El Canche De Granizal

I wish I would have taken more video this morning. We did a training session at one of my favorite places in Colombia, the turf field a minute from our house. When Messiah was here last year, they played a game against one of Alexs teams on this field. Most of them remember that experience very well. Granizal, the neighborhood we live in, is not a good one by any means. It has been a place of many gangs, drugs, and violence. The kids who play on this field, which is in the middle of the neighborhood, either have dads who are in gangs or they themselves are a part of a gang. We have been there 3 times or so to run training for younger kids, and will be there this weekend with Alex and his team of older guys. Our names go from Grant, or Forlan, and Jack, or Messi, to gringo, gringo, gringo!!!!! It is a completely different environment then being at the stadium, or other neighborhoods we go to. My blood pressure is always a little bit higher when I am there. Maybe it is the security guards at all the entrances with guns and clubs in their hands or the muzzled police dogs roaming the perimeter, nevertheless, it is a cool place to be. It is where Alex grew up, and lead his own guys in violence and drugs. Thanks to his new life in Christ, he leads this neighborhood in a different way. Everybody in the neighborhood knows who he is. His spectrum of influence is massive, and he takes advantage of it. Almost every morning for 3 hours or so, he takes his Bible and goes into different houses and shares the Gospel with them. He sits down with the families and fathers he used to provide with drugs, and provides them with knowledge of the Gospel of Jesus. It is so sweet to hear about. He has begun to take and share the tracts we brought down with the families as well. I am glad and thankful that we can join in with what he is doing in Granizal. It is a place that desperately needs Jesus. Pray for Alex and the CDUC guys who live here as they take the Gospel into some really tough places in this neighborhood.

I will try to take some more video of the soccer in Granizal this weekend. I was too busy playing with the kids, I forgot to video the actual session, but you can kind of see what it is like around here!

Jack