eXtreme tRaining arvo

I am very late in making this entry (it happened "last year" already!)...but wanted to get something on the blog regarding our "eXtreme tRaining arvo" since it went so well.

First…and most important…I want to thank God for His gracious answer to specific and extra-ordinary prayer! Those attending believe that God was really at work. It is always difficult to assess the outcome of a training session since the only real success is in applying the attitudes and skills learned, however the immediate feedback was exceptional.

On Sunday arvo (afternoon)...11 December 2005...a number of professional and elite sports personalities from the Sydney area met together to engage in "eXtreme tRaining" in how to better use their sports success as a platform for the good news message of Jesus. As far as I know there hasn’t been a training opportunity like this in Australia (cross-sport…and specifically for professional and elite sports personalities) for many years. Certainly one of the comments I heard repeated by those attending was that they had never been exposed to such specific (and helpful) training.

Our sessions included:

Back to the Basics--Identifying essentials in sports mission
Incarnation -- pre-evangelism --CJ Bruton, Sydney Kings, Boomers
Influence -- evangelism --Jason Smith, Sydney Kings, Boomers
Impact -- discipleship --Marty Wilson, NSW Waratahs
Scoring with your Testimony --Daniel Willis, Bible Society
“Mastering” the Media (Using media ops) --Glenn Daniel, Radio
Winning at all cost (How to share with others) --Gary Speckman, AIA

About 10 days out from the event we had six people confirmed. I was beginning to wonder if the December date would kill off any potential trainees. (I did receive a number of apologies from those who loved the idea, but couldn’t change competition schedules.)

As I was praying about this early one morning, the Lord really impressed me with the question, “What do you most want to see from this time?” It struck me, then, that my own primary desire was to see CJ, Jason, and Marty “presenting” mission skills and awareness to other professional and elite sports personalities. The number they actually “presented to” was not really the issue.

However, since that time the Lord brought along many others…three of them the day before the event…and one (long jumper) who arrived unexpected. Sports people numbered 12 (including 3 women)…and coaches, chaplains, and media people numbered 12…for a total of 24 in attendance
(plus a couple of volunteers).

I was personally very pleased with the initial response…and with the job done by the guys.

One participant wrote in an email early Monday morning…”gday gary…just want to let you and the fellas know that sunday was full on success. God was in charge of sunday and there are a few of us who are seeing the bigger picture of where we are going with all of this. (It) was spot on and you were really used for his purpose.”

I debriefed with Jason and CJ on the way home…and they are eager to do similar training in the future if there is enough interest expressed.

CJ was especially encouraging to me at the Kings’ training session two days later, when he said he had been sharing about the “eXtreme tRaining arvo” with his mum and she was so excited about it that she wants to meet me for coffee sometime and talk about “what’s this good thing happening to my boy?”

NBL All Stars Pregame Prayer

Received this as a cc to someone else regarding our inaugral official NBL pre-game prayer meeting and thought I would paste it here to "document" the event.

Just thought I'd let you know, that the first Chapel service for the All star game of the NBL was held on tuesday the 27th of December. Gary Speckman led it with each person sharing their thoughts about Christmas, then Gary led a short devotion, an opportunity for communion and a prayer time. Present were Gary and his wife, 2 players from opposing teams, the commisioner of the NBL, and myself. It was a great time, the commissioner was very encouraged saying, it will only get bigger and better, and wanted us to do a chapel service at the finals, the pre-season tournament and next years all star game, and he will put it in the schedule. Praise God for what he's doing in the Nbl this is a unique window of opportunity following on from the successful extereme sports event.

(Thanks to Darren Kingston--Chaplain of the Hunter Pirates)