Internationally-recognized goalkeeper and proud Christian Brad Guzan will travel with the United States Men's National Soccer Team to Brazil in their first 2014 FIFA World Cup group match on June 16.
Guzan is the team's number two goalkeeper – behind starter Tim Howard – and was named the 2007 Major League Soccer Goalkeeper of the Year.
The soccer star began playing the sport as a child in Cook County, Illinois. His skills grew as an athlete at the Chicago Magic Soccer Club, and at Providence Catholic High School in New Lenox. Also from an early age, his parents, Richard and Karen, imparted in him a desire to serve the Lord.
"My journey with Christ started at a very young age," he told Beyond the Ultimate in a 2012 interview. "My parents really wanted to instill that belief inside of me. We would always go to church – that was very important. Because of that, I wouldn't necessarily say that there was a point when I started following Christ.
"I think the desire to know and follow Christ was always in me and I made sure that I stayed on that path."
Guzan went on to become a star soccer player at the University of South Carolina, and left school after his sophomore year to play professionally. He was the second overall pick in the 2005 MLS SuperDraft, signing with Club Deportivo Chivas USA.
The 29-year-old first appeared in a World Cup qualifier in 2008, the same year he joined the English Aston Villa Football Club. He has since shown his strength as a goalkeeper in eight World Cup qualifiers, posting shutouts in five of them.
Despite his many accomplishments, Guzan has said that his Christian faith is the only thing that matters.
"I think we all need Christ in our lives," he told the Beyond the Ultimate interviewer.
"Money, fame, all those objects, they don't mean anything if you don't have Jesus in your life. All of those things can be gone in the blink of an eye. We can't get caught up in it."
The U.S. soccer team will face Ghana on June 16, Portugal on June 22, and Germany on June 26.
