He came out of the locker room and stood in the hallway looking me up and down. His head was covered in permanent welts from his role as an enforcer. Already stripped out of his upper body pads and jersey, one gloved hand held his stick, the other clenched in a fist in front of him about waist high. Other players and the head coach of the Rochester Americans (aka the Amerks) hockey club, the farm team for the Buffalo Sabres of the NHL, stopped and watched as the showdown unfolded. We stood eye to eye; I could smell his bad breath and sweat. His bare chest chiseled and muscles bulging, he was recently brought to the team because of his reputation as a hardcore fighter. He was tough, and he was a bully, just what the team needed to protect their marquee players. “What in the world is going on?” raced through my mind.

I was not, never was, and never will be a hockey player. My Dad played it a bit in his youth and seemed to always end up in goal—that was in the days when no one wore helmets or face masks. He ended up disdaining the sport as a form of soccer on ice with razor blades affixed to your feet. So, it would be an understatement to say hockey was not my sport of choice.

A year or two earlier, a friend of a friend, who had just become the assistant coach for this professional hockey club, and was a Christian, called and asked if I could conduct chapel services for the team. I laughed and confessed that it wasn’t my sport of choice. I was a lousy skater who associated skating with pain in the feet and the posterior. I had no understanding of the game and only went to one professional match in my life. He laughed in return and talked me into it.

With the head coach’s permission, I had five minutes to introduce myself to the entire team and present the idea of having a weekly Bible study and talk. I confessed that I didn’t want to be a groupie and that I had not seen any of their games—although I regaled my prowess on the basketball court in my prime younger days in a feeble effort to convey that I was not a nerd (though some may have still gotten that impression). I wasn’t there to get their autographs or memorabilia (though some of them, in time, moved up to the NHL). Hockey was just one part of their lives, and they didn’t care about my lack of hockey interest or ability. I told them I wanted to be available to help them be well-rounded individuals by including God in their lives. And in return, sometime, they could teach me to skate. I hoped my humor would get a reaction from them, but at most, only one or two smirked.

Our first “chapel” time began a usual routine of meeting in a side room after practice for whoever wanted to come. Four players showed up! Since I didn’t know any of them or any exposure they may have had to spiritual things, I posed a simple question to start: “If you could ask God any question, what would it be?” The first one to speak was about 6’6” and he asked, “I never understood that trinity thing in the Bible; what’s that all about?” So began some great discussions and a Bible study on the subject. We had some of them in our home for dinner. Many were single and a long way from home; a home-cooked meal and spending time with a family that treated them like normal people had great appeal. One player even sat at our piano and played classical music!

Back to the fateful day of reckoning. There stood the new guy; he was traded from team to team; he knew his role—fighting. And now he was squaring off with me, and everyone was watching. Assessing the situation, I immediately concluded he could deck me with one swipe of his gloved hand and pulverize me with his stick without breaking a sweat. Standard hockey protocol is to drop one’s gloves as the first move to begin the rumble; he still had his gloves on, so I had at least a moment to think strategically. The optics would not be good if I tried to bolt. I couldn’t ignore him; his presence was foreboding. He was ready; he was coiled. Was he using intimidation to show his hallway teammates that he wasn’t afraid of showing up the preacher? I am reminded of how Samson in the Bible prayed for God’s strength to defeat the Philistines. The enforcer standing before me was my Philistine, yet I didn’t have the miraculous quality of Samson’s long hair! Was he waiting for me to make the first move? His eyes didn’t blink, he was motionless, and his fisted glove hand was still clenched tightly in front of him. Without thinking, I made the first move!

My right hand moved with lightning speed as I raised my bared, clenched fist … came down with it on top of his fisted gloved hand. At that, he brought up his gloved hand up around and came down on mine, doing the same as me. It was kind of an old-style fist bump. He nodded, smirked, and walked back into the locker room. The players and coaches dispersed. Whew! I was tested, but not sure what it accomplished.

After the players finished getting cleaned up and dressed, we had our largest attendance for the special Christmas chapel service. Mary baked fresh holiday pastries for me to bring in, for which the single guys clamored to get the first pick. Both coaches and ten players showed up—and the tough guy! We sat around two long tables end to end. The angry, miserable fighter kept separate, his folding chair leaning back against the back wall, with a look of complete disinterest. Afterward, as the guys started walking out, I called to him and asked if I could buy him lunch. He agreed!

As we ate, my mind was whirling; what do I say to a hockey tough guy, a brawling fighter, who makes his living with his fists, and a man of few words? The only thing I could think of was, “What’s it like being an enforcer?” His answer, with a big sigh, was that it gets old. He’s tired of it. And he began to share his life story. He had been married, but his wife had left him, and he hadn’t seen his son in six years. He kept getting traded, moving to different cities, and what he did for a living was all he could do. Beneath the hardened, welt-covered exterior was a man with feelings, loneliness, and emptiness. We talked about the gospel of Jesus Christ and His death on the cross; he listened closely, said he would have to think about that, and thanked me for lunch.

He was with the team for only one more game and then was traded. Coach told me he was causing problems in the locker room. Last I heard, he finished his hockey career, having been traded to 17 different teams professionally (with some time in the NHL). He died at the age of 45 of inoperable brain cancer. I count it a privilege for the short time I had to share with him the wonderful message of forgiveness for his sin. Hopefully, others picked up the baton to lead him in the final step of his spiritual journey and he is now in his heavenly home with the eternal team of God—never to be traded again!

 Postscript: the team invited me one year to their annual winter family skate night for players, their families, and girlfriends. I went and even dusted off a pair of 20-year-old skates with rusted blades and stepped onto the ice with these professionals. Some of the guys tried to teach me a few things but gave me up as a lost cause. I told them I couldn’t skate!