Kids look up to Johnny Wysong. And not just because he’s six feet, six inches tall. But the forward for the Columbia International University Rams basketball team is also a role model.
Wysong was one of several Rams who volunteered for the annual weeklong Hoops for Hope summer basketball camp, an evangelistic outreach to children from lower-income Columbia neighborhoods, hosted by the CIU men’s and women’s basketball teams.
“It’s pretty awesome,” said Wysong. “Our opportunity to do this is a blessing … giving them the Word of God … to plant the seed. It’s awesome. Just the coolest thing.”
While Wysong and his teammates were corralling the 60-plus campers, ages 9-14, guiding them to their next station for either games or a devotional, the Rams Head Basketball Coach Tony Stockman, was making sure everything was running smoothly. He said each day of the camp has a different theme: love, grace, repentance, and obedience.
A Testimony of Grace
On the day grace was the theme, all the campers gathered on the bleachers of the Moore Fitness Center to hear a man who testified to being saved by grace.
Joseph Saleeby, founder of the South Carolina-based “Redeemed 2 Multiply” ministry, talked about how although he was raised in a Christian home and went to church, he rebelled at the age of 15 to follow the Hip Hop culture. He would sneak out of his house to become involved in gang activity including drugs and stealing cars. By age 17 he was in prison where he was sentenced to 13 months. Soon he was back on the streets. By age 21 he had been in multiple car accidents because of driving under the influence, had been shot at, and was always watching his back. But then Saleeby said, God was gracious.
“I remembered the gospel of Jesus Christ,” Saleeby told the campers. “I began to pray to
God and ask Him to fix my life,” and quoting from Romans chapter 6:
22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
“Every single one of us has to make a decision within ourselves, Saleeby challenged the campers, “We have to reflect, we have to think it through … there is nothing more important than to know you can’t do it on your own, but with the grace given to you.”
Help from Child Evangelism Fellowship
Also holding a camp the same week as Hoops for Hope was Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF). Through their Christian Youth in Action (CYIA) program, they were training 70 young people, ages 12-22, on how to share the gospel with kids such as the ones attending Hoops for Hope. So, Friday was set aside for the CYIA campers to put what they were learning into action by getting one-on-one with the Hoops for Hope campers and share the gospel using CEF’s Wordless Book. It uses colors to help explain the gospel.
Lena White, the South Carolina Upstate coordinator of CEF said that the Hoops for Hope campers will also have an opportunity to create their own Wordless Book.
“So they will have an active way of remembering what they’ve been taught,” White said. “If they are still trying to comprehend (the gospel), (The Wordless Book) reviews it. But if they’ve already believed, that gives them a tool to be able to go and tell (the gospel) to someone else.”
A Long Week. But …
Meanwhile, Coach Stockman says the Hoops for Hope week is hard work. But that’s OK.
“Basketball is what draws them in,” Stockman said. “I tell people all the time, basketball is my ministry. That’s something I’ve been blessed with — the talent, opportunity and resources. We just work hard at it. And the better we are at it the more people I think we can influence. (Hoops for Hope) is a part of that.”
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