When we think of professional sports, we don’t always think of the positive role models. Usually, we think of many of the scandals and felonies involving famous names in the world of sports. The NFL has been on their heels most of the season dealing with acts that their athletes have committed. Baseball (although doing more than most sports about the problem) still reels from the documented performance enhancing substance abuses of many of their star athletes over the last 20 years. I could go on, but I would rather focus on the positive with this blog.

Tonight is the college football championship game. Did you know that perhaps the biggest star of the game (Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota) is a young man of faith? Read these excerpts from the 12/16/14 Breakpoint commentary:

“As he told the Fellowship of Christian Athletes magazine, “With [Christ’s] power, we are able to pursue and play for His glory. We want to go out and show the world that Christ lives.”

While the Heisman is awarded for Mariota’s on-the-field accomplishments which are considerable, his off-the-field record is what makes him most worthy of admiration.

His Oregon teammates have nicknamed him “St. Mark.” Whatever else that means, it’s says something about how they view his character. In an age of numerous academic scandals involving football and basketball players, Mariota graduated in 3½ years with a degree in science.

There are, as USA Today puts it, Marcus’s “weekly unannounced visits to the Boys and Girls Club” and daily stops to pass out food and water to the homeless. As one of his coaches put it, “The best thing I can say about him . . . is he’s done absolutely everything right since he’s been here.”‘

Baseball–my favorite sport–has two athletes I want to highlight. Cy Young Winner Clayton Kershaw lives out his faith by doing countless acts of charity, specifically by raising money to build an orphanage in Zambia. He has won the Roberto Clemente Award and the Branch Rickey Award for his efforts. Madison Bumgarner–who rose to fame with his historic pitching this year in the World Series–was named Sports Illustrated “Sportsman of the Year” for 2014. Eric Metaxas in the Breakpoint commentary said that “SI’s Tom Verducci marveled at Bumgarner’s humility. As Verducci put it, “He wants success without spoils, achievement without attention and the ball without excuses,” traits that are “rare in an era when self-promotion defines too many athletes.”

That’s because Bumgarner is interested in promoting something else. He told Verducci that “My short-term goal as a person is to witness an activity of Jesus in my life, and my long-term goal is for people when they look at me to see something in me about Jesus.””

In golf, my favorite golfer is Bubba Watson–another man of faith. He along with Iowa native Zach Johnson and Ricky Fowler are regulars at a Wednesday night Bible study at PGA Tour events. You can Google any of those men to see how their faith has impacted them and others around them.

One of the things I love about these men is that they are tough competitors! Many times Christians are labeled as soft or too nice. Well, these men consider living our their faith to mean to do their best at everything they do (see Colossians 3:23).

So, if you needed some people to root for in sports heading into 2015, I hope this small list (there are many, many others!) gives you that and also encourages you to live out your faith in whatever your work is!

More to come…
Jeremy