#93 Tony Dungy on Being a Christian All the Time

I have a guest today, coach Tony Dungy. You might be thinking, he's not a scholar.

He's a theologian, he's a strong Christian, and he is more than adequate to speak on how he has integrated faith into being a coach for the

NFL and a Super Bowl winner. When you made that transition to be a Christian all the time, what types of things did you feel like you had to let go of?

God does call us to stand up, and he does say we can't be like the world. Was there a time where you had a lot of conviction about the work that you were doing, but the faith that you held, those two things blew heads?

Well, I got into television. They don't want to talk about the Lord, just be quiet about your faith.

How did grief affect the way that you understood God's character? Hello, hello, welcome to Biblically Speaking.

My name is Cassian Bellino, and I'm your host. In this podcast, we talk about the Bible in simple terms with experts,

PhDs, and scholarly theologians to make understanding God easier. These conversations have transformed my relationship with Christ and understanding of religion.

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Thank you so much for listening. Now, let's get to the show. Hello, hello. Welcome to Biblically Speaking.

I'm your host, Cassian Blino, and do I have a guest today. I have coach

Tony Dungy here in the studio with me, and you might be thinking, he's not a scholar.

He's a theologian, he's a strong Christian, and he is more than adequate to speak on his life, his leadership, and how he has integrated faith into being a coach for the

NFL and a Super Bowl winner. Not only as a coach, but also a leader and a father and a husband.

You are an expert at putting Christ first. But for those of you that may or may not be too familiar with coach

Dungy, you are a pro football Hall of Fame coach. You led the Colts to Super Bowl for your 41st win.

You became the first black head coach to win a Super Bowl. You finished with 148 to 79 record as an

NFL head coach. You played in the NFL. You coached with the Steelers, the Buccaneers, and the Colts, and you've remained a relevant voice in football as an

NBC sports analyst. But before all that, well, beyond all that, you are here on Biblically Speaking to talk about your leadership.

Welcome to the show. Thank you, Cassian. It's great to be with you. I'm excited. We're out here in Hawaii for the prayer breakfast and just spreading the word.

And this is something that is very, very special to me. So I'm excited to be doing that and excited to be with you today.

It's such an honor to have you on the show because you've done so much with your life. But most of all, when we were talking about, you know, what could you come on the show and talk about, it was how you defined being a

Christian first. And that's, I would love if you could just share a little bit about that story as to how you got that advice and what that means to you.

Yeah, I grew up in a strong Christian home. I was really, really blessed to have great parents.

My grandfather was a minister. Two of my uncles were ministers and my mother taught the Sunday school class.

So she would rehearse on us when we were kids. And I heard the gospel. I knew the message. All of that was very much in my heart.

As a young boy, the minister said, who wants to go to heaven? I raised my hand. I do. I accepted

Christ. I knew what that meant. But like so many young boys, I just got into sports and school.

And that's what I focused on. And through high school and college, I don't think any of my friends would have, if you asked them to describe me, they wouldn't have said

Christian. They would have said, you know, nice guy, hard worker, a good student, good athlete, all of those things.

But I was not living, you know, to represent Christ. I lived in a great family.

I knew right from wrong. I tried to do the right things, but I was an athlete. Well, I ended up after my senior year in college going to the

Pittsburgh Steelers. And that was the best thing that could have happened to me. We had about 18 to 20 really strong Christian athletes on that team.

They described to me what it meant to make Jesus your Lord and not just your savior.

So I was 21 years old when that happened. Well, shortly after that, we had a chapel service, a chapel before a game.

And the speaker was a guy named Tony Evans, very, very prominent preacher on the mainland. And he challenged us.

He talked about his life. He talked about our lives. And then he said, I have to tell you guys,

I'm a Christian all the time. I'm a Christian when I'm here speaking to you in the chapel, which you expect.

But when I go home, I'm a Christian husband and father. And when I go shopping,

I'm a Christian consumer. And he just went right down the list like that. And then he said, are you a

Christian all the time? And I had to stop in my tracks because I knew what it meant to be a

Christian. I knew I was saved, but I was not demonstrating that. But at about 22 years old, that became the challenge.

And I said, you know what? I want to be a Christian all the time. So I made a commitment right then.

I'm going to change myself into, yeah, I'm still going to be a strong athlete, but I'm going to be

Christian athlete. I'm going to put Christian first. And I did that. And I've tried to do that in everything

I've ever done since then. Christian coach, Christian commentator, Christian dad,

Christian neighbor, wherever I go, I want people to see Christ. Wow.

That is, I think it's something that I personally strive for. And it's something that we hope for, but that's not always the easiest thing.

I remember when I was, you know, becoming more public about my faith, I had a lot of fears about kind of releasing some things that I held onto that were of this world.

When you made that transition to be a Christian all the time, what types of things did you feel like you had to let go of?

And how did you get through that? I was really helped because I had some great teammates with the

Steelers. We were winning Super Bowls at that time. Some of these guys were some of the most prominent figures in sports, and they lived that out.

And I saw them live it out. So I said, you know what? I'm not by myself on this. I'm gonna walk in their footsteps.

Now, when I left there, I got traded, and I'm now with other teams and in other places, and you don't have 25 strong guys around you.

Then, okay, are you gonna step out and be bold and be a Christian when maybe there's just a few of you?

Or you get to a place where maybe they don't embrace that that much. And that's what I had to really decide, okay?

How am I gonna be when the atmosphere isn't as conducive as it was when

I was playing with the Steelers? And that took me a little while to say, you know what? This is who

I am, and you're gonna have to accept that. That came slowly, but by the time

I would say I was in my mid -30s, that was my MO. Wow.

And being in the NFL, I can imagine that you are surrounded by abundance, wealth, women, fame, ego, idolatry.

Was there ever some points that you were really at ends with the career that you chose, being a

Christian? Yeah, there's a great tendency to wanna fit in. I think we all have that.

And so, especially when you're in athletics, you're wanna be part of a team, and you just wanna say, you know what?

I wanna fit in. I wanna be one of the guys. I don't wanna be that person that stands out. But the more

I talked to our chaplains, the more I read, the more I studied, God does call us to stand out.

And he does say we can't be like the world. So, okay, I'm on a team of a lot of strong Christians with the

Steelers, that's great. Now I go to another team in San Francisco, maybe there aren't that many Christians.

What am I gonna do? Okay, now I go into the coaching end of it. And I started coaching when

I was 25. And now my peers are a different group.

It's not these players, it's now these coaches. And especially early on, there was kind of this, how shall

I say it? This expectation of a coach that you would be gruff and rough and tough and grouchy and lead and be very demanding.

Well, I wanted to be demanding, but do it in a respectful way and a way that still honored the

Lord. And that was pretty rare. When I started coaching, that wasn't the mainstream

MO. I can understand that that is something that stood out, but how did you struggle?

Did you just like adopt it so easily or were there struggles that you had of embarrassment or shyness?

Like, how did you get through that, Tony? No, I had seen my parents and I'd seen them model it out.

And so that helped me. And then I also got to the point where I said, you know what?

When I played football, we practiced hard, we played hard. We wanted to be champions.

So we didn't do everything the way everybody else did. Yeah, we took it to another level because we wanted to be great.

So I said, you know what? I need to take that same approach to my Christian life. I don't want to just be average.

And it may turn some people off, but that didn't bother me because I said, if I'm going to do this,

I want to be the absolute best that I can be. And my dad used to talk about that in a different way.

He used to say, you know, we don't want to be like the crowd. We don't want to follow the crowd. We want to lead the way and have the crowd follow us.

And now that takes some gumption, that takes some nerve. And you also have to know where you're going because you don't want people following you in the wrong direction.

But if you know where you're going and you're very convinced about it, then there's nothing wrong with being a leader and having everyone follow you.

And that's the way my dad operated. And so I took that position that, you know what? I'm out here for the

Lord. I'm going to lead. I'm going to be strong. And I really don't care what people think. Wow.

I wish that I had that boldness and that courage that you had. I mean, I feel so young, but also so scared.

I mean, I work in a secular workplace. Yeah. I work in the music industry and I like, was there a time where you had a lot of conviction about the work that you were doing, but the faith that you held and kind of when those two things went heads?

That happened to me a little bit when I got into the television market. It's funny, in sports, as long as you perform well and do well and you're winning, you can pretty much do whatever you want because people are buying.

You can be a bad guy, terrible. And if you're winning and you're helping your team win, they'll overlook that.

So you always had that to fall back on. Well, if we're winning, if I'm good at my job,

I'll be fine. Well, I got into television and it's a different world.

As you say, it's a secular market. People get offended very easily. They don't want to talk about the

Lord necessarily. They don't want you to talk about the Lord because that may drive some viewers away.

Hey, you talk about Christ and yeah, you'll have a following, but then you'll have some other people who don't want to hear that.

And we don't want to turn those viewers off. So maybe you should just be quiet about your faith. You can have it, but just be quiet about it.

And I said, no, you hired me. You knew who I was when you hired me. I'm sorry.

Okay, there'll be some, I'm not going to go preaching on television, but if something comes up and someone asked me my opinion,

I'm going to say, here's what the Bible says about that. Or here's what God thinks.

And that could turn people off. And I got some pushback when I first started broadcasting, but I said, that's who

I am. That's, oh my gosh. I can't even imagine being on TV and saying something like that.

That is so much boldness. But speaking of wins, you know, when you win, you can do whatever.

You were the first black head coach to win a Superbowl. How did faith play a role in the path to that success and the challenges that you must have faced?

Yeah, when I started coaching actually in 1981, and when I came into the NFL, there were very, very few minority coaches at all.

And so I wasn't expecting to climb to the top necessarily. I just liked being around football and helping players.

So having fun, we started having success. People started talking about, hey, there's this young guy in Minnesota or in Pittsburgh, Tony Dungeon, maybe he's going to climb the ladder.

He's going to be a head coach. And at first I didn't pay too much attention to that.

But then the more and more I heard it, and the more I felt like God may want me to do this, and I'm prepared to lead.

Well, about 15 years went by and I didn't get that head coaching position. And a lot of people thought that I wasn't going to be tough enough on the players.

I wasn't going to be a dynamic leader. Maybe some people were turned off about the faith aspect of my life,

I don't know. But it didn't come right away. And I remember having a long conversation with our chaplain when

I was with the Minnesota Vikings. And he told me, don't change, be who you are, represent the Lord, he'll have a spot for you.

And you just have to be patient and wait. So those years went by and I finally got hired with the

Tampa Bay Buccaneers. And I came into my first press conference and my first meeting with the players.

And I said, you know, I'm here to bring you a winner. I know we haven't won, that's why I got hired. But I have a bigger goal than that.

I want to represent the Lord. I want to make Tampa a better place to live. I want our players to be men and to be strong men in the community.

So I had a lot of different maybe values and expectations than they were used to.

But because we won pretty early, it ended up being okay. I didn't get too much pushback.

That's amazing. Was there a part or a season, other than waiting and having trust in God's timing, that you had to have your deepest trust in God beyond that waiting period and just kind of pushing through the regular trials?

We had some good success early on in Tampa. We changed things around, we started going to the playoffs, we got a new stadium, we were selling out, but we didn't make it to the

Superbowl. We got close a few times and ownership said, well, you did a good job getting us to this level, but we don't think you can take us all the way to the top.

And I got fired in 2002. And that was tough because I felt like God had us there in Tampa for a reason.

I felt we were doing what he wanted done. And then all of a sudden I'm out of a job. I asked to go to the press conference where they announced that they were firing me.

They were a little hesitant. Why in the world would you wanna go to this press conference? But I talked them into it.

And I said, thank you very much for hiring me. I disagree with this move, but it's your team.

You're doing what you think is best. And as a Christian, I have to trust the Lord. And I don't know what he has in store for me, but I'm not bitter,

I'm not upset. And I'm gonna wait to see the next thing that he has for me. Well, shortly after that, the owner of the

Indianapolis Colts called and he said, I want you to be our coach. And I loved what you did there.

That's what I'm looking for. And that was one of those moments where, you pray, Lord, I'm gonna put this in your hands.

And he came through for me. Was that, is that very common that once you get fired, you go to that press conference, you show that much grace and understanding?

No, and I don't think the owners were, they didn't know what I was gonna say when I asked to come and it was very unusual.

And I think the reporters, when they were there, their eyes lit up, what is this all about? But I wanted to do that because I had a press conference when

I got the job and I thanked the Lord and I thanked the Glazer family for hiring me. And so I said, when

I go out, I need to do the same thing. I need to be the same person. And so I thanked them and I thanked the

Lord. And a lot of people told me that that was very impactful. They had never seen that.

They hadn't really expected that. And I think that's what we're called, to be a little bit different.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, talk about gentleness and kindness and respect. Talking about the win itself,

I can't even fathom what it would be like to win a Superbowl, Coach, but I'm sure that there was this element of, you did that and there's pride, there's achievement in that.

But as a Christian, how do you reflect on that achievement so it doesn't become about the self and that success doesn't go into your identity or ego?

Yeah, it was an amazing moment. We had a great year, fantastic time.

And now we're at the Superbowl. There's 120 to 140 million people watching the game.

The clock is running down. We're ahead at the end. I know we're gonna win. And I remember just standing on the sideline thinking, how does this happen?

How does a young kid from Jackson, Michigan who doesn't have that type of resume, how did

I get here? And I started thinking about my mom and dad, they had both passed away by that time. Pastors who had spoken into my life, teachers that I'd had, coaches, all of that's going through my mind as the game is winding down.

And then I thought, okay, I'm gonna get up there on this victory podium. I'm gonna thank our players and our fans.

I was gonna do that. But what else am I gonna say? And I really wanted to make a statement that I was doing this for the

Lord. So Jim Nance, the CBS broadcaster, presented the trophy to us.

And he said that Tony Dungy, you're the first African -American coach to win a

Superbowl. What does that mean to you? And I said, Jim, that means a lot. I'm very proud to represent

African -American coaches and stand on their shoulders, but I'm more proud of being a

Christian and showing people that you could get to the top of this profession and win the biggest game in the sport and do it the

Lord's way. And so that's what I wanted to represent. And that's really what

I wanted to say. Did that hurt you or help you when you said that? It made me feel great.

And I think it really helped. I got so many comments about that, people saying, and that was just at that moment to really speak for the

Lord, it said a lot. By that time, I think though most people knew, most people in the football world anyway, knew about me and what

I stood for. But that was a moment of the Superbowl, as you know, people who don't even, they're not big fans, they'll watch that game.

So there were a lot of people that maybe didn't know about me that got that message. And it was a special night.

We actually, there was another thing that happened that night. After every game that I ever coached, we always had a pre -game prayer and a post -game prayer.

And you usually get 10 minutes after the game to do what you need to do in your own locker room and then let the media in.

Well, the Superbowl, I found out was different. As soon as the game's over, everybody barges in because you've got thousands of reporters, they all want the story.

So they just came into our locker room and they're interviewing players and there's cameras everywhere. And one of our players said, coach, we didn't have our post -game prayer.

We've prayed after every game. And in this big moment, how can we not pray?

So I asked everybody to turn their cameras off and turn their microphones off and give us two minutes to do what we need to do.

Well, we sat down, we all got in our circle like we always do. The chaplain led us in a prayer and one person, one cameraman kind of violated what

I said and he took a picture of us. And I was upset at the moment.

I said, I asked you just for five minutes, okay? And you wouldn't do that for us.

But then the picture actually went viral the next day. And it's still, 20 years later, it's still there.

And it was one of those proud moments where people thought, okay, usually you see the champagne popping in the locker room of the champions and here these guys are all on the knee praying.

Man, this is unique. Wow. Oh my gosh. That really is a restructuring everything about how teams operate and what celebration looks like and what glory to God can look like.

I just at the highest level, like what am I doing feeling shameful about praying in public before my meal when you're out here in front of reporters.

So just looking beyond football, looking at your life, looking at your personal life, was there a moment when faith was directly shaping a major decision?

Because you've done so much and I wanna talk about your prison ministry and a lot more, but was there a moment that you kind of look back on and see faith at the center of that really was a defining factor in the direction that your life went?

Yeah, it had always been there. And I think from the time I was 21, I tried to make decisions based on what

God would want. And I wanted to lead that type of life. But when it really got tested in 2005, the year before we won our

Super Bowl, we actually had our best team. We were, gosh, we won our first 13 games and everyone was saying that this is the best team, they're gonna win the

Super Bowl. And right before Christmas that year, we lost our son who was 18 years old at the time.

And it was a devastating moment. As a parent, you're not ready for that. You think about,

I'm gonna have to bury my parents at some point, but you really don't think, gosh, there's gonna be a time I'm gonna bury one of my children.

So it was during the season and it caught our whole team by surprise.

My son James had been part of the group. He'd been in the locker room all the time and all the guys knew him.

So that was a difficult moment. How was I gonna respond to that? How was my wife gonna respond to it?

And I had to really think about how I could come across. I don't want to take this casually.

I don't want people to think it didn't matter, but I also want to let people know that as a Christian, yes, the highs and the winds and the glory, that's great.

I can say, praise the Lord. Well, what am I gonna say in this moment when everybody's looking at me and it is devastating news?

And I had to say, we weren't ready for this. We didn't expect this, but you know what? As a

Christian, I'm still gonna trust the Lord. I'm still gonna let him work through this and know that he's gonna be my rock.

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Thank you so much. Now back to the show. Wow. Thank you so much for sharing more about that.

I've never experienced a loss that significant. And so, you know, when that day comes for me, whoever it's with,

I'm sure that I'll have a shaking my fist moment at God and I feel, you know,

I can anticipate anger and sadness, but how did grief and this experience, this loss, how did that affect the way that you understood

God's character? You know, it was tough and we're questioning God and my wife and I both said, you know,

Lord, we believe everything in the Bible. So we believe Romans 8, 28, that you work all things for good for those who love the

Lord, but how can this be good? Lord, we don't see any good in this. And that was my stance for a couple of days.

Well, that changed for me. We went to the funeral and we had a lot of people there. And one of my high school buddies waited until everybody was gone.

And I shook hands with everybody and talked to everybody and said, thank you. And so it was just he and I in the church at the end.

And he said, Tony, let me ask you one thing. I know you know the Bible. I know you understand

God's word. So let me ask you this one question. With everything that you know about heaven, if God gave you the power to bring

James back right now, would you bring him back or would you let him stay in heaven? And I said, wow,

Larry, with everything I know about heaven, it would be, I'd wanna bring him back, but that'd be very selfish.

And that changed my whole outlook right then. I said, wow, my son's in heaven.

Why am I down and depressed? And that changed me.

And I was able to go forward and say, you know what? This is tough. It's difficult. We're hurting, but God's got this under control.

He is gonna use this for good. Yeah, yeah. In that moment, do you think what made you trust

God was knowing that he was in heaven or knowing that that was God's will for him to go to heaven early?

I think both. I think number one, knowing that he was in heaven. As Paul says, we don't grieve like those who have no hope.

We understand that this life is temporary, that there is a future. We are gonna be reunited if we know

Christ. And I had that assurance. I knew my son knew the Lord had made him a savior, so he was in heaven.

But then two, I knew that that was God's will. We had had a chapel service.

Well, no, it was actually a church service. And one of my pastors was talking about James and Peter being jailed and persecuted.

And he said, okay, you've got this whole group of people and they're praying for James and they're praying for Peter. James gets beheaded and Peter appears at the door and is saved.

So he said, what does that mean? Does that mean that God didn't hear them praying for James? That God liked

Peter better than James? No, it means that James' mission was finished. The Lord took him to heaven.

Peter still had more things to do, so the Lord put him back to the front door. But it was

God's will in both cases and both men are gonna be honored. And so, again, when

I reflected on that, that helped me when young people pass away, when things happen and all of a sudden that Christian is not there anymore.

That doesn't mean God didn't see them. That doesn't mean that God left them. That means that the work that he had for them to do was finished.

My gosh, it makes me emotional thinking about it, but your perspective is so faithful in God's will and God's plan and not our own.

And that just - And it's hard, it's hard because we all have plans. We want our plans to be good.

And God, why did you have a different plan? And we have to know that he's God and we're not.

Yeah, wow, that takes an incredible amount of faith. I mean, that's just what faith looks like. And, you know, you want an example, there it is.

But, oh my gosh, that, I gotta keep going. We're also keep crying, but. So moving forward with that trust and that faithfulness,

I imagine that your whole world is reshaped. So how, what was the biggest redefinition on how you were changed after that loss in both, not just your faithfulness, but like your leadership and how it changed you moving forward and celebration of his life?

Yeah, I don't think it really changed me a whole, whole lot. What did change was my perspective.

I knew that I was a Christian for the long run. I wasn't a Christian just because everything was going well.

And that proved to me. And I think that was a big part of it. God said, I want to test you. And the book of James says, we're going to get tested.

And I think that was the Lord test me. Tony, do you follow me just because everything's good, just because you're winning, just because you get good jobs, your family's doing great, everything's fine.

I can see why you're following me. But if Satan does like Job, hey, take one of his kids, take one of his jobs.

Then let's see if he can follow you or will he fall away? And I was able to say, you know what?

I'm following the Lord no matter what. And so that did help me know that I could make it through tough times.

Wow, wow. I know that I asked you ahead of time, what kind of verse do you carry?

And you told me about 1 Corinthians 9. Why did you choose that verse? It's one of the verses that actually turned my life around.

I knew the Lord and I understood what being a Christian was all about. But I was so focused as I would say from the age of 10 to 21,

I was focused on being a good athlete and a good student. So at 21, I get to the

Pittsburgh Steelers, they're in the midst of winning Super Bowls. And I go to this team Bible study.

And the chaplain points out this verse, 1 Corinthians 9, 24. And to be honest,

I had never really read it or I didn't remember reading it before. But Paul says, hey, in a race, everybody runs, but there's only one first prize.

So run to win. And I remember saying, Hollis, wait a minute, read that again. Run to win?

God really tells us to win? And he said, yes, God expects us to do our very, very best.

You're not gonna win every time, but he expects you to run to win. Use that effort on everything.

Doesn't matter if it's practice, meetings, weightlifting, conditioning, he expects you to do your very, very best with what he gives you.

I said, wow, I never heard that before. All I heard was people telling me in church, it doesn't matter if you just do your best, that's all

God cares about. And he's really saying run to win. Yes, we're supposed to. And then he said, but don't stop there.

Read the next verse. And the next verse, verse 25 says, athletes do it to win a prize that will fade away.

But we do it to win an eternal prize that won't fade away. And he went on to explain, just everything we talked about, all the effort and intensity and energy you put into winning, which you should do, you better put more into being a good

Christian because that's what's gonna last. And right now, I thought to myself,

I'm not doing that. I'm 100 miles an hour as an athlete, but as a Christian, I'm at about 30,

I'm 25 miles an hour. And Hollis said, you can't do that.

You better put more energy into being a Christian. And that changed the way I looked at things. Okay, yes,

I am gonna still work hard and practice hard and I'm gonna coach hard, all those things, but it's not as important as honoring the

Lord. So I better make sure that part of my life is together. Yeah, and I mean, aside from sports and money and fame, what is your metric for a life well -lived?

I think it's doing what, the best you can with what

God gives you and where he places you. God gives us all different things. He puts us in different places and how are we gonna utilize that?

And what are we gonna do? He's given me children to raise. He's given me jobs in different cities to be part of the fiber of the city.

He's given me opportunities. I'm gonna be at this prayer breakfast tomorrow in Honolulu. Okay, he's given me an opportunity to speak.

What am I gonna say for him? Am I gonna just say, hey, I'm happy everybody's here. I hope you have a good time.

Or am I gonna really say something that's gonna be meaningful and point people to Christ? And so doing the very best

I can with whatever he, wherever he puts me and whatever tools he gives me, that's how

I should measure my success. Not with how much money I made, not with what my grades were in this class, but hey, he gave me some things.

What did I do with them? Wow, simply put. So beyond family life, beyond the

NFL, you work a lot with the community and you're actually involved with a prison ministry and you mentor the youth.

Is there a story that you can share that kind of stays with you and keeps you going and keeps you in it? Yeah, my sister worked.

Jackson, Michigan, where I grew up has a very large prison, one of the largest prisons in the

United States. A lot of people in my hometown worked there. I never visited there, didn't wanna know anything about it.

My sister worked there. But when I got to Tampa in 1996, one of the pastors there, this iconic pastor,

A. Brown, he asked me if I would go with him. He had a prison visitation ministry, wanted to encourage the men especially, but women also.

But he said they would love to hear from the new coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I think you could be an encouragement to them.

I was a little hesitant, but I, again, I thought, okay, God put me in this position, not just to coach, not just to win games, why am

I here? So I said, okay, Reverend Brown, I'll go with you. And the first trip we took,

I expected to see these, I guess, in my mind, 40, 50 -year -old men, hard and tough criminals.

And we came in this prison, there were so many 22, 23, 19 -year -old, that looked like my kids.

And I was talking to them and, you know, they're talking about the team and sports and everything. We had a really good time.

We shared the gospel and, you know, it was great. But then on, we're riding back home and I said,

Reverend Brown, how in the world does this happen? How, we're in a maximum security prison and there's 19 and 20 -year -old kids in there.

How does that happen? And he told me, he said, Tony, it's not education.

It's not socioeconomic. It's not any of that. So these kids did not grow up with their dad.

They didn't have, 95 % of them did not have a relationship with their dad. And that's where things start.

And I started thinking, man, I've taken this for granted. My dad was there every day for me.

He was always there, always pouring into me. And I thought that was just normal. And so I said, you know what, especially for young boys,

I've got to, I want to be an advocate. And that changed me in 1996 to say, yeah,

I want to visit these prisons, help these young men and that they can turn their lives around. But I want to see if I can be proactive before they get into that trouble.

How can I energize them? And I knew a lot of young men like that, but most of mine was in the sports world.

So if you ask them, well, if your dad wasn't around, well, who impacted you? Well, my middle school coach or this coach of this team.

Well, what about the kid who's not playing sports? What happens? Where does he get his energy from and his direction?

And so that became something that I became passionate about. Wow. Oh my gosh.

Is that, that is so much. When it comes to working with these groups,

I mean, just the mere metric that it was because their father wasn't around, how can churches today step into a role that supports kids before,

I don't want to say they're too far gone, but play a role where there isn't a fatherly figure. Yeah, we have to mentor them and we have to be ready to step in.

Jesus said in Matthew 19, haven't you read the scriptures? God made them male and female.

Man leaves his mother and father, clings to his wife, the two become one flesh. Well, that tells us what the family is supposed to look like.

Now, it's not always going to be perfect and it's not always going to look like that, but that's the metric that God set up.

Mother, father, raise their children. And if that's not there, it's not perfect and there's going to be pitfalls.

So when that's not there, what can we do and how can we help that? So one of the things that we did, we started an organization in Tampa called

All Pro Dad. And we wanted to, number one, tell men how important that role of being a father is.

We want to give them encouragement, but we also want to give them tools so they could be better dads.

And then what do we do when that dad is not there? How can we help that family and how can we become mentors?

And so that became a focus of mine. That's amazing. Stu, would you say that that is your main focus in this next season, is building out this program?

It has been, and it's gone from Tampa. We're in 45 states now and it's been pretty awesome.

We're getting a lot of encouragement to continue on and to grow.

And it's been pretty special, but then, okay, what can we do to strengthen our communities other than that?

And we're in some different things too. We've done a bunch of things with foster care and adoption.

My wife and I, we've actually adopted nine children. We've probably fostered over a hundred, maybe 150 kids because you see that situation where the parents are not there or something's happened, something's wrong, and that child is not getting the encouragement they need.

Maybe we can give just a little bit of temporary help. And that's been a focus of ours too.

We supported the foster care in the Tampa Bay area for a number of years. That's amazing.

I don't know much about foster care. My sister used to foster, but I understand that kids aren't with you for very long.

Typically, how long is a child staying with you when they're under your care? It depends. Some of it is just emergency foster care where it's just overnight or a day until something happens and they can get the child back together in the home.

We've had kids up to six months or so. We've actually adopted two kids out of foster care that we're trying to get them back with their family and things just didn't work out.

They ended up being with us a long period of time and we ended up having the

Lord put them in our family now. Wow. Praise God. I mean, just a heart for the

Lord. When a child is with you, I mean, I'm sure that you have God all over your home. I'm sure every doorway is anointed, but what is the best way for you to bring

Christ into a child who's now, you're fostering them. How do you integrate faith into their life? What's your secret sauce?

Absolutely. Just praying with them, encouraging them, having them read the Bible, and then just showing them who

God is and who Christ is. We have one young boy who actually, his mom had a string of boyfriends.

The boyfriends didn't care about him. In fact, they didn't want him around. So they would kind of mistreat him, hope he'd go away.

So he was actually afraid of men because they'd been mistreated. So I would come in the house, he'd kind of run away from me.

My wife would come in and he'd run towards her. He'd always play with our kids, but when men would come in and he'd get so nervous.

Well, I wanted to have a lot of Christian men around. And so my friends would come in and after a period of time, this young boy began to realize not every man is like what these guys are different.

And he got to the point where he could trust men again because he saw some examples of Christian men taking interest in him and treat him nicely.

Yeah, wow. I'm sure that that had a profound impact. Is that child still with you? Yes, he is.

Matter of fact, he's one of the boys that we ended up adopting. Okay, that's amazing. And how is he doing now?

He's doing great. He's one of the sweetest kids. He's one of the most just compassionate.

He's doing sensational. That's amazing. So you're a busy guy.

How do you keep, like, what is one of the things that you cannot go a day without doing to maintain your closeness with the

Lord? I try to read and I try to pray all the time.

I try to read as much as I can. I've actually, I lead two Bible studies.

So that kind of forces me. You have time for that? I make time. You have to schedule. That's one of the things coaches know about.

We schedule, you know, and so I try to stick to that. But I did know, you know, if I lead a

Bible study, I'm gonna wanna do it right. I've got that 1 Corinthians 9 in me, run to win. So if I lead a

Bible study, I won't be unprepared. So that'll force me to read and study. And that's been good for me.

Oh my gosh. Well, I don't, I know that you're busy and I'm so excited for the prayer breakfast tomorrow, but I just have one final question for you.

And it's for somebody that might be listening and they might be lukewarm. I feel like this is who that podcast is for. They understand that Christianity is good, but they don't really want it as bad as they should.

And that was me a long time ago. But if someone's listening and they want success in the world's eyes, but they know that they have to put

Christ first, but they can't, how would you help them do so? Yeah, I would say, you know what?

That was me. I know right where you are because I operated that way for about 12, 13 years.

And I came, I was able to see some men put it into action. And I was able to see that's not the way to go.

And that's not what God calls us to do. If we're saying that Jesus is

Lord, which is what we have to say if we're going to be saved. Romans 10, nine and 10. If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is

Lord and believe it in your heart, you will be saved. But what does that mean?

What does it mean to say Jesus is Lord? That means I'm going to follow him. I'm going to do what he says and I'm going to put him first if he's the

Lord. If I don't do that, is he really the Lord?

Have I really committed to him? And there is a verse in Matthew chapter seven where people are going to say,

Lord, Lord, I did this, I did that. And he's going to say, what? No, away from me. I never knew you.

You didn't put me first. And we don't want that to happen. So I would say, just understand that God is not going to let you go down the tubes if you put him first.

If you put him first, he's going to give you what you need to succeed.

And it may not be the personal goals that we have, but you're going to succeed for him.

You're going to succeed in the way that eternity is going to be impacted. And so I would just recommend people, hey, don't be satisfied.

Don't be like I was and satisfied at just being a good student and a good athlete. Be a good

Christian first all the time and God will honor that. I mean, just utter surrender.

And that's such a, it's not, it's easier said than done. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard. Tony Dungy is telling you to.

Well, that's what God said. That's what God says. You put me first, honor me and I will lift you up.

And he, that's what he's done in my life. When I started honoring him, he lifted me up and I've done some things that I'd never dreamed

I'd be able to do. But I think it comes from putting him first. Yeah, yeah.

Well, I never dreamed I'd be speaking with you. So thank you so much for your time today, coach. It's been such an honor.

This has been great. And my family's excited. We're looking forward to the prayer breakfast.

There's an FCA outreach that's gonna happen this weekend as well. So we're very, very fired up to be in Hawaii.