Changed Lives at Camp

I'm still not sure of all the reasons God changed our South Africa trip this summer. We raised the money for all our expenses in the country, but could not raise enough for the ever increasing airline fares.

However, one of the reasons was for some of our players to go to a Christian soccer camp at UCLA. This we received several partial scholarships for five players to attend the week-long Fellowship of Christian Athletes camp.

As a result Jose, Joshua, Sergio, Jorge and Andrew were able to go. They slept in the dorms, ate in the food court with the other college students and received high level soccer training. Each night they had a worship service which gradually presented the Gospel. On the second to the last night, 3 of the boys went up to receive Jesus into their lives! Andrew, who was already a Christian, went forward with the others to help them feel more comfortable!

We have seen real change in these players lives! They have become very enthusiastic about the new found faith and regularly attend the Bible study that Ramiro, who is their head coach, leads every week. (Yes, this is the same Ramiro that we have talked about for the last 15 years! He coaches our under 16 year old team. It is amazing to see spiritual multiplication happen!).

Please pray for these guys, that they would continue to grow in their faith and truly know the Lord in deeper and deeper ways.

Our long-term plan is to still attempt to take a leadership development trip to the World Cup every four years.  On the other years we are hoping to take as many teams as possible to an annual Athletes In Action tournament in Ohio, at AIA headquarters.  This would also be a part of our leadership development program and allow for AIA to use their corporate facilities to minister to urban soccer teams from all around the country.