Day 3
August 4, 2014
5:45 PM
We have completed our first
day of basketball camp.
The University of Belize gym
had only one full court and two main hoops (that’s a little bit scary to think
about running a basketball camp with, especially with the amount of kids that
could end up attending!). The bleachers
were wooden and assorted in color. There was only one custodian and her name
was Denise. She was in charge of everything arrived to the gym when we
did. The floor hadn’t been swept so we
found five brooms, that one would use to sweep their kitchen, and helped Denise
get the floor ready to play. The
volleyball net was still set up and their poles consisted of two metal pipes
cemented into two tires. For extra
support, worn yellow rope was tied onto the poles and then to the bleachers.
We were thankful, though, to
be able to use their gym because otherwise we would have been playing on either
cement or dirt courts and it would have been a little toasty to be playing
basketball at 4 pm!
While basketball is great,
it’s more important to be “Jesus-with-skin-on” and Denise noticed that about our
group. One of our team members, Chris, had the opportunity to talk more with
Denise throughout the day and she ended up giving her life to Christ, which is
way more valuable than any basketball skills that we came to teach!
Basketball camp was supposed
to start at 8:30 am. The key-words are
“were supposed to.” Time is relative
here in Belize. I find it kind of
refreshing, however, on this occasion I will admit to feeling a little anxious
when only one kid was in the gym with 10 leaders. What this required then, was for two of our
guys to out into Belmopan and recruit young children to come to our camp. We
ended up with about 40 kids running around the gym. Word of mouth is the best way to let people
know about events so it is more than likely that we will have growth in our
numbers of campers as the week goes on!
From 8:30 am to noon, we
coached kids from 5 to 11 years old.
Then, from 1 pm to 4: 30 pm, we coached kids from 12 to 18 years
old. Age is also another relative thing
so a lot of siblings came together, even though they weren’t in that exact age
group.
Many of the kids had no idea
what the sport of basketball entails! When they saw the brand new basketballs
that we bought for camp, they were delighted to have something new! One little boy in particular, Jeffery, wanted
to hold his basketball even in water breaks and timeouts!!! We also had a few girls who said they had
seen a basketball hoop at the group home they lived at but they never knew that
it was before. When they left, we gave
them two basketballs to share among the five older girls so they could continue
playing even after camp was done. The
joy on their faces was immediate and all five of the girls proceeded to hug
each of the leaders before leaving with their host mom.
Day 4
August 5, 2014
5:45 PM
Another day of basketball
camp has been survived. I think the last
time I was feeling this exhausted was when I helped run basketball camp at
Bethel University this past June!!!
Kids are a blessing from the
Lord, but they are also extremely energetic, and lets be honest, sometimes even
naughty, but that’s how it is whenever you deal with children, no matter where
you are in the world. This morning, kids
began showing up a half hour before camp was ready to start, we also had kids
as young as three years old, AND we had around 65 kids.
We discussed three virtues
today in our “timeouts” just like we did yesterday. The words we covered today included patience,
discipline, and determination. I talked
today about patience. Those who know me
best would probably say that I don’t have the virtue patience and I will be the
first to admit that is completely true!
I am SO impatient! That being said, I think I had something important to
say about patience.
One of the most important
things my dad has always told me is: “The best is yet to come.”
For most of my younger
years, I would get extremely annoyed with my dad when he would remind me of
this statement. Why? Why did “the best” have to come later? Not only did I just
WANT something to happen right now, I had worked HARD for the good to happen
now! I look back though on my freshman
year of high school when my dad first started telling me that, and I look at my
life now as I head into my junior year of college.
The best has come, in some
areas, but the best will continue to come if you keep doing what you are
supposed to be doing. In the athletic
area of my life, I worked hard in high school to become a college basketball
player and that’s what I am doing now. “The best has yet to come” also refers
to many areas of life beyond basketball.
It refers to your relationship with Christ, to your family, to your
friends, to your finances, and the list could go on and on and on.
The little kids camp ended
at noon today and at 1 PM the older students began to flood in as well. We didn’t have as many as the younger kids
but our numbers doubled to about 20 kids.
The girls I mentioned in my Day 3 section came back today. I have learned all of their names and I enjoy
having them in my group a lot! They are
such joyful young ladies and I am so thankful to get to know them.
It amazes me that yesterday,
these girls were very against basketball – they didn’t know what the sport was,
they weren’t making all of their shots and they were miserable being at
camp. By the end of yesterday, they
seemed to at least enjoy hanging out with all of the leaders.
Today, the five girls were
the first older kids to arrive and they greeted each leader with a hug, then
grabbed a basketball and began to shoot!
My heart was warmed by the end of todays camp, at how much basketball
and we meant to these girls after really only knowing them for 7 hours through
basketball!!!
10 PM
I always love spending time
debriefing at night with our team. The cool thing about this trip to Belize is
that we are helping run at basketball camp, but there is also a crew staying at
our spot that is doing construction at Cayo Deaf Institute. It makes it fun to come back at night to tell
stories that happened at camp as well as hear what the construction crew got done.
We have a big day ahead of
us tomorrow. We will be holding our
third day of camp and the closer we get to the end of camp, the harder it seems
to persevere. I am constantly reminding
myself to have patience with the kids, not so much because they don’t
understand basketball, but many of them do not have parental guidance and have
never been taught to be nice or not lie, cheat, and bully one another.
Our theme version for camp
is Colossians 3:17 and our camp saying is “All In.” It reminds of a few things. One, that my team
leaders are ALL IN when it comes to sticking with these kids, continuing to
teach them about basketball, and loving them the way Jesus would. I couldn’t ask for better people to work with
at this camp!
The second thing I am reminded
of is that CHRIST is ALL IN for ME! I am
constantly amazed at the way Christ relentlessly pursues and loves me daily,
because by no means am I perfect! He
will never leave me or forsake me. His
love for me is not dependent upon my basketball skills and whether or not I
play a good game.
And my final thought for
tonight is this: I have some pretty dang cool parents. There have definitely been points in my life
where I have not liked them very much but I am extremely appreciative of all
they have done for me. Today, they
celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary teaching kids the game of
basketball, being Jesus-with-skin-on, and hanging out with people the three of
us have only know for four days. Life is
pretty sweet. So, congratulations to my
parents!
Day 5
August 6, 2014
5:45 PM
It was a little nerve
wracking since I have never done a live interview before, but it ended up being
an amazing experience! I got to share a
lot about being a college athlete in America, my first time experience in
Belize, what our camp is like, and how I use basketball to glorify the Lord.
After our interview, we
hurried back to the gym and we arrived right on time for the camp to
start. We had about the same number as
kids as yesterday and it was an extremely interesting day.
There are a number of kids
who have such beautiful hearts and are doing their best to learn about
basketball and Jesus, but there are also a lot of other kids who are big
distractions. We have been giving out
t-shirts as prizes for many contests and many of the kids are more than willing
to lie to lie to all of the leaders to try and get t-shirts and candy. It’s hard because a lot of them just want
attention, but the more attention you give to them the more you take away time
from the other kids who are doing exactly as you ask.
In the older group of
students, there have been about eight of them who have LOVED coming and just
hanging out with the leaders. They have
been so determined to not only make a lot of shots and become better at
dribbling, but they have worked so hard to memorize verses to say to us the
next day! Even when they aren’t doing
very well at something, their willingness to keep trying amazes me!
I am going to be very sad to
leave those kids tomorrow. A couple of
the older girls asked if I would be coming back to Belize and it made me sad,
because I have to be completely honest – I don’t know. It’s not that I don’t
want to – I have loved my time here and I have only been here five days, but I
can’t even guarantee life tomorrow, so I can’t promise these sweet girls that I
will be coming back!
One of our “traditions” has
been to get smoothies everyday after camp – it has been incredibly hot, so we
go to a small local coffee and smoothie store called Moon Clusters on our way
back to the Baptist Training Center. It’s been fun to hang out with just our
group of leaders during that time, plus I have enjoyed getting to know the owner
of the store and the employees
I got the chance to talk to the
owner of the store and she told me how every morning before going to work, she
prays to God for every one that will come to her store that day. She prays that God will give them peace and
that she will be a light to them. It was
such an encouragement to hear of her faithfulness to Christ!
-Courage, dear heart. C.S. Lewis
Lexi
-Courage, dear heart. C.S. Lewis
Lexi
