Dale McDowell and Chris Ferguson recently shared that God is the most important thing in their lives and in the sport of dirt late model racing that they have their careers.

McDowell touched on the importance of God in his life and in dirt late model racing in a video for Montgomery Baptist Church’s Vacation Bible School. Other drivers including Bobby Pierce, Chris Ferguson, Eddie Carrier Jr., Nathan Martin, James Grigsby, Billy Ball, Kinsey Patton, Ray Cook as well as Scott Bloomquist’s daughter Ariel participated in the local Christian outreach effort. Some drivers also brought their cars to the church so the children could sit in them and even got to see some of their teachers drive them around the parking lot.

In his video, McDowell said, “Every now and then, traveling across the United States we get the question of how important do we feel like God is in our lives and in our sport. And my answer is He is the most important. The most important piece to anything as He should be. It’s challenging when we’re out traveling and we don’t make it back in, back home in time to church so we miss a lot of Sundays and that’s a tough part. Just all over the place and trying to make time to do that. Fortunately, in our racing industry we have some chaplains at most of the tracks, we have Racing with Jesus, we have Dirt Racing Outreach, which helps spread the Gospel and keeps Him out there and keeps the Word out there among us and makes it available to have someone to lean on or talk to in troubled times.”

“Really, in the racing side I kinda compare life to a lot of what we go through in racing. In racing if you work hard at it and you do the right things, usually there’s a good outcome at the end of the night. Ultimately, you’re wanting to reach Victory Lane or do the best you can,” he shared. “And, in life, I feel like it’s the same way. I feel like that we have to try to do the right things. We’re going to get off track from time to time, but just being able to try to do the right things and reach the ultimate goal, which is pleasing God and having eternal life. That’s the most important thing.”

“I use the analogy all time if you get something in the mail that needs to be put together and you don’t read the instruction manual then sometimes when you’re trying to put that together you have pieces in the wrong place and it doesn’t go well. It doesn’t go as you planned. But in life, we have the Bible, which is really God’s instruction manual, I think. So we have to turn to Him a lot in prayer, and Bible verses, and stuff just to keep us on the right pathway so that we can be the best that we can be. Thank goodness Jesus washes away our sins. All of us are sinners, but at the end of the day staying on the right path and keeping your eye on the ultimate goal, which is eternal life, and trying to do the best we can through life and make the right decisions is the most important part. So it’s really important in racing, really important in anything you do in life, any type of sports, your job, anything. We just want to be the best we can,” he concluded.

Chris Ferguson also shared in his video, “Was very, very fortunate when I was 12 years-old to accept Jesus Christ. And since I’ve been racing, number 22’s been number, but inside of my number I’ve always put ‘Victory in Jesus’.”

“All the races that I’ve raced, all the wins, none of them really matter eternally. The greatest race I’ve ever won was accepting Jesus Christ. That’s why there is victory in Jesus. Jesus has already won the greatest race of all. He defeated sin. And so much of racing is like the race of life that we’re going on right now. There’ll be valleys, there’ll be peaks, there’ll be highs and lows, but when you have Jesus in your heart it makes everything a lot easier. It makes the path a lot straighter.”

He then concluded with reading Scripture, “With that being said, I’d love to read a passage that’s always meant a lot to me. It’s Hebrews 12:1-3: ‘Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.”

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