I actually got a little misty-eyed watching this. Not because of the sentimentality of the news man, but because this is a beautiful illustration of the church being what Jesus intended it to be. The key moment here is when the convicts say that every other team they played (presumably some even “Christian” teams) treated them like icky people that could transmit the sin-coodies if touched.
Thanks to one coach thinking like Jesus, and a group of Christians responding like Jesus, a group of men that the world had given up on discovered that Jesus offers them something different.
This is the essence of what it means to be “missional”.
[tags]missional, church, football, outreach[/tags]
Awesome. Talk about seizing an opportunity! I'll bet the home team didn't miss the extra fans, either. What I love about this is that the Christian school didn't mount some huge centralized "outreach" program; they just took an opportunity that came before them to be selfless and show love. Very cool.