Grammy-Award winning singer Mariah Carey was not shy about sharing her faith when she was honored with the Billboard Icon Award last Wednesday night.
“Icon? I really don’t think of myself in that way. I started making music out of a necessity to survive and to express myself. I just wanted to create something so I could feel worthy of existing and if I’ve learned anything at all in this life, it’s that truly all things are possible with God,” Carey said in her acceptance speech.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=IqNj22n3qm8
The superstar has credited her faith with helping her in the past. According to a report in Christianity Today, after Virgin Records dropped her from their record label in 2002, she went through a difficult time, but recovered with the help of Rev. Clarence Keaton.
Carey said of that time:
“I do believe that I have been born again in a lot of ways. I think what I’ve changed are my priorities and my relationships with God.”
Of her “breakdown” she said: “I feel the difference when I don’t have my private moments to pray. I said to my father when I went through all that stuff, ‘I feel like I’ve gone through everything but death, so I’m not scared of anything anymore.’
“Once you fall that hard and have been kicked and kicked you learn to protect yourself. I’m a fighter, but I learned that I’m not in charge. Whatever God wants to happen is what’s going to happen. I feel like I’ve had endless second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth chances. It’s by the grace of God I’m still here. Yes, I’m frustrated a lot of the time, I go through bad days. But, I’m ecstatic where I am.”
And in 2016, her ex-husband Nick Cannon said that Carey was “deep into the Bible,” and that the couple practiced abstinence before getting married.
“The first time we actually sat down and met it was on some spiritual stuff. We were praying and all that type of stuff and I was like, ‘Woah, I didn’t know Mariah had this side to her,'” Cannon added, according to a report in Christianity Today.