From NFL to New Creation with Derwin Gray | Created In The Image of God 227

For years, Derwin Gray went by “Dewey,” the kid from San Antonio whose sanctuary was a football field. Growing up around violence, substance abuse, and unspoken trauma, he learned early to stay on high alert. Football promised a different world: clear rules, hard work, and a sense of control his home life never gave. By high school he had transformed his undersized frame into a recruitable body; by college he was an All‑American at BYU; by his mid‑twenties he was a team captain in the NFL. But along the way, something subtle and dangerous happened—his identity fused with his performance. If football disappeared, who would he be?In this episode, Derwin tells the story of how that false god finally cracked. From the outside, he had made it. Inside, he was still carrying father wounds, pressure from family expectations, and a heart that went to worst‑case scenarios every time something went wrong. A miserable rookie year, injuries, and a night spent drunk and ashamed on the floor—vomit at his pregnant wife’s feet—forced a hard confession: “Something’s wrong with you, man.” Into that moment walked the memory of a teammate nicknamed “The Naked Preacher,” who had once asked him, “Do you know Jesus?” and challenged his assumption that being “a good person” was enough.Derwin describes the day in 1997 when he finally surrendered—calling his wife from training camp to say he wanted to be committed to her and to Jesus—and the tangible sense of love that broke over him. Tears, Scripture, and a growing hunger to share what he was learning led him from the league into ministry, seminary, and eventually into planting Transformation Church, a multiethnic, multigenerational community centered on the reconciling work of Christ. Along the way, his own experiences with race, class, and suffering shaped a deep conviction that the gospel is not just about individual salvation, but about healing divides in the church and society.This conversation offers an honest look at idolatry, identity, and what it means to follow Jesus from the locker room to the pulpit and beyond. For anyone wrestling with performance‑based worth, painful family histories, or the fractures of our cultural moment, Derwin’s story is a living reminder that in Christ, it really is possible to become a new creation. Get full access to SOOPMedia on Substack at soopllc.substack.com/subscribe Get full access to Created in the Image of God at wadefransson.substack.com/subscribe