My journey to faith in Jesus Christ started when I suffered a torn ACL during the third round of the playoffs. I had to stop playing football and wait a month for my torn MCL to heal so I can get surgery for the torn ACL. I was in crutches in my junior year, a time when recruitments happen. At that moment I felt devastated and hopeless because what I thought was gonna be my life, sports, was being stripped away from me.
Then as I was sitting in church on my 17th birthday I heard the pastor telling the congregation about how the Lord was looking for a few good men to carry on his kingdom, to spread His word, to live the life that He had planned for them.
That spoke to me and it was at that moment that I accepted Jesus Christ into my heart. I knew then that there was something bigger planned for me than just sports.
Fast forward on my fifth season, I get hurt on the very last game of the 2005 season with the San Diego Chargers. I had my shoulder dislocated and as I was sitting there thinking that I’ll never play football again.
A few months later during a visit to New Orleans with my wife, it was post-Katrina, I saw the devastation brought by the typhoon. My eyes were telling me not to go there in the first place because of what I saw, but then my heart and my soul were calling me to go. I then realized that the Lord was telling me that this is our calling, to resurrect a city. From that visit, my wife and I decided to move to New Orleans in 2006 and four years later my team, the Saints, won in their first-ever Super Bowl victory.
My experience opened my eyes to the reality of God. You cannot see Him or touch Him but 2 Corinthians 5:7 tells us that we should live by faith and not by sight. We should put our faith in God that He has a plan for us. We may not see it or understand it, but we just have to put our faith in Him.