During the February half term the south east team held Sweet Spot, a non-residential sports camp, in West Molesey. Over the course of the day, each of the 46 children and young people that attended received coaching in football, basketball, cricket and ultimate frisbee while exploring the incredible truth that Jesus calms storms. 10:2 student Melody tells us more: 

"After an early start, packing the van with all our sports gear and praying for good weather, safety for the day and the children to really engage with both faith and sport, we finally arrived at the centre. As the children arrived we introduced ourselves, began to play some informal games and then talked about the focus of the day: Jesus Calms the Storm (Mark 4)".

"It's incredible that Jesus just wakes up and calms the storm!"

"During each session the coaches had different teaching points to bring out from the story and so created their coaching sessions to illustrate some of the teaching points. For example, in my football session I created a rule that every time a goal was scored the team had to pick out a fear of the unknown card. These cards had various outcomes ranging from +4 goals to -2 goals and also had some scenarios such as: the scorer switches to the opposing team or the opposition receive a free kick. It was fascinating watching the children deliberately start missing because they were scared until one brave person scored and received +4 goals for their team".

"We didn't know if scoring would be better or worse for us. It made me think about the story and what it would have felt like to be in the boat not knowing what would happen next."

"I was then able to talk about the fear of the unknown and the things that make us afraid in life. I was also able to share that by trusting in Jesus we could get through and weather any storm, just as the disciples trusted Jesus and were kept safe so we can trust Jesus. He may not calm every storm but He is with us through every storm and that is more than enough.

Over lunch, ex-professional footballer, George Ndah showed us some of his greatest goals and shared his story of how God had worked in various situations he faced when playing sport and how that had affected his life. The children really engaged and were so eager to find out more during the Q&A time with George afterwards."

"An integral part of Sweet Spot is the issuing of character cards. These are cards the coaches can give at any time to the children that show positive characteristics while on the sports field and during sessions. As a team we want to encourage and make an example of positive character traits as well as sporting prowess.

Overall, Sweet Spot was an amazing experience watching children and young people engage with the sport and the Bible and I’m excited to do another Sweet Spot at West Molesey soon!"

Scripture Union is equipping churches to be able to run non-residential sports camps like these in their local area. This is done through training, shadowing sessions and equipping teams over the course of a year so that the local church is able to take this project forward and develop intentional relationships with the community.