When 16-year-old motocross racer Joshua Douglas lines up behind the starting gate, he is already thinking about what will happen on the track. Before his bike even moves, Joshua’s mind is focused on being the first rider through the hole and the first to successfully navigate the track’s series of turns, jumps and other features and cross the finish line.
“It’s intense,” he said. “Everyone wants to be first. There’s no place for fear or reservation.”
Joshua has the same feeling when he prepares himself for a jump. Though these days, he knows that much more than a successful jump is riding on this demonstration of man and machine. The crowd watching him jump is filled with young people, many of whom are unsaved. As Joshua readies his bike, his father, Rick, is talking about salvation and his prayer is that through their demonstration someone will trust Jesus as Savior.
Phil Robeson, director of the Marshall Baptist Retreat Center in Guntersville, does not know of another Baptist camp that has a motorcycle jump. But just like the campers, he has been excited by the demonstration and even more excited by the professions of faith that have resulted — seven so far this summer.
The idea for the jump resulted from the theme for Royal Ambassadors camp — Race to Win. With help from some church friends, Rick, pastor of Creek Path Baptist Church, Guntersville, in Marshall Baptist Association, built the jump at the retreat center.
“The jump from where it leaves the ground to where it lands is about 70 feet — about like putting six cars back-to-back,” he said.
In order to make it more interesting, they took the middle out of the jump, so when the bike leaves the ramp, it has to clear that gap.
There is no way a person could clear that gap without help, Rick tells campers as Joshua prepares for the jump.
“We’ve got to have something that can carry us across that gap from one side to the other,” he said. “The motorcycle has the power to get the rider from where he is to where he needs to be.”
On the last jump, Rick holds up a cross in the middle of the gap and Joshua jumps over it, the motorcycle flying 25 feet in the air across the gap of the jump.
“What Jesus did for us on the cross is what bridges the gap between us and God,” Rick says as he brings the cross forward toward the crowd. “Jesus paid the price to get us across the gap that is called sin.”
The metaphor works for people at all stages of faith, Rick said, because all people face challenges and have to trust God to get them through.
On the bike, he said, “you know from past experience the jump can be made, but you have to trust the machine you are racing to make it again and again.”
Some might say motocross racing runs in the Douglas family. Joshua’s grandfather Bill Douglas had a passion for the sport and raced motocross while stationed at Torrejon Air Base near Madrid, Spain, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Rick watched his father race in Spain and rode his first motorcycle at age 5. Upon the family’s return to the United States, Rick began racing dirt bikes, and by age 10, he had a sponsorship from a local motorcycle shop.
Rick raced until he was 18, about the time two other passions became more important to him — a young
family and his call to the ministry — and he got out of the sport. Seventeen years later, however, Joshua, then 13, developed an interest in motorcycles and racing and showed a natural talent for the sport, finishing near the front in most of his races.
Now Rick and Joshua travel together to tracks around Alabama and Tennessee, competing in races and using their shared love of motorcycles to share the love of Christ with bikers and race fans.
“We prayed for an opportunity to use something we love doing to share the gospel and have a Christian influence,” Rick said.
Motocross racing has provided that opportunity. In addition to traveling to various tracks and interacting with other racers, Rick has opened many races with prayer and Scripture, speaking to more than 2,500 fans gathered in the stands.
Rick and Joshua also have started Ambassadors 4 Christ Racing with help from Marshall Association, which provides a trailer to carry equipment from track to track.
‘Unexplainable joy’
As part of their ministry, the Douglases are working on a DVD, which will include motocross video set to Christian music, along with a segment about how to pray to receive Christ. They plan to give away copies of the DVD at races, with an invitation to watch the video and learn more about becoming a Christian.
“God can take the things we enjoy in our lives and use them to influence other people,” Rick said. “To be able to use the things we love to share the gospel is a joy that cannot be explained.”
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