Miss Elinor Mansfield was a night club entertainer who hobnobbed with Hollywood celebrities. Her testimony re-emphasizes the hollowness of Hollywood and the darkness of the bright lights. Here’s her story.

What a wonderful thing it is to know that I have been forgiven of my sins! Oh, thank you, Lord for saving my soul! It was hard for me to become a Christian because it had been so easy to be a sinner. I loved the world and all it’s glamorous attraction. I enjoyed all the pleasures and people attached to it. I could see no harm connected with it.

I was eighteen years old when the devil called me to serve in his kingdom. Before I was seventeen, his earthly handsome agents had been preparing me and teaching me to enjoy the “privileges” of his courts. I learned to do everything well, to dance, to drink, to smoke and I was popular. And I thought my parents were stuffy, old fashioned, narrow minded church goers. I was breaking their hearts with my folly.

From the time I can remember, I was taken to Sunday School. My father was choir director, and my mother was church soloist, and both have always been good Christians. I remember I used to love Sunday School when I was a child. But I started growing up. School and different people held new and fascinating attractions for me. I had started studying piano when I was five years old. God had given me a dramatic and musical talent. I was developing it to be sure, but I was not using it for His glory.

At the age of six I began to appear on the stage, learned to feast on applause. I worked twice as hard for each performance so I might keep that applause and gain for myself still more recognition. Soon I was presented in real concerts. What for? I didn’t know. In the mean time all love for God, His Church, His people, had made a quiet exit backstage. I was given the part and I became a prodigy of satan.

After a year of college I decided I wanted to take a trip to the West Coast. I was barely eighteen, and because my parents loved me and thought it might help me, they let me go. I bounded off with a girl friend, and I felt that at last I was free and could go and do as I pleased.

Such a high and extravagant time we had! Such glamour we saw! Famous people in swanky night clubs! The devil’s world! I associated with the people of the movie land and stage world, and, before I knew it, I was one of them, playing piano and singing in one of the “high class” night clubs in California. It was new, and so exciting, I thought. People watching me, smiling, clamoring, becoming “my public.” And instead of living for each Sunday, as I had once done, I lived for each payday, so I could go and buy glamorous clothes and accessories so that I could be as well dressed as all the highly paid night club singers were expected to be.

I lived the life of a night club actress. I reigned as a princess in the court of the devil; sleeping by day, being the life of the party by night; cocktail parties for my pleasure, card parties for my leisure; attending all social affairs; and accomplishing….. nothing! What goal did I have in mind? I do not know.

But soon I began to grow tired. The brightness began to become dull, tarnished; and so did I. I decided I needed a rest, and headed home. On my way home I flew through a terrible storm. I sat beside a young man who was studying to be a preacher. I was strangely impressed when he almost laughingly said, “I’m glad I’m studying to be a preacher.” Just the thought of religion did something to me. It was like a crashing modulation from a mournful minor key to a majestic key. Religion? Why it hadn’t occurred to me.

God? I awoke to the fact that I had taken Him so for granted that I had forgotten Him completely. That was it! That was the reason for my state of being! And God didn’t cause it, I caused it and was suffering the consequences. I figuratively missed the bus, had to return barefoot, and my feet were scorched. I had turned aside from God and had been whipped to my knees as a result. Something within me exclaimed, “You must get right with God!”

It was then that I found what I had been hunting so desperately. Perhaps it was that I found the key to the door I had locked so long ago. I had been serving the wrong god, with the wrong people. I had always heard that God forgives sin. And I remembered the story of Christ’s death on the cross to save the world from sin. It had been to me only a childhood story to remember. But now I suddenly realized the true meaning of it. Without Christ the world was lost, I was lost, only through Him might my sins be forgiven, I must confess those sins to Him, I must repent from my sins, I must put my whole trust and faith in Jesus, that Divine Savior who shed blood for me.

I could hardly wait to get home and be assured of the glorious truth of eternal salvation. I must admit that it was difficult at first to be a part of God’s congregation, but I was determined to try Him and prove Him as He has challenged us to. It was my only hope, and it worked! Thank God for His patience and mercy!

How about you? Have you been looking in the wrong places for fufillment and peace? Look no further! Jesus Saves!

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