While reading through the Old Testament, Jeremy Lin was struck by how God uses imperfect people to fulfill His kingdom work — a truth the Christian athlete says gave him "serious power and security."
In an email sent to his digital prayer group, the Taiwanese/American NBA star revealed that while studying the lives of Abraham, Jacob, Noah and other Bible "heroes," he realized just how sinful they are were.
"Seriously, God has been really impressing on my heart that He continually uses broken, imperfect people," he said. "I often put pressure on myself to be as close to perfect as I can otherwise God can't use me. But the reality is that God uses sinful, doubtful and proud people all through Scripture."
"Even with Abraham, he wasn't willing to wait for God to fulfill His covenant so he took matters into his own hands," Lin continued. "He also lied out of a lack of faith by saying his wife was his sister. I guess my encouragement to everyone is that we don't have to be perfect. God loves us enough that He's willing to include us in His kingdom work. He doesn't need us, but He loves us so much that He'd rather use us than not. There is serious power and security when we understand our Father's love!!"
The 29-year-old Brooklyn Nets point guard, whose 2017-18 NBA season ended prematurely due to a torn patellar tendon in his right knee, went on to ask for prayer for a "very productive" season.
"I've spent 5 straight months building a foundation for my body and knee in Vancouver, so I'm hoping to really take off in the next 5 months that are this offseason," he said. "Specifically please pray that I'd be able to implement a lot of the new movement techniques and tons of body changes that we've made. It's a daunting process to tackle so many improvements at once, but I'm hoping that everything will stick and get fully implemented into my game for good."
The Christian athlete also asked readers to pray for the non-believers in his life.
"I've seen many friends get interested in Christianity, but it's not as often that one of my friends dives headfirst into giving his/her life to Christ." he said. "I know it's God's job to allow spiritual growth so please pray for the softening of some of my non-believing friends' hearts."
"Lastly, please continue to pray for our nation and world," he concluded. "We're surrounded by tragedy so please pray for our nation and world leaders. That God's truth would be further lived out in this world!!"
Recently, Lin said he would like his legacy to be someone who "lived for God" and was "faithful" despite facing a series of challenges throughout his life and basketball career.
"My legacy with the world would be, I would want them to know that I lived for God, I was faithful in my life," he told David Meltzer of Sports 1 Marketing. "I wasn't perfect, but I always did my best and I tried to fix and right my wrongs and just do things the right way."
"The second thing I'd like people to see is that I had a lot of fun and I really tried to create change, legitimate change, in people's lives," he added. "That could be my teammates, that could be the fans that met me, that could be fans who never met me, or just people who just love my story. Being a source of inspiration or motivation to them would be pretty cool."
When asked about bridging the gap between the United States and China, Lin said he's "very cognizant" of the power of his brand.
"That's like my off-the-court job, is figuring out this platform and how to do it right and create a positive impact," he said, adding that he acknowledges he's in a "unique situation."
"There's many things that I'm able to do," he said. "We talk a lot about how to make it right, what vision, what brand, what path we want to take, and it's been enlightening ... this is baptism by fire figuring it out ... we spent a lot of it thinking about China and how we can help."
