For most of the globe outside the United States, it’s like the Super Bowl plus the NCAA Basketball Tournament plus the World Series plus the Olympics, all in one event. And Baptists in South Africa and elsewhere were ready for the ministry opportunities surrounding the FIFA World Cup, which began June 11 in South Africa. The 32-team tourney is scheduled to last a month, with a championship match July 11 in Johannesburg.
South African Baptists have planned ministry opportunities around the quadrennial international soccer tournament — from screenings of matches in local churches to sponsorship of children’s soccer tournaments to the publication of a special outreach-oriented newspaper at World Cup events, according to the Baptist World Alliance.
Eastside Community Church in Pretoria, South Africa, sponsors a yearlong internship program for young Christian leaders called Ignite the Flame. The program focuses on developing the outreach of smaller and underresourced congregations through the interns, and in 2010 it has had a special focus on developing ministries and partnerships around the World Cup events.
Among the Ignite interns are a group of Virginia Baptists who will help lead soccer clinics and direct other children’s ministry events with a soccer theme.
Brazilian Baptists have sent more than 150 volunteers. They’ll work as part of the Africa Connection 2010 program and will help with sporting events, personal evangelism, Vacation Bible Schools, seminars, evangelistic meetings and medical care.
BMS World Mission, the missions arm of the Baptist Union of Great Britain, already sponsored a Nicaraguan team in a soccer tournament, held in March in South Africa for street children.
During the World Cup festivities, BMS is offering a series of soccer-related video resources — including testimonies from Christian soccer stars — to churches to use as outreach devices.
Southern Baptist Convention representatives with the International Mission Board (IMB) are also among the crowds spreading the gospel.
“The world is coming to South Africa,” said IMB representative Wade Coker. “There is such a passion for the sport that … [w]e want to tap into the passion they have for that with the passion we have for our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”
Plans are to share the gospel with the hundreds of thousands of fans who will be attending. In addition, efforts will be made to use the event as an avenue to evangelize and plant churches in some of South Africa’s major urban centers.
IMB representative Kurt Holiday added, “We will have the ability to use soccer to get into areas where it is normally not easy to get into, to be welcomed and have a platform.”
And telling the story of all of it will be 20 Baptist journalists, most of whom serve with the IMB. The group of writers, photographers and videographers will focus on missions efforts as well as Christian athletes competing in the event.
For prayer resources and daily news about World Cup events, go to www.WorldSoccerJourneys.org. (ABP, BP)
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