Bryson DeChambeau, professional golfer and winner of the 2024 U.S. Open, recently expressed how putting his faith in Jesus Christ was a life-changing experience on and off the course. According to an Instagram post from the faith-based sports account Christhlete, DeChambeau noted that there was much more to life than the game of golf.
“There’s more to life than golf. It’s been definitely eye-opening for me to have a close relationship with the Lord and just more importantly being happy with myself, too, and more importantly getting closer to Him,” he said, per the Christhlete social media post which included a picture of the golfer holding a trophy.
In 2016, DeChambeau said he had discovered a book that completely changed the way he viewed life and sports. “What it talked about all the way through was how to play sports like Jesus would play sports,” DeChambeau said, speaking about the book “ “It captured the dynamic between being ultra-competitive and being as gracious and kind as possible, and it resonated with me.”
Bryson continued, explaining how he ultimately decided to give his life to Jesus Christ, a decision that granted him a newfound perspective on the situations he faced in his golf game and the way he treated others. Dechambeau illustrated how, regardless of whether circumstances were ostensibly good or bad, he would seek out the value in them.
“When I got to the tournament, I said to myself, ‘OK, I’m going to give my life to Christ and try to act like him in every single situation and do my best for him in every single situation, whatever comes about. If it’s a bad situation, I’ll look at it as an opportunity for me to show my patience, my resilience, my grace. Or if I do something great, I’m still going to be patient and graceful and kind and respectful to others,’” he said.
Furthermore, the pro claimed he encountered “three amazing miracles,” the first of which being able to eat breakfast on the morning of a golf tournament, something he used to never be able to do. Secondly, he experienced an undeniable sense of peace.
In the third miracle, DeChambeau was able to conquer his emotions while playing, where he used to struggle with anger and profanity. He stated that he was able to control his feelings and manifest them in a way that is more Christ-like.
“I had never been good with my emotions on the course, and this came out in the way I talked. I would get angry and cuss. But now my emotions were held in check,” he said. “They were the correct emotions, the emotions that Christ would employ. Sure, I hit bad shots, but now I was gracious and kind and never said anything. I stopped cussing.”
DeChambeau previously told USA Today, “I’ve learned so much about me as a person and my faith and whatnot through golf having been stripped away from me. It’s been a difficult time for me the past seven months not being able to play golf the way I really want to. It still is a little tough every once in a while in the hand to hit golf balls, but for the most part I can’t tell you how excited I am to be back out here.”
Featured image credit: Jacob Gralton, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bryson_DeChambeau.jpg