A Brief Update and Extended Theological Meandering

Ferry ride to Nanaimo

     Well this is one blog entry that has a lot of ground to cover, so I'll just get right into it.  First, as mentioned in other entries (I won't assume that you've read the others), my job involves mentoring and training for our coaching teams this summer, and as a part of that I got to travel to both Nanaimo and the Sunshine Coast to check in on a couple of camps that were going on.  The camp in Nanaimo is one that I have gone to for the last few years, and is always a lot of fun.  They have a large team of volunteers that faithfully serve at soccer camp every year, and the energy that they provide really boosts our team of coaches every year.  This was the first time I had ever gone to Sechelt, or the Sunshine Coast in general.  The ferry ride in was unreal, and the drive to the camp took me right along the coast, and driving along water is one of my favourite things in the world, so the travel to and from the camp was already a highlight.

Ferry on the way to Sechelt

     The church we are partnering with on the Sunshine Coast is in a cool position, as they have a couple members of their church who are at a place where their next step in sports ministry could be to go through the training we provide for our own coaches.  This is our vision at AIA for what the next step could be for a lot of our current church partners.  This would allow them both to accept more kids as registrants for their camps, as well as equipping them to better do their own sports ministry; both individually and as a church.  Our training for new coaches deals a lot with the fundamentals of coaching; how to set up a station, drill or game, how to look for opportune moments to coach, understanding some of the key points of techniques and tactics.  But what is a little different between what we do and what other soccer camps and even other sports ministries is that we interact with the culture that surrounds sport.

     Christians all throughout history wrestle how much to accommodate or reject the culture that they are surrounded by.  It's pretty common knowledge to hear that the newest hot button issue within the church has to do with how to interact and engage with a current cultural value or trend.  This is something that the church has done since its very inception; the first culture that Christians were forced to consider how to approach was that of the Roman Empire, ripe with idolatry and oppression.  Sports were part of that culture, largely gladiator and Olympic style games.  Those games functioned as an extension of the rest of the Roman Empire, revolving around the emphasis of Emperor worship and idolatry.  Our default position on sports in our world today is quite different.  First century Christians knew exactly what the messages were that were in the sports culture of their day; today we act, and sometimes explicitly say, that sports are separate from the 'real world' (interesting how we say the same thing about high school eh?).  Along with this devaluing of what is happens within sports, we live in a culture that elevates performance (successes and failures) above nearly everything else.  Think about that combination of messages that athletes of all ages are receiving, and then think about all of the other lies that kids are told in youth sports; the other team is the enemy, if you lose the game you're a loser, you are only valuable to your team if you can score, help score, or keep the other team from scoring.  These are things that effect everyone who has every been part of any competitive sport, and especially team sports (individual sports have their own set of issues within them).  

     Anyhow, the next week I got to do a week of coaching at my own church.  This was the 7th time that I have been involved at my own church's soccer camp, so some of the kids in my group (the oldest group at camp) have been in my group since they were some of the younger kids there. I got a chance to support our team at what is a bit of a wild camp, and to implement some of the things that I had been trying to help them build into their own coaching into my own coaching.  The week was a hot one, and there were a lot of kids who had no interest in soccer.  Others were so invested in soccer that anything we did that was not a classic soccer game was not good enough for them.  A camp that is half kids from the church and half kids who are sponsored by the church through the Food Bank is going to have such a dynamic.  So it was a challenge for sure.  In spite of all of that, I got to have some cool chances to speak some truth into kids lives who either were good soccer players or were not at all interested in soccer ever being a part of their lives.  My favourite part of the week was challenging some of the older kids who I know grew up in our church to think about how they play and compete.  They had been a camp for a number of summers by this point, so to challenge them to take what we teach a step further was a lot of fun and was pretty rewarding for me.  

The Tanks

     Then the weekend after was a wild one for me.  My own soccer team had a tournament, and we did pretty well; won a game, tied a game, lost a couple.  I played most of all of those games, and even had a chance to play some striker/forward in the last game (for those of you who don't know, my typical spot is center back, meaning I am usually the closest player to my own goalkeeper).  I ended up being a better attacker than I thought I'd be.  I also played against my younger sister for the first time ever, which was a lot of fun (her team won, which I partially blame on the 8 a.m. kickoff time).  To wrap it all up, I got a phone call from the office of my orthopedic surgeon telling me that I have my ACL surgery after two years of playing with partially torn ACL and requiring a substantial knee brace.  My surgery is next week, so if you're inclined to pray, that is a massive request looming, as I have never done any surgery before, and the recovery is a lengthy one.

This was a hefty update, but I must lead a terribly busy life.

Or I like to type too much.

Thanks for your time, message me if you ever wanna chat about what I do in person

Levi "the Leviathan" Friesen

Kicking It Up A Notch

As the title of this particular post suggests, summer camps have kicked off, and our two teams in BC are kicking it with two churches this week.  I'm kicking myself because my role this summer has me going to each teams first camp that kicks off their summer, and it has reminded me how much I did enjoy coaching alongside churches in order to redeem the culture surrounding soccer and sport, as well as providing a little extra kick as the churches seek to reach out into their communities.

Well if you stuck with me through that incredibly delightful opening paragraph, I question your sanity, but appreciate your dedication.  I got the opportunity to go to both our camp in Tsawwassen and one of our camps in Richmond this week, and observe how each of our teams were doing in their first few days.  This is one of my favourite parts of the job this summer, because I have coached at many of the camps that I will be visiting, so there are lots of opportunities during my time observing our own coaching teams to reconnect with church volunteers and those who coordinate the church's side of our partnerships. 

Me coaching with Tsawwassen circa. 2016

Tsawwassen Alliance Church is such a camp, as I have served at their camp twice before, so it was a good experience to go back and be able to be a little more intentional about hearing their vision for soccer camp, and how it fits into the rest of their efforts to reach out to the community this summer.  It was also fun to spend time with their volunteers and build into them intentionally, as many of them have been serving at their church's soccer camp for many summers now.

Richmond Baptist Church is running our other camp this week, and while I haven't spent time at their camps before this summer, they sent a couple of their interns to our own coaches training this summer to learn about and be trained in sports ministry for their work this summer.  So in addition to observing our own team or coaches, I got to talk with those who joined us, and to see how the training we run for our own staff helped equip them for their own work this summer; both in sports ministry and in other areas.

If you are looking for ways to pray for me, it would be great if you could focus on wisdom.  When I am looking to help our coaches and give feedback, I tend to over-analyze and offer feedback to the point where I overwhelm, so wisdom in giving the most helpful and applicable feedback is a big need of mine.  The other thing that I could really use prayer for is using my time well.  The title I hold this summer has a number of roles within it, and so to be able to plan and execute a wide variety of projects requires me to steward my time well.

Well you made it to the end.  I know you probably skimmed most of this after realizing how difficult that first paragraph was to read, but I still appreciate the time it takes.  Hope you are enjoying your summer as much as I am.

In Christ,
Levi "The Leviathan" Friesen