Written by Andrew Brackins
This summer I was helping a teacher prepare her room for the coming school year when I received a phone call.”Hey Andrew, it’s coach Powell.”I returned the greeting to my former football coach and asked why he called. “Well, it’s a long story, but do you think you could get me in touch with Jay [our church’s worship leader]?” I told him that I could, but was still curious as to the reason. His reply will remain in my memory for as long as I live.”I think the football team needs to have a worship service instead of practice today.”What? The season was a week-and-a-half away, and the head football coach of Prattville Christian Academy was telling me that he wanted to skip practice and go to church instead. Coach Powell explained, “Andrew, we have been saying for the past year-and-a-half that everything we do is for God’s glory. And I believe that we have planted that seed on the field, but today God wants the team to be unified in a worship service and he wants to speak to the team today. Who am I to stand in the way?”Three hours later, I stood in the sanctuary of Journey Church in Millbrook, Ala., with preacher Mike Mozingo trying to get everything set up for the team’s arrival. When the 33 guys who made up PCA’s football team arrived, I could tell that some of them had never been in a church building. Some looked uncomfortable, others already bored. Once everyone was seated, coach Powell played a video that highlighted a Christian school in Louisiana called Evangel Christian. This team had placed God in the center of its play. God was welcome in the game that it played every Friday night, and God was given the praise for its success (three consecutive undefeated seasons).As I sat in the back of the sanctuary, I saw heads start to nod in agreement, and I heard Coach Powell, a man who literally washed his players’ feet before one game, present a challenge for the players: a challenge to meet this Christ who changed a school. I watched a group of guys who had never been to church sing with arms lifted high, “Oh Christ, be the center of our lives. Be the place we fix our eyes.” And then I saw five players and one coach meet God.After the service, coach Powell pulled me to the side and asked if my pool was open. The passage about Phillip and the Ethiopian came into my mind, and I said, “Here is water … why wait?” That day I was given the opportunity to baptize six men in my pool, water that had seen two baptisms before. That day, six men found what it means to have a purpose to their actions.That day I was able to look six men in the eye and say, “Welcome to the family.”
