Running Around and Chasing a Ball

I (Nate) tend to enjoy solo sports. It is fun to compete against myself and see how I grow as I train and work hard. But when a guy at our church wanted to start a soccer group, I jumped at the chance to build relationships with some of the younger guys in our church. I also love the chance to stay fit and run around. I have accepted the fact that many of these guys have been playing soccer a lot longer than I have and are way more skilled, but I can run hard and have a good time. This last weekend, we had a practice tournament against a few other teams on Saturday morning. It can be hard for me to make time for an event like this. Saturdays are important family times, as well as the chance to spend time with people we are connected to inside and outside of the church. But I think this time with these guys is also important. So as we stepped out onto the field, I was genuinely curious how the day would go.

Well first things first, we lost... Every. Game. It was hard to be at the bottom of the pile. I played defense most of the game, and man, some of the other offensive players were small and fast and just way beyond my abilities. In no way did my few seasons of grade school and middle school soccer prepare me to face these guys. I honestly didn't expect anything different for myself. I knew it was going to be a challenge, but I am not sure I expected it to go this badly. I had heard we hadn't done well in previous games, but I didn't know that we would lose all of our games. And that we would lose them so decisively. Most of the other teams were just better. But here is something I realized: this is practice. Not just actual match practice. Not that we are practicing soccer. We are practicing life. This brings up a basic question: How do I handle failure? What do I do when I screw up? What do I do when it feels like the failure of your team is someone else's fault? How easy is it to undervalue my own failures and overvalue others? Once you start thinking of things this way, it can be hard to stop asking these sorts of questions. Each question has a subtly different answer. Each question peels back the layers, showing us the selfishness and sinfulness in each of our hearts.

The challenge is we often face true failure so seldom in regular life, that it can be hard to apply the personal gains to the next instance. But in this environment, where we get to accelerate the exposure, we can also learn more about it in our own lives. I said this is retrospect to a few people after the games, and the more I process it, the deeper in strikes home for me. The way we win or lose is far more important than the outcome. Displaying godly character is far more important than a number on a page. Scoring goals is fun. Winning is fun as well, but my identity is not defined by the number on the page.

I think the ultimate question I'm sorting through here is: Is there a Christian way to win and lose? Can we glorify God and be a witness in how we treat people when emotions are high on the field? I've seen it before, and I strive to model it as well. I want to be someone that works hard, that pushes and gives it my all, but also someone who doesn't lose a kindness that stems from remembering the image of God in each of my fellow teammates and the people I'm playing against. It is possible to show people Christ as we play together because I've seen it. I've seen players that work hard, but are selfless and charitable. I've seen and made my best effort to grab onto the chances to encourage others and to tell them when they did well. This is a habit that should extend into our daily life. We should be generous with our encouragement.

I found this to a be a pretty valuable experience, even though my 35 year old body is hurting, and we lost every game. Where do you see unexpected discipleship opportunities around you?

Where the Ministry Began...

So here is an interesting story from a prayer meeting I went to recently. First, it requires a bit of history. The Austrian free church started here in Vienna in the late 70s and early 80s. It started as a student movement. Most of them were "high school" and college age students. It came mostly out of a prayer and youth group. I need to learn more about this story...but I recently learned about one interesting piece of the free church history: one of its key locations.

I attended a prayer meeting last week. I arrived a bit late, because putting kids to bed is never as straight forward as one would hope. I sat down at the closest open corner, apologized for the interruption, and took part in the prayer meeting. At the close of the meeting, we were encouraged to break into smaller groups and pray for each other. I prayed with the older guy sitting next to me. He is probably old enough to be my father. We are still new to our "gap" church (more on that later) so we end up answering similar questions over and over agai. We've gotten good at telling the short version of how God led us to Austria in both languages. I talked about the vision to plant a church close to where we live along the U1 subway line. I mentioned that the two closest districts of Vienna have the same population as the next largest city in Austria.

As I talked about where we felt God was leading, he got excited. One thing he mentioned to me stood out. He said that he was apart of that youth movement in the 70s and 80s, the one that had started so much of the gospel witness in Vienna. He mentioned that the youth group where much of this started began right where we are feeling led to start a new church. Some 30 years ago, God was working in our area in a movement of prayer. As the group grew and morphed, some of the members went into the city to be a part of the "Tulpengasse" Church (this is a street name, because most churches are named after their address). Others went to go plant the Floridsdorf church, which is where we have been attending since moving to the northern part of the city. Both churches are mother churches that have sent out vhurch plants over the years and contributed in huge ways to the growth of the church and the spread of the gospel in the city. As he told me all this, he made a comment that stuck with me. After awhile, all the people from the original youth group moved on to other churches and a church was never planted in our target area, where the movement originally started. At the time, he was excited to see how God was working, but now he wishes that a church had continued there.

We are praying for exactly the same thing. We know that the gospel is life-changing news, that when we encounter the living God, it can change hearts and lives. It transforms relationships. We also know the importance of prayer. We want to see God move in our town, just like He did 30 years ago. We want to see God do the same thing in the same area again. Continue to pray that God will bring the growth as we seek to faithfully serve Him. 

Our Team is Expanding!

This Easter we have a special announcement to make. Our team is growing! Take a look below to hear the whole story. 

Seeing Change

The above is a simple time lapse video of my pregnancy from start to finish. As you can see from the first half, it took me awhile to really start showing and to look like I was pregnant! (And I got lots of comments about it throughout the pregnancy. I knew I was smaller than most people were expecting me to be!) But by the end, there was no mistaking it - there was a baby in there that needed to come out.

Watching this video gets me thinking about the concept of change and growth. In pregnancy, it's hard to really notice a change in a woman's body from day to day, because the baby's growth is so subtle and slow. But when you compare the beginning to the end, the growth is major! All of those little changes over time add up to a major change, and the contrast is evident.

This is also true for our spiritual life. Not every day is a huge turning point or an extreme jump in one direction. Most of the time, walking with God is about small steps that we take every day to draw closer to Him. We may not be able to notice the growth every day, but there are times when we can look back and see the major change God's been working in our life and how different we are today than we were weeks, months or years earlier.

Sometimes change goes in a negative direction, too. We may not notice the small steps we are taking away from God each day, but then we look at our life and see how far we've slipped over time. This kind of slow change can be insidious and dangerous.

May we make small choices and take small steps each day toward God, so that we allow Him to work the BIG changes in our life!

Milestones

When we started this language learning process, I was unsure about the middle stages. To be fair, I still am pretty unsure. I had a sense of the beginning...I knew what it was to start. It is easy to envision learning (or relearning, as was my case after a few years of high school German) basic verbs and nouns. I could envision learning basic sentences about dogs jumping and people running or cooking. But I have been amazed and encouraged at the other milestones we have encountered along the way. Here is a brief recap, in no particular order, of those spots along the way.

I clearly remember my first conversation when I felt like I spoke mostly German for an evening. I was at a restaurant with a few guys and celebrating Reformation Day. I remember the conversation was about language learning, and I was so amazed as I walked home that day, thinking that I actually had a conversation in German! The interesting thing about that memory is that later, I got together with the guy I talked with that night and his memory of the evening was the opposite of mine. He remembers that we spoke mostly English that night! I think it reminds me that this process is just that - a process. 

Today, I went into a climbing store because I wanted to look around. I mean come on, it's a climbing store and I like climbing. So I wandered around for a little while and finally someone looked at me and asked me if needed help. I asked a few questions and laughed with the guy behind the counter (most climbers are laid back and willing to chat about stuff). Later on in the afternoon, I was talking to a fellow language learner and I realized that I hadn't done something earlier. I hadn't rehearsed. One stage of language learning involves a lot of mental rehearsal before a social interaction, especially with a stranger. To be honest, it is emotionally draining. You think through exactly what you are looking to get out of the conversation and then what you expect them to say, or what questions you expect them to ask. So the fact that I went to the climbing store without mentally rehearsing anything, had a comfortable conversation and had no stress was an important milestone.
I would definitely not say that I am through the woods regarding language learning. I still have a long way to go, but it is great to look back and see times that were once difficult are not so hard today. It is great to see growth. 




Photo credit: Seemann from morguefile.com