Building Skills, Building Lives

Bryant Evans learned early that basketball is more than a game. Raised in Midland, Texas, by a single mother alongside three siblings, he found in the sport a safe haven that gave him structure, confidence, and direction. Years later, after playing in college and professionally in Europe, he returned to those same lessons, using them to encourage and discipline young people who needed both.

Evans played at Midland Christian School, where his team won back-to-back state championships, before continuing to Trinidad State College in Colorado. His performance there led to a professional career in Europe, including stops in Luxembourg and Germany. As a point guard, he learned to read the court, lead under pressure, and create opportunities for his teammates.

His work did not end when his playing career did. Afterward, Evans began coaching and training young athletes. For nine years, he has served as an Amateur Athletic Union coach and skills trainer and created Building Skills Academy, a program rooted in basketball but aimed at something larger.

Evans is not simply trying to produce elite players, though some of his teams compete at a high level. He also works with children who have never played before. Some older players came to him after failing to make their middle school teams. Under his guidance, they learned the game, built discipline, gained confidence, and began to succeed.

In many communities, youth sports have become expensive and exclusive. Tournament fees, uniforms, travel, and private training can shut out families with limited resources. Building Skills Academy responds by offering a more affordable path to high-level instruction.

For Evans, coaching is more than a side business or hobby; it is a calling and a way to serve. Through it, he passes on the lessons that shaped his life. Basketball is not the ultimate goal. He wants children to develop perseverance and believe they can improve. For him, the court is a classroom, and each drill builds habits that carry into school, family, work, and life.

Before practice, the team prays. Evans’s Christian faith shapes the values he hopes his players will carry with them. He tells them that life is difficult without God and encourages them to put Him first.

His own story gives him credibility. Evans knows what it means for basketball to provide refuge. He knows what it means to be shaped by coaches and mentors. Now he is a mentor himself. His players learn how to dribble, shoot, and defend, but they also learn to believe in themselves, value discipline, and see that life is bigger than the scoreboard. Bryant Evans’ true mission is helping build lives.

It Is Not Good to Be Alone

We are created for community. God declared, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Gen. 2:18). We are not designed for isolation, self-sufficiency, or survival alone. The first believers understood this well. In Acts 2:42-47, the new believers gathered together, shared their lives, broke bread, prayed, worshiped, and cared for one another. It is a beautiful picture of Christian community. Yet, by Acts 6, complaints had arisen because some widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. In Corinth, Paul had to correct a church whose members had turned the Lord’s Supper into an occasion for selfishness and division.

That is part of our sin nature. We are often inclined toward survival, looking out for number one. We have an “I” problem. In the garden, Eve disobeyed God because she desired to be like Him. Isaiah 14:12–14 tells of Lucifer’s desire to ascend and be “like the Most High.” Sin bends the heart inward. It teaches us to protect ourselves, promote ourselves, and place ourselves at the center. 

But the Holy Spirit moves us beyond that. Christian community is more than a gathering of people in the same room. It is a shared life shaped by service, humility, and mutual care. The New Testament’s many “one another” commands make this clear. We are told to love one another, serve one another, forgive one another, encourage one another, bear one another’s burdens, and care for one another. These commands assume that the Christian life cannot be lived alone. Faith may be personal, but it is never private.

True community generates something greater than the sum of its parts. It brings encouragement, increases effectiveness, and opens the door to new ideas and shared strength. It creates synergy. Detroit became the center of the American automobile industry because manufacturers, suppliers, workers, designers, and competitors gathered in close proximity. Silicon Valley became a center of technological innovation for similar reasons. When people with shared purpose, skill, energy, and imagination work near one another, things happen that would not happen in isolation.

The Baptist Temple campus has experienced remarkable seasons of community. When Jubilee Academy was located on campus, the partnership became more than a rental arrangement. Middle school students helped distribute food to the community, teachers helped on campus projects, and children sang at special events. One year, Vacation Bible School brought together the five churches that meet on the campus, refugee children from Africa, a mission team from the Baptist University of the Américas, and lots of neighborhood kids. 

That same spirit of community is also reflected in the many volunteers who first came to us for services. They felt welcomed and accepted, becoming part of the team and building self-esteem through serving others. Our volunteers reflect remarkable diversity in age, race, ethnicity, and economic background.

That spirit continues in other ways. From the Early Learning Center to Funeral Caring, USA our family of churches and service providers bring cradle-to-grave care to our community. Together we create a hub that magnifies our ability to meet the physical and spiritual needs of our neighbors while sharing expenses and reducing needless duplication of services.

Community is part of God’s design. It corrects our selfishness, enlarges our vision, strengthens our work.

Two are better than one,

because they have a good return for their labor:

 If either of them falls down,

 one can help the other up.

 But pity anyone who falls

 and has no one to help them up.

 Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.

 But how can one keep warm alone?

 Though one may be overpowered,

 two can defend themselves.

 A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

 Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

Victoria’s Journey to Faith

Victoria’s story is one of hardship, endurance, and redemption. It is the story of a woman who endured homelessness, abuse, and despair, yet continued searching for hope until she found a home in Christ at Baptist Temple.

Her connection to the church began when her children Dominic and Isabel were attending the BT Early Learning Center. One day, they noticed a sign advertising Vacation Bible School. The construction theme was colorful and caught the children’s attention. Curious, they decided to come. That small moment became the doorway into a new spiritual life.

Victoria had lived through years of instability. In 2017, shortly after the birth of her daughter Isabel, she became homeless amid family turmoil and personal betrayal. She lost her apartment, moved into the home of a friend, and endured an increasingly dangerous environment marked by alcohol abuse. One night, she was chased through the house by her intoxicated friend. The following morning, she went into labor.

She had nowhere safe to go after her daughter was born. With two small children and no support system, she reached out to the Salvation Army. A single room was available, and that opening became her refuge. She later transitioned into Haven for Hope, where she remained for an extended period while attempting to rebuild her life.

One biblical passage became especially meaningful to her during that season. While searching television channels one morning, she heard a sermon on Genesis 8:22, on “seedtime and harvest” after the flood. She believed God was telling her to continue planting seeds of prayer and faith, trusting that a harvest would eventually come. 

Her spiritual search, however, had begun years earlier. As a teenager, Victoria endured abuse at home. She recalled nights of violence and hopelessness so overwhelming that she thought about ending her life. During one of those moments of despair, her appendix ruptured. Doctors later told her that she nearly died during emergency surgery. That experience haunted her. She awoke wondering why she had not seen heaven, light, or God. Questions about death and eternity began consuming her thoughts.

For years she searched in many directions. Raised loosely within Catholicism, she experimented with different spiritual ideas, searching for truth. It was not until her time at the Salvation Army, where church volunteers regularly ministered to residents, that she began hearing a clearer presentation of the gospel. 

Victoria’s search led to Baptist Temple, where, she was baptized. Baptism, for her, symbolized far more than joining a church. She described it as accepting the Holy Spirit fully into her life and leaving behind the guilt, fear, and brokenness that had defined so much of her past. Though she understood that she would continue struggling with sin and hardship, baptism marked her public declaration that she belonged to Christ.

Now the faith journey has begun extending into the lives of her children, Isabel and Dominic. One of the most moving moments in Victoria’s testimony came when she described her son unexpectedly expressing a desire to be baptized. No pressure had been placed upon him. After learning about John the Baptist in church, he simply announced that he loved Jesus and wanted to follow Him. Isabel, though younger, expressed a similar desire. Victoria spoke emotionally about watching her children grow from restless toddlers unable to sit through worship into children eager to attend church, participate in Sunday school, and talk about Bible stories at home.

Throughout her testimony, the theme of redemption emerged repeatedly. Victoria frequently found herself in situations where survival seemed uncertain. Yet each time, another door opened—a room at a shelter, a church invitation, a new spiritual family, a renewed sense of purpose. Her story is not tidy or triumphant. The wounds remain visible. But her testimony reflects the conviction that God never abandoned her.

Victoria’s journey is a testimony to human endurance and God’s grace. From homelessness, fear, and despair, to worship and faith. She has come to believe that God was guiding her long before she understood His presence. Now, as she watches her children take their own first steps of faith, she sees survival behind her and hope ahead.

Dominic and Isabel were baptized on May 24, 2026.