TAKING IT TO CAMPUSES

By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Foundation

After helping with hurricane relief in Puerto Rico last May and ministering to children in Guatemala in December, the Baylor Sports Ministry team is taking a different path for next month's' trip to Johannesburg, South Africa.

They're going to college.

Partnering with Athletes in Action, a team of 22 Baylor student-athletes led by John Maurer, Cori Pinkett and David Wetzel will try to expand the AIA ministry's outreach on campuses at the University of Johannesburg and Wits University as the "main thrust" of the May 19-27 trip.

"Whenever you bring a group of Americans anywhere, you draw a crowd and you get some interest," said Maurer, who's in his second year as Baylor's Director of Sports Ministry. "We're going to do everything from playing pick-up basketball to having team meetings with the teams and coaches and interacting with them. They want us to help them find some ongoing ministry, if you will, on the two campuses."

Maurer has seen the attention Americans get and the impact they can make in South Africa. The first of four trips he made was in 1998, just three years after Nelson Mandela became president following 27 years in jail and the end of apartheid in the country.

"That's not that long ago," Maurer said. "In our country, we think about slavery being 300 years ago. Although on the world scale, that wouldn't be that long. But here, we're talking about a couple decades. They're in the midst of some serious transition and crisis in that respect. So, to get to know folks and have conversations with people who are living through that is a great opportunity for these kids to grow as human beings, as people of faith."

On one of his previous trips, Maurer said he brought a "couple big football players from Rutgers."

"Literally, you just walk on campus and sit down and people will just flock to you, because they all want to meet Americans and they want to meet large human beings," Maurer said. "So, we have a couple of those on this trip, too."

Offensive linemen Xavier Newman (6-2, 307) and Johncarlo Valentin (6-4, 323) fit the bill and will be joined by linebackers Owen Rogers and Jalen Pitre from the football team.

The traveling group also includes 11 student-athletes from the defending national champion acrobatics & tumbling team and seven from the Big 12 champion equestrian team that is competing at the NCEA National Championships this week.

Pinkett, Baylor's Assistant AD for Character Formation, also joined Maurer on the December trip to Guatemala.

Mission

"She loves the Lord and the mission in terms of what we're trying to do, and she's just a super quality leader in every way," Maurer said of Pinkett, who will handle all the finances on the trip since Maurer has to come back at about the midpoint of the trip to attend the wedding of his son, Derek, on May 25 in Chicago. "And, obviously, if you look at our roster – we have four guys and 18 women – Cori is going to play a huge role on this trip."

Tag-teaming with Maurer and coming for the second half of the trip is Wetzel, Baylor's Associate AD for Football Relations. The former football letterman and longtime high school head coach did the same thing two years ago when Baylor Sports Ministry went to Brazil.

"Different year, different partner, I'm not sure I would have done this," Maurer said. "But, the partners we're going to serve are like my friends. . . . I talked to David and asked him to pray about this, and I think he's excited about it."

On top of the campus visits with Athletes in Action, the sports ministry team will also do a service project with a local church or orphanage "in one of the townships like Soweto," Maurer said, as well as visiting an animal safari park, the Apartheid Museum and Mandela's house.

"Johannesburg is a city of millions of people," Maurer said. "I've tried to set the kids' expectations. When we land, you're going to feel like we're in New York City. You're not going to see lions and tigers, we're not out in the bush. They do have a safari park that we're going to get to experience for a couple hours, just outside of town, but we're going to be in a large urban city with a melting pot of who's who from around the world."

While the bulk of the expenses for the trip have been raised by the student-athletes themselves, the team is still about $20,000 short of its total financial needs. With the deadlines approaching, please prayerfully consider helping support this trip. For additional information, contact either John Maurer (john_maurer@baylor.edu) or Nick Florence (nick-florence@baylor.edu).

"They are super open people to talking about anything and everything," Maurer said. "It's actually much easier to talk to South Africans about spiritual things because they've got everything over there. People are wide, wide open spiritually, so it's not hard to get into conversations about our relationship with the Lord."

Mission

TAKING IT TO CAMPUSES

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