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.

Diego and Destiny Arredondo Answer a Call to Serve

Diego Arredondo was recently commissioned as a second lieutenant in the infantry of the Texas Army National Guard during a ceremony at St. Mary’s University. The following day, he received a bachelor of arts in criminology from the university. A pre-law student, he plans to attend law school in preparation for a career in federal law enforcement or as a prosecutor.

Arredondo graduated alongside his wife, Destiny, who received a bachelor of arts in criminology with honors. She is a member of the First-Generation College Honor Society and completed an internship with the San Antonio Police Department. She will attend the Texas Department of Public Safety’s Texas State Trooper Academy.

Both are products of the Baptist Temple youth program. While still in high school, Diego wrote the following essay:

Congregating has been a staple in many cultures since the beginning of time. Is congregating part of your cultural identity? The picture I took tells a narrative story about a place of worship and its many years of service to the people, the presence of a spiritual leader and an environment of learning that has taught and exposed many people the Word of God. 

This picture takes place in Baptist Temple Church of San Antonio, which is my place of worship. I have been attending Baptist Temple Church since 2019 when my father was hired as the Minister of Outreach. I have learned the history of the church and have been involved in its thorough and complicated projects to enhance its community's resources. This beautiful church has a deep-rooted history in the east side of San Antonio and has been serving its community since 1911 and has recently celebrated its 111-year anniversary. With a deep history like that it's safe to say that this place has become a cultural site for many of those who attend and congregate here. 

 

There have been thousands upon thousands of messages given at this cultural place. This picture sadly was only able to capture one of these moments. This first paragraph would not be complete without explaining the Baptist culture. Baptist believers trust and believe that Jesus is the son of God and believe that followers should make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The center of the Baptist faith and belief is servitude and this picture represents a service of hope given to the community.

Another beautiful story told in this picture is the presence of a spiritual leader, in this case my pastor Jorge Zayasbazan. This narrative photo displays our Church Senior Pastor Jorge Zayasbazan giving a sermon this morning. The presence and leadership of a spiritual leader has also been around since the beginning of time. Another staple of culture is having a spiritual leader and Baptist Temple has many to grace its community. Every Sunday a message is given and this picture depicts the weekly services and congregation that gathers together to hear the Word of our God. 

Culture can also be a habit or consistent activity but culture is also who you are as a person and as a group and spiritual leaders ensure that a group of people can be given the tools to pursue and help others pursue and trust in God, this is why they are so important to religious culture. This picture captures the story of a man who has dedicated his entire life to spreading the word of God, making disciples and church planting to the masses. The picture is taken from the perspective of someone who has been widely influenced by him as a spiritual leader and is mentored by one as well, spiritual leaders have always been rooted into my culture since birth. 

Although this photo can tell a thousand stories, my final one is that the photo captures a moment of culture in the way of the environment. The main culture idea that this picture captures is the religious environment that is common in the Baptist faith. It displays the colored stained glass windows that has been around for ages, the stained woodwork that flows throughout the church and the pool with the river painting over it where many have chosen to be baptized and give their life to Christ Jesus located right behind the stage area, all these beautiful features are a commonplace in Baptist churches, the instruments used to play music, the colored flags/banners with inspirational quotes and finally the warm colors and warm loving environment you can feel through the screen.

This culture is a big part of my life. Every Sunday and even more through the week I look forward to feeling the beautiful environment which is therapeutic to the eyes, soul and heart. This cultural environment is used to teach and preach the word of God to the mass community, share its overwhelming resources, make disciples and share God’s love. It is a beautiful, warm and inviting site. 

Overall, this narrative photograph tells a story of culture. It displays culture in three ways, one is the history of a place of worship, the importance of a spiritual leader and the environment of worship and its effect.
 

Youth Ministry in a Season of Change

“My first week was trial by fire,” said Shad Purcell, Baptist Temple’s new Minister of Youth and Activities (1999—2001).

He hit the ground running. He took the youth to Centrifuge his first week. The following week featured a mission trip to the border town of Van Horn with VBS and construction work all day, followed by worship in the evening. He was surprised to find out at the first worship service for the Spanish-language church that he was to be the preacher. He gave them a fifteen-minute message (including translation) and, on his guitar, played the one song he knew in Spanish—twice. 

When Purcell arrived at Baptist Temple, he was young and still discerning the shape of his ministry. BT called him to be the full-time Youth and Activities Minister after Danny Johnson’s departure. He had been the part-time minister of youth at Dellview Baptist Church while completing his Master of Divinity at the San Antonio extension of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Purcell’s early years in ministry would be shaped under the leadership of Pastor Mark Newton. “He was a great mentor to me,” Purcell said.

Purcell quickly developed an affection for the church’s south-side location and long history of community presence as he entered a congregation already navigating complex transitions—demographic, theological, and cultural. The youth group reflected those tensions. Some students came from long-established BT families, commuting from neighborhoods north and east of the city. Kids from the neighborhood were drawn by open gym nights, the promise of food, and a place to belong. But integrating students from different social worlds proved uneven. While open conflict was rare, true unity was lacking. The church could gather young people into the same room more easily than it could draw them into a shared identity. “They were rough,” he said.

At twenty-five, Purcell found himself working with young people who faced challenges and influences beyond the church environment. In one case, he recalled sensing a struggle between competing claims on a young man’s soul—between the pull of gang affiliation and the faith-based community offered by the church.

The gym continued to be one of the church’s most effective outreach tools, particularly through volleyball leagues and recreational programming that kept the campus active throughout the week. Purcell credits Cathy Peeler and her daughter, Linzi, with keeping the gym full and the leagues organized.

As meaningful as the work was, Purcell increasingly sensed a separation between his own developing convictions and the church’s institutional culture. BT, responding to broader currents within Baptist life, placed consistent emphasis on denominational identity and distinction. While Purcell affirmed those commitments, he found himself longing for a ministry less about tradition and more about the joy of the gospel. Worship services were too formal and reinforced a model of church life that seemed distant from the community the church hoped to reach.

One incident stands out. It was in the wee small hours of the morning when Purcell finished replacing the chairs used for the Fiesta Saturday Night Parade fundraiser. He went home for a nap and showed up for worship without a suit and sat with his wife rather than on the platform with the rest of the staff. “I caught so much grief for that,” he remembers.

These dynamics seemed misaligned with the immediacy of the gospel work he was encountering among students and in the surrounding community—an expression of larger questions facing the congregation. Could BT function as a neighborhood church again? Encounters with students navigating gang pressure, economic instability, and broken family systems sharpened that question. 

Purcell’s time at BT was also marked by moments of deep affirmation. The Habitat for Humanity build stands out as a highlight. Working side by side with church members, sharing physical labor and common purpose, embodied the kind of communal faith he valued. The experience would shape his understanding of ministry long after he left.

In cooperation with his home church, Crossroads Baptist Church, Purcell was ordained at BT. It was an occasion made especially meaningful by his father’s public expression of pride and affection. “He's from the generation where you just don't say that out loud,” he said.

Shad Purcell remembers his time at Baptist Temple as formative rather than frustrating. The church tested his assumptions, refined his priorities, and shaped his calling. The lessons learned there, amid both affirmation and strain, would continue to shape his ministry for decades to come. Today he serves as Pastor of Discipleship and Assimilation at Alamo Community Church.

Baptist Temple was faithful to who it had been, even as younger ministers and emerging communities pressed toward what the church might yet become.