God truly has a sense of humor...

(I'm miserable at short blog posts... sorry!)

While this internship has me working a crazy amount of hours – 55-60 most weeks – we thankfully get the entire week of the 4^th of July off and also enjoy a few long weekends. This past weekend (June 13-15) happened to be one of those long weekends. Our team from Chicago left Saturday morning and the Yakima team came in Tuesday morning. Therefore, since I knew we would have both Saturday and Sunday afternoons off, I decided to ask Mikey, the 25 year-old intern I work with, if he would want to go play volleyball at the local beach by Lake Pontchartrain that he had told me about during one of the first days I was here. Now I hadn’t told Mikey or the other interns how much I had played over the past couple of years, and for those reading this who haven’t heard or who have forgotten, I was quite the volleyball junkie.

To refresh your memory, I was the kid who played indoor volleyball 3-4 times a week during my sophomore year and spent all last summer networking my way up the ladder at Alki Beach and Golden Gardens by playing 5-6 days a week after work. This meant that I was playing oh, around 25 hours a week! Yet as far as volleyball was concerned, the time invested and dedication to the sport did pay off in regards to the fact that I won two tournaments at Alki Beach, and towards the end of the summer was playing with the most elite beach volleyball players in Seattle over at guys’ houses who had spent around $30,000 to put sand courts in their backyards.

Throughout last summer I had multiple friends confront me with questions like “Kyle, do you think you should be playing this much volleyball?” or “Kyle, where are you serving the body of Christ?” Each time I would confidently explain to them that I had a “ministry of presence” on the volleyball court which in some respects was partially true, (I did have some discussions about my faith, Jesus, the Bible, etc.) but the fact of the matter was that I had taken volleyball, something morally neutral, and made it an enormous idol in my life. I had taken a good thing and made it an Ultimate thing. I didn’t fully come to grips with this until Steve Sakanashi, with the help of a couple of sermons from Matt Chandler (!), ended up tearing me apart with Scripture (For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow – Hebrews 4:12) one night early last Fall after I had told Steve my plans to play 3-4 times a weeks with the beach players. One of the big things Steve said was that in the story of Abraham and Isaac, I was like Abraham and Isaac was like volleyball (bear with me with the simile), and just like Abraham was willing to sacrifice to follow God, I must lay down volleyball. So make a long story short, the Holy Spirit convicted the heck out of me and I ended up surrendering volleyball to God by stepping out in faith and trusting that He would have something better for me that would bring Him glory (as opposed to me), or He would give the sport back to me. In doing so I had the most amazing nine months of spiritual growth ever and ended up pursuing this Louisiana internship – neither of which would have happened if I had played volleyball all year long and into this summer in Seattle.

So, now jumping back to last Friday when I asked Mikey if we could go check out the beach the next day, it turned out that there just so happened to be a doubles tournament going on at 4pm on Saturday afternoon that he wanted to sign up for (he has played a little indoor and outdoor 4’s and 6’s but not a lot of doubles). Now initially I hesitated because I hadn’t played in nine months and I was a little nervous about falling back into idolatry. But then I remembered Steve’s words about surrendering volleyball to God and stepping out in faith and trusting that He would have something better for me that would bring Him glory, or He would give it back. And, while I didn’t want to jump to conclusions, I felt like one day of volleyball wouldn’t hurt (after all I was making this decision on my birthday, Friday the 13^th!). So Mike and I went to the beach to sign up on Friday night, and since I had never been there before I didn’t know what to expect. When we got there I was immediately blown away! It turned out being a volleyball complex with 22 courts that had lights so that you can play at night, and the best part about it was that it was free to the public. Plus the complex had beautiful imported sand, was protected from the wind, and the nets were always up (in Seattle I had to bring my own net and lines, the sand was grainy and hard on the feet with bottle caps/broken glass/sticks, and the wind was often blowing). This complex, called Coconut Beach, happens to be the largest lighted beach volleyball facility in the entire United States!

Anyways, Mike and I showed up on Saturday about an hour before the tournament started and I used the time to coach him on a bunch of tips I had gathered from last summer (I actually was a true student of the game and had a few pages of “tips and techniques” I had learned saved on my computer). There were 8 teams in our division and we played 3 games to 25 in the humid weather. We won all three – one was a blow out and the other two were within 5 points. Then we played in the semi-final and fought back from an 11-16 deficit to win 25-20. By this time the sun had gone down and we played for the championship under the lights which was a match – best two out of three. We won the first game by 4 and the second by about 10! As prizes we both got our choice of board shorts, shirts or a $45 King of the Beach volleyball. Mikey picked a shirt and I of course had to go for the ball (this was ironic because I really debated whether or not to bring a ball from home down here when I flew in, and had decided against it).

So I’ve written all of the above because I believe that I have really experienced the faithfulness of God in this area of my life. Volleyball to me was Everything and it was becoming more of a lifestyle than a fun pastime. At the end of last summer I was already worried about how I would be able to get an internship this summer that would enable me to get to the beach by 4pm each day so I could meet my 25 hour a week quota. But instead of worrying about that, I stopped playing altogether and chose to pursue Christ and His will for my life, which led me to take an internship thousands of miles away from the only place I thought I would be able to play this summer. To my surprise, I have found myself living a 10 minute drive away from the largest lit beach volleyball complex in the US where more than 4,000 people play per week! This time around, however, God has drastically altered my priorities. Last summer it was almost no ministry and 25 hours of volleyball a week. This summer its 55-60 hours of ministry and a few hours of volleyball. Last summer, I lived with my hand clutched tightly around volleyball telling God that He could do whatever He wanted with my life, but volleyball was a nonnegotiable – something I wouldn’t give up. This summer I live with volleyball in an open hand, knowing that it is a good gift that God has given me for this season of my life, and also knowing well that it will be taken away when I head to China for 3 months this Fall Quarter. Furthermore, the beauty of it is that my situation has a built-in anti-idolatry plan – I’m working so much that I will only be able to play a few times a week, and even if I wanted to play more I don’t have a car and therefore have no way to get to the beach. So in surrendering my will for God's will and trusting Him with my life I have found that He provided an awesome internship that allows me to serve Him in being His hands and feet doing relief work in a hurting city, but He has also provided a healthy dose of my favorite sport on the side! Comical if you ask me. :)