Seattle Seahawks head coach Mike MacDonald says Jesus Christ is his “Lord and Savior,” detailing the recent transformations in his walk with God as he attributed his team’s Super Bowl LX-winning season to “God’s favor.”
In an appearance on “The Sports Spectrum Podcast” last week, the 39-year-old coach reflected on his team’s win in Super Bowl LX earlier this year and the regular season that led up to it.
“A lot of things do have to go your way,” he said of winning a Super Bowl.
“I do feel like it was God’s favor throughout the season that you felt in certain moments where you’re like ‘OK, like um it’s in His hands, you know.'”
In response to a question asking, “Who is Jesus to you today and what has He been showing you and teaching you in the season of life that you’re in,” MacDonald proclaimed, “He’s my Lord and Savior, man.” He added, “My faith right now is probably as strong as it’s ever been.”
“He’s taught me, I think through our success, about why we do what we do,” MacDonald said. “What are we actually trying to do? Are we chasing hardware or are we chasing the relationships and the people and our community and bringing people together?”
MacDonald believes that what God “wants from us” is “pretty obvious,” stressing that “You just got to listen and then chase it.”
“Win or lose, it’s part of His vision for you,” he said. “It’s what you’re really praying for is like let Your vision come to life on this and let’s let’s glorify Your vision about how You want this to this to go.”
MacDonald, who was hired by the Seahawks in 2024, recalled how he was raised Catholic but stopped attending church when his parents got divorced.
While he attended a Methodist church with his mother after the divorce, MacDonald acknowledged that he “wasn’t really strong” in his faith until he met a student pastor in high school.
The football coach credited the pastor with making “a huge difference” in his life by helping him create “a personal relationship with God” rather than “just going through the motions.”
While MacDonald’s faith remained strong in his college years, he said that his faith “wavered a little bit” when he started coaching.
“I had some really great people in my life reach out to me,” he said, expressing gratitude that they caused him to realize “I’m missing something here that I used to have.”
MacDonald added that his wife, Stephanie, is a positive influence on his faith, describing how he found a faith community at his wife’s Catholic church in Maryland that caused him to feel like “I’m back pursuing that relationship with God.”
“[God’s] right there,” he said. “He’s just right there waiting for me to come back.”
Additional influences on MacDonald’s walk include then-Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh — whom he worked with for several seasons before becoming Seattle’s head coach — and Seattle Seahawks assistant head coach Leslie Frazier. He called them “great role models” who “made it very clear how important faith was to them.”
He said both Harbaugh and Frazier talk about their faith and “make that such a priority even with our players and the community,” saying its “really inspiring.”
“When I got my first Bible, I was actually in Baltimore,” he said. “I never really had my own Bible until I went to Bible study in Baltimore and John Harbaugh had an extra Bible.”
When asked if there was a “God moment” during the week of Super Bowl LX or the week after, MacDonald brought up the Seahawks’ victory parade where Seahawks General Manager John Schneider threw “small Jesus figurines” to the crowd.
“He had one, and I think he might have seen it on my face, some stress or whatever, and so he just stuck it right there … on my desk.”
He said “Jesus just sitting there staring at me” is a positive influence that gave him a sense of “lightness” and “clarity” that caused him to realize “it’s not in your control.”
“You’ve done all the things you need to do, have faith in the process,” the coach said.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: [email protected]
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