Power Up Sports Ministry Virtual Conference

Free registration is now available for the Oct 6th Power Up Sports Ministry Virtual Conference. This excellent event is normally held live in Michigan, but this year it will be on-line. 

Here’s the registration link: powerupsportsministry2020.eventbrite.com



Please plan to join us. Thanks.

Re-engagement Strategies for 2020

As the COVID-19 situation drags on most of us are trying to figure out how to reconnect with coaches, their staffs, and their teams. The process is clumsy and very fluid for all of us.

 

One of our colleagues serving with FCA staff on college campuses has developed a couple of resources that could be helpful to your ministry. Below is her email to her team and further below are the two documents. They are excellent for communication and preparation to reconnect. Thanks, Emily!

 

Good morning Team, 

 

We will go through the following documents in our next staff meeting, but please read through them before then. We need to make sure we are going through the proper protocols as we are asked to re-engage by coaches.

 

·       Document 1: Principles for Re-Engagement. Remember some counties are mandating masks, regardless of our opinions on this we need to have a mask with us and be prepared to use it. 

 

·       Document 2: FCA Coaches Safety Poster. This is a piece the we designed for you to send to coaches so they can see that we are here for them. It’s a good visual and should make them feel comfortable.

 

Blessings, 

Emily Gravino
Atlanta Collegiate FCA Director 

https://atlantacollegiatefca.org

What is the Value of Sport?

One of the misunderstood elements of ministry in sport is the value, or lack of it, sport has in and of itself. Many of us in sports ministry believe sport has value only as it is used as a tool for ministry. Others of us, myself included, see value in sport in its own right. I would assert that sport has intrinsic value, as does any other created thing. Its value is either enhanced or diminished by those who use it.

A long-time friend and colleague of mine, Rev. Shane L. Bishop (@RevShaneBishop), recently posted a note in social media about the value of sport in his life.

“I am quite sure I would not be who I am today had I not played sports my Senior year of high school.

It seems dripping with hyperbole even to write it, but I believe it to be true.

In football, I learned that when I don’t work hard, I let the team down. It was a lesson I learned too late to help my mediocre football career or to add much value to my good football team, but a lesson that impacted my adult life. Any team I am on is better if I work hard to contribute and when I don’t work hard, I let the team down; not just myself. 

Running high hurdles in the spring was the first thing to which I truly dedicated myself and I had a great deal of success. This success gave me confidence that if I do the right things, the right way; I can expect the right results in the right time. It put an idea in my head that I could be really good at something and that was worth working toward. 

That epiphany changed everything.

As many Seniors look at the possibility of a year without sports, I am truly sad for them.

Much of my “real” education came on a grass and dirt football field and on an oval cinder track; for better or for worse.”

Reverend Shane is fond of saying his seminary education prepared him very well for a world that no longer exists. It seems the lessons he learned from playing high school football and running hurdles have an enduring quality that continues to serve him into his fifties. Shane’s note resonated with me and many others as we also recognize all that we have learned from our experiences in sport, things we could never have learned in a book, a classroom, or a video.

Let’s lean into the value of all we experience in sport, some of it will be painful, other times it will be full of joy and fulfillment. Let’s look for the Lord Jesus to lead us through all of it in the process of growth and development of our lives in Him.