| "I remember winning the Super Bowl that year, and that night after the game I was the first one out of the locker room, the first one to the press conference, and the first one to go home. And I remember my wife, Carolyn, saying to me, "Baby, you just won the Super Bowl! Don't you have a party downstairs or something to go to?" And I just said, "Nah," and rolled over and went to sleep. That was the same week I bought myself a brand new $275,000 Lamborghini, and I haven't even driven a mile before I realized, "No, that's not it. That's not what I'm looking for. It's got to be something else, I'm so hungry."
That's when the Lord was really calling me. There was nobody going through it with me. It was just me, one-on-one with God. I tried running from it and running from it, and even when I was playing baseball the following year in Cincinnati, the Lord kept calling me, pulling me, drawing me along.
I tried everything. Parties, women, buying expensive jewelry and gadgets, and nothing helped. There was no peace. I mean I was playing great. I got all this media attention and everything the world has to offer, but no peace, no joy, just emptiness inside.
The Bible describes it in the first chapter of Ecclesiastes as chasing after the wind, and that's exactly what it was like. I tried to by myself something to make me happy and I was even emptier than before, because I could see that nothing could possibly satisfy the hunger that was deep down inside of me.
I tried throwing myself into my career, into sports, trying to see how far I could go, and when I achieved every goal I could think of, I was right back where I started. Empty, empty, empty and nothing I did could touch that deep loneliness inside of me. I was just running, I couldn't stop.
My life was falling apart. I was pretty much at the bottom during all this. My baseball game started to fall off and before long some of the guys on the team could see something was wrong. But I don't think anybody ever guessed that my life was in shambles.
I was struggling with just about everything in my life. My attorney (Eugene) could see what I was going through and he tried to help as much as he could, but I was so disappointed and disturbed about the way things were falling apart that I wouldn't listen to his advice most of the time. He talked about his faith, how Jesus gave his life purpose, and things like that, but I wasn't ready to receive any of that.
(Later) I started asking Eugene what it meant to be a believer in Jesus Christ and he was telling me about being saved, and about this time I got a call from a guy I used to play with on the 49ers, Marc Logan. He was playing for the Washington Redskins and he was planning on being in Cincinnati that night and would like to meet with me. So after the game, Marc can to the ballpark and we met.
We drove down to an IHOP and we must have sat there for three or four hours. I really respected Mark as a person and as a Christian.
After we ate dinner, we sat there in the same seats for hours, and he was telling me about how the Lord was working in his life. At one point he asked me, "Deion, are you saved?" And I said, "No, man, I can't say that I am. But my attorney has been asking me the same question." Of course, Eugene knew I wasn't saved, but I had been reading up on it, and after talking with Marc I went home and went to bed, and this stuff was really on my mind.
I was lying there in bed about four o'clock in the morning when I was awakened by these awesome lights in my room. I say it was like a 747 had landed beside my bed, and there was this incredible rush of wind that felt like a helicopter had come in with it.
I remember opening my eyes just the slightest bit and saying, "God, if that's You, take me! Take me, Lord," and I was trembling all over. Before long it was silent and the lights disappeared, and later that night I got up and opened my Bible to a passage that said, "If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation" (Romans 10:9-10). The words hit me like a ton of bricks. I knew they were meant for me and at that precise moment I was delivered.
I put my trust in Jesus and I asked Him into my life. And as soon as I realized what I had done I was so excited I had to tell somebody, so I got on the phone and called my attorney and said,"Eugene, I did it! I got saved!"
After that, little things started to change. I was just feeding myself, day by day, constantly growing in the faith. Then there would be a storm there, and I would stumble, but I knew I had to keep on going.
The first time I ever gave my testimony, I felt better that I'd ever felt in my life. Telling about the trials and tribulations of the professional athlete it was like the Lord spoke to me and said, "Don't be ashamed of Me." He told me to have courage to go on and speak what He had done in my life, and it was just a complete and total transformation that began to work inside of me."
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