Cam Newton: The gift that keeps on giving

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Family feels higher power directed Cam Newton to boy who lost father 6 weeks ago

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I'm actually close with the family of the child and Cams actions actually really did touch them deeply spiritually since they were struggling with their loss.

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It's a God thing.

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CreoleAubie

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Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton wears several wristbands on his left arm, but one held more significance than the others Wednesday.

It was the one he got at a Halloween block party he crashed in September to surprise 10-year-old Elijah Aschbrenner.

The band says, "Prayers for Elijah" and "Never give up."

Elijah died Tuesday night of a rare form of cancer.

"Man, I didn't even want to talk about it just out of respect to him, but ... it's crazy just to think back of a person who is so young but his heart was huge," Newton said.

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Newton said that Elijah wanting to meet him helped give purpose to what he does as an NFL player.

"Why am I playing this game?" he said. "Just to give hope to people like that."

Newton recalled how low Elijah's energy was when they first met.

"But yet he was talking about statistics, talking about football, talking about Auburn, something that he loved," said Newton, who led Auburn to the 2010 national championship. "I was asking him things that he liked. He said he loved Papa John's Brownies. They are pretty good.

"And he loves steak. For his party, my foundation put in a major order for steak and brownies, the side French fries. He liked that, too."

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