Hey church,
I wanted to write to you about some changes coming to a ministry that I started back in the Spring called South Walker Sports. The original intention of this ministry is to make South Walker Baptist Church an asset to our immediate community, especially for youth through sports, so that Christ can be magnified in the opening of a new road for Gospel conversations.
God has impacted several peoples’ lives with South Walker Sports thus far through our efforts. I want to passionately thank all of you who donated to this ministry, sacrificed your Saturday and your sweat for this ministry, or took an injury while volunteering (if you know, you know) for this ministry.
However, the execution of this mission has been inadequate due to my own miscalculations in my original plan for this ministry. I want to detail some issues I have noticed with the details of our plan with this ministry and how I would like to continue forward.
Too Often
Originally, I reasoned that since Saturdays are quite hit-or-miss days for many younger people (with extra-curriculars, work, vacation in the summer, etc.), we would need to offer it as often as possible to build a consistent crowd. Furthermore, if the community understood that it was every possible Saturday (when weather was cooperative), they could count on us being there.
Unfortunately, having a weekly event like this has been quite taxing on a church like us, where a high percentage of us are already ministering in some way throughout the week. Personally, I admit struggling in remaining motivated to continue weekly meetings, even though I have a lot of fun with youth that show. There is also a kind of diminishing returns by having so often meetings with no special agenda or attraction, making it difficult to generate enthusiasm among regulars and visitors.
To combat this, I would like to decrease the frequency of our meetings to once a month. Each of our meetings will have a particular theme; our first theme is the Pickleball Tournament on October 5. This will allow our youth time to look forward to the event and invite others. We can also dodge the days that would conflict with LSU game times (which really does discourage some from participating).
Outreach Struggles
Sometimes new ministries take some tweaking in the initial stages to hit a sweet spot with a community. The truth is that we did not have as many “new faces” as I had hoped we’d attract. I want to invest my time into developing outreach skills for our most committed youth. Going to a once-a-month frequency will allow us to figure out what works, coordinate outreach that does work, and see exponential growth.
Downsides
While I think the upsides of this change are quite convincing (apart from the self-serving motivations too), the largest downside is that unpredictable weather becomes much more disruptive for our schedule. Good thing we always have normal weather in southeast Louisiana (ha, ha). Postponing is possible, but this could conflict with other scheduled events.
The Future
We are not giving this up. Paul told Archippus, “see to it that you fulfill the ministry that you have received in the Lord” (Col. 4:17). I believe we must be “wise as serpents,” using all judgment and reason to effectively steward the ministry God gave us. We are doing this different, but God continues to be in the midst of it. Perhaps in these events, we open it up for children and family participation. Perhaps, we can have adult volunteers, depending on the turnout, to serve amenities or concessions and establishing relationships with community families. We do it as a church, and we do it to make Christ known in our backyard. I hope you will join me in giving Him our all.
Harris Dickson