The longer Ron Brown coaches the receivers for the University of Nebraska's football team, the more he hears the same question over and over again: "Why aren't you a head coach yet?" The question insinuates that he is not complete as a person or a coach until he becomes a head coach. That is the way the world thinks. In Brown's case, it is easy to understand why they do.

Since coming to Nebraska 16 years ago, he has received three offers to join NFL (National Football League) coaching staffs in Tampa Bay, Kansas City and New England. He has also received offers from Florida State, Penn State, Temple and Brown University. Whatever the opportunities, Brown's life now is a testimony to seeking God's direction in all of the decisions he makes.

Growing Up
Thankfully, Ron did not need to achieve a high social status for Arthur and Pearl Brown to love him. They loved him just as he was — an infant in a New York City orphanage — when they adopted him.

Arthur and Pearl raised Ron in a disciplined but loving home in Martha's Vineyard, MA. "My mother was a very gentle, kind woman. My dad was a little bit more of a tough guy, hard-edged. But both had huge hearts," Brown says.

The whole family attended a neighborhood church faithfully, but the gospel was not clearly preached there. A woman from the community held a Bible study, and it was there that Brown first heard the plan of salvation. "But I turned it down because I really felt a sense of adventure for the world and I felt like that would hold me back," he says.

Football Playing Days
Brown played college football at Brown University in Rhode Island in the late 1970s and became a Christian there. He went on to sign with the Dallas Cowboys in the NFL but was cut during his rookie season because of an injured shoulder.

He was signed and then cut by the New England Patriots, the New York Jets and finally the Chicago Bears, where he severely injured a knee. After rehab he played for the Philadelphia Stars in the USFL (United States Football League, now defunct).
Brown's knee was never the same, though, and his professional football career was over. He went to graduate school and played semi-pro football with the New Jersey Rams. He got a master's degree in public health from Columbia University in New York City. "It was there that my faith really began to take off," Brown says. "I began to grow, and a lot of times it was just me and God. I was in, at the time, the largest city in America and yet sometimes I felt like I was the loneliest guy in America. But God and I had some great times." He found a good Bible-believing church in New York City and grew in his faith, eventually leading both of his parents to Christ.

Transition Time
In 1982 his bad knee forced him to stop playing with the Rams. To his surprise, they asked him to be an assistant coach. Although he had some uncertainties about coaching, after he gave it a shot he felt he was made for it.

A year later, Brown University (his alma mater) asked him to be the head coach of its freshman football team. Brown called six or seven of his best Christian friends, and they prayed for him, sensing that coaching was God's call for their friend. Brown took the job and just before he left for the university, he met a woman named Molvina Carter, whom he went on to marry after his first season coaching the freshman team.
Marriage was not the only big change in Brown's life that year. All except two of the coaches on both the varsity and freshman teams at Brown University were fired and Brown was chosen to stay. But with the new staff came new challenges.

Exaltation Belongs to God
Even though he was promoted to be the varsity defensive backs coach, Brown did not feel like he fit in with the other coaches. He was the youngest guy on the staff and the only Christian. He became even more discouraged as he spent a lot of time on the road away from Molvina on recruiting trips.

One day before work, he had what he calls a "pity party" in his car. He asked the Lord if he was going to be at Brown University for the rest of his life. "I remember the Lord leading me to Psalm 75," Brown says. "That was a breakthrough day for me. In Psalm 75, something really hit me because it was talking about promotion. It says, 'For not from the east nor from the west nor from the south come promotion and lifting up, but God is the judge! He puts down one and lifts up another' (Psalm 75:6-7, AMP).
"What really came through for me was that God was saying, 'Ron, I can take you out of this situation at any time. I could take you to a Division I job. I can exalt you at any time. I can maneuver things any way I want to at any time. You just follow Me. You just serve Me. You have influence for Me right now.'"

Brown took that lesson to heart. "I began to really look for speaking opportunities," he says. He did not see his coaching position at Brown University as a stepping stone for career advancement as other coaches did; he saw it as an opportunity from God to minister right where he was. Brown was faithful to do just that.
Then, in 1987, Nebraska Head Coach Tom Osborne asked Brown to become the Receivers Coach for the Cornhuskers. Brown accepted the offer and still holds the position today. And through the years — true to His word — an ever-faithful God has lifted up Ron Brown.

Defining Success
As the years rolled by for Brown at Nebraska, the sports media began to ask him when he would take a head coaching position somewhere. Now Brown hears the question constantly.

"The old philosophy has always been — and this is a very common trait in sports — you take care of that job, you keep climbing the ladder," Brown says. "Because after all, being a head coach is the main thing now and winning a lot of games and all that. So you keep climbing the ladder, and wherever you go, you just kind of make time for ministry." Brown just doesn't see things this way.

To define true success, he points to the Apostle Paul's words in Acts 20:24: "However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me — the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace."

"Paul was impassioned about the ministry that God had given him," Brown says. "And everything else takes a back seat: football — like everything else — should now have to fit into that spiritual package plan."

Brown's role in coaching has not always been this clear to him. Out of the seven coaching job offers he has received from the NFL or colleges since he has been at Nebraska, only two of them would have been a lateral move. The other positions would have been promotions. Either way, these offers often led to struggles with God.

Wrestling With God
In 1994 when Tampa Bay offered Brown a position coaching its wide receivers, he saw a great situation. The head coach, Tony Dungy, was a Christian, and Brown would be coaching in the pros. As he spent time with God, seeking direction, God spoke to him while he was reading Colossians 4:17: "And say to Archippus, 'Take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord, that you may fulfill it'" (NASB).

"That hit me like a ton of bricks," Brown says. "I believe that God took that verse for me to use at that juncture of my life, and that He was saying to me, 'I'm not finished with you here yet at Nebraska with this ministry,' and, 'You can go if you want to. You can go for the gusto, but just understand that there will be some consequences for it.'
"I feel like God really wanted me to stay at Nebraska and put another leg to this ministry. I joined up with Stan Parker to formulate Mission Nebraska (an organization designed to take the gospel to the whole state). I just sensed that God was calling me to unite with someone who was diversified in other gifts that I didn't have."

The Future
Does this mean that Brown is bound to Nebraska for the rest of his coaching career?
"The Bible says, 'The truth will set you free,'" Brown says. "I've really in essence just desired to be free. Free enough in Christ where I'm not bound to Nebraska, nor am I bound to something else. I'm only bound to God. So whenever He calls me to look at a situation, I can look at it in freedom. I don't have to be afraid."

It is because of this attitude that people may get the impression that Brown does not care about his sport — since he uses it as a platform to speak about Christ. Brown does not see a conflict at all. "I want to excel in this profession," he says. "But why? To be considered the greatest coach? No. I do it so that I get to walk through those open doors, those open hearts, and share the greatest news of all."

And with whom does he share this news? "I get to go to the Indian reservations and I get to go to rural Nebraska. And whether it's a camp for kids or whether it's a community event where a whole town comes out and you see people just coming forward at the end of the night to give their lives to Christ ... that's better than any Super Bowl win or National Championship."

Editor's Note: When Light and Life magazine initially decided to publish a profile article about Nebraska Cornhuskers Receivers Coach Ron Brown, a major university was in the process of interviewing — and then ruling Brown out — for its head coaching position. One possible reason for rejecting Brown was the university's concern that he is too vocal about his Christian beliefs. After the story broke, we wanted to give our readers the chance to hear from Brown first-hand regarding this issue. (He requested that we not include the name of the university.)

Are the recent media reports true that say a major university did not hire you as its head football coach because you are vocal about your Christian beliefs?
That was the reason given to me. That's what I went on. This particular university has since qualified their assessment of their interview and their decision not to bring me back for another interview (by saying their comments were taken out of context). I'm not saying that my beliefs were the sole reason, but they certainly had a part in the decision-making process.

Is this a case of religious discrimination?
The Rutherford Institute [a non-profit conservative legal organization dedicated to defending civil liberties and human rights] contacted me regarding the situation, and I asked them what would happen if a Christian head football coach took over at a secular university and decided that he wanted to hire a predominately Christian staff. The Rutherford Institute told me that he would be on shaky ground because he would be basing his decision upon religion.

So religious discrimination can work both ways?
I've had some time to think about it and I think so. We Christians often say, "That's unfair! God doesn't even get a chance." But placed in the same situation, would we want to hire primarily Christian coaches? That's a legitimate question. I think that many Christians would want the freedom to hire Christian coaches if they were in that situation.

Standing for Christ in your case came with a cost, didn't it?
Somehow we have bought into the American Dream mentality even as Christians in this country that says, "We deserve this." I wonder if we are working so hard to gain our life that we are actually losing it. This particular university was founded upon biblical principles, but now it has a problem with Jesus. If my faith cost me a head coaching position, then the bottom line is, I don't need that job. That job is not the answer for my life. Jesus is.

Did standing for Christ cost you more than a head coaching position?
One of the people I dealt with during the interview process for this job was a college friend of mine who works at this university. There's been a part of me that wishes none of this had come out publicly because of our friendship. But on the other side of that, Jesus said that the gospel will divide. There's definitely a cost for living out the gospel, and that was one of the costs for me. There was a sudden halt in our communication that happened as a result of this. First John 5:12 makes it clear — there are two teams on this earth that oppose each other: those who have the Son and those who don't.