Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
With Jonny Reid and Graham Daniels
243 Plays18 days ago
There was a time when a famous sports star giving their testimony was considered the pinnacle of evangelism. These days, there's a richer and more accessible relationship between sport and sharing the gospel. We have two guests from Christians in Sport on the podcast today, exploring the opportunities sport has for us, either as participants or observers.
Dr Graham Daniels is a former professional footballer, now the General Director of Christians in Sport and a director of Cambridge United Football Club. He also holds positions at St Andrew the Great Church and Ridley Hall Theological College in Cambridge. He is married to Michelle and has three children and five grandchildren.
Jonny Reid is the Director of Engagement at Oak Hill College and writes regularly for Christians in Sport. He plays cricket at Cumnor Cricket Club and is one of the leaders of Town Church Bicester.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Peptalk Podcast
00:00:11
Speaker
Well, hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Peptalk, the persuasive evangelism podcast. I'm ah Andy Vanister from Solas, and I am joined as ever ah by my effervescent co-host, Christy Mayer, all the way from London. I'm guessing today, Christy, how are you doing?
00:00:29
Speaker
I'm doing very well. Thanks, Andy. I'm excited to be with you and with our two wonderful guests today.
Meet the Special Guests
00:00:34
Speaker
Now, you see, you've sort of given the game away that ingo today is a very special offer for pep talk listeners. We actually have not just one, but we have two guests ah for you today. We have ah Graham Daniels, Dr. Graham Daniels, and we have Johnny Reed. So to begin in reverse order, Johnny, well, wear wears a number of hats, but he is director of engagement at Oak Hill College. So, Christy, I guess he's a colleague of yours. Well, he's my boss. Oh, right. Okay. So if our listeners, there are real softball questions and lots of, my word, what's a wonderful insight, Johnny?
Evangelism and Sports
00:01:07
Speaker
We'll know what's driving that than your usual hard media exterior. um But also the other thing that interests us for the purposes of this episode, Johnny also doesn't want to work with Christians in sport, the keen cricketer. ah So possibly you might spot the theme developing here. And then Graham, Graham is a former professional footballer. I'm a former unprofessional footballer.
00:01:27
Speaker
ah now director of Christians in Sport and a director of Cambridge United Football Club and you've got connections down down there at Ridley Hall ah Theological College and ah I've probably covered everything but here's the thing because we're short on time for this episode Sport is the common link between you two gentlemen, Christians in sport in particular.
Evolution of Evangelism in Sports
00:01:48
Speaker
So, Christians in sport, evangelism, what has evangelism got to do with sport? There we go, there's a question to to kick you off, either of you gentlemen. Well, it could have two things to do. In a way, when we started Christians in sport in this country or before my time in the 70s, but I was converted to Christ in 82, and there really was a dominant paradigm which we'd inherited from the States, which was find the most famous person
00:02:13
Speaker
get them as it would have been in the day on a video so that you can tell as many millions of people as possible about Jesus. So that was the only paradigm that is the dominant paradigm at the beginning of this.
00:02:25
Speaker
and What shift it is that happens a lot. We can discuss that really because social media has changed and people put their own stories out there all the time now in professional sports. So no one does it for them. ah But the big shift, I would say, has been the understanding since the 80s, certainly in the 90s onwards, that your number one place for evangelism as a soccer player in my world or in any sport is the changing room.
Sport as a Cultural Connector
00:02:51
Speaker
It's the people you play with and against, because that's where your witness or your testimony is that it's most powerful, because behavior and words need to line up a bit. So I think there are two angles on it, probably. Johnny, anything to add to that? What does evangelism and sport have to do with each other? as did So sport is one of the biggest, if not the biggest cultural thing in our country, if not our world. So everyone engages sport thinking about sports.
00:03:19
Speaker
um playing sport many, many people. So it's it for me, it's the place of best connection. my friends a sport I'm in a sports club. but um I work in in the Christian world. And so for me, it's the one time I have where I'm with people who don't trust in Jesus.
00:03:34
Speaker
um But I have big questions and there's a real common ground, which is really easy to build friendships because we build it around the sport we love. And off the back of that, then there's loads of opportunities to speak about Jesus. So sport is kind of the the glue for my relationships, all my friendships.
Merging Sport and Faith
00:03:50
Speaker
And it's, yeah, for me, it's the best opportunity to make friends.
00:03:54
Speaker
Yeah, it occurs to me as well that point you made there a minute ago, Johnny, that, you know, I think I forget the stats, but, you know, millions and millions and millions of people engage in sports at some level, particularly by the way, I think I was an eye opener for me was, you know, I'm joking aside, I'm not into.
00:04:09
Speaker
team sports right so I don't I don't enjoy football kind of particularly so I never thought of myself as sporty but then I go to the rock climbing gym every every week i got my kids into climbing so climbing that's a sport it may not be a team sport but it's a sport mixing with with other with other folks but the key thing for me I was going to ask you I think a lot of Christians just don't connect those worlds they don't they don't they don't think about how you use your hobbies or in this case sport as a platform for for sharing Jesus, why is that, do you think? Why is it we sometimes can be tempted to live compartmentalized lives? And sport happens over here, and then my Christian work stuff happens over here. Because I think there's a lot of that does go on. Yeah. and ah Sorry, Johnny, Andy, I was going to say, I think that's shifting.
Shifts in Sports Culture
00:04:52
Speaker
I think I'm in my early 60s. There's no question, generationally, that would have been normal in sport. I would say until the last five or six years,
00:05:03
Speaker
And however we use the what can easily be a cliche of Gen Z. It's a shift. There's a shift. People talk about how they feel in changing rooms. No, let me rephrase that because I work with men. Men talk in changing rooms like they've never talked before about how they feel. And so there's been a shift. There's no question there's a shift in the last five to six years in this. So I'm I'm wondering how empirical this is or anecdotal, but I think it's shifted. People will talk more about their well-being, their health, their mental health, their physicality, their sexuality. These things are not taboo conversations. And so I think it's easier evangelistically, in some ways easier than ever before.
Building Connections through Sports
00:05:48
Speaker
yeah as in ah um I co-lead a church up here in Biston. It's but one of the main things we do. Once a year, we meet all our members. We go and have a drink with them, get sit in their front room, chat with them. And we'll always ask them, who are you spending time with who doesn't know Jesus? And the often the answer is, I'm just not I don't have any friends, maybe at the school gates, maybe at work, but at work, I'm at work, and then I go home. And so one of our encouragements is saying is not necessarily sports. Like, sport, for me, feels like one of the easiest ways. But join ah join a club where you can do something in common with somebody else, and just build friendships. And as you build friendships, as you share life, as you speak about church, there's an overflow of that of
00:06:31
Speaker
I would you come to church with me? Would you like to meet some of my friends that would you can merging merging your universes as a guy called Sam Chan talks about? um And I think that's, so we've we've got a guy we've got a guy in our churches part of the a war hammer club, a girl who's at the musical theater club, and probably 70% of our church are part of a variety of sports clubs, and they're not all naturally sporty. We've just encouraged him to go have something you do. It's good. It's good for your mental health anyway, just to be out doing something and using your body and and do something but but built friendships. Otherwise, it's it's hard. I don't know. Like, I find neighbors hard, I find school gates hard. But I find when I'm, I'm training on a Wednesday night in my hockey club, it's pouring down with rain, that strong friendships are formed, even just in that two hours once a week, which can lead to real great opportunities and speaker Jesus speak of my faith. So
00:07:21
Speaker
For me, it's finding a connection point and sports a brilliant way of doing that because you live the highs and lows maybe in a way which you don't at Warhammer Club um because you you get the victory and the loss together and you exert yourself together. So sports, yeah, sports brilliant for for building those initial friendships which can lead to really great evangelistic conversations.
00:07:39
Speaker
If you are a warm up or have a fan listening to this who wishes to complain, you can write to John E Care of... chrisy even yeah I feel more and more persuaded to take up a team sport. um that's That's very persuasive. And I just wonder what what do you think it looks like for for you both and Christians in sport to to equip and encourage kind of men and women who are engaged in those sports. Like what is the work that that you're doing, not just through your local churches, but through a para-church organization, through CIS? How do you help?
00:08:12
Speaker
Well, ah we help them to be plugged into us, be present, be in your sports club. We we go, if you're gonna be there, be there. So don't be, we have a little phrase of, um ah um you you can either be there and never share or never be there and try and share. And it's going, no, no, be there and share. So don't be somebody who just rocks up and occasionally and then goes, hey, can I tell you about Jesus? Like, no, be present in people's lives, share life with each other, ask them how they're doing, just build normal friendships. So be there.
00:08:43
Speaker
and share. And then we we we have a phrase we use, pray, play, say. And it's quite a simple mantra where we go, pray is the Lord's work. He opens blind eyes. He's the one who saves people. So be prayerful as you approach your sport. As I drive up to training, when I'm when I'm thinking about this, I'm driving the train, I'm praying, Lord, give me opportunities to to build deeper friendships. I've opted to speak of Jesus, to say something, um play, then play in a way which honors God. So so my, as Graham just said, in the locker room, ah my people are looking at my witness book in my life. How do I react to the referee's decisions? How do I respond when I lose the race? um How do I um deal with gossip in the dressing room? People are watching that in a really evident way. that They're looking at that as as long as they know I'm a Christian. I've been upfront with that. I'm saying, no, I ah do follow Jesus. I go to church, whatever it might be, something to help that.
00:09:33
Speaker
And then look for those opportunities to speak of Jesus um and make those opportunities. um We have another mantra, kind of your story, my story, his story. So so what's your story? what how How's your week going? How's your life going? Have an opportunity. Hopefully they'll ask you back. Was that for you? And I made this a chance there to share something of, well, actually, I've been learning this at church recently, or we've got this going on in my life, with my family. And we're praying about it because it's it's complicated.
00:09:59
Speaker
um And then hopefully an opportunity then to say something of of his story, something of Jesus, and maybe invite him to something. So you can't do any of that if you're not there, if you're not present. If you're just if you're just turning up one minute before the training session starts, leaving one minute afterwards, if you're not playing matches and going to any away games, because you yeah have to be present. And that takes time and commitment and and effort, but it is integral if we're going to have opportunities to speak of Jesus with people.
00:10:27
Speaker
yeah i think the um I think one of the things that really struck me in what you folks have been saying, I mean, a connection piece is crucial because I think it's interesting, right? I
Overcoming Barriers in Evangelism
00:10:37
Speaker
think most people, many of us struggle to say to speak to our neighbors, but then you analyze why is that? Well, just because you live geographically next door to someone doesn't mean you have anything in common. You know, we've got a lovely,
00:10:46
Speaker
you know, lady lady lives next door to us, looks after our family pets when we're away, but we have nothing in common beyond that. And so it's quite tough trying to fill in those connections. But as you say, if you can create a space where you have a connection, you've got connections in in vast amounts because you're you're playing together or doing Warhammer together or knitting together, we'll do a podcast and knitting some other time.
00:11:05
Speaker
um Yeah, you're going to find it infinitely easier. And I'm increasing as I get older, wondering whether the reason we find evangelism as Christians often so hard is we're trying to do it in the hardest place possible with people who we have no connections. Yes, God's got a plan for your next door neighbour. Don't hit me to be saying that otherwise. But it might not necessarily be you. It might be someone who's closer to them.
00:11:25
Speaker
no night
00:11:28
Speaker
It's certainly the case, isn't it? that It'd be interesting to see your stats on this because most people ah who do play, let's go into your 20s or beyond that. Most people who play, certainly through their teens and into their 20s, they're playing because they're wired up to play. So, you know, you're wired that way as a kid. It becomes your hobby at school. It becomes very much part of who you are, yeah of your makeup, of your relationships.
00:11:55
Speaker
ah I think it's intuitive that the things Johnny's talked about, ah we can coach those almost to teenagers or undergraduates. We can draw those things out in the way that Johnny described, pray, play, say. So it gives concepts to what you would do anyway.
00:12:13
Speaker
I think what's shifting in our culture is the conversation we've just been in. And it is that people are starting to find ways to engage when the world is quite lonely. um So a lot of people are taking a recreational sport, you might call it then, later in life, um much later in life, because actually the world's quite lonely and isolated from your next door neighbors. So I think, i think it It's highly feasible for Christians to say, hey, I've never been super competitive. i've never I wasn't like this as a kid, as a teenager. But you know what? There's a really good name, the club now, with a range of ability levels down the road for me. It'll be good for my fitness, good for my health, make some new friends, and actually
00:13:01
Speaker
it could introduce people to my church community. So that that shift as people are living longer, obviously in a healthier means that you wouldn't have to be the sporty kid anymore to take up sport because there are a range of levels as you get older. So it can be quite efficient, actually, church-wise.
00:13:19
Speaker
And just just thinking about that topic of ah loneliness.
Sports Events and Social Opportunities
00:13:24
Speaker
um And for those who maybe don't play sports with others, so they don't have the opportunity to um play and pray, they say, but they do watch sports with friends and they have if communities like um cricketing kind of communities where you come together and and you have a great time and having lunch and and watching it. What what would your what would your kind of response be to those who are in response to that isolation? Don't play sports, but they watch a lot of it. Well, Johnny, let me pick that one up because I'm current when we're talking, I'm at Cambridge United's training camp. So ah I'm sitting here and now the players have just left to get ready for Saturday's game.
00:14:04
Speaker
um Here's something we found, and this is really slightly weird. There are 72 clubs in the English football league that is outside the Premier League. The gates of something like 68 out of 72 clubs have gone up dramatically in the last three years. So take one example. We'd be typical. Cambridge United can hold 7,000 people. Our average gate has jumped from four to six, eight in three seasons. And we've been bottom of the league three years in a row.
00:14:35
Speaker
and what the data seems to show is exactly what you just said, Christie. Actually going somewhere, our biggest increased numbers naturally are young people, sort of 16 to 20, and over 55s who haven't been to watch sport for years but live in Cambridge.
00:14:53
Speaker
and And actually that's a big picture version of what this can mean because you can go to a sports event, you don't have to make conversation, you can watch the event, you can have a laugh and join in and cheer, but you don't have to look face to face and talk to each other for an hour. And again, forgive me for putting it like this, but for the men in the context that I work in, it's a really, really, really great way. Just take your friend to watch a game, not on the telly, fine, go live.
Johnny Reed's Upcoming Book
00:15:22
Speaker
and you can have great conversation. And it's happening in the secular culture, if you like. So I think this has got legs for us in in churches ah as spectators. I also, yeah, I think that's really interesting observation. I also personally want in the case of Cambridge, whether it's just people have assumed that you've hit rock bottom, you can't go any further down. So you know, now's the time to get in before the before it comes up again. Yeah, no, they're just being sorry for us. But they still want something to do. It gives them something to complain about. You get the best There is laugh you know that. Again, I'm not a massive sport watcher, but watching friends who are. But that very point, when your team does well, you can celebrate together. When your team does badly, you can commiserate together. If you disagree with the ref, you can argue together as Christians. We can show a way of doing that while we still disagree. but we
00:16:05
Speaker
So there are all these bonding things. I'm conscious time is against us, and there's one saying we also wanted to chat around, which was there was a book coming out, isn't there? Yes, I was going to say, Johnny is kind of nodding in and a kind of modest kind of way. So so ah so what what is the book ah all all about, and when does it and when does it hit the mean, mad, crazy streets of the UK?
00:16:27
Speaker
to hit the Meemam H. Preeze of the UK and America, I think at the same time, on the 1st of April. It's it's it's nice a look great day to launch a book, I always say. well yeah on the shadow and and written With The Good Book Company, um so we co-authored it together, it's called Spiritual Game Plan, competing with joy and godliness. And it looks and a lot of these things. it's we We kind of take a, what does the Bible say about sports? um How do we think about sports as Christians? That kind of, like you talked about, that divide we often make between my my faith and the things I do. And we try to really put those things together and go, no, no, God is such a kind God. He's given us, He's wonderful.
00:17:05
Speaker
things we can do so we can have joy ourselves and have joy in him as we do it. And then how about then overflows when if we've got a secure identity, if we know who we are in Jesus, so we're not trying to strive to earn favor with people or earn kind of people's love or then out of that overflow, we can then love others and we can speak of Jesus. And then we've got specific chapters just on that topic. We've got a chapter for fans. We've got chapter for parents, chapter for dealing with the issue of Sunday sports, which is a whole other conversation. just trying to really apply it to people so they can really practically apply it so yeah out in April.
Graham's Motivational Speech
00:17:39
Speaker
Yeah and so we will put a link in the show notes to certainly to Christians in Sport where people can find out about you guys and also yeah of course let us know when the book's out it'd be great maybe to get you back on the on the kind of show. But I suppose a kind of a final question from me, and then I don't know, Christi, if you've got a final, final, final one is, you know, we've talked a lot of stuff this afternoon, but really practically, if you could say one thing to somebody who's listening to this, who's like still a bit, not quite sure about it, or, you know, the locker room, those motivational speeches you're kind of used to, whatever you're kind of like, you know, the locker room speech to a Christian, he's like, well, I'm in the sports club, I'm a bit nervous, gonna give a bit of pep talk, get them out, get them to go, go get them.
00:18:25
Speaker
And you say, go on, get a proper pep talk now, right? Proper pep talk. Listen, God gave you the talent to play. It doesn't matter how good you are or not. There are people who want to play. There's loads of people who want to play. Get amongst it. Get in there. Enjoy it. Get fit. Feel good about yourself when you have a shower after the game. And here's the thing, you will make friends, proper friends.
00:18:51
Speaker
<unk> Intimate, really, because you're going to compete together. And that opens up all kinds of conversations, life conversations. So you should go for it. Pray, play, say. Best decision you'd ever make, Christie. Best decision you'd ever could make. Get out there.
00:19:07
Speaker
I don't doubt it. Thank you so, so much.
Conclusion and Future Insights
00:19:10
Speaker
and Thank you to both of you. Thank you, Johnny. Thank you, Graham. There's so much for us to kind of reflect on. I'm going to look into what kind of teams I can i can probably think about joining. So thank you very much. It's been great to be with you this afternoon. And that's it for me. That's it from Andy. And we look forward to being with you again in a couple of weeks' time and for another guest on pep talk. That's it for now. Goodbye. Goodbye. Bye.