In a span of three weeks, I felt like a lot of us have turned back “Father Time” when we engaged the Lorenzo Ruiz Academy Crusaders varsity high school team in two friendly basketball games already at the LRA campus gymnasium in Ongpin, Binondo, Manila.
The idea of a friendly game started when LRA’s head coach Sherwin Navarro (not related to Pastor Bong N.) came in our Victory Connect held last July 3 (Saturday) at the U-Belt center.
The Victory Connect was our post-One (Sunday) series avenue to help people find a Victory Group in U-Belt. We got to talk and I found out that he used to play for the National University Bullpups in the UAAP before winding up at the University of Manila in college later.
And 2010 marks his first year as a full-pledged head coach of the Crusaders, which is bunched in the second division of the Fil-Chinese Federation basketball league.
He admitted that the Lord had spoken to him during the three-part One series messages we had on June. Now, he wanted his high school players to be taught Biblical values while helping them play ball as well.
So here I was, thinking that maybe, this is an opportunity for me to showcase my triple-double averages in the game (of 10 attempts, 10 claps and 10 loud cheers).
But seriously, I got in touch with Eric Suguitan and Luis Palaganas, former UE Red Warriors, whom we get to reach out some years back to help me assemble a competitive basketball team. They were excited to not just play with these high school ballers but also serve as their discipleship mentors.
And thus far, with their help, as well as the perimeter shooting of U-Belt LifeBox campus minister Lennon Almoroto, singles Victory group leader Faws Carrasco, Pastor Bong and their recruits, we were able to keep pace with these speedy ballers and eventually score two straight wins.
But the biggest “win” here was that 15 of these high school ballers are now distributed into three Life/Victory groups after our Thursday afternoon game, where Eric, Luis and Faws help me meet and engage them.
Can’t wait to see the next generation of disciples! The next Eric and Luis 