AG Pastor Becomes Official Chaplain for University Football Team, Leads On-Campus Group of Hundreds

Six weeks after a Long Island University running back and new believer at Church Unleashed invited lead pastor Todd Bishop to launch a Bible study for fellow football players, Bishop sensed the Holy Spirit nudge him to do an altar call for the dozen attending athletes.

Among the five who prayed to receive Christ in that October 2019 study was the Sharks’ starting quarterback Clay Beathard, 22, brother of NFL quarterback C.J. Beathard and grandson of Pro Football Hall of Famer Bobby Beathard.

From then on, each week Clay Beathard came to the campus Bible study full of questions about his newfound faith in Jesus: “‘Hey, pastor, I was reading this. What does that mean? What about this verse?’” Bishop recalls his new disciple asking. “We’d talk an hour after Bible study answering his questions.

“He was the guy you want to be around because he always wanted to make you feel like you mattered,” says Bishop, 51, who with his wife Mary planted the Assemblies of God congregation formerly known as Point Church in Commack, New York.

When the Sharks’ football schedule allowed, Beathard attended Church Unleashed. As school let out for Christmas, Beathard phoned Bishop offering to share a box of his brother’s San Francisco 49ers team swag.

Days later while rehearsing at the church, Bishop saw his phone had blown up with multiple calls from football players. Their news brought him to his knees in tears: Beathard had been murdered.

After the initial shock wore off, “There was so much anger that [the players] couldn’t share hope. A lot of it became grief counseling for the next month,” Bishop says of the small Bible group of football players.

Bishop drove a dozen team members in a van to Clay Beathard’s celebration of life in Franklin, Tennessee, where Beathard’s dad, acclaimed country music singer/songwriter Casey Beathard, asked Bishop to speak. Many at the service gave their lives to Jesus. Later Bishop also spoke at Beathard’s memorial service at the Brookville, New York, university.

When LIU classes resumed in January, Bible study attendance jumped from around seven to 20. Bishop’s task in ministering to the university’s football team was to bring them from despair to hope.

In Long Island, few residents are evangelical Christians; on campus the demographics are similar for the private university’s student body of around 16,000. “I didn’t even know if they’d let me stay on campus,” he says.

But in due season, from the senseless death came new life reminiscent of John 12:24. The study continued to grow in person and via Zoom when COVID shut down the university. A field hockey player was the first of athletes in other LIU sports who began taking part.

Later in 2020, Bishop was named official football chaplain. He found himself on the sidelines at football games, included in team photos, and leading chapel services with “the favor and freedom to do what I need to do or want.” Before long, he realized God’s plans were well beyond what he could have imagined. “I’m here for something bigger,” he says.

Word spread about the grassroots campus ministry, officiated by an AG pastor, that had informally partnered with the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Its no-fluff generic name simply reflects what it is: Bible Study. Participants themselves took ownership. Students put up posters across campus advertising its meetings.

In 2023, Bishop began equipping participants with discipleship material, including first-time decision materials and Bibles. He desired to nurture spiritual growth in the Thursday meetings which took place in a campus theater or lecture hall, accommodating around 175 attendees from 19 different campus sports. This fall, attendance extended beyond athletics as members of a sorority began attending.

Each week students share testimonies about what God’s doing in their life. Since February 165 students have decided to follow Jesus through Bible Study. The group’s spiritual demographic is around 70 percent unchurched and 30 percent from a Christian background.

Among students from churched backgrounds is gymnast Kady Bills-McCoy, 19, from Clermont, Florida. Last year she learned of Bible Study from a gymnastics teammate.

“It’s brought so much joy in my life,” she says. “Many people on campus are hungry for the Word and having hope for their lives.” Regarding Bishop, “He genuinely is there for each of us and prioritizes his time with us. It’s not just a task for him but he really wants to be there.”

Ice hockey goaltender Noah Rupprecht, 22, of Thief River Falls, Minnesota, likewise grew up in a church. Last year he joined Bible Study.

“Through Pastor Todd encouraging us to have deeper prayer life and surrender everything to God, I have more wisdom and I’m more able to discern,” he says. “It’s so neat to see how God can fill you up with so much more than you think is possible.”

Bishop affirms he’s seen a change in the campus’s spiritual atmosphere. “There’s been real heart change,” he says. “People are hungry and desperate for truth.”

Bishop is mentoring his son Malachi, 20, who’s now leading a high school Bible club. In partnership with FCA, Bible Study is expanding 25 minutes south to Hofstra University in Hempstead.

“I thought I was just there for this moment and out,” Bishop says. “But God sent me here for such a time as this. I believe we’re just getting started.”