The Power of the Ball

This week I had the opportunity to go with some of the leadership of the Nairobi City Stars and Ambassadors In Sport to travel to a part of Kenya where there is religious warfare. We were able to visit one of our brother's who has started a football team and is doing some amazing work over there. He is not allowed to share the gospel and is under constant surveillance by the town officials. During his practice session, many of our members were approached by spies and were being interviewed about our reason for our visit. Fortunately, I was able to miss all these interviews because I was able to train with the boys. They spoke a different form of Swahilli, but even though I had no idea what they were saying, we had one language in common, football. I cannot describe how we were able to communicate, but when my team had the ball we were able to work together and when we would lose the ball, we would work hard to make up for each other's mistakes. This was amazing for me to see, because at first they were timid to pass a mzungu (white man) the ball, but after a while it was like our skin color, heritage, clans, everything didn't matter any more. These particular group of men have been known to fight during practice sessions and games because their is so much hatred between the different clans, but on this day, it didn't matter. They shared the common goal, football. I will never forget the impact of this ball and am in constant amazement at the things that God can use to bring Him glory.