In The Zone Athletics
In The Zone | Multi Sport Training Complex
These monthly essays of mine tend to have a doom-and-gloom quality to them (I mean I talk about global finance from a Christian perspective so it comes with the territory), but I’d like to do something different this week. Namely, tell a personal/professional journey I have been on over the last few years.
I manage nonprofit
business entities for a living, in addition to the work I do here at Christ Centered Capital. One of the entities I’ve recently undertaken is called In The Zone Athletics in Bath, Pennsylvania. For those not familiar with Pennsylvania, that’s in the Lehigh Valley, the northeast portion of the state.
In The Zone Athletics has been around for over 20 years. A gentleman by the name of Steve Turpening
started it and ran it for almost 19 years. When he decided he wanted to sell, he approached my wife and me. We had played basketball at the facility pretty regularly and Steve liked us and he asked if we were interested.
We told him absolutely not.
We had five kids. I had more jobs than I could count at
the time. And we definitely did not have the money to buy a 22,000-square-foot business with three basketball courts and a full weight room.
But we told him we knew a guy.
We introduced Steve to a good friend of mine, Will Michaels, who lived in New Jersey and was heavily involved in sports ministry.
Steve was interested. Will was interested. But Will didn’t have the resources to buy the business or run it himself.
A mutual friend of Will and me was David Walton, the former president of Push The Rock Ministries, a global ministry that uses sports to reach children for the glory of God throughout the U.S. and abroad. They are located in, I believe, five different countries.
Well, Will, David, the current president of Push The Rock, Scott Canterbury, and I all came together and put in an offer to purchase In The Zone Athletics.
I thought my role was done.
But Will, Scott, and David asked if I would be interested in handling
the bookkeeping for In The Zone. I said sure, as long as the time commitments weren’t overwhelming.
So, I started keeping the books. Will Michaels was named director, and things ran that way for about three years.
Our goal was simple. In The Zone would become a revenue generator for Push The Rock’s
ministry efforts, both domestically and abroad.
There was a lot of work to do. We raised over half a million dollars to install brand-new hardwood floors. Renovations were needed. Programs had to be improved. And all the while, we had to keep revenue coming in.
It wasn’t easy.
But I wasn’t even in the backseat. I wasn’t really in the car. I was helping here and there if I could.
About three years in, a breaking point came. We had these three beautiful new hardwood floors. The facility looked amazing. The potential was enormous. But Will could no longer continue as director due to his family needing him back in New Jersey.
Suddenly we were at an impasse.
Would In The Zone actually become a sustainable revenue generator for Push The Rock? Or would this stall out?
We began brainstorming, Will, the Push The Rock team, and me, trying to determine what to do
next. As discussions continued, I started to feel something I didn’t expect, a call to offer myself as director.
The problem was that I did not want to do it.
I have five kids. My wife and I hope for more. I manage two churches, a school, a preschool, this apostolate. Why in the world would I add a
22,000-square-foot sports facility to that list?
But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. My insurance is covered through a health-share ministry. I already manage multiple entities. I knew the people I could hire. In a strange way, I was uniquely positioned to do it.
Not as a traditional
director who is there from sunup to sundown, but as an overseer who offers guidance and decision making.
My pitch to Push The Rock was simple. I would take less than half of a normal director’s salary and use the remaining funds to hire strong part-time coordinators, operators, and trainers. We would divide and conquer. I would oversee staff meetings and high-level coordination, but most of my work
would be done from the same office where I run everything else.
After some deliberation, Push The Rock agreed.
We said a sad goodbye to Will, and a little over three months ago, I was named director.
I can say
without exaggeration that the first month was the busiest month of my life. Not just because of In The Zone. There were church and school matters happening simultaneously. The renovations were closing out at In The Zone. It was Christmas season. It was chaos.
My wife and I looked at each other many nights and asked, “Did we make a mistake?”
But I told her something I’ve learned through experience. When I say yes to something I don’t really want to do, it is usually exactly what God is asking of me.
So we white-knuckled our way through December. Then things started clicking.
Our AAU program
looks promising. The hires we made are doing a great job. Systems are forming. It is early, but we are seeing fruit. My entire premise was that running a facility this size will burn anyone out unless you divide and conquer.
So far, that seems to be working.
But that’s just the background.
The real reason I’m telling you this story is not to brag about how many jobs or kids I have. Truthfully, my life isn’t that busy. I have been blessed with good friends, strong family support, and solid time management. Despite juggling five roles and counting, I rarely work more than 40 hours a week. I pick my kids up from school. I drop them off. I am home most nights.
All in all, life is good. My Savior lives after all.
Around the same time I got involved with the In The Zone deal, a friend of mine, Danny Crenshaw (Not the congressman), approached me about contributing to a book called For God, For Profit. The book highlights businesses, nonprofits, and ministries that have become sustainable revenue-generating entities for the Kingdom of
God.
It discusses finish lines for leaders and guarding against greed as organizations grow. It emphasizes building treasure in heaven rather than stockpiling wealth. It showcases ministries around the world that succeed because they focus on advancing God’s Kingdom rather than their own.
As I was working inside In The Zone, a for-profit
arm of a nonprofit ministry, it dawned on me.
In The Zone is a perfect case study. And then another dawned on me…God’s Providence!
I’ve played basketball my entire life. High school. College. I won a Division II national championship as a benchwarmer on a great team (I love basketball but am no great
athlete). I was a skills trainer at IMG Academy, one of the most prestigious athletic prep schools in the world. I worked for the NBA for six years. I met my wife playing college basketball.
Before my conversion, I dreamed of running a facility like In The Zone because basketball was literally my life, but it felt like a pipe dream.
Then I converted. Basketball was no longer the center of my life. God was. My family was. The churches and schools and people who rely on me were.
And when the opportunity finally came, the exact dream I once had, I didn’t want it. That’s when I realized something. God often gives us what we need, not what we want, especially when we stop making ourselves the center
of the story.
Looking back, His providence is obvious. The obsession with basketball. The NBA experience. The training at IMG. The childhood dream of owning a facility. The conversion. The detachment from the sport.
And then, when I wanted nothing to do with running a sports facility, it was placed
directly in my lap.
Now I see what it can be.
In The Zone Athletics is a Christian business supporting Christian ministry. We run adult leagues, AAU programs, open gyms, pickleball, volleyball and more. We begin with prayer. We end with prayer. We hold devotions. Two of our three brand-new hardwood courts
have crosses on them. The third says “Community” and “Excellence.”
It is an amazing thing and has the potential to do great things for the Kingdom.
If you’re ever in northeast Pennsylvania, stop by In The Zone Athletics. I may be there. I may not. But it is worth seeing.
Also, if you know anyone with $25,000 lying around, we are currently accepting naming-rights donations for a new weight room we hope to install in the next 12 months.
Also, check out the interview I recently did, linked below. It covers In The Zone, my conversion, and much more. It was with two young men who are genuinely seeking the Lord and trying to build
something good for their community. Give it a listen or a watch.
