The Los Angeles Dodgers took their fans to church with their recent Faith and Family Day.
Hosted during their final regular-season home game, where they played the San Francisco Giants, the event featured utility man Tommy Edman, star outfielder Mookie Betts, reliever Blake Treinen, starting pitcher Justin Wrobleski, reliever Evan Phillips and outfielder Alex Call who all shared their testimonies and reflected on faith’s impact on their pro-baseball careers, Sports Spectrum reported.
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Call, who was traded from the Washington Nationals at the trade deadline last season, shared how his faith became his own once he got to the MLB.
“That’s where it kind of became real for me,” he explained. “I went from, ‘Yeah, I don’t do this or this because I’m a Christian’ to ‘God calls us all to be disciple makers. He calls us all to love and to be a blessing.’ That’s where I turned it up a notch and try not to be ashamed of the Gospel or anything else — just glorify Jesus in my daily life and on the field.”
Wrobleski described his faith as a “journey” filled with “ups and downs.”
Related: Dodgers’ Tommy Edman Says Faith in Jesus Christ Is His Foundation
“It’s been a journey for me,” the pitcher said. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say there were ups and downs with my faith and God trying to show me things and get me back to where I need to be. Every time I feel like I’ve been down in my life or I feel like things aren’t going the way that I want, it’s just God showing me I need to get back to the Word and pray.”
Edman handles the pressures of being a professional athlete by remembering that his identity is found in Christ alone.
“As a baseball player, one of the big struggles that we have is our identity being tied up in our performance on the field or being just a baseball player,” he admitted. “Baseball is such a crazy long season and a rollercoaster of emotions that you can go up and down like crazy.”
“I have my identity rooted in my role as a son of God and a follower of Jesus Christ. I always have that in my foundation. Not to say that helps me perform on the field, but it definitely allows me to have that inner peace regardless of how I’ve done on the baseball field,” he emphasized.
Betts revealed that he found God when he got to the MLB because he wanted a sense of purpose. He realized that baseball wasn’t enough for him.
“As I got a little older playing ball, I kind of wanted the sense of purpose, because ball is just an avenue to show what God has given me and given all of us,” the eight-time All-Star said. “Once I wanted to learn my purpose, I think going to chapel, getting to know [chaplain Brandon] Cash, getting to know these guys has really changed my life completely. These are literally like my brothers. Obviously, we’ve grown playing baseball and winning together, but I think we’ve grown the most in our Bible studies and our chapels on Sundays.”
Call reflected on the event on Instagram later, saying he’s “Been praying that our message would fall on fertile soil.”
“Proud of these guys for shining the light of Jesus on stage! Thanks to everyone who was out there!” he added.
With the regular season winding down, the players offered fans a rare glimpse behind the uniforms, showing that for them, faith isn’t a separate from baseball but the foundation of everything they do.
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