By Mallory Mattingly
Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Emeka Egbuka heart to glorify God drives him to the end-zone.
“To put it simply, it’s such a big part of my life because of what Jesus has done in my life, and I know that He offers the same for every single person,” the athlete told Fox News Digital of what his faith means to him. “He kinda met me where I was five years ago now, which seems crazy to say. I’ve been walking with Him ever since.”
When Egbuka surrendered his life to God, he immediately found “peace” and “joy,” two things he still feels today.
“The sense of identity that I have that I didn’t have before. There’s a lot of things in my life and a lot of ways I was battling mentally that He pulled me out of,” the wide receiver explained. “That’s stuff that goes unnoticed. That’s stuff behind the curtains that people don’t see every day because we put on these masks, put on these faces [and] facades.”
Related: Buccaneers WR Grounds NFL Career in Scripture: ‘Jesus Is King’
He explained that “deep down,” everyone deals with “trials and tribulations.”
“At the end of the day, we’re human,” Egbuka said. “We can only do so much to hold ourselves up when it comes to a point we make it to the end of ourselves – that’s where I was when God met me. Just being able to preach about Him, use my platform to spread the Gospel. Just the hope that there is in Jesus is what I feel my purpose is.”
Watching other NFL stars like Raiders quarterback Kirk Cousins and Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud encouraged Egbuka to speak vocally about his faith.
“I think it’s a blessing and privilege that we have to be able to be so open,” he said. “Obviously, it didn’t always be like that, but even nowadays in different countries, you can be murdered and killed for professing your faith and everything like that. We’re just in a society and culture that we’re able to share that openly without any hostility or backlash at us. I think it’s a huge privilege we have to be able to share our platform and use it to spread the gospel.”
Along with sharing the gospel, Egbuka uses his platform to help those in need.
He recently teamed up with USAA for its Huddle UP For Hurricane Prep event to put together disaster kits and educate Tampa Bay citizens about hurricane safeguarding.
“When you can make an impact off the field and in the community, there is no off season,” Egbuka shared on social media.
“PSA: Hurricane season is starting soon, and just like game planning in the NFL, preparation is critical,” he added. “To raise awareness, I teamed up with volunteers from @USAA who came together at USAA’s Huddle Up for Hurricane Prep to pack 1,000 disaster kits, with essentials everyone should have ready to go in case of an emergency evacuation. We’ll be distributing the kits to military families throughout the Tampa community.”
Egbuka certainly makes the most of his platform to share the peace and joy found in Christ with his fans and followers.
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