By Dick Alexander
Every church leader who cares about a lost world has heartburn over how to engage their church people in the global mission of Christ. Many church people—good people—just don’t understand the importance of reaching people on the other side of the world with the gospel.
The phrase “unreached people groups” doesn’t resonate. Church planting doesn’t stir their hearts. So many problems in America need to be solved. Many people give money to the Animal Rescue Fund and some tutor kids at the local elementary school every Thursday after school. But Africa?
There is no one-size-fits-all, quick fix for engaging individual American Christians in world outreach, but one major tool is to partner with missions doing holistic ministry. Such partnerships can offer an opportunity to participate. This is a story about how a sports ministry run by an African organization is engaging Americans in global mission.
A MISSION OF HOPE FOR FAMILIES
Missions of Hope International (MoHI), headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, serves people in extreme poverty in both massive urban slums and remote villages. In the urban areas, people exist with essentially no government services (no police or fire protection, no running water, electricity or sewers, few schools). Population density is hundreds of thousands per square mile.
Established in 2000 by Kenyans Wallace and Mary Kamau, MoHI now serves 32 Kenyan communities, providing almost 25,000 students with exceptional Christian schools that consistently outperform government schools, even though they work with children from the country’s most disadvantaged communities.
MoHI’s approach is to work with children to reach the families. Few of the children’s parents have jobs, but MoHI has trained more than 10,000 adults in how to start and run a small business that will support their families. The mission provides basic health care for the children and their families, and woven through everything the mission does is consistent, strong Bible teaching resulting in conversions and churches being started in each community.
In 2016, Kristen Hodge, a bank vice president and busy mother of three, and a member of East 91st Street Christian Church in Indianapolis, visited Missions of Hope while in Kenya to do a bucket-list climb of Mount Kilimanjaro. She was stunned by the masses of people compressed into so little space, and her heart was broken for the children. She saw that the children were getting a great education but was burdened they had no place to play, and she wanted to change that.
SOCCER FIELDS IN THE SLUMS
Randy Acosta was also impacted and moved when he witnessed the slum environment, Acosta, a member of Mountain Christian Church in Joppa, Md., serves as vice president of development with the Cal Ripken Sr. Foundation. While on a short-term trip with his church, Randy saw thousands of children blooming in the mission schools, but he also observed—as had Kristen—that there was no place to play.
Randy knew how to fix that.
Randy’s work with the Ripken Foundation involved building mini sports fields in crowded urban areas in the United States. He knew that such an approach could also work for Missions of Hope, and he volunteered to help.
Through a series of events, God brought Kristen and Randy together with Christian Missionary Fellowship (CMF), which had for years partnered with Missions of Hope. CMF agreed to coordinate the volunteer-led project of raising the necessary funds with a goal of installing 10 mini-pitch turf soccer fields in the Nairobi slums.
And this spring, it happened!
The first two turf mini soccer fields were installed by a joint team of U.S. and Kenyan workers on a plot purchased in the heart of the slum. For the children of nearby MoHI schools and the community, it was a glory hallelujah day! When the gate opened, children swarmed the fields, astonished that a place like that could exist in their community.
To date, more than $400,000 has been raised, mostly through Kristen’s leading of two groups of Kilimanjaro climbers and two Rim-to-Rim hikes of the Grand Canyon as fund-raising projects. An estimated 800-plus people have contributed. This large effort, all volunteer led, is done through church people passionate about a project for Jesus on the other side of the world.
But the fields aren’t just about play—they are about discipleship through sports. Everything Missions of Hope does is to transform lives and communities for Christ. Sports are an avenue for evangelism and teaching Christian character.
Kenyan coaches will use the fields year-round as a venue for discipling students. And U.S. Christians will share in the fun! MoHI’s partner churches in the United States will bring short-term teams of high school students and adult leaders who will use the new fields to do sports camps with the mission children—another opportunity for direct involvement of U.S. church folks made possible by the mission’s holistic ministry.
MORE AREAS OF MINISTRY
Other areas of MoHI’s holistic ministry have also provided avenues for American volunteer involvement. The mission’s American church partners send nearly 1,000 Americans a year as part of short-term teams; each invests a week or two serving with MoHI in Kenya.
Whenever possible, MoHI matches the U.S. Christians’ skills to specific projects in Kenya. Sometimes it’s a new skill taught to the nationals; sometimes it’s a service offered as a gift. Examples include advanced training for MoHI teachers, new programs started at the skills center, new dental clinics, business outlets opened for Kenyan products, providing large-scale health care, and much more, all done through American volunteers!
Child sponsorship is another major avenue through which U.S. Christians can become involved in world mission. Missions of Hope is able to help children because U.S. Christians sponsor them. Churches that encourage child sponsorship often see high levels of participation; the number of sponsored children can equal 30 percent (or more) of the church’s average worship attendance. When such a high percentage of a church has a picture of a disadvantaged child on their refrigerator, and when those Christians and their families are praying for that child at dinner each night, they connect not only with the child but with what God is doing around the world.
Not all mission work is broadly holistic, nor should it be. And not all mission fields can welcome American visitors. Some of the most important global outreach is done by a tiny handful of long-term missionaries who can receive only finances and prayer, and who could benefit from more of both.
But there are more “Kristens” and “Randys” worshipping in our churches on the weekends. When a U.S. church has one or more major partnerships with missionaries or organizations doing excellent holistic ministry, it can open a pathway for U.S. Christians to personally connect with the work of Jesus on the other side of the world.
If you would like more information about the Missions of Hope International sports ministry highlighted in this story, contact Erin McDade at [email protected] or Dick Alexander at [email protected]
Dick Alexander serves as international consultant with CMF International. He served in church ministry for more than 40 years.
I love MOHI! What an incredible mission empowering people in the name of Jesus Christ!