Teresa Sears’ time as a playwright has brought her to her tenth production.

Set to debut on Saturday, April 13, “When I’ve Done All I Can Do” will take stage at the J.A. Pickard Auditorium at 400 Washington St. in Selma.

Sears began writing plays in 2005 and admits that it wasn’t a dream of hers, but it is something that grew out of a single idea.

“It wasn’t a dream of mine,” she said. “It wasn’t something that I thought I would be doing. One day, inspiration just came to start and it just came in conversation in my head. I started putting names to the conversation and, the next thing I knew, I had a whole script written out and a title. From that, the entire process of putting it into an actual play setting just happened.”

From that, “Church Folks” was on stage and Teresa Sears Entertainment was formed.

“It talked about how different things happened in church,” Sears said. “It included everything including people not acting like Christians, but just acting like people that go to church.”

Sears said the play also showed how issues in the church are also dealt with on family levels as well.

“One of the plays I wrote was about the Crucifixion,” said Sears. “I incorporated the scriptures that talked about the crucifixion into the play as well.”

Sears said that play was one that impacted a lot of audience members and said that all the others have encouraged people to share their testimony about their own situations in their life.

“I’ve had people share testimonies of how the plays have touched their hearts,” said Sears. “With the Crucifixion play, one of the cast member’s daughter had never been to church, but started going and got saved.”

The cast members for the plays are from all parts of the Black Belt.

“They are people from around Selma and I’ve had people from Lowndes County as well,” she said. “I did two shows in Thomasville in 2017 and I used some of the young people in Thomasville and one of the radio personalities was in it as well.”

“I’ve gone to schools and worked with children in school,” Sears said. “We’ve done black history plays and we’ve done them at The Performing Arts Center before it became a movie theater, at the schools all over. I directed a play one year at Jubilee that was written by Mrs. Sanders and it was called ‘How the Church Got Religion.’ It was before the 50th.”

Sears said she has the goal of delivering big scaled performances.

“I realized that I wanted to do plays on a bigger scale,” Sears said. “That is why we’re not just on a stage, I have people come and set up a stage with proper equipment and the audience can get a real theatrical experience. The play that we are working on now we have been working on since October. Some of the actors have never done this before and it is just totally new to them and it is amazing working with them and the vision that I have. If these plays can help one person, it is good enough for me.”

Sears is a wife, mother of two and a 1988 graduate of Southside High School. She has an associate’s degree in business administration from Wallace Community College-Selma and will be receiving her Doctoral in Divinity from Touch of Love Theological Institute this April.

“I was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write plays,” Sears said. “Throughout the years since I’ve been doing plays, has there been struggles? Yes. Has there been loss? Yes and sometimes even disappointments. But the purpose that was placed inside of me before I was born gives me the drive to press my way to the mark of the high calling so that I may fulfill that which I am purposed to do. I want to encourage anyone who feels the pressure or strong desire within that just won’t leave you alone, go after it and keep striving. No matter if it seems unreachable don’t allow those things to hold you back, get focused and stay focused because your greater is coming.”

Tickets for “When I’ve Done All I Can Do” are $15 in advance and $20 at the door. They can be purchased on the Cash App using the username $TEESEARS or by visiting www.facebook.com/teresasearsentertainment.