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Sitting here right now, it's hard.
I feel pressure.
Pressure to dramatize things, to make things up, or even not tell you things
completely.
That I shouldn't include these things that makes me humble.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
As I was preparing for the show, I was watching all these
past seasons of Survivor.
I was writing down common themes, common characteristics.
Manipulating and deceiving people and how to further yourself in the game and
watch your own back at any cost.
But I sort of liked it a little bit.
You know?
I was like, I could be good at this.
At age 22, Matt joined the cast of "Survivor" for it's 22nd season - "Survivor: Redemption Island".
When I hit high school, I really started to come into my own as an athlete
playing football and soccer.
I was good.
I was really good.
I didn't let people know that I knew I was that good.
I let them think that I was a really good guy and that I was really humble.
But no, I loved it.
I loved the attention.
I loved the power.
I loved the success.
I loved it all.
It was the day before we started filming.
I was busy scoping out the other players and really seeing their weaknesses, and
seeing where I could use certain character traits against them.
I was preparing for domination.
But the day before filming happened, I had a voice in my head that just said,
"how arrogant can you be?
Really?
Is this what you're going to do, Matt, after I give you this show?"
And it was a humbling feeling.
And after that, I said, "God, it may not make sense what I'm going to do in this
game, logically.
But no matter what, I'm doing it your way.
I'm not going to do it mine."
Days later, Matt was the second player voted off.
He was sent to Redemption Island: A remote Island where eliminated players duel for a chance to return to the game.
After I got blindsided, I was like well, that's not what I had in mind, God.
This isn't how I saw it.
And I guess you weren't listening.
I saw myself being the hero.
I said, God, this is your game.
You take control.
But I still had my vision for it.
On Redemption Island, I felt like I was going to let God down.
And I wasn't going to do His will, and that I couldn't do His will anymore from
where I was.
I would just look like a stupid kid.
And to some people, I did look like a stupid kid.
But, that was exactly where God wanted me to be.
Sent to the island twice, Matt spent a total of 29 days in isolation.
Life was really slow on the Isle of Redempt.
No cellphone, no internet, no TV.
I was separated from everything that I had.
You'd get up, you'd sort of wish you were dead, in the middle of nowhere with
nothing to do.
But really, it becomes remarkably easier to hear and to understand and to think
whenever you take out life's distractions.
With the Bible, that Crystal left me, everything changed.
God had to have me in that solitude.
He had to physically remove me from everything else.
With my physical self, I had to depend on Him to get through every day.
And that's what it took.
That's what it took for me to give Him everything I had.
Redemption is new life.
It's a new way of living, a new way of thinking, a new way of feeling, a new
way of seeing, hearing, believing.
And Jesus is the one that offers that new life.
So to me, redemption and Jesus are almost synonymous.
My name is Matt Elrod, and I am Second.