WEBVTT

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I want you, for a moment,
to look at your life as a movie.

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As a young child -

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when I thought
about the movie of my life -

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I'm the middle child of three boys

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and one of the few African-American
executives in Hollywood.

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Well, when I go back and look at my life,
when I was young growing up in the church,

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they said, "DeVon, 
you can't go into Hollywood.

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That's the devil's playground;
that's Sodom and Gomorrah."

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But I said, "I believe God is calling me
in the movie of my life into Hollywood

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to tell stories
that can change the world."

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"But DeVon, if you go to Hollywood,
you're going to lose your faith.

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Don't you understand

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that that is a town
that does not respect who you are

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or the God you serve?"

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But as a young child,
I would say, "Wait a minute.

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You're teaching me in the Bible
that faith allows me to do all things

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and I can do all things through Christ
who strengthens me.

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But all of a sudden,

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I get to the gates of Hollywood
and the power of God stops?

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Tell me, What am I supposed to believe?

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Does faith work or does fear work?

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Because you're telling me intellectually
that faith is supposed to guide me,

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but then you're teaching
me to practice fear

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the moment I get outside
the doors of the church."

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So you can only imagine as a young boy,
when you get smart with your elders,

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they say, "Boy, don't you
get smart with me."

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And I said, "I'm not trying to get smart.

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I'm just trying to understand
what is the path in life

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that is going to lead to success."

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And so as a young child, I said,

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"Listen, I've watched these movies
like 'Rocky' and 'Back to the Future.'

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What I loved about 'Rocky'
is that he thought he was a bum.

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And when he got the chance
to fight Apollo Creed,

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what was his number one goal?

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He said, 'I don't even care if I win.

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I just want to go the distance.'"

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When I would see movies like that
as a kid, I said, "That's me."

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You know, as a middle child -

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Any middle children in the house?

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Okay, we'll have
a support group after this.

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Alright, you know we need
a little extra care and counseling

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because the older one,
my older brother, he was the oldest,

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and my youngest was the baby,

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and here I am, the middle child,
kind of put off to the side.

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But when I would see films,
I would get inspired.

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And I said,

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"I want to be able to make movies
that can absolutely touch people

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in the way that 'Rocky'
and 'The Color Purple'

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and 'Back to the Future' did for me."

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But I had to make a choice.

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I said, "Am I going to go against
what I'm being taught

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and follow where God's voice
is leading me?

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Or am I going to follow 
those who may be ill-equipped

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to develop my movie

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and become what they think 
my story should be?"

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Well, at a young age,

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I said, "I have to believe
that God is the director of my story,

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and I'm going to follow
Him to the industry."

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And so here I am,
an 18-year-old young man,

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got into the University
of Southern California.

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I go in for my first internship interview

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at the management company
that manages Will Smith.

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I'm literally about to get
my foot in the door.

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At the end of the interview,
the lady says,

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"DeVon, is there anything else
you want us to know?"

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And right there, 
God is speaking in my ear.

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He said, "Tell her about the Sabbath."

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Now you must understand something.

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As a Christian, I grew up
observing Sabbath:

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Friday night sundown through
Saturday night sundown, I don't work.

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It's the day that I take off
for observance, rest, and restoration.

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I'm there in the internship interview
about to get my foot in the door,

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Hollywood,

NOTE Paragraph

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and God says,
"Tell her about the Sabbath."

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I said, "Lord, after I get the internship,
I'll tell her all about the Sabbath."

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(Laughter)

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You know how we are:
we love to get what we want,

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and then we'll start moving 
the pieces around

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about what we can and cannot do.

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But after a moment of silence, I said,

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"Well, I can not take this internship

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if it requires me to work on the Sabbath."

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And it was quiet, just like it is now.

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And after a moment of silence,

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she said, "DeVon, don't worry.
We can work around that."

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What that taught me in that moment

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is that it's not about just the door
of opportunity opening in your scene;

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it's about how you walk through the door.

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Because every door that opens

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that does not allow you
to fit your faith and who you are,

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I argue it is not a door to go through.

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You have to understand

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that when you are walking in your path

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and you are walking
in the movie of your life,

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the scenes in your life
will conform around you

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if you have enough faith 
to be exactly who God created you to be.

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I don't buy into this idea
that you have to compromise who you are,

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compromise what you believe.

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As a matter of fact,
be even more bold than who you are,

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more bold than who you believe,

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because you are the hero
of your own story,

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and if you don't believe your story -
guess what? - ain't nobody else going to.

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C'mon, yeah. You give yourself
a round of applause on that one.

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(Applause)

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But here's the challenge:

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We get into scenes of our life
where we want to give up hope.

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As a studio executive,

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one of the things I do
is develop scripts into movies.

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But there are some scripts
we develop for a very long time

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and it never looks like
it's going to get made,

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and we call this creative time
"development hell."

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Some of you have been 
in development hell,

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because you had an idea for your life.

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You've been trying,

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you've been pushing to allow
that idea to get into production,

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but you seem so far away from it

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that you don't know
what you're going to do.

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And in this moment, in development hell,

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it is so tempting

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to give up on the very idea
that brought you this far.

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You must realize that in development hell,

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when you're going through a time
where you're about to give up on yourself,

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give up on your God,

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give up on your friends,
your dreams and your beliefs,

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this is when you have to go back
to the original idea

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that motivated your life,
and hold on to it, and don't give up.

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Because you know why?

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Because it is just like
a scene of a movie.

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There are some good scenes,
there are some bad scenes,

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but if you keep walking forward,

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guess what?

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The hero always wins.

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And you know what makes the story good?

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The conflict the hero faces.

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So when you go through bad scenes,

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that must mean you are getting ready
to be prepared to be victorious.

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You must know

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that a bad scene with conflict
is not meant to take you down,

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but it's meant to actually bring
out the hero in you and build you up.

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If I could allow us to label this scene
that we're in right now,

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I would call it:

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"Locked up, but not locked down."

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You must get this,

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anyone who is in
Ironwood Prison right now:

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You might be locked up,

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but they don't have enough iron
in the universe to lock down your spirit.

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You have to keep your spirit up.

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You have to keep believing.

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You have to know
that what you see is possible.

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(Applause)

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Do you know why?

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Because in the movie of your life,
you will succeed.

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Don't let your current circumstance
dictate your destiny,

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because your destiny

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will be set up in the moment
that you're in right now.

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Yes, conflict will come,

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but if you have faith,

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if you like who looks back at you
in the mirror,

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everybody that comes against you
going to have to step back and say,

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"Wait a minute.

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We didn't know they had that much power.

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We might as well go ahead and let them out

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because there are other people out there
who need the hero that's within."

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When you're getting ready to give up
on your movie, step back and say,

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"No, no, no, no, no.
This movie is still good."

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It just might take
a little longer than you thought.

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Don't be impatient.

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Don't be getting so much anxiety.

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Relax.

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Because you are going to win in the end.

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Thus saith the Lord.