Today is Saturday, a day when the students at the Bible School have no classes. Breakfast is later than usual, 9 a.m., then, after cleaning up, there is free time until mid-afternoon. At that time the schedule calls for door to door village outreach and a children’s program in the local church that birthed the school. This morning, though, the students and some of the staff rented the local football (i.e. soccer) field and spent an hour running back and forth, scoring goals, and thoroughly enjoying each other.

Soccer is big in Albania. That is an understatement. Two years ago when I made my first sojourn into this country to visit the friends who are house-parents at the school, the country had come to a halt for a big game in the capital. Albania’s national team was playing Greece’s national team in a return match after Albania had beat Greece in their last encounter. The capital was basically gridlocked, as cars streamed in from all over the country—each with a red Albanian flag prominently displayed. The pastor/missionary of the church here in Erseke had been asked by the mayor to put up a large screen (two sheets sewn together) and use his video projector to show the game in the town square. It was quite an experience to gather that evening with 2,000 others and stand and watch the drama unfold—and it was a good drama as Albania scored two goals in the first sixty seconds and in the end left the field as 2-1 conquerors. I went back to the house I was staying in when the guns started firing into the air in celebration, and all night long honking car horns could be heard as young men drove up and down the streets expressing their jubilation.


A local measure of the popularity of football is that Erseke has three city teams, one in each of three leagues. And they have a nice stadium for them to play in. The teams in the two highest of the three leagues have players that are paid, although not much, and two of the players, Marcus and Leo, live at the Bible school. Marcus is here because when the only housing he could afford was an unheated room in the recesses of the city stadium, the mayor asked the school if they would take him in. Leo is here because he was released from his contract in Tirana to come here, but the Erseke team could not pay him, so he had nowhere else to go. Both of these players were recruited from Brazil, and both may go back there to stay at Christmas. And both are believers…

Tomorrow the school is going to Korce, a larger city about an hour’s drive from here, to watch Markus play. I am not sure if this game is considered a home game or not, because despite the existence of Erseke’s very nice stadium no home games are played in it. The reason is that in the last game that was played here the fans were so frustrated and angered by what they felt was biased refereeing that they stormed the field and the officials had to flee. But that was after some of the players had also made their displeasure known, and in a physical way. The league suspended a number of players, some for a year or more, and dictated that no more Erseke home games would be played in Erseke, at least this season. Like I said, football is a big thing here…

I guess a lesson in this is a prayer—a prayer that somehow the enthusiastic loyalty to a football team would be surpassed, in the lives of more people in this town, with an enthusiastic loyalty to Jesus Christ. Some of the believers in Erseke show that this is the case for them, but a prayer would be that it would be for more. Sometimes I have felt the same about our country when we get more excited about a sports team than about our faith. Local spirit is good (even when the Mariners lose…and when the Seahawks or Sonics win), but as I was reminded in the first parable I am taught here, our greatest enthusiasm ought to be for our greatest gift, the grace of God…That parable was spoken by a women from the street who invaded a dinner party Jesus was attending. She made a fool out of herself and roused the anger of the hosts with her unbridled enthusiasm for Jesus, but she did not care. Tears of gratitude, kisses of joy and an expensive ointment were her way of thanking him for the grace she had received from him. She was a great fan—and of something more important than a sport--and a great model for us...