“We All Have Babylon Moments”: Elijah Alexander Reveals How His Own Transformation Shaped Nebuchadnezzar

In an exclusive EKKL Connect interview, Elijah Alexander opens up about the “Babylon” season that changed his life—and the surprising way it prepared him to play one of Scripture’s greatest converts.

“We all have Babylon moments.”

Elijah Alexander wasn’t talking about a place on an ancient map when he said it. He was talking about the moments in our own lives when everything familiar is stripped away and we’re forced to confront who we really are. Sometimes those moments come through loss, financial hardship, health struggles, trauma or other dark seasons that force us to get grounded and take a closer look at who we are.

In Daniel and the Fiery Furnace, which opens exclusively in theaters September 18, Daniel and his friends face their Babylon moment when they’re forced into exile.

For Alexander, who plays King Nebuchadnezzar in the film, that moment came during COVID.

The actor had spent three decades building a career in entertainment. Then in 2020, the stages went dark. Productions stopped. For the first time in decades, he had no idea what would come next.

The Babylon He Never Expected

COVID didn’t simply interrupt Alexander’s career. It upended the life he had built around it.

“Like many other people in the world, I lost work. I lost a relationship. I lost a home, and suddenly I was left with no work, no money, no job, no family, no support staff,” Alexander revealed. “And I had to really take a good look at who I was, without the roles I was playing, without work, without those things that I identified as.”

In the moment, it was devastating. But looking back, Alexander sees that season as his own kind of “exile”—a time that not only tore him down, but also built him back up and refined him in a way that no other experience could.

“I was afforded the opportunity to really get to know myself,” he said. “And that’s the beginning of the greatest spiritual transformation of my life.”

Alexander moved to Colorado, where he spent two years teaching at a local high school. The experience gave him a renewed sense of purpose and challenged him to think differently about the meaning of his life.

But the spiritual questions Alexander was beginning to wrestle with weren’t entirely new. He was raised Jewish and had grown up attending Hebrew school. He’d always believed in God, but something was still missing.

“I had a very, very strong faith as a child, a very strong connection with God, although I didn’t really understand the particulars of it,” Alexander recalled. “It was a deep-seated feeling.”

So, when Alexander returned to acting, joining The Chosen as Atticus, something clicked. 

“What this series did for me was it exposed me to Jesus and his disciples in a very intimate way,” Alexander said. “Six years later… on the set of The Chosen, I was baptized. I entered into discipleship and devoted my heart to God through the mediation of Jesus Christ. It brought me closer to God than I ever thought possible.”

For Alexander, the personal transformation that began in exile had now brought his identity into focus. And with that came a sense of contentment he had never known before.

“I don’t have a false identity. I don’t need to call myself an actor in order to feel comfortable in the world. I’m a human being. Sometimes I do some acting. And sometimes I do other things,” he said. “I’m capable of all of it. And I’m confident in who I am.”

From One Convert to Another

Shortly after his baptism, Alexander was cast in Daniel and the Fiery Furnace, the new biblical epic from the Kooman brothers. And when he began researching Nebuchadnezzar, he soon discovered just how personal the role would become. 

“I realized that he was one of the greatest converts in world history,” Alexander said. “And it became a very, very personal journey for me to play. I realized I could invest everything that was happening in my own life into this biblical, historical convert.”

Alexander wasn’t interested in playing Nebuchadnezzar simply as a powerful king or a biblical villain. The more he studied him, the more he became interested in what was happening inside the man.

“Mostly when I play characters, I’m always asking these questions, like, where is this character’s heart? What’s the history? What was the childhood like? What’s the family like? What was his relationship with his father, with his mother, with his god or gods in this situation?” Alexander explained.

The answers to those questions revealed something surprising about Nebuchadnezzar.

“There’s a heart that’s open,” he noted. “A yearning. A longing for God.”

Alexander believes Daniel’s faith was key to awakening that longing in the Babylonian king.

“When he sees a true living servant of God in Daniel, it’s almost like he’s seeing God reflected through Daniel,” Alexander explained.

“Nebuchadnezzar had the susceptibility,” he added. “He had a suppleness of heart. He had a heart that was open to it, and all he needed was a catalyst. And it was the right kind of catalyst.”

And that’s a feeling Alexander can identify with.

His own Babylon had left him broken and searching. But thankfully, what began as a season of losing everything became the beginning of discovering what mattered most.

There’s More Waiting for You on EKKL

Elijah Alexander’s story is a powerful reminder that even our hardest seasons can become the place where God changes us most.

If you’re looking for more inspiration for your own faith journey, become an EKKL member today and enjoy movies and series that encourage, devotionals that help you draw closer to God, podcasts that make you think, and faith-filled entertainment for the whole family.

And don’t miss Elijah Alexander as Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel and the Fiery Furnace, exclusively in theaters September 18. Get your tickets now.