For more than a year, from different directions we hear a screams such as “Glory to the heroes!” Every day, we learn from the news of the soldiers who had died defending their country. We just have recollected that a few years ago, we were already preparing for the camp with a similar theme, which today has become for us even more urgent. And now, in Ukraine, everyone from a little to a grown, living under the pressure of war. Many of our relatives and friends are fighting at the East of the country. The father of one of the boys, who has been this year in the camp, now is in the zone of ATO (anti-terrorist operation), and for him his father is a hero. We’ve decided that we want to speak to children about the heroes of the Bible and about our the most important Hero is Christ.
Usually, in order to gather a campers in the camp, we were advertising, putting up various ads, calling to our friends for help, and the largest number of children in recent years we’ve had up to 30 people. But in this year, we have not even began to advertise our camp, we already have on the list about 45 children aged from 6 to 13 years old. We were very surprised and happy, although a number of children gave us an understanding that we do not have a sufficient number of balls, shirtfronts and other equipment, what we were suppose to borrow from a sister church.
It’s been already 6 years in a row that we’re holding the camp at the stadium, next to the house of Tom Merchant, a missionary from the United States, who has built this field for the sports ministry of such a camps. The camp was held in the daytime format from 9 a.m. to 13-14 hours. In the team of ministers were five people from our church. Each of them had his own group of boys and everyone was preparing a Bible lesson. We talked about Joseph, Joshua, Hosea, Jesus and Paul.
Every morning we prayed together with them and glorified God. At the first part of the day, the guys were getting skills of how to play soccer in different exercises, honing their skills in terms of a ball possession, they were learning to play against an opponent fairly, tolerantly, with love and respect. Then we had a snack, which consisted of delicious pastries and beverages. After a break everyone were gathering in the shadow of the unfinished yet dressing room in order to carry out a major part of the camp in the study of God’s Word and acquaintance with God’s heroes.
The children, whom are often difficult to organize and assemble, listened carefully and they took an active part in the discussion and asked questions. Considering the life, an experience and the situations of an individual heroes, we’ve tried to convey the gospel to children. We are so happy to be able to put this truth into the hearts of the young boys who will soon grow up and probably themselves will become for someone as a heroes.
All campers were divided into two different age groups, each of them had four more individual teams. Throughout the camp there was held a tournament between them of mini soccer. We’ve finished the camp traditionally with the “Parent’s day”, which on this year has exceeded all our expectations – so many families responded to our invitation to come, and with an interest and a benefits to spend time with their children.
As usually, we had fun and ran a lot – played in a variety of games, relay races, held a soccer matches of children against their parents. And also, mothers have competed for the best possession of the ball and for the most active part in the celebration, and for the one of them it was a pleasure to suddenly get the cup of “The most active mom.” Likewise, we had a wonderful picnic with a delicious food and pleasant communication. We are very happy to see the families, who come to us for several years in a row and became for all of us a good friends, to whom we can serve and witness. We had a good opportunity to talk with parents about how important it is to be a hero for your child and how to educate them in the light of God’s Word. We talked to them about the Prime Hero, who suffered for all our sins, namely about Christ.
Both parents and children were very happy for this camp, we heard a lot of nice words of gratitude from them, but we were a little bit sad that the camp was over. But the consolation is, that throughout the year we do not stop relationship with our young soccer players, and each Saturday we get together for a training and reading the Scriptures.
We are grateful to the Lord for such an opportunity to serve for the construction of His Kingdom, for the camp, which ended, and has brought us so much joy and the opportunities to influence on children and their families. Also, we are grateful for all the people who have invested prayerfully and financially in the camp. We are asking everyone to continue to pray so that we could remain to be the light and the salt for a people in our city, and in fact, for children, with whom we have a chance to exercise. Please pray for the opportunity to replenish an inventory for sports ministry. Likewise, we plan to collect a new group of children by ages 6-9 years old with a purpose to create a new team and to exercise with them for a several times in a week. So please pray that our dreams and plans could come true, if there is the God’s will.
Sergey Shvora, Church “Source of Life”
