MOULTRIE – After Mark Richt was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in the spring of 2021, he went on Twitter to say that he considered the disease “a momentary light affliction.”

The former University of Georgia and University of Miami head football coach used that term to describe it, he told those who attended Thursday’s Colquitt County Fellowship of Christian Athletes banquet, because that’s what he considered it “compared to the glory that’s coming.”

“Thank you, Jesus, for the promise of the glorified body you’re going to give me with no sin and disease,” he said.

“When one becomes a believer, our spirit and soul become perfect. My hope is not in the temporal. It’s in the everlasting.”

As Richt continues to deal with the symptoms of Parkinson’s, he still travels to express his faith.

“I’m still going to enjoy life and preach Christ as much as I can,” he said.

The banquet, a fund-raiser for the local FCA chapter drew a large crowd at Heritage Church and also featured Colquitt County FCA Ambassador Danny Blaylock, Colquitt County head football coach Sean Calhoun, Packers offensive coordinator and high school FCA huddle sponsor John Cooper and FCA area director Noah Henson.

The theme of “Every Coach, Every Athlete, Every Student, Every Faculty Member to hear the Gospel on Every Campus” was presented by Henson.

Local FCA board member Durwood Dominy was the moderator of the event and when introducing Richt as the guest speaker, he noted that Richt had spoken at an FCA event at the old Bull’s Restaurant more than 30 years ago when he was a member of head football coach Bobby Bowden’s staff at Florida State.

And it was while serving on Bowden’s staff that Richt accepted Christ in 1986.

Richt, a quarterback, had played college football at the University of Miami and in 1985 took a job as a graduate assistant at Florida State under Bowden, who had recruited him as a high school quarterback.

In 1986, after Seminoles sophomore offensive lineman Pablo Lopez was shot to death at a party, Bowden gathered his players and coaches and told them that he didn’t know where Lopez was with his faith or where he was going to spend eternity.

“He told us, ‘I know there is a God in heaven who loves us and created us all and he wants us to spend eternity with him in heaven,’” Richt said. “He said, ‘All we have to do is ask for his gift of grace and we’ll be saved.’

“And I felt like the Holy Spirit was speaking to me.”

The next morning, he went to see Bowden.

“I told him, ‘I need Jesus,’” Richt told the audience. “And I prayed to receive Christ right there in his office. And it changed a ‘me’ guy to a Christ-centered guy. It changed my life for all eternity.”

After the experience in Bowden’s office, Richt said he had a new goal: to live a life that would be pleasing to God.

“It’s a very simple goal,” he said. “Not an easy goal, but a simple goal.”

And Richt has sought to achieve that goal in the years since.

He remained on Bowden’s staff until 1989, when he went to East Carolina as offensive coordinator.

The next year, he returned to Tallahassee as quarterbacks coach and in 1994 became the Seminoles’ offensive coordinator.

While at Florida State, he coached two Heisman Trophy-winning quarterbacks in Charlie Ward and Chris Weinke and six quarterbacks who went on to play in the NFL.

Between 1993 and 1999, Florida State won seven straight ACC titles and national championships in 1993 and 1999.

In 2001, he was hired by the University of Georgia to replace Jim Donnan as head football coach.

While in Athens, Richt’s teams won two SEC championships, six SEC Eastern Division titles and nine bowl games.

Georgia posted a 145-51 record during Richt’s tenure and he left after the 2015 season as the second-winningest coach in school history behind Vince Dooley.

After being dismissed by Georgia, Richt quickly was hired by Miami, his alma mater.

He coached the Hurricanes for three seasons, posting a 26-13 record.

He then retired, experiencing, he said, “extreme fatigue.”

Richt and wife Katharyn moved to Destin, Fla., where, he said, they enjoyed “looking at the ocean and working out.”

On one late October day in 2019, while working out at a gym near their home, he suffered shortness of breath, nausea and chest pains.

An ambulance was called and as it reached the hospital, Richt said he felt his entire body going numb.

“And then everything started going dark,” he recalled. “And I thought, ‘This is it.’

“But, guess what, I felt peace, knowing where I was going. I remember thinking, ‘Here I come Jesus.’ I have never doubted my faith and that was great confirmation for me, that I knew where I was going.”

Richt recovered from the heart attack and said he was thankful, “not just because I was out of pain or that God spared my life.

“I was thankful for the peace that I felt knowing where I was going.”

Less than two years later, Richt finds himself facing another serious health issue.

And about that “momentary light affliction?”

“I don’t know if it will be 10 years or 20 years,” he said. “But it’s momentary compared to forever.

“The only thing that is important when you are about to die is where you are going.”

For more about the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, visit www.southgafca.org or email Noah Henson at nhenson@fca.org.