Sports Friends Malawi and the Evangelical Baptist Church of Malawi came together for a Basic Training event in Balaka, in Central Malawi, and two major milestones were achieved A recent Basic Training event, held by the Evangelical Baptist Church of Malawi (EBCM) in Balaka district in Central Malawi, saw two notable landmarks achieved. The first was that this was the first such training event the EBCM had organised and funded on its own. The second milestone was marked on day one of the three-day event. That day, 22 June 2017, was exactly five years since the first-ever Sports Friends Malawi Basic Training camp was held. As a denomination, EBCM has a total of around 350 churches situated in the eastern and central part of Malawi. Of these, around 75 already have trained sports coaches/ministers who are working with the youth of the churches. Peterson Kaipa was appointed as the National Sports Co-ordinator for EBCM and he has been trained by Sports Friends Malawi, but this was the first event his Church had staged on its own. “I am just thanking God that this is the first Basic Training that EBCM has sponsored,” he said.
“It is a great opportunity for us as a Church to be able to train our own coaches. Our plan is to roll out this training across the whole of EBCM so that all of our 350 churches will have well trained sports coaches and ministers to take the work forward.” EBCM is the second major denomination, after the Africa Evangelical Church (AEC), with which Sports Friends Malawi has worked over the last five years. A third denomination, the Baptist Convention of Malawi (BACOMA), will soon be brought on board when its first group of coaches will go through Basic Training. All of this is a long way from 2012 when Luke Voight, the out-going Co-ordinator, and Pastor Fostance Mtolo, the new Team Leader, held their first basic training with a group of coaches from AEC.
“We have certainly seen God’s hand at work since we started in 2012 to where we are today,” said Fostance. “We have seen Sports Friends Malawi grow to include almost all of the AEC churches, and now into the EBCM and soon working with BACOMA. Working with new denominations will be the way that Sports Friends Malawi will grow in the future. “But as we develop links with new denominations, we make sure that we maintain links with those who have gone before. So, just because we are now establishing ourselves with EBCM, it does not mean we will just dump the AEC! “We have very good links with them and we shall continue to strengthen them as we work together.” But, as we recently reported in Malawi Amoto, there are some significant changes about to take place within Sports Friends Malawi. Luke Voight, who set the work up with Fostance in 2012, is returning to the USA and has stepped down from the post of Co-ordinator. Fostance will continue the work which Luke did, both in terms of the day-to-day running of the ministry and also helping with training events and camps. Despite these changes, both Fostance and Peterson are confident that the strong relationship that is being built between Sports Friends Malawi and EBCM will continue. “I am confident that our relationship will continue to develop in the future,” said Peterson. “It is no joke when I say we want to have sports ministers in all of our 350 churches. This will be hard work, but I am determined that, with the help of God and Sports Friends Malawi, we can achieve this.” And Fostance is equally confident for the future for Sports Friends Malawi and the way they are rolling out the ministry into new denominations. “Rolling out training to all of the 350 EBCM churches and developing the new relationship with the Baptist Convention will keep us busy over the next few years,” he said. “We will continue to look for more new opportunities to develop and expand our work, and I pray that God will help me in my new leadership to be able to accomplish all of these things.”
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