By Mallory Mattingly
Former NFL player Derwin Gray opened up about the surprising person who first shared the gospel with him.
“…God in his grace placed a teammate of mine in the locker room. His name is Steve Grant, but his nickname is the Naked Preacher because every day after practice, he’d take a shower, dry off, wrap a towel around his waist and he’d get his Bible,” Gray told Matt Forte and Jason Romano on the “Sports Spectrum” podcast. “He’d ask my teammates, ‘Do you know Jesus?’ And in my mind, I’m like, ‘Do you know you’re half naked?’ So I asked the veterans on the team, I’m like, ‘What’s up with the half-naked black man talking about, do you know Jesus?’ They said, ‘Don’t pay no attention to him. That’s the Naked Preacher.’
Gray continued: “And then one day, I’m sitting in my locker, and he comes up to me, and he says, ‘Rookie D. Gray, do you know Jesus?’ And like most people who do not know Jesus, I explained to him I’m a good person. And then he said, ‘Good compared to who? Because the standard of goodness is God.’ I said, ‘Well, what can I do?’ He says, ‘You can’t do anything. But Jesus has done everything. He lived a sinless life because you couldn’t. He died on the cross for your sin that you deserve death, but He took your place, but then He rose again on the third day to now live in you, to make you a new creation and give you new power.’ And I looked at him like, what?”
It was a “five-year process” for Gray to lay down the idols in his life and finally commit his life to Jesus.
But since that day, the athlete has been committed to telling others about Jesus. That is why he left the NFL to become a pastor.
Gray just released his new book, Lit Up With Love:
On March 12, he shared on his Instagram that his book was named a ECPA Christian Bestseller.
“Thank you for being part of this journey! Your prayers, your encouragement, and the thousands of you reading it in small groups across the world, is fueling this movement. Let’s keep the Holy fire spreading!” the pastor wrote.
Related: 13-Year NFL Vet Keeps Playing Football for This God-Glorifying Reason
Gray left the NFL in 1999, two years after he gave his life to Christ. If it weren’t for a man wrapped in a towel in his locker room, he might not be in on a mission to tell as many people as he can about the love of Jesus, just like the Naked Preacher did.
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