Faith, Football and Following God's Will (with Jason Romano of Sports Spectrum)

Jesse:
It is once again time for Going Mad and we've got a doozy. Emmy Award winning producer and podcast host Jason Romano of Sports Spectrum joins us today. Jason walks us through his transition from working at ESBN for 17 years to Sports Spectrum and how he has navigated representing Christ.

in both arenas. We are giving away one free year-long subscription to Sports Spectrum magazine. If you'd like a chance of that magazine showing up in your mailbox Send an email to go mad show at hutchcraft.

com and we'll announce one lucky winner down the road. Links to Jason's website and podcast are in the show notes. Ready?

Go team and go mad!

Brad:
Welcome back everyone to another episode of Go Mad with Doug and Brad and Jesse's back there behind the glass.

Doug:
Hello, hello. Hi Jesse. Jesse could not be more psyched.

Because we're we're talking some sports today. By the way, real quick, so if you see that our guest today, our awesome guest is a sports guy, even if you're not into sports or the NFL or s Stick around. Oh yeah.

Because we've got stuff for everybody today. I promise you're not going to want to miss this. But Jesse is perhaps the biggest sports fan I've ever met.

Jesse:
Yeah. That is so true.

Brad:
I told Jesse before we started that I need to get him that shirt that just says Go Sports Team because he just There we go. You're even from Jersey like we are.

Jesse:
It's so funny. I see you guys are wearing a Giants jersey and a Yankees jersey. That was my childhood. Yeah. Something happened when I turned twenty or twenty one and I don't know what it is.

Brad:
Why?

Jesse:
Why am I doing this stuff? I don't know.

Brad:
Well I will say that uh actually we are recording this uh tomorrow. The wait recording this tomorrow. Because the giant wait, did I say recording tomorrow?

Wow recording this tomorrow. How's it going? How is it going?

Doug:
Wow The Giants game is tomorrow. The Giants game tomorrow. And so we're not sure if they're gonna win or not. We're just so we're not even gonna

Brad:
So here's the intro if they won.

Doug:
We love you. All right. Always loyal to you. We love you no matter what. And if they lost Oh give me a break.

Brad:
Seriously, Jones, what were you thinking? Fire everyone. Okay, good. Pretty much represents New York sports fans right there. So there we go.

Doug:
Uh I I just before we get rolling with our uh amazing guest, Jason Romano today, so as as Brad knows, Jesse might know, we Played our own football. We did. Lane Valley High School.

I remember my own football playing days. My act my coach actually took notice of all I was doing on the field once. And and he shared his thoughts with me, pulled me aside of actually at my shot at the NFL, and it was that my my was my dream.

He said, Doug, listen, if if you were only faster, taller, bigger, stronger, faster, smarter, coordinated, faster. And much better. You'd have a real shot at being the club.

That was one of the best days. But other than that, so it's the nicest thing you ever said to me. Wow, that was the nicest thing he ever said.

Wow. And of course we still have memories. Um Brad used to have this disgusting mouth guard from Not used to.

You still have it?

Brad:
Every year.

Doug:
Okay. I'm going to tell this and then bring in our guests.

Brad:
Please tell them where it is. This is uh please tell them where you still have to be. And uh she took the mouth guard off of my helmet and wrapped a red ribbon around it as a joke and said, here's a new Christmas ornament.

It still hangs on my tree every year, and yes, I still try it on every year, and yes, still has dirt in the world. I didn't know that. It still has dirt in it from 1992.

Doug:
So there you go. My son, my son Taylor. We've got to get to our guest here.

Uh he has a great podcast. You're gonna want to check this out. We'll talk about little bit about it.

It's the Sports Spectrum podcast. I had Sports Spectrum magazine all over my room growing up. We loved it.

He actually had Dallas Jenkins. He had Jason Grimsley on recently, the pitcher for the Yankees. He had Dallas Jenkins on the other year.

Brad:
quarterback for the 49ers now, but he is the director of media with Sports Spectrum and he's the host of their podcast. But beyond that, people may remember him because he was an Emmy Award winning producer uh for ESPN. He was a senior manager there.

He's produced content for basically name a great show they've had and he's been involved with it, whether it's Sports Center, NFL Live. And even Mike and Mike in the morning, which I will say that is actually a special memory to us because we had that morning radio show on the Hopi Reservation in Arizona for a number of years. And when I would be getting ready, I'd be watching and listening to Mike and Mike in the morning.

I'd turn on ESPN on the TV, watch them, uh, and uh listen to them. So a lot of great memories there. But let's bring in Jason Romano.

Jason, thank you for being with us today.

Jason:
Doug Brad, I can't believe you guys made me sit. through all of that.

Brad:
Wow.

Doug:
That's what every guest that's what every guest always says. What's going on, man?

Brad:
You didn't hang up, so that's good.

Doug:
It's true. I'm still here. Thank you.

Not to put you on the spot here. But as a professional sportscaster, sports guy, you'd say the Yankees, Giants and Knicks are the best teams in the history of the world, right? That's As we can see, he is not.

Please don't say the red side. Okay.

Jason:
Or they root for the Dallas Cowboys. And that's been since I was five. I think our connection's breaking up.

Doug:
What's going on? This mic the the mic's off.

Jason:
You wanna hang up on me, I totally get it. Totally get it.

Doug:
Oh man.

Brad:
Well, Jason, we're glad that uh you could join us in this stretch because we know actually this uh episode will take us through the Super Bowl, through the big game, and Uh it's just been interesting because we're living in a an interesting time where there's so much talk about Hey, we are uh not supposed to talk openly about Jesus. If you do, you the whole weather canceled or whatever else. And but recently we've just been in a stretch where It is, hey, there's it's okay.

And part of that is because of Damara Hamlin and just what happened, what took place there, and because the nation was watching. And what I love is we get to have a conversation with you today because Sport Spectrum has been about telling these stories for years. I mean, you guys, whether in print or in media, you guys uh the digital media podcasting, you guys have always been about, hey Let's take some time and focus on these stories.

How did you make that so you were with ESPN? You were an Emmy Award-winning producer. W how did you wind up making that move to Sports Spectrum a few years ago?

Jason:
Well, it was a a combination of a few things. I wasn't looking to leave. In fact, if you'd have told me I don't know, eight years ago that I was what in my early 40s, that I would, you know, retire at ESPN, I would have said, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

I think that's probably gonna happen because I love my job. I love what I got to do Uh I loved who I was working with. Uh I mean guys, if they're gonna pay me to go watch football and you know produce sports, yeah, okay, sign me up, right?

And so I wasn't looking to leave But as my faith started growing, uh as my walk with Christ started getting, I don't know, a little more deeper, and I just felt like I wanted to do more for God. I didn't know that meant leaving ESPN. But I wanted to do more for him.

I didn't know what that meant. Uh I started, you know, I I guess saying yes to a few more things than I normally thought I might say yes to, like be an elder. on the leadership board at my church and things like that.

Oh yeah. And so I was growing deeper and I I just thought, is there, God, is there something else you want me to do? besides ESPN.

And that's all I would ask. And you know, I wasn't looking to leave per se, but I went to a conference in Nashville in 2015, I think it was. And I was at this conference and there was probably 75 or 80 people there who were who were working in ministry or at a faith-based nonprofit, a church, something like that.

And they were all doing similar work to what I was doing at that time, which was I was a digital producer, social media producer. And I saw these people doing basically the same work, and it really started I don't know, making me curious on whether I could do something like that. Could I do work that was similar to what I was doing at ESPN, but Maybe do it for a greater purpose, right?

Or do it with some more intent than just talking about sports. And again, I wasn't looking to leave. I just, it really piqued my curiosity.

to see if there was something like that. And lo and behold, I start to have conversations with a few people who work in sports ministry and ultimately I had a conversation with Steve Stenstrom, who was a quarterback with Stanford in the nineties, and then in the NFL a little bit, backup quarterback Well, he's the president of Sports Spectrum. And Steve and I get a you know a call together, a connection, and we start talking, and we really start to hit it off.

And Ultimately, in the fall of 2016, that led to him offering me a position which was substantially lower than what I was making at ESPN. It was not full-time, it was a contract position. basically part-time uh and would allow me to do other things if I chose to, but ultimately would probably have to leave ESPN if I made this decision.

And I prayed about it, prayed with my wife, talked to my wife. And at first it just didn't make sense to my wife. Like why would we walk away from you know, close to forty thousand dollars a year in salary when um when we're still we have a kid who's you know four years from college.

Like what are we doing here? Are you sure about this? And I just said, listen, I think this is from God.

This isn't my doing. And if it is, he'll see us through. If it's not, it'll blow up in my face, in our face, and I'll probably end up back at ESPN.

But I had enough faith and confidence, obviously faith in God, but faith and confidence in my career that if this wasn't from God, I hopefully would be able to land on my feet and continue my career somewhere, probably right back at ESPN. Um and here we are six years later and I'm still at Sports Spectrum. Wow.

And I love the work I get to do. And God has continued to open up doors and blow my mind on what he can do with the work that we've been doing now for six years.

Doug:
That is I mean, what a what an amazing story. Um, you know, that I absolutely love hearing that, Jason. I mean, that's what that's what uh God's people are about Um it being a light, a representative, an ambassador for Jesus wherever they are.

Um that's what this podcast, that's what life is all about. His representatives bringing Jesus through our words, our actions into the the life conversations we're always having in our families, our workplaces, teams, everywhere. Um so that's why i it it's so fascinating to hear your story here.

Tell us uh What's it like for you to be an ambassador for Christ? Because that's what that's what we're always talking about here is your situation. Our dad always says your situation is your assignment.

Your situation is your assignment. God has put you where you are. He's made you who you are for a reason.

So when you look around And you see your coworkers or your teammates or your schoolmates, other students, or whatever, you're seeing future inhabitants of an eternity, not just Oh, this is this is the guy I get and drink coffee with in the morning. Um so so what does it look like for you to be an ambassador for Christ in this particular situation. Uh i in the sports world, maybe uh not always even being in the most open environments spiritually Um what what what maybe what's the uniqueness about being an ambassador in your work?

Jason:
Yeah. Talk from two different places. The first will be from when I was at ESPN, right?

And that took me a long time to understand that I could be an ambassador. for Christ at the workplace. I used to think if you were at ESPN and you were working, like you were hired to be a producer and you want to do the best job you can as a producer.

But I never really thought I could like bring my faith into the workplace. It didn't mean I wasn't a Christian. It just meant I I don't know what that looks like.

I wasn't even thinking about being an ambassador for Christ in the workplace. I was just thinking about you know, doing good work and maybe getting promoted or getting a raise or whatever, getting recognized. Like that's where my thought process was for so many years.

And then I started to realize later in my career, probably the last five years at ESPN, that no, there was a purpose for me being here. And that God had planted me here for a reason, and that was to do the best work I could. I think that represents God properly But also to love the people I work with, to, you know, be intentional about loving them in a way, serving them in a way that might look a little different than others.

Um, to not just be in it for myself, but to be in it to help other people. Like that was really what changed, I think, the last few years at ESPN. And to me, that's what it looked like to be an ambassador.

And it just opened up possible conversations with people. I remember talking to one of my former bosses who was at ESPN and uh she's one of the best people I knew there and was a newer Christian and we would have some good conversations about faith. you know, on coffee breaks or in the cafeteria during lunch, and one day I was telling her that I was having a really hard time with a boss.

Like just I just could not see eye to eye with this guy. Um he was not about you know, my needs or concerns, at least, or even hit the people that he, you know, was a boss to, he wasn't necessarily concerned about their lives. He was concerned about the work.

Did you get the work done? And did you do it properly? You know, and I was like, man, I'm a human here.

I'm not a robot. And you know what my boss said, or my former boss, Carol, is her name. She said, Jason, have you prayed about this or prayed about your boss?

Whoa. And I or or for your boss. And I laughed at her.

I said, no, why would I pray for this man who's driving me nuts right now? But obviously I knew I knew what she was asking and what she was saying and it was profound and it made me think, like, listen, even in the midst of difficult circumstances The situations that people are in, they might not be their favorite situations. It's like you just said, your situation is your assignment, and my assignment should have been to pray for my boss in the midst of him driving me nuts.

And that wasn't my first thought. It was just to be, you know, complain about it or whatever. And ultimately God opened up doors, which eventually led me to sports spectrum, as I just said.

Being an ambassador at Sports Spectrum, I'm not going to say it's easier, because I am working in ministry, right? So like people when they see the content that I put out and the work that I do and the work that we all do at Sports Spectrum, I think they know that it's coming from a perspective of faith, right? It's coming from a perspective of Christianity, of Jesus.

And so It's not easier per se because you're still trying to cut through an audience out there that maybe is very secular. But I think sports People are more adept to reading sports stories if you're a sports fan, even if you're not a person of faith. Right.

And, you know, we've seen that the last few weeks with the Damar Hamlin thing. Our stories never change, but our stories have been read by a lot more people the last couple weeks because I think they're looking for something deeper and bigger in the sports world. Like Are we just gonna talk and scream about, you know, the Eagles and the Giants and the Cowboys every day on ESPN or are we actually gonna go a little deeper and find out what moves these guys and what what drives them to be great and, you know, a little bit more about their family life.

That's how I look at the work we get to do now. And I really mean that when I say I get to do it because it's not something I have to do each day. It's something that I want to do and I get to do and I look at it that way as a real gift and a blessing from God.

And we have a chance to really share stories that nobody else is sharing. And it brings people to at least hear about the gospel. Hopefully respond to it, but at least hear it.

Doug:
You know, I I just have to say, sports spectrum really made a difference in my faith um when I was a young man. Seriously. I I would Great. It's not easy being a believer an uh anytime, but as a teenager, you know, public school and everything and just reading kind of about your heroes and going, well, they they go through some of the same things um we do and and because it was about sports it opened me up to reading more about faith. I was automatically interested because it was it was a sports thing and I will bet that and today sports spectrum is so much bigger It's gotta have so much more impact today for so many people.

Brad:
And I remember uh opening up and seeing getting the copy that had Andy Pettit on the cover. And I just I like my heart jumped. I was just like, wait, what?

And so that was great. Now, Jason, I want to ask you the um A couple of things before I ask you just kinda about what you are seeing nowadays, just kinda in this last stretch. The um the couple of things that I just want to make sure our listeners are picking up on is that the Make a Difference Ambassador Hart is something that you're laying out there without actually even specifically saying that because you were someone who said, hey, I'm going to Lay my gifts before the Lord and see it say, man, God, here it is.

I'm I'm giving it back to you. Is there someplace else you want to use this? And you You were just open to what he had to say to you.

And that's a really key step when we are see seeking what the Lord has for us. And you did that in the secular environment of ESPN. You're doing that in the environment you're in now of saying, where can I use my gifts and how can I use my situation?

I'm Aye, there's a old story of this lady who told her pastor I'm a disciple of Jesus Christ, cleverly disguised as a machine operator And you've been a disciple of Jesus Christ, cleverly disguised as a producer and as a content producer, content creator Um, as you've been doing that this last stretch, as you've been having these conversations, not just on the podcast, but just conversations you're having with people just in real life and everything. Damar Hamlin, as we were saying, changed the conversation a little bit.

Doug:
Remember that Damar Hamlin is the guy who, if you're not aware, you've probably been under a rock for a while, but he was He was the uh player of the Bills player that had had a uh bad heart episode and and just collapsed on the field and For a while. It was terrifying. The whole world was really like what is gonna happen here? And it was it was it was um It was a very interesting time because I mean people were praying on ESPN.

Brad:
Well, and that's what it star it started with Pray for Damar. Pray for Damar. And it was and usually that's a lot of times that's where it ends.

is people are like, yeah, pray for so and so and you see that a lot for a couple days. But this took deeper roots. This had more legs to it where it was Yeah, I I think that to see that Damar Hamlin, to hear some of his story and some of his quotes about his faith, and then you had The some of the Bills players, their head coach, that all of a sudden are like, you know what, there's a window here.

I can actually say something more. Dan Orlovsky on ESPN to be able to say I I'm gonna stop and pray right now. And it is uh these different things, there was a little more to it, uh, and it seems to be lasting a little bit more, even with the uh united prayer huddles, which usually are a lot smaller than we're we're seeing and everything.

What are you seeing as far as people who love Jesus in their workplace, that is professional sports, and how this has impacted them and their ambassadorship, I guess, is is how kind of I would phrase it.

Jason:
Well, strangely enough, um just over the last 19, 18 days, whatever it's been since Damar Hamlin's injury, uh, I've found a lot more newer readers and listeners to our content. I'll start with that first. And that intrigues me and is really interesting to me that people have found our content and you know I still think we're here.

You know, ESPN's way up here. We're we're much lower than that. And I always think, wow, our ceiling, if people If more people knew about sports spectrum, like something really neat could happen as we all want to share the gospel, right?

And I saw a little bit of that after the Damar Hamlin injury. I just think a lot of people were We're curious to try and find sports and faith content that they didn't they didn't think even existed, right?

Brad:
Yeah.

Jason:
You you have a couple things at you know at play here, I think, with with Damar. Obviously we can talk now and hindsight knowing he's okay. Right?

Like he's gonna it sounds like he's gonna be okay At least to survive. Whether to play football again, who knows? But at least he looks like he's gonna live, which is great.

Jason:
Yeah.

Jason:
So knowing that now, I think we can look back because I said this just a couple days after th the incident happened. That the NFL is very faith-based, faith-oriented anyway. It just is.

Like I'm at conferences every year with a 200 NFL players. who are there to grow in their faith. Really big names.

Names that you guys would absolutely recognize and know. And so that that alone has me always, you know, but thinking that the NFL is is just always welcome to it. You know, the 50-yard line prayer.

Um Guys praying before games, uh, you know, a lot of faith-filled coaches and former players and coaches out there who are not afraid to share their stories. You just see that. And so when the DeMar situation happened.

The NFL responded right away with pray for Damar. I mean every team on their Twitter handle switched their profile picture. to pray for Damar.

Every team did that.

Brad:
Yeah.

Jason:
And it didn't say thoughts and prayers. It said pray. And there's something about actually praying, whatever you believe. You're praying to something bigger than yourself.

Doug:
Yes.

Jason:
Right? So there's a you you can be an atheist all you want, but you can't be an atheist and pray. You just can't. You can't hope.

But you can't pray if you're an atheist because you don't believe in God, so why would you pray anyways, right? So I thought that was really interesting because suddenly now you're asking for prayers, and that means you're asking for something that's outside of yourself, something bigger. The other thing is the Buffalo Bills and the Bengals, for that matter, are two very faithful teams, led by head coaches who are believers, led by Team chaplains who are very prominent within the two teams.

And if there was ever a team that a situation like Damar Hamlin would could happen to that would have been prepared spiritually to respond, it was the Buffalo Bills. Wow. I know their team chaplain, Len Vandenbos, very well.

Len is a great guy. He's he's very connected to the team. He's on the sidelines during the game.

People don't know who he is, but I know Len personally, so I see him over there, you know, right behind you know, the coaches or some of the players on the sidelines and think, yep, there's Len. So he's welcomed in as a very important person within that organization by Sean McDermott and by the rest of the team. So you have that factor.

Then you saw the you know the huge prayer on Monday night football, and Len was leading that prayer, you know, on the field while he why you know DeMar was being tended to. You saw the reaction after. You saw the story.

Maybe you guys saw this of Josh Allen just last week talking about how Spiritually, he was challenged and felt like God is real. And you know, he admitted he hadn't had a great relationship with Christ, and yet something happened that's moved him in a powerful way spiritually So wanna draw closer. And by the way, the quarterback room that Josh Allen is in includes Case Keenum.

Oh yeah, it's Matt Barkley. That's where it's Case and Matt are both very strong Christians. So now you compound the head coach, the two quarterbacks that are backups.

the team uh and what and it went through and now your leader your MVP Josh Allen is talking about things from a spiritual perspective that sets it up for people to be like okay something's going on here And I think it it was really a neat time to see people open to prayer. And I think that's why so many were Drawn to it. You know, nobody was preaching Jesus, although you and I would say we are preaching Jesus.

Sure. Nobody's telling you that You were a left winger or a right winger, you're this or you're that. Nobody was bringing politics.

This was all about a man's life and how we had no control over this, so we needed to pray. Because that's the only way that maybe a miracle could happen here. And guess what?

A miracle did happen.

Brad:
Well and I think what you're saying there, uh Doug and I uh growing up in our bedroom had just this sign hanging up that said prayer changes things And what what we've seen, I love that because that's what people have seen and that's what some of the same folks a lot of times you just pray, something happens, everything, but there's been a lot of prominent names who have circled back and said Please know it was prayer that did this. There is something powerful at work. God is at work.

And so people have continued to point the way. So I appreciate what you said about prayer. Sometimes people think.

That's all I'm doing. And it's like, no, that you're doing. You were doing something like that.

Yeah, well, you've had people there too.

Jason:
You've also had people, you know, there was if if you go on social media, which is really your only gauge, um, and unfortunately it's usually a poor gauge on how people are truly thinking. You're gonna have, you know, trolls and other people that come back and say, well That's great that you're praying to your God, but what about all the doctors and the responders? And I'm like, yeah, those doctors and responders are people we need to thank God for.

And they needed to be there. But these prayers worked. Like God equipped these people to do what they had to do, and yet this guy almost died twice on the football field.

And so you can have prayers and gratitude towards those first responders and those people in the health industry who are helping a Damar and so many others. you know, walk through difficult health issues. So I think prayer, that's why I think a lot of people were open to saying, yeah, we should pray that God works a miracle here and then we should thank God for people.

like those first responders. And for the most part, the majority of the people who were responding uh were really encouraged and I think intrigued. I saw My friend Dan Orlovsky, you guys mentioned him.

You know, Dan and I spoke, and Dan was feeling a heavy heart to do more than just say he was praying, but he wanted to actually pray. And that was I mean that went viral. That was to me unheard of.

Doug:
So gutsy. So gutsy.

Jason:
And gutsy and very bold to say, you know what? A lot of people are saying we're praying. I want to pray and I feel like I need to.

And he did. And I can't tell you how many millions and millions of people watched that prayer on social media, on the different posts that we had. Uh, and Dan has somehow now reached an audience of people I don't think that he ever thought he would reach, which are people who are really interested or intrigued by his faith.

Forget all the football knowledge he has. Yep. And now Dan, I think he's always talked about being an ambassador for Christ, like you guys mentioned.

That was living it out in the most bold way possible to be an ambassador. And it was received Positively, which blows my mind. I would have thought, no way ESPN execs would ever want to have that on the air.

But he saw a moment, he was bold in his faith. And it was the right moment to pray.

Doug:
And he did it. You know, this this is uh that that moment was A follower of Jesus listening closely to the Holy Spirit and going, I'm my situation is my assignment. I'm I'm supposed to do this right now.

I think that um I think that that Christians we we start to take prayer for granted and we don't recognize how powerful it is. I mean when God is saying things like When you keep asking, I'm listening and I want to do something about it, the creator of the universe who who governs all the galaxies says, come to me. And bring all sorts of requests.

You do not have because you do not ask. I want to give you these good gifts. And we we forget how powerful prayer is, man.

But when we pray. We're like when you pray with somebody and and I'll I'll tell you you you need to ask permission, but there are times where I've even with someone I don't know that well, God has prompted me to say, ask them if you can pray with them. Because When you do that, you're you've just made this ethereal thing, this God idea very real.

Your relationship with God has just become very real for someone to see. Um man, uh we could I I absolutely love this. This is such a great conversation.

Jason, we want to make sure we touch on real quick your podcast and and and so people can come Check it out. Um, I I you had Dallas Jenkins on recently, Dallas Jenkins, creator of the chosen. I was actually surprised.

Was it did I hear this right? I was surprised to hear that the Apostle Peter was on the Jerusalem Giants.

Brad:
Did you?

Doug:
Wow, I hadn't heard that wow. It it was it w uh if you're watching the video I almost left on that one. Brad brought up Andy Pettit before I was Yeah. Was that I'm just want to make sure, was that the Andy Pettit that beat the Mets in the two thousand one series?

Brad:
Why would you do that? We just had a great conversation. I didn't say it when we got started. I didn't say it m I didn't say it at the beginning.

Jason:
All right, I'm gonna that Andy Pettit. Yes.

Doug:
Let's circle back here. Um, but tell us a little bit about the podcast, how people can find it.

Brad:
Yeah, because the reality is People can find out uh find a lot more of these conversations that you're having with people. Yeah. So tell us about how they can find out more about Sports Spectrum and your podcast specifically.

Jason:
Yeah. So Sports Spectrum I think from an overarching media ministry is which is what we call it. You can find it at sports spectrum dot com.

And that's all of our content. It's free. There's devotionals.

We actually have a podcast network of shows. So not just the show that I host, but we have three or four other shows that are part of Sports Spectrum's podcast network that are there that you can check out. So those are all free and available everywhere podcasts are found.

Um and then our you know content that we're writing and updating every day, the different stories and articles. uh the different you know messages that we're trying to get across through these athletes and coaches, uh they're all available there. So go to sportsspectrum.

com. You can even when you're there, You can sign up for our magazine. You guys mentioned the magazine.

Our magazine is still going strong. It's a quarterly magazine now, four issues. Yeah.

Yeah. Uh for the year, but it's the only thing that we any charge any money for and we still keep it affordable, but I think people would if they're looking for something that they can tangibly You know, hold in their hand and actually say, okay, I have a magazine in my hand. Let me give it to you.

And great pictures and devotionals are in there and great stories of some athletes that you may not have thought were Christians. And it's perfect for kids. So like if you guys had kids that you're trying to raise up who love sports but also to follow Christ, like Sports Spectrum magazine to me worth the investment.

Doug:
It's worth the investment. As you're saying that Before he even said that, I was I am right when I get home today, I'm subscribing. I'm gonna re-subscribe to Sports Spectrum because my boys are starting to get more interested in sports and are interested that I'm interested in sports and and I want to sit down with them with that magazine with something tangible and and show them.

Listen You need to go, if you're listening to this, you need to go and check out this podcast, uh, Sports Spectrum Podcast with Jason Romano. I've listened to it, and I'm telling you, it's one of the best out there. It's really well done.

It's fascinating.

Brad:
Natural conversation.

Doug:
Natural conversation. Jason is a serious pro with this. I seriously, uh when Brad told us that you were gonna join us on the podcast.

I was so thrilled, man. Thank you so much. The podcast is awesome.

Your story is amazing. It's so great to hear. God is always up to something bigger than we know, than we imagine.

He's working big time in the sports world and using guys like Jason uh and his ambassadorship to show himself to a a world that is desperate for his hopes. So thank you, Jason.

Brad:
Can I uh can I stop and pray for Jason real quick and their ministry as a whole? Can I ask you something to pray for it too?

Jason:
We're gonna be actually going uh the week of the Super Bowl down to Arizona. We've done this now for six years We're interviewing players and coaches from both teams that'll be down there talking to a bunch of different legends and other people who love Christ that are in the football space. So as you pray for our ministry, could you include um Doug and Brad praying for our our trip to Arizona first week of February and just as we you know look for these stories to be able to share that other people aren't sharing. So that would be amazing.

Brad:
Oh we'll do Heavenly Father, just thank you for uh this time with Jason for this conversation. I thank you for the ministry he's part of with Sports Spectrum. We know he represents a lot of people that are reaching out into the hearts and lives of yes, athletes, professional athletes, college athletes, uh to people who are interested in sports.

And we are encouraged to hear that their reach has grown. Uh, even over these last few weeks, Lord. We pray that would continue.

We pray that more people would share what's going on because these conversations are important. And we want to pray specifically for their trip to Arizona, Lord. What an incredible opportunity to be able to not just hear people's stories and have those conversations, but to share their stories and to be able to share your story, Lord.

We pray that you would give them many open doors. to talk with people who know you and that those who know you would be bold about talking about you. And Lord, we pray you'd give many open doors to share you with people who don't. We know there's going to be a lot of people.

Who need to hear about you during that Super Bowl time and what a huge audience there is during that stretch. So we pray, Lord, that you would just guide their conversations, give them safe travel, give them the right connections every step of the way, the right interviews And we just pray that you would continue to make a difference through sports spectrum in the lives of all those involved. And we just pray all this in Jesus' name.

Amen. Amen. Amen, guys.

Jason:
Thank you so much.

Brad:
Absolutely, Jason.

Jason:
So we'll sign off as always. Until next time, everyone. Go mad! With