News Stories
Soccer Ministry: Japan
01/07/2006 1:00 pm
What's that in your Hand?
Hard to imagine it might be, but there are more countries in the world that belong to football's governing organization of FIFA than belong to the United Nations, a fact that gives football a unique platform to cross social; political and religious barriers in a way that few other things can. Today, as people around the world look back to football's showpiece event, the 2006 World Cup final in Germany, few could argue that the beautiful game as some like to call it, has a major influence in the lives of people and cultures throughout the world.
For me the World Cup finals have always been something to look forward to but increasingly these days they have become a time to look back and to reflect on some of the events that have shaped my life since the day when I first heard the gospel on a football field in a suburb of Manchester in the UK.
Andreas Escobar
Some may recall that in July of 1994, the Colombian soccer player, Andres Escobar , was fatally gunned down in a suburb of Medellin, Colombia. He was just one of an estimated 80 people murdered in the city that week, yet his murder, thought to be punishment for an own goal he had scored that effectively eliminated Colombia from the 1994 World Cup finals, shook an entire nation and was felt by football fans throughout the world. According to eye witnesses, the assassin had shouted "goal" for each of the 6 bullets that were fired into his body.
What made Escobar's death particularly poignant in my life was the fact that whilst participating in a soccer ministry in Medellin, Colombia, on the streets and in the prisons of that city, God would challenge me about the potential to use sport to build bridges into peoples lives over which could cross the life changing truth of the Gospel.
Soccer in Japan
Several years later and on a different continent, I could never have imagined how sport and football in particular would become such an integral part of my minstry here in Japan with OMF International. In July of 2002 with the Japan/Korea World Cup over, my wife and I had time to reflect on our involvement with GOAL2002, the utreach organizing committee, and our role in helping to co-ordinate the work of participating groups.
Amongst those groups was Ambassadors in Sport, a global ministry with a vision to spread the gospel through football. It was to be the culmination of that time of reflection and the subsequent discussions between OMF and Ambassadors that led in the latter part of 2004 to a partnership between the two groups with my wife and I appointed to direct the work.
Working together with the national church, Ambassadors in Sport are committed to the goals of identifying, training and mobilizing Christians in strategic locations to assist in evangelism, church planting and growth and developing indigenous sports ministry in Japan. Through sports evangelism we aim to effectively communicate the Gospel and make disciples using football as the platform through camps, clinics, tournaments, international tours, youth and schools work.
When the Lord spoke to Moses at the burning bush perhaps we could paraphrase his response as, "I'm just a nobody with nothing to offer." But the Lord responded, "Moses, what's that in your hand?"
On the face of it, the tools of a sportsman's trade might not seem like much to offer in terms of impacting the nation of Japan for Christ but we are convinced that the Lord uses the ordinary things in this world to do the extraordinary!
Please pray with us for the impact of sports ministry in Japan.
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