Afterliving in Deion Sanders’ $500,000 house, LaPlace pastor

now uses his former lifestyleto help others find a better life

By KEVIN CHIRI

Publisher

LAPLACE — Pastor Steve O. Allen Sr. knows how important your environment can be in molding your life.

After all, he looks back on the past 10 years and sees an incredible change in his own life, all affected by the environment he was living in.

To the world, Allen had it all less than 10 years ago.

He was living the grand life of a sports agent in Atlanta, Ga., living in Deion Sanders’ $500,000 home. He makes no secret about the fact he had changed from what appeared to be a promising future as the pastor of a church, to now living a life involving women in every city, making $1 million a year and having all the partying he could want.

But that very environment which led to his incredible change in lifestyle almost led to what he thought would be the end.

&#8220One night in Atlanta I had a woman over, and the next morning we were running around the house throwing pillows at each other,” he recalled. &#8220The next thing you know, she slips on the marble floor and hits her head. I saw blood and was sure she was dead. It was amazing how fast I shifted into the prayer mode, crying out to God that I would change if only she would live.”

God must have heard Allen, as the girl was only injured. The future of talking to the police about the dead woman in the house turned into a scare that helped Allen change his life, and eventually turn things around in an amazing story that has led to pastoring one of the fastest-growing

churches in the region, now here in LaPlace.

Today, Allen, 42, is pastor of New Home Ministries in LaPlace, a church which started only six years ago with 33 people, and now holds four services on Sunday with an average attendance over 600. And it is the new environment Allen lives in, and the life he endured in the past, that he uses to show others how they can change.

&#8220It’s all about your environment,” Allen says today, leaning back in the chair of a beautiful renovated office the church bought next door to the sanctuary on West 5th Street. &#8220I have lived it. I know that your environment can lead you to places and things you never thought you would do. Thankfully, that is all behind me.”

Allen’s story is a stunning tale of a young man who came from a broken family, to what appeared to be a life in the ministry. But that path was short-circuited by the lure of fame and fortune in the life of a sports agent.

In the midst of it all, he is candidly open about slipping into a life of affairs all over the country although he was a married man, drinking, doing drugs and spending time at adult entertainment clubs.

But today he says he wants to tell that story, with the blessing of his wife, because together the couple believe they can show many around them that the Christian life is attainable, regardless of your life circumstances or your past.

&#8220When I began to pastor the church here, I talked to my wife about how much we would say from the pulpit about the life I had been living. But she was the one who wanted to tell the story so we could empower families, and show that anyone can make it if we made it,” he explained.

A Broken Family

Allen was born in New Orleans, but raised in Muskegon, Mich. until he was 11 years old. When his parents divorced, his mother moved back to New Orleans to live at his grandmother’s house.

&#8220One thing I always remembered was that my mom made us always pray together, my two brothers and me along with her, every morning and every night,” he said. &#8220Dad was not the greatest family person, and honestly, my dad was a mean man and it wasn’t hard leaving him. It was my mom we were all closer to.”

His mother is now 71, and was brought to live in his own house in LaPlace five years ago, after his father died at age 72 just two years ago.

Allen said he can clearly see in his high school years how much his environment affected him, since they lived in a neighborhood with some bad crowds.

&#8220I had been a nerdy guy, but we moved to a ghetto area and all of a sudden I wanted gold teeth and just wanted to be cool, like all the other guys. I didn’t have the money for the gold tooth so I remember using foil paper on my tooth,” he said with a laugh. &#8220But my mom saw what was happening and moved us to an area that wasn’t so bad.”

More importantly, she had the boys going to church at New Home Missionary Baptist Church on S. Broad Street, where his uncle was the pastor.

&#8220We had church Monday, Thursday, Saturday and all day Sunday,” Allen said. &#8220And I was greatly inspired by my uncle the pastor, Bishop Robert Blake Sr. He was the father figure to me and kept me out of trouble.”

Things seemed to be going just perfect for Allen. He said he was &#8220called to preach” and started seminary classes while working at Zale’s Jewelers for eight years. During that time, he married at age 20 to a woman he had met at the church and been friends with for a long time. &#8220I remember proposing to her by giving her a ring hidden in a chocolate egg on her birthday,” he said.

Professional Sports Lure

But things began to turn for Allen in 1988 as he approached the age of 24. His cousin was Neil Smith, who went on to fame in the National Football League with the Kansas City Chiefs, and Allen began to work with Smith’s agent.

&#8220His agent began teaching me the business and I began recruiting, traveling a lot and eventually gaining enough experience to become an agent on my own. I became good friends with Willie Roaf (formerly with the New Orleans Saints) and in 1996 got offered a job with Career Sports International (CSI), a major national sports agent company.

Going to work in Atlanta, he left his wife and two children in Kenner and moved into Sanders’ house in Atlanta.

&#8220Deion was a friend and told me he had this extra house that I could live in if I just took care of the upkeep,” Allen recalled. &#8220This place was 6,000 square feet with two swimming pools, one shaped like a football and one shaped like a baseball, and the upkeep was as much as renting your own house.”

Even with the memories of his call to the ministry, the lure of the famous lifestyle was too much to walk away from.

&#8220I would try to come home on weekends at first, but eventually it got to the place I was only coming home maybe once a month,” he said. &#8220Again, I can see how quickly I adapted to the environment I was now living in.”

He was wining and dining potential college stars, as well as entertaining big-time athletes CSI had signed. Allen was a key player in the $125 million deal NBA star Kevin Garnett signed, while working with many other big name stars such as Houston Astros pitcher Andy Pettite, Detroit Pistons star guard Chauncy Billups, and many more.

The $1 million annual income was just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the lavish lifestyle Allen was living. He admitted to beginning affairs in every city he traveled to, and got so bad that he even had a mistress in New Orleans when he would come home to see his family.

Never a drinker before, that quickly changed when he had to go out with the athletes.

&#8220At first I would tell them, no, I don’t drink. But they’d say, ‘get him one anyway.’ At first I would just play with the straw, then I began to sip the drink, and then I just drank like the rest of them,” he said.

He also said that the favorite spot for athletes to go was the adult entertainment clubs.

&#8220When I first went in them I didn’t even want to look at anything,” he said. &#8220But before you knew it, I was waving dollar bills, and then I was going to them alone.”

He even dabbled in smoking marijuana, part of the wild lifestyle he was so entrenched in now. But through it all, Allen knew it was wrong.

&#8220Every day I knew what I was doing was wrong,” he said. &#8220I would drive in my car, playing Gospel music, and cry like a baby. But I couldn’t stop. I knew what was right, but you know, we are not all spiritual creatures. We are flesh also, and that part of me was winning.”

Allen would even party all night, grab breakfast, and then go to church on Sunday &#8220giving an offering to pay for my sins,” but not being able to shake loose of the lure from the money and partying life.

Finally A Good Change

However things finally began to change for Allen in 1998 after the big scare at his house one morning, when the woman he had spent the night with had the accident to shake him up.

&#8220I begged God for forgiveness,” he said. &#8220I prayed and told God I would change. And finally I did something about it. I knew I couldn’t stay in that lifestyle, so I asked my boss if I could move back to New Orleans and work out of my house. They agreed, and even though it took a while to completely change the life I was living, it was that change in environment that helped me to do it.”

He quit CSI in 1998, even as all this time, a faithful wife knew much of what was happening, but refused to give up on her family.

&#8220My wife is the greatest woman in the world. All her family kept telling her she was crazy to stay with me, but she believed God put us together and she did not believe in divorce. She needs her own story in the Bible to have stuck with me after all I did,” he said.

Back home, Allen’s full circle of change was beginning. He went back to church with his uncle, and got serious again about what he believed was a call to the ministry. As he showed his life had changed, his uncle wanted him to start the ninth branch of the New Home Ministries in St. John Parish.

&#8220This building came up for sale, and even though initially I didn’t want to come here, you could see God had a plan. We bought the building on faith and started services one night with 33 people. From that day forward we had church for 21 days in a row,” he said. &#8220The church has been financially self-sufficient from the beginning.”

Allen began to tell his story from the pulpit, all with the blessing of his wife, and all to show people in the worst situations that God could put them on the right track.

&#8220I believe that one of the greatest reasons we are growing here is that I am so transparent,” Allen said. &#8220There is too much dishonesty in the church today. I don’t preach over their heads and I show them that I had been through what they may be involved with. But the life I have now is attainable for them, since it happened for me.”

With the church bursting at its seams, Allen is looking for &#822015 to 20 acres” of land in the area to build what he says will be called the &#8220New Home Dome.”

Meanwhile, life in LaPlace is incredibly good with his wife of 21 years and their two children. And thankfully, he says, he didn’t squander all the money he made. Just this past Christmas, Allen took it upon himself to take children to a Toys ‘R Us in New Orleans and let them shop for anything they wanted for Christmas. Through his church, he continues to preach the message of healing emotionally and physically, from anything people have encountered.

&#8220I believe God allowed me to go through that lifestyle so I can now be merciful to people,” he said. &#8220If I can change from what I went through, anyone can change.”