Our team was welcomed in stylish fashion with a wonderful Belgian classic dinner: Stoofvlees and frietjes (Literally one of the best I have ever eaten). Our team was a bit different than in the first week since we lost our dancers and soccer players, however we did pick up Landon. 

The church did something special on Sunday afternoon. The church youth and the SQ team split up in smaller groups and went on different prayer walks around the city. Even though we were tired, our commitment to prayer did help us to work through this time. 

The church is very involved in this project and there are many ways they want to involve the local youth. Every morning before lunch they come in and we have about an hour to do worship and games with them, than after lunch they walk with us to the gym. Our first camp day was very overwhelming. We had over 40 basketball players on two small courts, but only had 2 for volleyball.

Outside of the low numbers for volleyball, the girls in basketball struggled with gaining the respect from the older boy basketball players. The level of the camp was a lot higher than in Genk and it wasn't easy for them to listen to the girls and it conflicted with our goal of building relationships. Our team had to overcome this obstacle and through prayer and discussion we were able to find a better strategy to handle these guys. By having Landon, Karel and Artaya working with the higher skilled players and Elise, Claire and I with the fundamental group, we added the balance we needed. 

This camp really made me think of my first time in Genk in 2003. There was a lot of skill, but many of them had a very limited knowledge of Jesus or even just did not believe in Jesus. Touching on topics like prayer, faith, love, friendship, and others really helped us to touch on some of the teachings of Jesus. 

On Tuesday night we left from camp for our annual SportQuest game in Herentals. It was a bit weird since Herentals normally is in the first week of our project, but was moved to the second week this year. The girls played first and even though they fought extremely hard they couldn’t pull out the win in the end against our giant opponents. The guys struggled to find their rhythm, but found it in the second half pulling away from Herentals late in the third quarter and extending their lead in the fourth. SportQuest is bringing home the trophy for the 5th year in a row! Exciting to see that three SQ campers played in the game for Herentals: Steven, Tomas and John Bosco. Maybe one day they will play for SQ! 

The week was coming to and end our new strategy was working well. The guys really started to open up to us, some of them even came to our movie night on Wednesday night and started coming to our morning worship times. 

Things were going well and we wanted to close out this awesome week with a bang. Since the SQ night was going to be held at the church we wanted to do things a bit different than other years. We shared the Gospel during the break time and I was able to take this story and paint it in a way where all the youth could understand. I painted the picture of swimming over the ocean as an illustration to help them on their way, hopefully the seed was planted. 

The day continued and we returned to the church after the camp. We had many youth join us at the church for dinner and it was incredible to see how things just naturally developed. We had a plan for the night, but it was like God was saying it would be a lot different. I saw Claire, Bre and some of the church girls sharing their faith with a young man from the camp, others were playing instruments and worshiping and others were playing and having fun together. It was like the peace of the Holy Spirit was already working in this place and it was incredible. Some of the guys had to leave early to catch their train said goodbye with a tear in their eyes but all the rest of the kids stayed around until we had to close down shop for the night. God is working in their hearts and it was with a heavy heart we had to close that door, especially when they are so close to taking that step in faith. Our prayer is that they will know that they are able to do all things through Christ who gives them the strength. 

I have been doing this for a very long time and it never gets easier to close that door. Our team took a long time to evaluate, share and pray for what happened this week and night. God has been so faithful and we trust Him to do a mighty work in their hearts. 

The next morning we left for Ghent to join the other teams for the Summer Classic. The Summer Classic is an annual tournament at the end of the project. This was the first year basketball was not on the schedule, only soccer. The soccer tournament kicked off, but some of the veteran athletes were chosen to serve one more time. Duane and Penny, long missionaries and partners of SQ, were moving and needed some help with some projects in the house they were selling. A few hours later we rejoined the team and apparently SQ had to represent a second team in the tournament since a team did not show up. They did really well, and had one more game. Even though we were all basketball players, we had some skill and hustle to bring to the team and gave the team we played a good run, but ended up losing. 

The tournament came to an end with the SportQuest first team bringing home the victory in a hard fought game (their first ever championship). We closed out the day with some worship and awards, to close our time with a time of prayer. 

What a time, what a project, so many memories and highlights. I am sorry that it took me so long to write them all down, but I hope that the words shared will be an encouragement to you and everybody involved. The one thing I want to say is that everybody that has a heart for God, to serve through sport has a place in SportQuest. I can give a million examples how SQ has impacted my life and the lives of others and it will only keep growing if we have more people. Please think about joining us or making this possible for others. 

Many blessings,