The musician announced on his social media pages that he’s leaving country music in order to focus on ministry at his local church outside of Austin, Texas. When his upcoming Like a River tour — named for his 3-year-old son River who died after a tragic drowning accident in 2019 — currently underway, it will serve as his farewell.
Speaking to PEOPLE exclusively about the decision, Smith says that he’s “excited” to pour himself into his church after the tour comes to an end on Aug. 26.
He told PEOPLE, “Being a musician was never a prison, but this is a new passion, a new focus, a new direction that I believe is going to allow me to focus more on individual people and their lives, which is ultimately why I started music touring in the very beginning.”
Smith is Currently working towards a master’s degree from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
While Smith identified as a Christian prior to River’s death, it wasn’t until after that he started to develop a different connection with his religion.
He said, “As I was reading the Bible, I was coming across things with a new heart and eyes opened. During my healing, I was reading things like Mark 8:36, where Jesus said, ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake, and the gospel, will save it.’ Then he goes on to say, ‘For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?'”