Fellowship of Christian Athletes
The Fellowship of Christian Athletes is one of the greatest organizations in our country. Please don’t ever hesitate to generously offer financial support to the organization that is changing the population of Heaven! One of my great privileges was to serve for eight years on the National Board of Directors of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
Mark Jackson was a Frazer member and an FCA staff member. I invited Mark to give a witness at Frazer. I will never forget his bringing a huge box to the pulpit and dumping hundreds and hundreds of cards on the pulpit. He then told the congregation that each of these cards represented a student in Central Alabama who had accepted Christ through FCA. That service was on both local and national television.
Frazer’s commitment also involved financial support. John Gibbons is a great leader. He has been the State of Alabama Director of FCA for several years. He said that Frazer gave more money to FCA in one year than any church has ever given in a year! What an investment!
Today, in Alabama, there are 832 FCA campus ministries ministering to athletes. There are 92 staff members. There are over 75,000 participating athletes and coaches in the FCA ministry weekly or monthly. This year there have been over 3,000 first-time faith commitments!
Wow! There are many other aspects of the ministry in Alabama, such as, five marriage enrichment retreats for coaches and their spouses.
One young man, Tyrone Peterson, received a Frazer scholarship to go to a national FCA camp at Black Mountain North Carolina. He had become a serious problem child, as he was placed in several different foster homes and Brantwood Children’s Home.
Jesus changed his life at that conference. He went from being the guy that nobody wanted to be around to one of the most popular high school boys in the City of Montgomery! I loved walking with him in the Eastdale Mall and most every student of any race or school spoke to him.
He went to Troy University and now is a teacher and coach here in Montgomery. He has a marvelous wife and two beautiful girls. Montgomery is different because of Tyrone Peterson, and Tyrone is different because of Jesus Christ and FCA!
It was a great privilege for him to stay in our home during holiday seasons. I’ve always had a morning devotional on the radio on WLWI at 6:00 A.M. Tyrone got all the kids at Brantwood up every morning and had them in the gathering room by 5:50 A.M. to listen to the devotion. He then led them in prayer.
I wrote a book last year called “Life Lessons Learned from Sports.” There are fifty-four lessons involving coaches and athletes. You can order the book from our ministry for $10.00 plus $3.92 postage. Many leaders and churches in different communities have given a copy to each coach in their school system. Many parents and grandparents have used it to teach lessons to their kids. I am working on another book I hope to bring out next year on more life lessons in sports.
Please pray for God to raise up more Godly coaches, change the lives of more athletes, and raise up more organizations like FCA that has a ministry to all students!
