morning, desperate for His Word, hungry for His Word," he said. "And that's when it changed from cultural Christianity to I became an adopted son of our Lord."
Smith hopes Moonrise can encourage viewers this Christmas season who are grieving either a recent loss or an anniversary of a loss.
"I hope that this movie could say, first of all, you're not alone. There is a way forward. You will feel joy on the other side of this. Maybe not this year, and that's okay. But by next year and the year after that, you'll find a way forward. There is a way," he said.
Granger and his wife, Amber, founded a non-profit charity, the River Kelly Fund, in honor of their son.
Photo courtesy: ©Affirm, used with permission.
Video courtesy: ©Pure Flix
Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.
