Training Session #14Programming: Ministry to TeamsPractice and Game Day Attendance
OBJECTIVES
- To understand the value of ministry to teams and best practices in team ministry
- To gain confidence and competence in how to first meet a team and begin ministry to that team
EQUIPMENT
Have a journal ready to take notes.
WORKOUT
Watch the following videos and reflect on the questions. You will discuss them with your coach.
Randy shares his philosophy regarding Team Ministry, how to start, and some Best Practices.
- How might you begin to serve a team?
- Are there any opportunities you currently see in front of you to serve a team?
- What points did Randy make that stuck out to you?
Roger explains how to be present at Practices and on Game Day
- Consider the specific sports you are (or will soon) work with. What would be the best places and times to be during a practice or on game day?
- What are some inconvenient and uncomfortable ways, times, places, activities where you can serve the team?
- Roger mentioned several times to watch, listen and try to understand relationship amongst the team. How natural does that come to you? How can you grow in that habit/skill?
REPLAY
Team Ministry is about showing up consistently with a heart of interest within a "supercommunity" from all kinds of backgrounds. Serving the coach, injured athletes, and support staff such as the athletic trainer can open up tremendous doors. Be authentic and real, patient and humble, and a blessing to the team without having an agenda. Serving in the background with unsavory tasks consistently will earn you credibility.
If you are invited to attend practices, try to be in the right place at the right time - out of the way, but in a strategic place. The more inconvenient and uncomfortable, the more the team realizes that you are committed. On game day, you can serve the team from the stands or the sidelines and if you are given the opportunity to travel - take it!
Learn to watch, listen, and try to understand the relationships, interpersonal interactions and team culture while at practices, in the heat of competition, and in more relaxed environments. Sport culture, gender, and coaching style also impact these team dynamics. Your understanding will inform your work with that team, what you say to them, how you craft Chapels or Bible studies, etc.
Be patient - sometimes you may need to ask for permission to attend practices, but it will take time and consistency to earn their trust.
PRACTICE
Shadow an FCA staff person at practice or on gameday. If possible, attend several different sports so that you can get exposure to what involvement looks like in various sport cultures or underneath varying levels of access to the playing surface. Things to look for and ask about: where do they position themselves during practice and why? when do they show up and leave and why? what are they trying to accomplish during practice? if they are not permitted on the playing surface - what do they do? if they are not permitted at practice at all - how do they be around the team
and/or minister to the team? how did they get to start serving in this fashion? what would they say are best practices?
DEBRIEF
Write a reflection or record a video that details what you experienced and what you learned from it.
OVERTIME
- Video: Observe and Perceive
(1:39) - principles to remember as you interact with a Team
- Video: Ask Permission
(1:06) - the importance of not assuming access and honoring the Coach
- Experience: Habitudes - A curriculum put together by Growing Leaders, Habitudes are widely recognized as great leadership and character development curricula within Collegiate Athletic Departments.
