Former two-time world heavyweight champion and veteran of more than 80 professional boxing matches, George Foreman, is now a minister at a North Houston Church in Texas.
George Foreman, in a sixty-minute sermon, on Sunday, described God’s creation of the World, warned about false philosophers, biology, Pluto, marijuana, boxing punches, getting lost in traffic, the morals of dogs, the morals of women who buy booze by the gallon, people who wallow, wheat and weeds, and Adam and Eve.
Foreman’s turn towards Christ, came in 1977, moments before heavyweight Jimmy Young beat him. Foreman’s mind filled with battling thoughts: preening pride vs. death, panic.
“I kept thinking, ‘You believe in God, why are you afraid to die?’” Foreman said. “But I really didn’t believe.” Foreman bargained, offering to devote his boxing prize money to charity.
“I don’t want your money,” Foreman heard a voice say, “I want you.” Instantly the boxer found himself cast into the bleakest darkness he had experienced.
“It was the saddest, most horrible place I had ever seen,” he said. Then a “giant hand” plucked him into consciousness. Foreman found himself on a locker room table, surrounded by friends and staff. He stated that he felt as if he were physically filled with the presence of a dying Christ. He felt his forehead bleed, punctured by a crown of thorns; his wrists, he believed, had been pierced by nails of the cross.
“I knew that Jesus Christ was coming alive in me,” Foreman said. “I ran into the shower and turned on the water and — hallelujah! — I was born again. I kissed everybody in the dressing room and told them I loved them. That happened in March 1977, and I never have been the same again.”