SOCCER BALLS

Pass the soccer ball, please

As Kristin Serniotti, Children’s Ministries Director at Mountain View, prepares for her first trip to Senegal, she’s packing as many soccer balls as space will allow. She’s part of the six-member Travel Team headed for northwestern Africa to share God’s message of hope with the Wolof people. It’s our church’s 11^th trip to that region since 2007.

Kristin hopes to be a bridge between the kids at Mountain View and those in Senegal. “I want to connect them on a personal level,” she says. Part of what will make it personal for Kristin is soccer. She is an avid player, and she’s eager to relate in a way that active, energetic youngsters the world over understand: having fun playing sports!

Kristin Serniotti, Children's Ministries Director at Mountain View, is ready for futbol ministry in Senegal.

Especially in the smaller, poorer villages of Senegal where our Team is visiting, children play soccer whether or not they have a ball. “They kick around small stones, cans, even rags knotted together,” says Kristin. “And on the rare occasion when they have a ball, it doesn’t last long. The ground is too rough and rocky. Here are these kids just doing whatever they can to play the sport. That kind of passion to just play, I understand.” Kristin has played soccer for more than 30 years and currently is a member of three community teams, with multiple games every week.

So in between inoculations, language lessons, planning meetings, and the myriad details that go into getting ready for a trip of this sort, Kristin began fundraising for soccer balls—tough soccer balls. Her research led her to the Futbol (www.oneworldplayproject.com), described as the ball that never goes flat. She ordered enough to fill a large duffle bag.

When asked how she plans to distribute the balls once in Senegal, Kristin says the schools where our Travel Team is making stops are likely places. “Christmas break will just be ending, so we’ll have to see when the students come back. The chances are pretty good we’ll get to kick a ball around, especially in the villages,” says Kristin. Diagle (Jog-a-lay) is Mountain View’s sister village and it’s where our Team is making a number of visits.

Kristin envisions that “kicking the ball around” might also help bridge language and cultural barriers. Reflecting on a mission trip she made last June to an impoverished area of Mazatlán, she points out that it didn’t seem to matter that she didn’t speak the same language as the youths who played soccer with her. “We found ways to communicate because of the sport,” she says.

As for connecting Mountain View kids to the Wolof kids of Senegal, Kristin sees the universal power of play as a connector. “I’ll be bringing back a lot of photos. Whether they’re pictures of boys and girls playing soccer, singing, laughing, whatever, I want to show how much we have in common, that God loves us all the same regardless of the country we live in; that His love goes beyond this box we call church.”

Kristin points out that our Team ultimately is there to express Jesus’ love any way they can. “Childlike faith. There’s such a purity to that phrase,” she says. “So if you can impact a child—and research shows the greatest opportunity to influence a person’s walk with Christ is before the age of 12 years—that individual is likely to remember, with childlike faith, that there was this person or group of people who came to their community in friendship, who showed they cared, and maybe even played soccer with them.

“So, yes, I want to be able to tell the (Senegalese) children about Jesus, and read the Bible to them. But most of all, I want them to know that our Team is there in the name of Christ, and I hope the kids feel loved because we are there.”

She also says that she’s trying not make too many presumptions. “I really do want to keep my mind and heart open for God to take control. I want to be respectful of their (Wolof people) needs and culture. Maybe it won’t work for this adult female to play soccer with the kids. I may just need to sit on the sidelines and make suggestions. If so, maybe I’ll get to play the next time I go, having laid the foundation this trip.”