“Wait until your father gets home!” Susan Felker warned her boys.

At that moment, Jay and David Felker, the two oldest of three Felker children, had just been caught coloring on their father, Rockey Felker’s Southeastern Conference Player of the Year trophy from 1974 — the same award later won by football stars such as Tim Tebow and Peyton Manning.

Rockey’s response that day stuck with David ever since. 

“I remember, still, when my dad came home, and he saw the trophy, and he kind of giggled. He just grabbed it and took it up to the attic.”

Now a pastor, David loves to share that story, because for him it shows that even in a sports vocation in a sports-addicted culture, football and its laurels were not his father’s main priority.

“The trophy wasn’t weighty to him,” David said. “Those things on my Dad’s resume didn’t define him and they weren’t his justification or righteousness.” 

Instead, David said, his father has anchored his life in Christ’s work on his behalf. 

That spiritual influence appears to have impacted all of his sons, as now all three — Jay, David, and Stephen — are serving in full-time ministry positions.

David is the executive minister at First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, Mississippi. Stephen is assistant minister of young adults at Independent Presbyterian Church in Memphis, Tennessee, and Jay is pastor of equipping at an independent church in Fort Worth, Texas.

Football and faith 

David likes to say the Felker family was a pack of nomads following their father’s football coaching career around the South, crisscrossing Texas, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Mississippi.

When Rockey became head coach of his alma mater, Mississippi State University, in 1986, he became the nation’s youngest collegiate head coach. In 2019, Rockey was inducted into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. 

Football influenced their lives, but Rockey and Susan Felker pointed to God’s sovereignty, goodness, and faithfulness in every relocation. 

“I think my dad always was able to model how to hold sports with open hands,” David said. “Even though it put food on the table, I think he had a more simple view of it. It wasn’t an ultimate thing for us, even though wins and losses meant salaries changing; it meant a change in resources; it meant moving trucks at times and walking into new schools and having to make new friends.”

What was stable wherever they went was their home.

Hymns were constantly playing in their house, Bibles were open, and church was as much a part of their lives as games or practices.

“Faith was very important in our household.” Stephen recalls. “It was a priority. From a young child, I can remember doing different Bible studies that our church would offer.”

The Felkers also prioritized hospitality, often hosting families from church and players from Rockey’s teams around their table. Looking back, David and Stephen can see clearly that their father viewed his role as a coach as also a way to minister to people. 

Their mother, Susan, who passed away in 2019, served right alongside her husband. David likened his parents to Priscilla and Aquilla in that what they did for the Lord, they did together. Whether it was having guests, helping with mercy ministries or children’s programs, Susan was involved. 

David said the beauty of his mother’s godliness “was an instrument that the Lord used in my life to make the good news of grace precious to me.” She relied on the Lord to build a “loving, ministry-minded home” where she joyfully welcomed everyone from Reformed University Fellowship students to her son’s friends to Rockey’s athletes. 

For many years, Susan, who worked as a teacher before becoming a mother, assisted with an RUF ministry, and her sons still often hear from women about the influence their mother had on them.

Stephen recalls that every fall, his parents would host a freshman welcome dinner at their house for new students, with 50 to 60 students showing up for hamburgers and snacks. At Thanksgiving, all were welcome to sit at their table.

“They had a great home, a big living room, and they wanted to use it for other people,” Stephen said. 

While all three boys enjoyed sports, it was never made the main focus of their home.

“There was not a lot of pressure around sports, even though there’d be a lot of reason to think there would be,” Stephen said. 

Instead, character and integrity were preached on and off the field.

David remembers one game in particular from when he was about 12 or 13. He bungled a play that cost his team the game. Disappointed with himself, he left the locker room without talking to anyone. His dad found him, and instead of offering criticism, said simply, “Son, I just love watching you play.”

Winning and losing

While football brought a lot of good to their lives, the Felkers did not escape its pressures. When losses outpaced wins, they felt it.

It was a pre-Twitter era, but the family still heard harsh words in the stands. Newspapers wrote about failures.

That heaviness would follow them into the church pews, but the Felker children saw their parents lean on God in those times.

“My dad’s role was so public and it included significant pressure. But the Lord kept my Dad” David said. He described his father experiencing the peace that passes understanding in the midst of the wins and the losses.

Rockey would remain a faithful and emotionally steady person, but he and Susan didn’t shy away from the hardships either. David said his mother helped the boys process the wins and losses, pointing her sons back to the gospel and how God was at work in all of it. 

Using their gifts

While all three boys were influenced by their parents’ faith, none felt pressure to pursue a career in ministry or football, they say. What their parents did encourage was for them to use their gifts well.

David said his first career interest was in coaching. Then he thought about pursuing medicine. A temporary role as a youth director at Grace Presbyterian in Starkville, Mississippi, altered his plans. 

When he first took the position, David thought of it as a place to rest after college and figure out his next steps. But as he used and tested different gifts, he realized God might be leading him into ministry. He went to seminary and saw God work providentially to lead him where he needed to be, from youth ministry roles to his current position.

While never pushing their children in a particular direction, Rockey and Susan were there to offer advice and encouragement along the way.

“Both of them, as I was conflicted, both in college and then after college, helped me test my gifts or gave me feedback on gifts,” David said.

For his part, Stephen first earned a degree in education and taught for four years before sensing a call into ministry.

His wife, Mary Virginia, was working at Independent Presbyterian at the time, and he began volunteering in the summers, trying to determine if he might want to pursue full-time ministry one day. When a youth ministry position opened up at the church, he took it, while also completing seminary.

Lessons learned

The way Rockey and Susan served and ministered to others offered an example that the Felker sons now look to in their ministries today.

From coaching others to withstanding public criticism, the crossovers between football coaching and ministry are many.

“Both when I was youth director early on in ministry or now as an executive pastor at a larger church, I think about ways that [Rockey] stewarded his leadership and coaching all the time,” David said.

The Felker sons also try to live the character qualities their parents showed at home.

“Some of the things that made me attracted to full-time ministry was the way that I saw my parents care for people, have people over, and really shepherd other people,” Stephen said. “It was just a desire to care for those who are hurting and needing love.”

In a world where sports can be an idol displacing Christ’s lordship, the Felkers encourage families to prioritize God.

“It’s important to think through what I am actually modelling for my kids in how we use our time,” Stephen said.

When he looks back, David can confidently say where his parents’ main focus was.

“It wasn’t to win football games,” he said. “First and foremost, it was to love Jesus Christ and to serve his church.”