I still remember the first time I went to a village in Zambia...we had waited a long time to meet the people and to see the place where we had raised funds for in order for the people there to be able to build a first school building for their community...and yet to be honest, those first hours were really a bit overwhelming...it was unlike any place I'd been before and there were the usual struggles with language and culture differences that left me feeling a bit like an outsider despite the immense joy I felt and the Zambian people felt in celebrating how God had brought us together in a Kingdom way for Kingdom purposes...
But after some village tours, welcome speeches and dances, and exchanges of thank yous and gifts we walked down a dusty village trail to a 120 yard long by 75 yard wide piece of African dirt where for me everything suddenly became comfortable and usual...we put on soccer jerseys and played a full match against a local village team scoring goals on wood frame goalposts at the edge of a field where the grass grew instantly longer as you stepped off the soccer pitch...this game was something that was familiar and loved by both teams playing and I found myself playing without inhibition and talking to Zambian players without some of the same fears and questions I had been struggling with just minutes before...although I must confess I have never played a game since where someone with a megaphone on the sidelines was screaming out the play by play of the action on the field interspersed with comments like "We will defeat HIV!" and "AIDS has no chance of beating us now that we have education!" in between the announcements of who had scored the latest goal...
Soccer did then and has for several more years connected me in community with friends in Africa in a unique and surprisingly strong way...and I have watched soccer become a vehicle of community and service for people in obvious need and people with plenty of stuff all around them...soccer has allowed me and hundreds of students to help provide AIDS education programs, health care and food and clean water, new shoes and uniforms and equipment, and the chance to share the story of the Gospel in a long term ministry and community development partnership for close to a decade now...
So when some of the coaches and players in the Cornerstone University men's soccer program began to ask some questions about how they could as a program use their sport to help change the world as an outgrowth of what God was up to in their own lives, I immediately thought of an idea our ACTS poverty and justice group on campus had heard about called Night of Nets...the idea was to host an event that would highlight the devastating impact of malaria upon African kids and their families while seeking to raise resources for the purchase and distribution of life-saving and malaria-preventing bed nets to those at great risk of catching the disease from mosquito bites...
We came up with the Night of NETS event where we would invite people attending both the CU men's and women's games to pay a $6 admission charge that would purchase a bed net for a family on the other side of the world...and we ended up creating a website and other opportunities for people to get involved in the cause as we sought to change the lives of 1000 families in Zambia because of the playing of a game that is revered and treasured in the African culture...and as we host this event, we will strangely once again through the beautiful game called soccer experience community with people who we have very little in common with on many levels...and it gives us a wonderful opportunity to use athletics and serving the poor to create a truly community event for our own college community...we are expecting that we might see the largest crowd to ever watch a soccer match on our campus and we hope that students who have never really understood the beauty of soccer and the reality of the health crisis created by malaria can do both on a 120 by 75 yard piece of grass on our campus that day...
It is tough to try and draw people together physically, socially, and spiritually on a campus like ours where so many students are doing so many different things...many live off campus, many have extra jobs, and many come from different economic and denominational backgrounds...but we all desperately long to be part of something fun and significant together...and that's why I think athletics and service are so valuable in bringing us together to celebrate the gifts of those in our community and the power of coming together to share gifts with others outside our community...
And that's why I've had Saturday September 25 circled on my calendar for the past several months as a day I couldn't wait to experience...and to my joy and amazement, many other folks on our campus are feeling the same way...soccer players are inviting old teammates and family members to come see them play; students are planning to sleep under bed nets outside the night before the game to raise awareness; people from other parts of the country are supporting our project; and flyers about this day are literally plastered everywhere you look on our campus...
Only a God like ours could create a game to be a conduit to most perfectly connect people like me with people like my Zambian friend Fordson...and that's why for me Soccer and Bed Nets are a strangely perfect combination...and I can't wait to deliver these bed nets in Africa to villages in May with some of our CU soccer players before we play a match together in the African dirt...and we'll be thinking of the community we represent back at CU and in the body of Christ as a smile creeps over our faces and a tear rolls down our cheeks...and the Kingdom, the community of Jesus, made up of soccer players from both Grand Rapids and Zambia, will break forth in a most beautiful and blessed way...
For more information on the CU Night of Nets event that is part of World Vision's ACTS to End Malaria campaign you can check out their website for this special soccer fundraiser match at: www.cunightofnets.com
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