Sports Friends

When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends of your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind.  — Luke 14:12-13

IN TYPICAL MALAWIAN CULTURE, one of the last places you would expect to find a person with a disability is on the soccer field. Usually those with disabilities are mocked ruthlessly and prohibited from participating in even the most common daily activities. But when the Spirit of God moves through a coach and a team, the culture adapts to what God’s Word teaches. Sports Friends Malawi places a high value on inclusion, so we invite the “crippled, lame, and blind” to our teams, just as Jesus would have it.

Meet Vinny. Vinny lives in Malawi and is a joyful, enthusiastic kid. He has cerebral palsy and struggles to walk at times, but you would never know how difficult his life is when he comes to soccer practice. His radiant personality adds so much to the sports ministry team that he is a part of in the city of Blantyre!

Having Vinny as part of our team has taught us so much about God and His Kingdom. I will never forget a time when our U-16 boys were competing in a match and 9-year-old Vinny wanted nothing more in the world than to join them. Our best player was named Jonto and, at the top of his lungs, Vinny shouted, “Jonto looks tired, let me in for Jonto! I can do it. I will score. Come on, coach?”

Our coaching staff didn’t consider substituting our best player for Vinny – we wanted to win, and Vinny often struggled just to get his foot on the ball. But Jonto had a different perspective.

Jonto heard Vinny chirping from the sidelines and saw it as a moment to bless Vinny and to show him how valuable he is in the eyes of his teammates and in the eyes of God. In a moment, Jonto ran off the field and said, “Vinny, you’re in! It’s your turn to go for it!”

Vinny’s mouth literally hung open in disbelief. Then, that disbelief turned into the most beautiful smile that you’ve ever seen. Vinny dashed onto the field and hugged Jonto. He wrapped his legs around Jonto and asked, “Can you stay with me to help?”

Jonto agreed, and the other team, impacted by Jonto’s Kingdom decision, allowed the ball to get to Vinny’s feet. He dribbled up the field towards the goal. Everybody was chanting his name, “Vinny, Vinny, Vinny…”

Vinny’s joy overflowed as he softly kicked the ball into the goal and dove in the dirt. He ran over to the coaching staff and gave us the biggest hugs ever, shouting over and over again, “This is the best day of my life!”

This is why we do sports ministry. It’s not about winning games; rather, it’s about winning young people like Vinny into the Kingdom of God. And in doing so, we are learning so much about how God uses people like Vinny to broaden our views of the greatness of Christ and how how each person is “fearfully and wonderfully made.”

KAKUMA REFUGEE CAMP, KENYA

It’s often in the hardest and darkest places of our world that we see the gospel flourishing, When civil war broke out in South Sudan, many were forced to flee their homes to the refugee camp of Kakuma in neighboring Kenya. It’s in this place of more than 50,000 displaced people that William (above) is using a soccer ball to share the gospel message of hope.

William’s testimony is remarkable in that he himself came to know Christ through a soccer ball and a Sports Friends-trained coach called Wanyama. Wanyama had been struggling to plant churches for many years, until he discovered sports as a way to connect with the community. With just ten soccer balls and a great faith, he was able to plant five new churches in South Sudan. During the unrest, these churches were relocated to the refugee camp in Kakuma (along with Wanyama and William) where Sunday services now take place under the shade of a large tree, and Wanyama and William disciple members using the platform of soccer.

 

 

It’s uncertain whether William will ever be able to go back to his home in South Sudan, but he dreams of one day returning as a sports minister: using a ball to take hope to those who are living and dying without a gospel witness. For now at least, his ministry “field” is the refugee camp of Kakuma.

 

We recently held a Sports Friends training inside the refugee camp to equip 70 new coaches from the five church plants. Pray that these new coaches would be salt and light in the refugee camp and back in South Sudan if and when the Lord allows them to return home.

We, as a people and a ministry, are wholly dependent on God. This year we invite you to take just a few minutes to pray for Sports Friends each day for 7 days beginning October 1st. And if you know someone serving with us, then take this opportunity to pray for them, too! Simply sign up below and we’ll send you a short email on each of the 7 days, to help focus your prayers on a different aspect of the Sports Friends ministry each day. Thank you for joining with us in seeking the Lord on behalf of the Sports Friends ministry!

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When Coach Ben attended an early Sports Friend Basic Training in Thailand, he hoped the experience would prepare him to run his own sports ministry model someday. However, the last place Ben probably envisioned himself serving was in the very place his training proved to be most valuable: in prison.

Coach Ben was running a thriving youth soccer academy when some past ‘disagreements’ with the police disrupted his life. One morning, drugs were planted in Ben’s vegetables before he went to market to sell them. The police were tipped off, and, to the devastation of his family and community, the local coach was sentenced to six years imprisonment.

Stuck in a dilapidated cell alongside 200 other inmates, Ben could think of nothing to do but pray. After some time, the coach had an idea. Ben approached the prison management about starting up a soccer team for the inmates.

Discovering he was a qualified coach, they agreed, and 10 people signed up during the first week. The players were drawn to Ben’s style of discipline combined with humility and a genuine care for their lives. More and more inmates decided to join the group.

Eventually Coach Ben took his team to play in a prison league, where they became national champions. Following this he was appointed head coach of the prison’s sports club and was upgraded to a “VIP” cell of just 20 people. In three months he read the whole Bible from cover to cover so that he could share the Gospel with his team.

One of Ben’s team members wanted to see if the God whom Coach Ben talked about was real, so the man prayed that, if God existed, He would deliver him a Bible into the prison. The next morning, some missionaries arrived to ask if anybody needed a Bible. He raised his hand, and believed.

Another man had given up hope because his wife had not been to visit him for two months. Coach Ben offered to pray with him, and the next day his wife showed up. She had been in the hospital for two months, unable to get a message out to her husband. He, too, believed.

Inmate after inmate began to accept Jesus Christ, people with devastating pasts and criminal records. More than 50 prisoners have come to faith because of Coach Ben’s ministry. One new believer wrote to him, “You have given me hope -I thought that the purpose of my life was just to wake up, eat, sleep, and die. But you have given me hope in Jesus Christ, and now I know why I was born.”

Another prisoner gave Ben a child-like drawing. It shows Ben pulling a line of struggling men up a rugged mountain towards a cross labeled ‘Jesus Christ.’ A speech bubble from his mouth says, “fight, fight!” Underneath, it simply says this:

May you be our coach forever!”

Coach Ben is still in prison. But, when he does get released, he has promised to go back regularly and coach his new sports ministry model. Pray for his release. But more than that, pray that the name of our almighty God, whose plans are so much greater than man’s, would be glorified and amplified through Coach Ben’s extraordinary life and ministry. 

For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are My ways your ways,” declares the LORD. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9

by Cat Edwards