FCA/Hume Lake Girls Team Soccer Camp

High School Girls. Coaches. Soccer. Teambuilding. Campfires. High Ropes Course. Silly Games. INTENSE competition.  Amazing Food and Scenery.

Really…what more could you ask for?  I totally got to speak for this camp.   50 coaches and athletes representing 3 HS girls’ soccer teams descended upon the beauty that is Hume Lake a couple weekends ago.  My job?  To speak both mornings after breakfast in the optional chapel time.  So a girls’ gotta earn a right to be heard, right?  So the rest of my job?  To play with them all weekend!  Ropes course it up, participate in their soccer practices, do marshmallow’s over their campfires and help the coach’s team hold the campers’ team scoreless in indoor soccer!  (click on any picture to see it larger)

 

crazy game i don’t remember the name of :)

Bumper Tubes

Deer on the soccer field!!!

One of our high schools

Climbing the wall!

The Screamer!

Me getting to speak to the girls

Get your grub on

As for the speaking, every last one of them stayed to hear me talk about the trust and team and friendship they were experiencing all weekend…and to speak about my BEST friend who has ALWAYS been deserving of my trust…Jesus.  I got to remind them of the harness they wore on the high ropes course.  If you haven’t ever done high ropes, put that on your bucket list!!  You’ll do things like climb a wall, and the harness is there as a fail-safe, just in case you fall.  But then, you perform other elements like the girls’ favorite, the ”screamer”, where the harness is intended to hold your full weight as you trust it and the Belay Guide truly with your life (well, the solidarity of your bones and joints at the very least).  And THAT is the picture when the writer of Proverbs says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart” (3:5-6). 

So that was my challenge to them and to you to…is Jesus your fail-safe just-in-case kinda Savior?  Or have you placed your entire weight on Him?  Why would you really?  I mean entirely turn over the shot-calling rights to YOUR life?  Only if that Person is Good, trustworthy, and reliable.  The best I can do by myself is SO not worth even camparing next to the best God can do with me as I entrust myself to Him.  Are you “all in”?  

Ps- It blew my mind as I had real talk with some of the girls/caoches and I told them it doesn’t promise that life will be better, definitely not easier, just that Jesus said He’d never leave you and never forsake you…and 20 of them said, I still want Him!  Kind cool.

We love the FC Gold Pride!

It’s incredible when your job becomes leveraging one of your friends for God’s kingdom and setting her up to succeed. 

I met Whit during my time on FCA staff at Auburn University.  Since leaving there, we have kept in touch and she has become one of my closest friends.  When she got drafted to play Professional Soccer and told me she wanted to use her platform as a pro athlete to speak for Jesus, I began trying to connect her with the FCA staff in California.  Little did any of us realize that that email would eventually lead to me joining the Bay Area FCA Staff.  Who knows where she will be next season, but for now, as the backup goalkeeper for the FC Gold Pride’s Women’s Pro team, I get to serve my friend as she is used for God’s Glory. 

In July, we finally got the opportunity to coach together! FCA partnered with a pastor in Tracy, CA to put on a youth sports camp.  Thursday featured soccer with Whit as the showcased clinician.  92 kids crowded the field as they learned about soccer and heard Whit tell her story of faith and sport.  Then on the 19th, She got the opportunity to speak again with a group that gathered from Young life and FCA after getting the 3rd start of her professional career!  Last Sunday marked the end of the FC Gold Pride’s Inaugural season.

Speaking at Power Camp

Power camp in Tracy

FCA loves the Gold Pride

Whit speaking after the game

My Brazilian Sisters :)

On the personal front, it has been so much fun to watch women’s pro soccer make a comeback in the US.  Through Whit, I’ve had the honor of meeting many of the players and office staff in the organization, and am so thankful for some of the friends I’ve made in that.  Some of my closest friends that I’ve made since I moved here are her roomates/teammates.    It’s been incredible to watch a young woman who understands how much she has been blessed and that “to whom much is given, much is required”.

If you want to hear more, FCA’s Sharing the Victory magazine featured her in last month’s issue.  She and Cat Reddick Whitehill are two Women’s Professional Soccer Players who are human, yes…but willing to put their lives out there and use their gifts to bring glory to God.

Speed Camp

So we did a couple speed camps as well this summer, partnering with Competitive Edge Sports .  These guys were traveling all over the West Coast doing Speed Camps and we got to tag team with them to offer an FCA camp.  One washeld at Propect HS in san Jose, the other at Liberty HS in Brentwood.  I think one of our Liberty HS coaches worded it best in an email about the camp at his school, so I leave you with his words and some pictures from both camps:

 “The camp focused on being a complete athlete through developing body mind and spirit. The athletes experienced some great training through CES (www.competitiveedgesports.com), training usually reserved for pro athletes. But more impressive was the awesome word of God. We had a total of 31 athletes attend from the ages 8-17. 25 of which signed a card saying they made a commitment to receive Christ. Thank you for taking the time to plant a seed in a child.  Clay Elliot, Joe Seeley, Jason Dillard, Guy McIntyre, Pedro Adao, and Jim Snyder were all dynamic speakers that enabled these young athletes to see God through there testimony. It was an amazing time to watch God work through sports and people.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Summer Camp

We hosted for the 3rd year at Monterey Bay Academy.  FCA is really new to Northern California, so it has been incredible to be a part of growing it.  In an email from our camp director, it was written: 158 athletes at camp, 31 made first time commitments, 24 recommitments…1 pleased Head Coach above!

Now if you’re asking me, that’s pretty ridiculous!

It was incredible to be a part of this camp, to meet the other FCA staff in Northern California, to watch High School athletes walk in to camp with a hard attitude, and walk out with a smile on their face, a changed life, having learned something of their sport and of life!  And a personal favorite, to get to speak into the lives of our collegiate athletes as they serve all week long!  Enjoy some pics…and a couple comments from a camper :)

All the Athletes and Huddle Leaders who went to camp from the Bay Area!

The College Huddle Leaders who served all week at camp!

Me with Kylie, one of our San Jose State Volleyball players at camp

“I wanted thank FCA for a great experience….I have had one of the best experiences of my life.  When I went to FCA I was just looking forward to the sports. But I actually liked the chapel time more than the sports time.  The chapel time was really fun. But still had its messages and all of those messages made me realize that I need God in my life all the time also that I cant put him in a box anymore. Since going to camp I have not put God in a box I have been reading my bible at least every day.”