Another title for this blog post could easily be: How the World Cup can help build up the church.
It would be the rare individual in our world today during
summer 2014 who hasn’t heard at least one word of announcement or publicity
revolving around the World Cup football tournament that is taking place in
Brazil during June-July. Perhaps someone
who doesn’t have access to a TV, or the Internet, or someone who just isn’t
interested in football (and for my American readers, that’s translated
“soccer”). We grew up around
soccer on Chicago’s south side, as my dad coached the local team of boys
playing for the St. Simeon Serbian Orthodox Church. And of course my brother George was one of the players,
though probably not the star player that my dad hoped he would be…George ended
up 6 feet 7 inches tall in life and did much better on the basketball court
dunking the basketball than he ever did running up and down a soccer pitch.
Living in Europe these last 9+ years, we’ve seen a
lot of football games on Sunday afternoons. And this year’s World Cup (Wereld Beker in the
local Flemish language) is especially exciting because the Belgian Red Devils
have qualified for the first time in 12 years. In which of the 3 official languages of Belgium that you choose to recognize them, Les Diables Rouges (French) or De Rode Duivels (Flemish) or die Roten
Teufel (German), this team is making big news this 2014 World Cup here in
Belgium. You see their ads in the
supermarket, on the bus and trains, people are decorating their cars and
mirrors in black, gold and red, and devil horns are popping up all over the
place. We have joined in on the
World Cup fun, but I have to admit it was difficult to be crying out with our
English-speaking friends “go devils, go devils” (it was a first time experience in my life for me to be
cheering on “the devils”!!!).
As the World Cup tournament began, I gave a challenge
to our local congregation to enjoy the games but to do it in community. Figuring that many of us would be glued
to our TVs at all hours of the night (games start here at 6pm and 10pm), and
knowing that we are such an international community (we have people from church
who were cheering on their home teams from Belgium, Netherlands, Germany,
Croatia, USA, Nigerian, Cameroon, Iran, France, Brazil, Mexico, Australia,
England, Ghana, Japan and Spain), the challenge was to invite as many people
over to watch the games in community. What a great small group ministry idea ~ thank you FIFA!
Here are a few of my favorite World Cup quotes as
shared in the local body of Christ:
“Iran maakt Nigeria kapot” (Flemish for Iran is going to make Nigerian kapot).
“We are not going out of the World Cup 2014 on
penalty shots losing to Costa Rica”.
All in good fun, lots of laughter, even orange soup
when you hang out with the Dutch fans.
We have loved the gift of community and football. We have loved the gift of
laughter. We have been faithful in
keeping our Wednesday evening discipleship group meeting (though we will finish
early this week because the Dutch are playing at 10pm). And I do believe that God has been in
our midst in many spontaneous moments of enjoying life, laughter and pure joy
together.
And now for a few photos to help you share in the fun ~
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| Steve & his Dutch football buddies, day 1 |
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| Steve switches his alliance for one game.... can you guess we were hanging out with our Dutch friends? |
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| That is one serious hat, Barbara Jean! |
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| True allegiance to the flag ~ we even put a wooden block on the fireplace that said "may peace prevail on earth" |
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| It must have been an amazing save by the American goalie! |
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| Even the dogs are curious about soccer and the color orange this summer |
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| Did I mention that even the soup was orange one night? |
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| Dutch late night victory. It was a bit difficult to get up for church the next morning ~ felt like I was a college student staying up all night! |
