Lecture

Hi, my name is Colin Pinkney, and I have served as the team chaplain for the Charlotte Hornets since 2005. I also serve as a nonprofit executive and have been doing that since 2005 as well. You know, when we talk about this whole idea of what is sports ministry, for me in the very beginning back many, many years ago, I was really unaware of all the different opportunities that would be afforded to me to use my ministry gifts and my passion to serve the players, the coaches, and their families. But what I’ve learned over the years is there are many, many great opportunities for individuals like me who would be willing and desiring to get involved in sports ministry.

So I want to talk about in this session what is sports ministry, and to do that, I first want to share three goals that I have in sharing this with you today. So first I’d like to make a biblical case for what sports ministry is. I’d also like to share an understanding definition of sports ministry that I believe will help anyone who’s willing to get involved in sports ministry. And then finally, I’d like to share four key success principles that will help you build and sustain a successful sports ministry.

And so as I said, I’ve been serving as a chaplain since 2005, and over the years things have changed. But one thing that hasn’t changed is that there are a lot of people involved in sports. In a recent U.S. News & World Report survey, they reported that over 55 percent of high school students are involved in some type of sports. The NCAA, for example, reports that there are 460,000 college students who are also athletes. And then in a recent survey this year, it was reported that 72 percent of Americans identify themselves as sports fans. The conclusion is that most people in this country are involved in some way with sports, and where there are people, there’s an opportunity to do ministry. And what we know is that there are a variety of needs that are available to serve as a sports ministry leader, whether it’s in high school, college, or the professional ranks. The key is being equipped as a sports ministry leader so that you can do the very best job to serve whatever team that you are able to serve.

So there’s also some other alarming research that we should understand as we think about what sports ministry is. The Pew Research Center reported recently that 65 percent of Americans identify themselves with some type of faith perspective. And that sounds like a good number, but what we know is that number is actually on the decline. What’s on the incline is that there’s an increasing number of individuals who say that they aren’t affiliated with any type of faith perspective. And that would be included in the sports arena as well. So what we know is there’s a great opportunity for sports ministry, for individuals who care about people. Jesus said it this way in John 4:35, “Do not say that there are yet four months and then the harvest. Look and see, now I tell you, now is a time for harvest” (paraphrased). And now is a great time, if you’re thinking about, it to get involved in sports ministry.

So let me share with you what I believe is a working definition of sports ministry. Sports ministry can be defined as “the effort to build and sustain a community that provides spiritual uplift and soul care to athletes, coaches, and their families.” And so when you think about sports and sports ministry, you not only think about the players who are involved in the sports, whether it’s basketball, baseball, or football, we should also think about the coaches themselves. And we should also think about the family of those coaches and those athletes who are also engaged in those sports because we know that sports takes time, and people have to invest themselves fully to be successful there. Which is why, again, sports offers a great platform for any ministry leader who would want to be involved in sports. Everything from serving as a silent partner in the locker room, or a prayer partner after a critical event in life, is really important as a sports ministry leader. And so to be aware of all of these opportunities where all of these people will congregate and gather around sports, again, is a great opportunity for those of us who would be willing to get involved in sports ministry.

And so I’d like to share with you now a successful way to involve and start your sports ministry. And I’ve got an acrostic that’ll make it easy for you to remember, that’s PEPP. The first P stands for preparation. And it’s critical to being successful as a sports ministry leader. Just as any athlete who’s going to be successful has to prepare themselves, so too does any sports ministry leader or chaplain needs to do the same. And so when we think about preparation, we first think about individual development. It goes without saying that if you’re going to be involved in any type of sports ministry, as an individual, it’s important for you to be the very best that you can be and to be authentic. And that’s why making sure that you are ready and developing your own spiritual life is really important. So your own prayer time, devotion time, involvement in your own faith community is really important because then it allows you to be the most authentic sports ministry leader that you can be. And trust me, the players know when you’re authentic.

The second part of preparation is understanding the organization itself. Whether it’s a basketball team or football team, a girls’ softball team, every organization has its own way of doing things, its own culture. And so if you’re going to be an effective sports ministry leader, it’s important for you to also understand the culture of that organization. Surely you’ve got to be astute when it comes to things of prayer and biblical understanding, but it’s also important that you become astute and aware of the organization, and know how the organization moves, know the key people in the organization, not for the sake of growing your cache of people you know, but for the sake of being an effective servant in the ministry to that organization. And so preparation is the first key step in a successful sports ministry.

And then we’ve got engagement. Engagement is the critical part where you actually would be able to engage with the players, the coaches, and even their families. And so we think about being engaged during the season. Typically during the season, most players and coaches don’t have a lot of free time to develop their own spiritual lives, their own faith. And that’s where being a sports ministry leader or a chaplain really becomes critical to the uplift of the team and the players and their families, because during the season, they’re focused on their craft, their skill, their game, and we as sports ministry leaders get to help them also focus on the other areas of their life that are equally important. So being available during the season is really an important aspect of a successful sports ministry.

But then out of the season is also important as well. A lot of times after the season’s over, there are players who are serious about their craft and coaches who are still engaged in the game. They still report to the office, they still work out at the gym, they still go to the field to practice. If you want to be a successful sports ministry leader, then you’ll find ways yourself to be involved in the out of season activities. For example, I have regular meetings with players during the off season for lunch, and things that get them away from the game and let them think about other areas of their lives—personal, financial, social, and otherwise. So it’s really important during the off season to make yourselves available to the players, the coaches and their families.

And then the third key success factor in sports ministry is persistence. Persistence is a really important attribute for anyone in life, right? But it’s also especially important for sports ministry leaders and chaplains because it’s a character trait that we see the athletes themselves have to convey, and so it’s also a great way to model your care and concern for them by yourself being a resilient type of a leader. And so what that means is that you have a long-range focus. That means you’re focused on not just the right now, but you’re also focused on what’s coming down the road. We see regularly in the NBA, the players get traded, they get moved, or they get cut and things change. It’s important that during those times that we are persistent as leaders ourselves, that we are still available as much as we can be because that’s really an important part of ministering to the athletes, the coaches, and their families.

And it’s also important as we have this long-range focus, persistence and resilience, is that we have practical expectations. What I’ve learned over the years of serving as a sports chaplain is that your expectations as a fan are very different than your expectation as a ministry leader serving a team. And so expectations around how players and coaches might behave when they win and how they might behave when they lose, for example, is a great expectation that you as a ministry leader should be aware of for yourself so that you show a type of consistency that will provide uplifting care for the players and coaches and their families.

These expectations range from everything of your access to the team for example, in some cases you may have access to the locker room. That’s a sacred space for a sports ministry leader. So that’s not something we demand or ask for, that’s something that we accept if it is allowed; if not, we have the expectation that whatever arena that that team might allow us to be in, whether it’s practice, whether it’s pregame or postgame, it’s important to have expectations that those things are not guaranteed, but if they are offered, then we will be there to serve.

In the sports world, most of us know things can change on a dime. We can’t predict outcomes of games, we can’t predict outcomes of seasons. And so it’s important for us just to have practical expectations that are more akin to serving the individuals that we have to serve. So we don’t look past people, so that the new player on the team who just comes in, building a relationship with that player is really important, and it’s important to have practical expectations. One thing I always say is don’t make any promises at all. Not promises you can’t keep, just so you don’t make promises when you’re in sports ministry, you just make yourself available. And that’s really important to have those expectations so that the players and the coaches know what to expect from you, and you can know what to expect from them.

And so again, preparation, engagement and persistence are the first three keys, but the final key to successful sports ministry, and I think the most important, is patience, it’s patience. Patience is needed if you’re going to be a successful sports ministry leader or chaplain in any arena. I’ve had the privilege of serving at the high school level, college, and in the pros, the professional ranks. And it’s really important that you have . . . you operate from a position of humility and care. And in order to do that, you’ve got to be patient. Sometimes we as chaplains, get a little antsy about wanting certain players to show up in the chapel room or we want certain coaches to give us an invitation or access. It’s really important that those aren’t our motivations. Our motivation ought to be, to be willing, humble servants and to wait on any opportunity God sends our way to serve the players, the coaches, and the families of the organizations that we serve.

And one way to be patient is to develop a routine, to have a routine of being available. There are many opportunities you may find that as you move in this area of sports ministry leadership that may be afforded to you. For example, for me, I get called on regularly to lead prayer and invocation at different events within the organization that don’t have anything to do with basketball. And that’s a privilege for me to serve, and that’s really the heart and soul of sports ministry, and that is to be available, to have a routine of availability so that players and coaches and families know that they can call on you, whether it’s in season or out of season. Because again, they don’t have the normal life that most of us have where we can check the box of going to church on Sunday or Bible study on Wednesday night, because those things might conflict with their schedule. So we as sports ministry leaders have to have the patience to be available and to be humble and willing servants at any time that we’re called upon to serve.

And so in conclusion, what I’d like to sum all up, this to say is that I believe that sports ministry leaders are important, but I believe it’s also important that sports ministry leaders are more inconspicuous than they are conspicuous. That means it’s not so important to be seen when you’re a sports ministry leader, it’s more important to be available, because the critical value of ministry that gets to happen when we make ourselves available, though we might not be as conspicuous, is that we see lives transformed for the good of our community and for the glory of God. Best to you in your sports ministry leadership.