TYLER, Texas — It's hard to find a more beloved, uplifting and positive coach in Texas than Grace Community School girls soccer’s Chris Hemphill.
He was a longtime assistant who took over the head coaching position to the joy of many. But in 2022, his world was turned upside down.
After a seemingly routine visit to the doctor, Hemphill was rushed to the emergency room, where he was soon diagnosed with stage 5 kidney disease and kidney failure.
"And that thought of this is serious. And the thoughts that go through your mind like, 'you’ll be fine, you’ll get out of this and make it out of the hospital.' But then you think, not everybody does. There are people every day who go into the hospital and don’t come out," Hemphill said.
He went on dialysis and home hemodialysis for seven months. He barely had the energy to keep going day by day. He was waiting for a lifeline, and then one morning he received an important call.
"We have a match. We have found a kidney," Hemphill said.
And the help he needed turned out to be right there all along with a parent of one of the girls on his team stepping up.
“But as soon as it happened, when I got out of the hospital, they had me over for dinner," Hemphill said. "She had been a part of a situation like this, but on the other side. She says if there’s anything I can do, please let me know. I’m going to get tested, and I just hope that the Lord would let me be a match -- for me to get to be the one to give this to you.”
And for the first time, she decided to speak out publicly about her life saving act of kindness for someone she only knew as her daughter’s soccer coach.
“My daughters attend Grace and they always came home talking about Coach Hemphill and it was always encouraging and always positive," donor Rebeca Bazzell said. "But it wasn’t until I heard that he was ill, did I really get concerned. And I wanted to help.”
Bazzell tested and she was in fact a match. So she made a life-changing decision to donate one of her kidneys to Coach Hemphill.
“I’ve always had a heart for organ donation. When it came out that he needed a kidney, I wanted to see what I could do. So, I just asked Chris to let me know if they needed to start that process. My husband and I decided to see every step as how God answers that," Bazzell said. "And every step, it was like keep going. And after multiple tests, I was very blessed to be able to donate a kidney. It was such a blessing for me and an honor to be able to help.”
Thanks to Bazzell and the grace of God, Hemphill is now back coaching and teaching full-time, winning state championships and back to doing what he loves.
“Organ donation is very important to me, and it’s very obvious how it can help others and really help them to have a better life. To really help them continue their lives in a better place and not have it be just all about medical and health. But to really be able to enjoy their life, and it’s great to be able to help in that way," Bazzell said.
Hemphill said he and Bazzell have been able to be great blessings to each other.
"It creates this special connection and this sense that everything that I do, that I get to achieve and experience, she plays a huge role in that," Hemphill said. "Her faithfulness to the Lord telling her to do this. He’s used that to be such a blessing in my life and through me to then be a blessing to other people.”