athletes ministry

Basketball and Bible Study

ashlye.vanderworp@intervarsity.org — Mon, 12 Feb 2018 19:54:35 +0000

Ashlye Vanderworp

Basketball and Bible Study

Gabby was a college basketball star who went to church “maybe once a year.” She believed in God—mostly because she was afraid of what would happen otherwise.

“I couldn’t understand when people would say Jesus died for me. In my head, he didn’t even know me,” Gabby said. “I used to question God all the time, and I didn’t understand the Bible and its meaning.”

“God, like the real God, spoke to you?”

On a road trip in 2015, Gabby’s best friend and fellow basketball player on another campus talked about Rec Week, an annual ��ñ�� conference. Gabby’s friend shared how at Rec Week she grew in her love for Jesus and engaged in listening prayer.

Gabby was shocked, “God, like the real God, spoke to you? How?” Her curiosity was sparked, so she agreed to study the Bible with her friend over the summer.

The next semester, Gabby transferred with a basketball scholarship to Our Lady of the Lake University (OLLU) in San Antonio, Texas, her best friend’s school. Excited to join the same life-changing ��ñ�� chapter as her friend, Gabby regularly attended a Bible study led by Patrick Farris, an ��ñ�� staff minister.

Patrick convinced Gabby, along with her teammates, to go to Rec Week, the same conference her friend attended a year earlier. A call to faith was made. Gabby said yes and decided to follow Jesus.

“Jesus does know me! I know that now. I don’t have it all together, and I need him.”

“��ñ�� changed my life.”

The following year, after co-leading a Bible study for basketball players at OLLU, Gabby and her team attended Rec Week for the second time. There, they prayed for campuses with no ��ñ�� presence, including Sul Ross State University—the same campus where Gabby already accepted a role as Graduate Assistant Coach of the women’s basketball team.

“That,” Gabby said, “presented a great opportunity to start a chapter!”

Today, Gabby leads Wednesday night Bible studies for the Sul Ross women’s basketball team when they’re not on the road. Just like Gabby’s team at OLLU, God is transforming the lives of the players at Sul Ross. They’ve become more open and are reaching friends outside of the team. Plus, this May, three years since her best friend told her about the conference, four of the women agreed to attend Rec Week with Gabby—the first time for Sul Ross students.

“��ñ�� changed my life,” Gabby said. “It not only strengthened my relationships with friends I already had, but also brought into my life people whose faith kept my faith growing even more. I thought I was good before, but when I gave my life to God and felt his love for me, I realized I was far from good. I actually lacked everything.”

Will you consider giving to ��ñ��, so more students like Gabby and her team can come to know the God who knows them already? Just like Gabby, ��ñ�� wants to see more future leaders developed on campuses across the nation. For more information and to give, click the button below.

Donate to Develop Future Leaders

News Keywords

Running to God: A Glimpse of God’s Work at the University of Kansas

gordon.govier@intervarsity.org — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 14:20:57 +0000

News

Lisa Rieck

Running to God: A Glimpse of God’s Work at the University of Kansas

University of Kansas sophomore Julia Dury has been running competitively for six years now. “Running gives you a lot of time to think and pray,” she enthusiastically explained. “And things seem a lot more beautiful when you’re running. You’re out in creation seeing sunrises and sunsets.”

God’s work in Julia through her running has itself been beautiful to see. Though she’d attended church since sixth grade, she became more intentional about her faith during her sophomore year of high school. “It got really real then,” she said. “I wanted to be serious about it.” And she was. She started a Bible study for friends on her cross-country team—a study that she continued this past summer, even though she’d been away at college for the year.

Living for God

So it’s perhaps no surprise that, when she arrived at the University of Kansas as a freshman cross-country recruit last fall, she found more opportunities to develop new friendships and live out her faith through her running. “You build relationships with teammates because you’re out running for so long,” she explained.

One of the teammates she got to know was Ben, another freshman who was also in Julia’s economics class. In addition to seeing each other at cross-country practices and meets as well as in class, the two would often study together. Their study sessions provided plenty of time and space for conversations about running, life, and faith.

As they talked, Julia found out that Ben had attended a Jesuit school and was raised in a Lutheran church. But faith in Jesus didn’t seem to be a core part of his college life. He was, however, really open to talking about spiritual things, often initiating the conversations himself. “I saw God continue to plant a seed of curiosity,” Julia said. “He kept asking questions and we kept having conversations.”

One day, when Julia mentioned that she was going to a Bible study later, he offhandedly remarked that he used to be involved in Bible studies too. Julia took the opportunity to invite him to study the Bible with her. “You get really afraid that when you bring those things up, people are going to say no,” she said. But Ben—like her high school cross-country teammates—said yes. Looking back on it, Julia said, “He was really willing. He just needed someone to mention it.”

For their first study, they looked at Luke 5:1-12, where Jesus asks people to drop everything and follow him. “We talked about what that really meant,” Julia said. And they kept meeting. Ben also started going with Julia to her small group Bible study.

After several weeks of studying Scripture, Ben decided that he wanted to follow Jesus fully and intentionally in the way that Luke 5 was talking about. “We had really good prayer together,” Julia recalled, “and he asked God to become more real and more of a priority in his life.”

Walking with God

God has continued to answer Ben’s prayer of surrender, including during the summer months while he was away from ��ñ�� friends. The few texts he and Julia exchanged over the summer indicated that he was excited to come back to campus and live out his faith in intentional ways.

Upon arriving on campus for this new school year, he did just that, actively participating in the chapter’s New Student Outreach (NSO) events. “Ben was incredible during NSO,” Julia said. “He was amazing to have. He didn’t have to go to people; people were coming to him. And they responded so well to him.”

Ben’s surrender to Jesus last year is a small picture of the big work God is doing on their campus. During NSO in this new school year, the University of Kansas ��ñ�� chapter—just in its second year—received 150 contact cards from students who wanted ��ñ�� to follow up with them. That’s 10 times the number of names they received last year! “God is ready to do something and grow it,” Julia said. “We have people who are so excited and who work together really well. Big things can happen this year.”

And, thanks to God’s work in Ben through Julia, they’ll both be a part of it.

News Keywords

University of Kansas

athletes ministry

Running with God

gordon.govier@intervarsity.org — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 22:10:05 +0000

News

Abi Christian

Running with God

Fidgeting nervously, Lauren stood before a crowd of 40 student athletes—including her cross country teammates, half the soccer squad, and others at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ). It was the first time she would share parts of her story aloud. Reciting to herself the words of Psalm 28:7, “The Lord is my strength and shield,” Lauren took a deep breath and began.

Filling a Void

As a child, Lauren endured sexual abuse, and feelings of shame and brokenness continued to color her life. When she entered college, she sought to cover her pain with relationships, parties, and TCNJ’s track and cross country team. Occasionally, guilt drove her to attend church. “These things didn’t make me happy, but it filled a void in my life,” said Lauren.

Last fall, an injury limited Lauren’s ability to run. With her extra time, she attended an ��ñ�� small group Bible study for athletes, led by her team captain. Intrigued, Lauren continued to come each week and began going to church more often. “I realized I wanted this other life, this new life I saw in the Bible. I needed God,” said Lauren.

She met with Christine Loesser, an ��ñ�� staff member and assistant coach for Lauren’s team. Christine explained that God could fill the void in Lauren’s life and take her shame away. Right there, Lauren prayed to give her life to God.

“I felt myself washed away of all this dirt,” Lauren told the student athletes. She ended her testimony, urging students to accept God’s gift of grace so that their hearts and minds would also be renewed. “I’m more at peace now,” said Lauren. “All my desires for those other things that filled the void—they’ve gone away.”

Nine Say Yes

Later that evening, the athletes were invited to fill out a card, indicating where they were in their spiritual journey. Nine students expressed a desire to invite God into their life for the first time.

One of those nine athletes, Julie, is also senior on the cross country team. After hearing Lauren’s story, Julie asked to meet with Christine. Julie had gone to church with her family before college, but she knew she didn’t have the relationship with Jesus that Lauren talked about.

Julie told Christine that during practice, she grew quickly angry with some of her teammates, and that bothered her because she knew the Bible said to love your neighbor. She realized the sin in her heart, and with Christine’s guidance, Julie prayed to turn from her sin and follow Jesus.

Transforming Athletes

Christine and Lauren are celebrating these new lives among athletes. For several years, little ministry had happened among student athletes. But this fall, 70% of the cross country team’s freshmen came to ��ñ��’s Fall Conference and 50 athletes have been attending the weekly meetings, many of them non-Christians.

“We’re building foundations, so that across the board, they know who God is and why he wants to be in a relationship with them,” said Lauren.

Christine said, “Much of this growth is due to the transformation we’ve seen in athletes like Lauren, which is changing the culture on the cross country team. Lauren’s now using her story to share the gospel in an athletic context, and God is drawing athletes to himself!”

Though Lauren’s past has been hard, she chooses to focus on the present. “I don’t think people should focus on why things happen—it will make you go crazy. If through my experience I can help someone, that’s enough for me,” said Lauren. “God is my new strength and hope.”

News Keywords

The College of New Jersey

TCNJ

athletes ministry

athletes ministry

Basketball and Bible Study

Basketball and Bible Study

“God, like the real God, spoke to you?”

“��ñ���� changed my life.”

Running to God: A Glimpse of God’s Work at the University of Kansas

Running to God: A Glimpse of God’s Work at the University of Kansas

Living for God

Walking with God

Running with God

Running with God

Filling a Void

Nine Say Yes

Transforming Athletes

“��ñ�� changed my life.”