Ball State redshirt freshman defensive back Elijah Davis thought his brother, Jeremiah, was dead. He was on scene of a shooting and saw Jeremiah stretched out on the ground. 

Elijah was an eighth grader at the time, and his brother was now paralyzed from the waist down. Jeremiah was like a father figure to Elijah and raised him the best he could, right, wrong, or indifferent. 

“Everything was blank,” Elijah said. “I remember crying on the way to the hospital, and once we got there, it was all blank. I stopped crying, my face got straight and I was just hugging my mom. All the emotion had been sucked out of me from that point going forward.” 

Those emotions then got in the way when Davis met his current girlfriend. He said he was emotionally unavailable. He closed off his world to a point where he rarely responded to family members. 

“My heart wasn’t with her, it wasn’t with football and it wasn’t with my family,” Davis said. “ ... I just knew I could not keep feeling like that. I continued to pray about it. From eighth grade to  freshman year in college, it was a long time living your life like that.”

On the verge of ending his relationship, Davis paused the conversation to pray. He asked God to open up his heart. And for the first time since he was a little kid, Davis said he felt love. 

“There was genuine happiness,” Davis said. 

Even in practices where he let up touchdowns, or even when he was going through a hard time during spring camp. Through it all, happiness was with him.

“There wasn’t a hole in my chest anymore,” Davis said. “...So much unraveled. There was so much being put away and for that to be built for years was gone. It was amazing. It was an answered prayer.”

Davis said the 2024 Ball State football season showed him, through highs and lows, that if he is doing anything, it is going to be for God. 

“This whole past year has been a complete turnaround in my life,” Davis said. 

There to aid a turnaround, a friend, or even just have a weekly conversation is the Ball State football Bible study group. The group meets every Thursday to study and talk about the Bible and their faith. 

The goals of the group are simple: grow closer to God and grow closer with each other. 

“It's just a safe place for guys to get vulnerable, [and] share what you've been struggling with,” redshirt junior linebacker Jackson Weigold said. 

Redshirt junior linebacker Jack Beebe was one of the first members of the group alongside former Cardinal Trenton Hatfield. Having grown up in church, joining the Bible study group was a no-brainer for Beebe. 

“There were only like five to six of us,” Beebe said. “It was in The Haven in an apartment, much quicker than what it is now since there are a lot more people…. Seeing it expanded has been a real testament to what God is doing on this team. [It’s] super inspiring for me, and for a lot of people, to see that growing.”

Beebe also said the group of more than 25 players allows them to really get to know their teammates. 

“We talk about guys being in the Bible study more than we talk about their football play,” Beebe said. “...While they did play and contribute a lot on the field, we love talking about their personalities and character more than their play.”

Football is violent, and you are expected to be a macho man, Weigold said. There is an outside perception that the players do not get vulnerable, but the Bible study is a different place. 

“We encourage that vulnerability, which is very countercultural to what we live day in and day out,” Weigold said. “...It is countercultural to what we do in our occupation – which is being a football player, versus our identity – which is in Christ.”

Weigold is not ashamed of his past. It is who he is. He was caught by UPD “doing some illegal stuff” early in his career at Ball State which put the Cardinals in a position to kick him off the team. 

His way of life was not fulfilling, did not give him peace, and subdued his joy, Weigold said. 

“At that point, I was coming off of an injury, and I wasn’t serving a whole lot of purpose to the team as far as me playing,” Weigold said. “[Former head coach Mike] Neu showed me grace. The police officers showed me grace. Conduct officials showed me grace. People around me showed me grace. 

“I know that God showed me grace through those people, because while I was living in that sin, while I was actively committing that sin, I was still shown grace.”

Weigold said he would not trade his mistake for the world. It brought him to Christ. 

Weigold wants to start games, win a Mid-American Conference (MAC) Championship, and win MAC Defensive Player of the Year, but these things are all temporary to him. 

“Those are all worldly,” Weigold said. “The way I conduct myself and the way I love others, that is my purpose. That is my goal here at Ball State, to bring others to Him. Football is just a vessel or avenue of which I can do that.” 

Like Weigold, former junior tight end Tanner Koziol said he has always been searching for a purpose in life and felt he was caught up with all the things in the world. 

“If you do not have Christ, there will always be a void you are trying to fill,” Koziol said. “... For me, it was football. I put my whole identity into football, and if football was going good, my life was going good. If football was going bad, my life was going bad.”

Koziol’s mental health struggled from this mindset, and he ended up finding Christ by looking for his purpose on this Earth. 

“I cannot even explain how grateful I am for that Bible study, because it has changed my life,” Koziol said. “Finding Christ has changed the joy I have in life. That relationship with Christ is inspirational. Taking the field with them and knowing that our identity is not in football and that football is truly the tool we can use to glorify God and bring people to his kingdom.”

Koziol was baptized last spring. 

Redshirt freshman wide receiver R.J. Mukes III said he has been deep into his faith since he was young, so when he heard about a Bible study, he knew he had to join. 

The study is a refresher and reset for Mukes that allows him to focus on who he is doing this for: God. All the practices, bus rides, plane trips, workouts, late nights and more are all for God. 

“That’s what I look forward to during the week,” Mukes said. “Those talks, that brotherly community, that real love in bonding over something that loves us even more… It is really a brotherhood that is now a family.”

Mukes said the messages of the study never end on the designated meeting date, and the members try to carry the cross in every single aspect of their lives. 

“Being here really magnified the blessing God gave me, which is being able to talk and spread his word in a good way,” Mukes said. “I really understand that this is much bigger than football.”

Davis was open and honest by saying the 2024 season has been mentally taxing for the redshirt freshman. There have been times when it affected his play and said it could have sent him on a downward spiral. 

The anxiety was weighing down on Davis, so much so that he was throwing up before every practice. 

But alongside Davis was a foundation. A foundation of Cardinals who were in the same spot as he was. Bebee and Koziol were just a few of many who supported Davis by telling him about their struggles in the same area. Davis knew he had to run to God. 

“Having God in your boat doesn’t mean you won’t face storms, it just means you won’t perish in those storms,” Davis said. “I still face storms. I still have down days where I get angry, but I won’t perish because they won’t consume me as they would have then.” 

Contact Elijah Poe via email at elijah.poe@bsu.edu or on X @ElijahPoe4.

Share