🏈 ‘God, Why Me?’: Deion Sanders Never Asked That While Battling Cancer 🔌

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Weekend Plug-in 🔌

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Editor’s note: Every Friday, “Weekend Plug-in” meets readers at the intersection of faith and news. Click to join nearly 10,000 subscribers who get this column delivered straight to their inbox. Got feedback or ideas? Email Bobby Ross Jr.

(ANALYSIS) Deion Sanders can’t — or won’t — stop talking about the Lord.

Especially now.

This week, Colorado’s head football coach mentioned God and faith at least three dozen times during a 40-minute news conference to discuss his private battle with bladder cancer.

The 57-year-old coach revealed that his bladder was removed to ward off an aggressive form of cancer. He appeared downright giddy as Dr. Janet Kukreja, director of urologic oncology at the University of Colorado Cancer Center, declared he had “beaten” the disease.

“It has been a tremendous journey, and I’m truly thankful that God is so good,” Sanders said, repeating that last part for emphasis: “God is so good — you have no idea.

“You have no idea how good God has been for me to be here,” he stressed again. “You have no idea.”

At times emotional and other times humorous, Sanders — who plans to coach the Buffaloes this season — sported a cowboy hat, sunglasses and a necklace dangling a diamond-encrusted cross.

“It’s a totally different life,” the NFL Hall of Famer, who also played major league baseball, said of his post-cancer circumstances. “I mean, thank God, now I depend on Depend” — the brand known for making incontinence underwear.

Since becoming a college coach — first at Jackson State and now at Colorado — Sanders has made repeated headlines with his outspoken focus on his faith.

In a September 2023 piece, Religion Unplugged’s own Clemente Lisi noted that Sanders “has not been afraid to sound like a pastor during team meetings or with the reporters.”

Lisi wrote:

But Sanders’ journey to Christianity is a complicated one. It was in a 2018 interview with Andscape that Sanders said a suicide attempt in 1997 led him to God. Sanders recalled that suicide attempt in his autobiography “Power, Money & Sex: How Success Almost Ruined My Life.” He drove his car off a cliff but survived what he said was a 30- to 40-foot drop without any major injuries.

It was after that moment, Sanders recalled, that he became committed to living a Christian lifestyle. Since then, Sanders has also claimed to have spoken in tongues during a health scare. 

“I don’t believe you can be at your optimum without your faith,” he said. “Sports is sports, it’s a game. My faith is everything. It’s the gas that propels the courage, the truth, keeps me going. It’s the wind, it’s the wings, it’s the air that pumps into my lungs that provokes me to live. Faith is everything.”

In a 2021 video with David Emmert, senior pastor at Celebration Baptist Church in Tallahassee, Florida, and retired coach Mickey Andrews, Sanders’ former defensive coordinator at Florida State, Sanders reflected on his faith journey.

“You could sleep in the bed with two and three women, and nobody’s satisfied,” he said of his former life. “You got 100 suits, and you can’t cover up the pain. You got 300, 400, 500 pairs of shoes, and you can’t take a step in the right direction. You got nine to 10 cars in the driveway, and you ain’t going nowhere. You got a 15,000-square-foot house, but you ain’t got a home.

“By the time you get to the bottom — because God is calling you collect, and you do not want to accept the charges because it’s going to cost you something — so that ringing, that ringing, that noise in your life, you can’t get this out of your head,” he explained. “So you’re just crying out, crying out for help.”

READ: Hoops and Healing: Why The Thunder’s First NBA Title Means So Much To OKC

Life becomes so much better, he suggested, when one surrenders his life to Jesus.

“That’s why nobody can’t tell me nothing about the gospel of Christ Jesus,” Sanders said. “Nobody can’t tell me nothing about who he isn’t because I had a moment in Cincinnati, Ohio, a condo by myself, when I finally got on my knees, and I surrendered.

“I said, ‘Lord, if you’re here, take me. I’m yours.’ And the lights came into that room. That sound and the wind and the whistling came into that room. And it’s like papers was flying, and the light was so bright and radiant that I was just crying out, ‘Lord, take me. Take me.’ And it was the most beautiful thing that I ever saw. I had a real visitation.”

Sanders said he learned he didn’t have to be perfect to serve God.

“God hasn’t called me to be perfect. He called me to be present,” the coach said on the video. “God hadn’t called me to the pulpit. He called me to the street. God ain’t called me to the altar. He called me to the field.

READ: A Pitch To Follow Jesus: Baseball Fans Embrace Players’ Faith Testimonials

“My ministry is everywhere I am,” Sanders added. “It’s not just isolated in this place. It’s everywhere I go.”

As a football star, Sanders’ swagger and persona earned him the nickname “Prime Time.” 

But former baseball teammates recalled in a story by The Athletic in 2023 that Sanders was just “Deion” in the locker room:

Tony “Mort” Walter, who has worked in the Reds’ clubhouse for more than 20 years, remembers Sanders sitting at his locker and reading his Bible. Occasionally Sanders would play music — gospel singer Kirk Franklin was his favorite — but he was among the most unassuming people in the room. 

In Sanders’ coaching tenure, not everyone has appreciated his approach to faith, especially at a public university, as Kelsey Dallas — then with the Deseret News — noted in a news story last fall:

Deion Sanders is sparking religious freedom conflict again this season by incorporating faith-based messages into his football program.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation contacted the University of Colorado in late September to say that Sanders cannot have his spiritual adviser pray with the team.

“Using a coaching position to promote Christianity amounts to unconstitutional religious coercion,” the foundation argued.

But this week, another legal organization stepped in to defend Sanders’ actions and argue that the Freedom From Religion Foundation is misapplying the law.

Courts have long allowed for sports chaplains, as well as team prayers, according to an Oct. 14 letter from First Liberty Institute to the University of Colorado.

Fast-forward to this week’s news conference. 

Sanders, who has clashed with reporters in the past, welcomed journalists to inquire about his cancer battle. But he kept returning to the spiritual nature of his journey.

“Let me add this for you people that get upset when I start talking about the Lord,” he said at one point. “I never once through this whole journey said, ‘God, why me?’”

Why not? “Because I would have to say, ‘God, why did you sit me up in front of this wonderful group of people? Why did you give me the position of the head football coach of the prestigious university? Why did you allow me to father five wonderful kids? Why did you give me these relationships with these wonderful people? Why me, Lord, did I have some of the things that I have?’ I can never say that.

“I said, ‘Lord, whatever it is that you’re doing, let me know what it is so I can expedite the process. Because I know you’ve got me. I’ve seen you have my back. I’ve seen you there in the midst of storms. When nobody knew I was going through hell, I’ve seen you guide me through. Lord, I would never say why me, but let me know what I can do so I can help.”

READ: Houston Texans Head Coach Says God Guides Him ‘For The Good Of His Kingdom’

Sanders voiced concern for anyone fighting cancer and urged those hearing his voice to get tested early so they, too, might have a chance to survive.

“God bless you all,” he said as the news conference ended.

Inside The Godbeat

Religion reporting rocks.

Just ask the Arkansas chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

At the recent 2025 Diamond Journalism Awards — promoting outstanding journalism in Arkansas and six neighboring states — the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s religion editor, Frank Lockwood, won first place for investigative reporting. He was recognized for the second straight year for his coverage of the coverup of sexual abuse at a church.

The Diamond Journalism Awards were presented this past weekend. (Photo via Arkansas SPJ)

I was honored to receive the Diamond Journalist of the Year prize for my portfolio of religion stories, and my former Christian Chronicle colleague Audrey Jackson earned the Emerging Journalist of the Year award.

Not a bad night for the Godbeat!

The Final Plug

Long before his breakout success with “The Chosen,” Dallas Jenkins wrote and directed the film “What If…”

Fifteen years later, it’s still a great film — and Religion Unplugged movie critic Joseph Holmes explains why this week in a review that Jenkins himself shared on Facebook.

At its 15th anniversary, Dallas Jenkins’ “What If…” remains a top faith-based film, critic Joseph Holmes writes. (Screenshot via Facebook)

Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.

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Bobby Ross Jr. writes the Weekend Plug-in column for Religion Unplugged and serves as editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 18 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.