Describe Your Relationship with Christ
I
wasn’t blessed with a silver spoon when I came into this world. My life wasn’t
like most kids from being born to 11 years old. When I was born I wasn’t
blessed with having families take care of me for the rest of my life. My mother
kept me for a year and then she gave up for adoption. I bounced from house to
house till I was 6 years old and then I went to Atlanta Georgia and lived there
for a while and seen things kids at my age shouldn’t be seeing. I then went to
a home in Rockford, IL and It was me and 3 other kids in the home. We live in
an apartment building in a 2 bed room place and the 3 others and I had to
cuddle together and share a closet. Our foster parents made us sell drugs on
the streets and if we sold the amount our food was sugar water and mayo
sandwich or sugar sandwich and if we didn’t sell as much as they wanted us to,
they would beat us and not feed us at all and lock us out of the house and we
had to dumpster dive for food. My friend Reggie in the house with me we would
be locked out of the house and go to Loves Park on the west side where we lived
and go to the park and sleep in the train tunnels so we could get out of that
place. One day we were walking back to the apartment and I saw some people
following us and it was the Latin Kings.
They
would sell drugs where we would also sell, and then I saw a car driving by then
and a guy pointed at us and I told Reggie run, run. I am running past him and
then I look back and see him running and then I hear 3 gun shots and I see him
go down. I took cover behind garbage cans and after everything cleared up I ran
back to him and held him in my arms and he is looking at me and tells me to get
out of the foster home and he closed his eyes and died. A lot of people come
out to help and I couldn’t let him go. I was 8 years old at this time.
A
few weeks went by after his death and one day I asked for a glass of sugar
water from the foster dad got mad yelled “NO”, and hit me and then stabbed me
in the leg with a cocaine covered knife in my leg and I went down and went into
anaphylactic shock and seizure and convulsing.
I woke up in a hospital and tubes in my mouth and oxygen mask on my face
and monitors all over and 3 nurses in the room watching over me and they said
“can you hear me? Are you ok?” and I put my thumb up as saying I am ok. The
doctor told the social workers and police that I was dead on the doctors table
for about 6-7 minutes and they got me to come back and that they had to put a
type of medicine in me to not have me addicted to cocaine because some much was
in my system and it made my heart stop. I told the doctor a few days later
after I got released from the hospital with social workers and police thank you
for saving my life. The social workers and police took me down town to the station
and got me out of that house and brought me to other house in Tennessee and
only there for 6 months, then went to Milwaukee for a few months. Now that I am
9 years old and in a foster home in Eau Claire, WI and the social workers place
me there and they seemed like some nice people and I liked it for the first few
weeks and then the family completely changed on me. The foster parents took me
out of the fake room that was supposed to be mine and put me in a small closet
and they only fed me one meal a day and that was only a peanut butter sandwich
or sometimes I got jelly on it too.
What
you need to realize is that I only had 2 shirts and one old pair of sweat pants
that had holes in them and my birth blanket. For about a year it was like this.
I am 10 years old now and very malnourished and skinny and they still treat me
like this. They would beat me sometimes because they just wanted to. The foster
parents had 2 kids and their daughter was in 8th grade and she would
try and sneak me food and if she got caught she would get beat. The parents
would give me my weekly bleach baths where I would sit in a tub and she would
pour bleach on my head and all over me and she would make me soak in it till it
burned my skin off. Then she would tell me “ok stand up dry off and go put your
clothes on.” She would make me work around the house and be around for a few
hours as the bleach burned and ate at my skin then she would say “stop crying
and go wash it off and come back here” and I would and it would hurt so bad. Then
the foster dad would yell at me and tell me I am not washing the dishes or
floors right and he would beat me with his belt and he used the belt buckle
side and it went into my back one time about 4-6 inches into my lower back and
had to get 10 stitches to close the hole in my low back his big buckle made.
Every time the social workers would come over they would fake me sleeping in
bed and tie me up in my small closet and have my wrist and ankles and mouth
taped up so I couldn’t move or say anything. Then they would show me fake
sleeping in the room. There was one time I escaped the house one night and ran
to the neighbor’s house and he didn’t believe anything I said and he brought me
back the foster home and I was beat so bad and burned by a torch and face
brought close to the stove top till my face would burn n bubble.
They
had a son Josh and he would attack me every night to try and molest me. One
night in particular that still sits in my head was that he was trying to get to
me; I would have to keep myself awake so I wouldn’t get attacked at all. I was
fighting for my life when he would come after me. He was in 12th
grade and he would cut me on my chest back arms wherever he could and one night
he was attacking me and his parents come walking by and they stop and I run to
the foster mom and she pushed me away and said “what is going on?” and their
son said “Oh nothing we are just playing” and I yelled “Hell no we not, he’s
attacking me, help me please” and the foster parents just closed the door and
walked away. I had to fight for my life every day in this foster home. I had to fight and claw all night to keep
him away from me.
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There
was one day that I told the Foster parents that I was hungry and thirsty and
they said “You had your food today and your drink doesn’t come for another few
hours.” So I said ok and after they left I went to the sink and turned on the
water and had a cup in my hand to get a drink and they heard it and came after
me and my foster dad hit me in the head with a baseball bat 2 times and smashed
my skull on my left side and I was 10 at this time and had to go to the
hospital and I was in the emergency room for a long, long time. God I was in
Heaven and didn’t know it. God and Jesus spoke to me for 3 weeks every day. I
couldn’t speak to them I could only listen. God said “If you believe and trust
in me I will save you because you are dead right now.” And on the last day of
the 3 weeks God woke me up. I was in a coma for 3 weeks and had to get a metal
plate put in the left side of my head. They lied to the doctors and social
workers and said I fell down the stairs. So that meant I wasn’t out of this
foster home anytime soon.
The
best day of my life was a few weeks later when the social workers come to the
house with the police like they usually do and I was tied up like I always am
when they come but I worked so hard to get out of the closet and I broke the
tape and busted the door down and fell down the stairs and dislocated my
shoulder and broke my cheek bone in my face as I fell down the stairs and I got
up with a bloody nose and I said please get me out of this house it is HELL.
The social workers said “what is going on here and yes Zach you are coming with
me right now.” I went to the police station downtown and got to a new foster
home in 4 days and I stayed in the police station getting questioned about
everything they did to me and said to me and I made it to the last foster home
of my life.
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The
home that I live in now and the family I life with and the people I call my mom
and dad and I have a brother and a sister that are much older than me but they
treated me right and gave me a roof over my head and I never had a bed till my
senior year of high school and also my own room and opportunity at a life that
I thought I would never have. I started my first bit of school ever when I was
in 4th grade and I was put in a class room that was for mentally
challenged kids that need lots of help. I didn’t know how to read or write
hardly at all. They said I wouldn’t make it in school and wouldn’t graduate
from high school and would never make to college. Well I like to prove people
wrong especially being the only black kid in my Northern Wisconsin town
Ladysmith WI and went to a small school of 300 people in my high school and
going through hate speech every day with different kids. I eventually graduated
high school with honors and I got a Division 1 scholarship to Northern Illinois
University from Coach Jerry Kill. I got to NIU and didn’t know what to expect
and the first semester I got 3.5 gpa which I thought was pretty got but what
happened was my real mom contacted me for the first time in my life and I went
crazy and tried to kill myself in my dorm that winter and overcame that and
then I finished my first year with football and emotional struggles and then my
2nd year of college and football and get to start playing ball
because I red-shirted my 1st year and played and started some games
and had a great season going to MAC championship and started on PAT/Field Goal
and played some D-Line too. We lost won the bowl game and lost our head coach.
Also got to me my real mom after the bowl game back in Wisconsin and that was a
long and emotional 3 hours of my life but blessed I got to meet my real mom.
Got
a new coach coming in and I was working really hard in the Winter Conditioning
and beast each workout and 4 days before spring break I tore my Achilles Tendon
and this is my first injury related to sports and I really didn’t know how to
handle it and got really depressed and didn’t want to do anything but with the
help of my teammates they helped me push myself to get better in 4 months and
got cleared to play in summer football camp and grades are getting better and
played really good football and played 40 snaps against University of Wisconsin
and got an interception on Russell Wilson and had 6 tackles and 3 tfls that
game and played against Cal Poly and had a great game too and I thought I was
going to have a great season my 3rd season but I got bad news again
and my trainer said I tore my Bicep Tendons and am done for the rest of the
season and It really hit me hard and didn’t know how to handle it and one
weekend my good friend shot and killed himself and I just couldn’t take it
anymore.
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December
2nd 2011 I was sitting in my room after I heard the news about my
friend and I should’ve been playing in the MAC championship but I had my
surgery on my arm. All of these emotions are running through my head and I was
sitting in my room and just said to myself that I have had enough of my life and
I want it over with. I took my .44 magnum revolver pistol to my head and said
“I AM DONE God please I just want to be with you and why are you putting me
through all of this hell.” I put the gun to my head and started to squeeze the
trigger and just before it went off someone started knocking on my front door.
I stopped and I got up and walked to the door and opened it and nobody was
there. I went outside and it was only my car in the parking lot and nobody was
in the apartment complex. I went back In my room and said “whatever it was
nothing just hearing things.” So I grabbed the gun again and I put it back up
to my head and something knocked on my living room window and I ignore it and
literally in my room I was squeezing the trigger and I could hear the revolver
start to turn over and I would be dead but the size of a hair was how close I
was to being dead and something knocked on my window right behind my head in my
room and I ripped open the window and started yelling “who is there, show
yourself.” I ran out to the door and the parking lot and nobody was there and I
ran up all 3 levels and pounded on everyone’s doors in the complex, NOBODY WAS
THERE. I went back into my room and grabbed my gun and bullets and put it in a
bag and threw it away in the garbage. That was the day I gave my life to Christ
2 and a half years ago.
I started to get healthy again and start to
run and work out again and doing things that would make me feel better. This is
the beginning of my 4th year and grades are good and healthy and
playing good football and then my real mom called me in October and she said my
real grandpa is dying and I need to get home to say my last goodbyes and I
drove home that day and 2 days later I am holding my real grandpas hand at bed
side at the hospital as he took his last breath when he died. He and I we close
when my family adopted me when I was 11 because he was the first real family I
have ever met and got to see and talk to. That was a tough week for me. We
finished out the season for football at 12-2 and made it to the Orange Bowl and
Back To Back MAC Champions and BCS Busters. Now I am in my 11 semester here at
NIU and I got to walk the stage for graduation this May 2013. My parents who
adopted me never came to my graduation this spring at it was hard for me
because I just wanted my parents to say that they are proud of me. They never
did at all and it hurts. They don’t come to my games because they would rather
go to the grand kid’s things and I understand but I did all these sports back
then to try to get them to notice me and be proud of me and tell people that is
there son. But that never happened at all. I am done seeking the approval of
flesh and blood because it results in “disappointment, broken hearts and
dreams, and just lose confidence in one’s self.” I am so honored and blessed
that God was there to watch me cross that Graduation stage and watch me on the
football field!!
That
20 hour competition really broke me down to the point I needed God to help me
stand because I gave it everything I had at UTC. Showed me the power of prayer
and scripture and how it gave me strength and I now know that God saved us by
His Grace! So because He has saved me I owe Him. So I give my entire life to
God so that He can help me learn more so that I can build the roots of The Lord
deep within myself so that when the winds of SIN try and up root me off my path
the strength of Gods roots inside of me won’t break nor get up rooted. I
realized after UTC that God loves me for me and will never leave me nor forsake
me. He will help me learn and teach other people about Him and what He has done
in my life and at UTC! UTC showed me that I finally have a family and that is
160 + that were at UTC week 1 2013 and they love me for me and will have my
back if I need them. God has my life in His hands right now and I wouldn’t
trust anybody else with that!!
How
Important Has God Been to Your Success As An Athlete?
- In my success as a athlete it was always
me, me, me. I did this, i accomplished this on my own in my own power. But now
i know that i cant even live my life let alone play my sport on my own. i
realized at UTC that i needed Him in everything that i do. If i dont play my
sport anymore it isnt a problem because it is in His hands with what happens to
me in my life. He has better plans for me then rather than playing football in
the NFL. Now my goal is to be the best Christian in life and the best Christian
Athlete i can be for Him EACH DAY IN EVERYTHING I DO!!
Do
You Have Any Favorite Bible Verses?
-
Isaiah 41:10
"Fear not, for i am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your
God; i will strengthen you, i will help you, i will uphold you with my
righteous right hand."
- This one i love and have tattooed on me because i
know that i have nothing to fear because He is always with me no matter what.
He will always help me and strengthen me and if i fall He will up hold me with
His righteous right hand and not let me fall in life!!
Psalms 91:2
"I will say to the
LORD, "My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom i trust."
- This to
me is that My God is my father and will always protect me from anything that
will harm me. I will abide in His shadow so that no Sin or man will not bring
no harm against me because God will protect me.
Isaiah 40:28-31
- This one to me is
powerful because in our sport and also in life we will fall and faint and cant
get back up but God will renew our strength and show us that He is real and
will lift us up and we will sore on Wings Like Eagles! nothing can hold us down
because no matter how tough the road ahead gets we have God and He will never
forsake us nor leave us.. We are free and saved by His grace and covered by His
Blood!! truly amazing.
What
Are Your Ambitions For the Future?
- Plans for the future is hoping that God
blesses me with a beautiful woman of Christ and will help push me to grow with
and in God. I want to live in Colorado and start my own personal training
facility and nutritionist facility and have massage practice in there also and
yoga.. It is ultimately up to God with what He wants me to do.
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