I may be Presbyterian, but I take exception to strict sabbatarianism, not because I’m a fan of Sunday brunches—although I don’t mind deviled eggs after worship—but rather because two of my childhood’s delights took place on Sunday, and I have no intention of deserting either anytime soon.
Growing up in Nairobi, my brother and I woke up early for Sunday school, which started at 8 AM and was a good forty minutes’ walk away. So, our shoes had to be tied and our faces vaselined before seven. And, truth be told, I can’t recall my brother and I ever being long-faced on those early Sunday mornings. What could beat Sunday school?
After the usual lessons, with David and Jesus featuring prominently, we returned home for some television if the school uniforms were clean and there wasn’t any forgotten homework. But no matter what we did after Sunday School, we were anxious to return to the church for Christian Service Battalion (CSB), a Christian version of Boy Scouts. We marched to “Oh when the saints go marching in,” prayed, and were taught scripture, our motto being “bright and keen for Christ.” But above all—and I speak for almost all the battalionians—we played soccer or futa as we called it. The first hour, between 2 and 3 pm, was set apart for the queen of sports.
I was one of the regular champions—my brother says I misremember—of chenga-funga (dribble and score), a game that, I’m sad to report, I never invented. But whoever did, bless his soul, modeled it after WWE’s Royal Rumble.
Chenga-funga is an every-man-for-himself game. Instead of two opposing teams trying to outscore each other, players jostle for the ball, with every individual fighting to be the first to score. Chaos has never been so exciting. After a goal, the scorer ejects whoever they want from the game, and play continues: the goalie kicks the ball, players shove and dribble, someone scores, and another bites the dust. This continues until only two players are on the field: the goalie and the chenga-funga champion.
Many legs were bruised as we chenga-fungad—none broke unless I’m misremembering—for one of the unspoken rules of the game seemed to be: if you miss the ball, don’t miss the leg. So delightful were those Sunday afternoons that my heart sank when I read Booker T. Washington’s recollection of his playless childhood, “I was asked not long ago to tell something about sports and pastimes that I engaged during my youth. Until that question was asked, it had never occurred to me that there was no period of my life that was devoted to play…though I think I would now be a more useful man if I had had time for sports.”
If you had visited our CSB squad in the late 1990s on the dusty field at Africa Inland Church (AIC) Kibera—a church that former Kenyan president Daniel Moi spent a fortune to help construct—you would not only have heard names such as Otieno, Mumo, Rabai, and Langat, but you would have been surprised to hear Juma, Noor, Ibrahim, Swale, or Abdul—hopefully as they were biting the dust because, need I remind you? Musembi almost always won.
One of my friends, Moha (short for Muhammed), despite lacking the necessary skills to be crowned a chenga-funga champion, never missed a Sunday. He may have been a friend, but I never liked having him on my team for a full match, for he played with a lightness of spirit—losing the ball wasn’t a matter of life and death—that seemed to defy one of the fundamental truths in sports: for one to win and rejoice, they have to inflict pain on their opponent.
Some of the Muslims who chenga-fungad with us were willing to spend the rest of the afternoon matching and listening to the Bible lessons. Our battalion teachers never followed up with the Mohas and Jumas. Apart from the usual, do you have any brothers or sisters? Again, where did you say you live? But come to think of it, was there ever an easier opportunity to reach a Muslim?
I can’t pick on my CSB teachers without incriminating myself for the numerous times I’ve taken God’s providence for granted. Even on that dusty field many years ago, I was more concerned that Juma or Abdul would eliminate me from chenga-funga than I was about crafting an eternal friendship. But if I, we, truly believe, as John Calvin would have us, that “every event which happens in the world is governed by the incomprehensible counsel of God,” then we shall be careful to consider the “good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
God ordains our steps and governs the affairs of the world. He even brings significant events to our doorsteps, and a major one is coming next summer: the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It will be the first North American World Cup since the United States played host in 1994. However, although most matches will be played in the U.S., including the final match at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, her neighbors Canada and Mexico will co-host.
The FIFA World Cup is one of the world’s most significant sporting events. According to the governing body, FIFA, the final of the 2022 FIFA World Cup was watched by more than 1.5 billion television and streaming viewers worldwide, with 26 million tuning in from the U.S.
The tournament means different things to different people. For the players, lifting the FIFA World Cup Trophy is a once-in-a-lifetime achievement that few will ever attain, including some of the best talent ever to kick and head a ball—sorry, Cristiano Ronaldo.
For the governing body, the tournament means several things, including expanded youth programs, but if recent revelations are anything to go by, money is central. Talking of mammon, I bet that FOX, the official U.S. broadcaster of the tournament, is working tirelessly to dazzle us and empty our pockets with mesmerizing advertisements. I can’t blame them because, at the end of the day, money plays a massive role in modern sports, and I’m sure that they and many other companies will make bank in 2026 for who can advertise better than what I’ve heard referred to as the United States of Advertisement?
For the many fans who flock to Canada, Mexico, and the U.S., it will be a summer of laughter and tears, with some fans having the ultimate shout of joy when their team lifts the trophy on Sunday, July 19, 2026.
What about Christians in the host countries? It is worth noting that there are individual believers in the aforementioned groups, for if God could have some in the praetorium and Caeser’s household, what is soccer? However, it is necessary for Christians and churches, especially in host cities, to creatively think about engaging the influx of visitors next summer. Maybe churches in host cities could tailor their websites to invite people specifically in the country for the World Cup to worship. What do you think? I’ll leave the creativity and nitty-gritty to you and your churches.
Talking of churches and events, two years ago, while visiting the Greenwood Car Show in Seattle, I noticed that while the businesses, understandably so, had the sign ‘restroom for customers only’—a very dreadful sign if pressed and broke—several churches were open with not only clean bathrooms but free water bottles and cookies. In one of the churches, I noted, and to my delight, that the cookies had received their being from someone who knew their way around dough; an apt lesson for all cookie-serving churches. Did I also mention that the church had coffee, not just any coffee, but beans superior enough for the Seattle palate?
What the churches adjacent to The Greenwood Car Show did is just one example of what churches near stadiums can do in 2026. But remember, a clean bathroom, free water, and cookies don’t give you a free pass for a thirty-minute lecture on the ordo salutis. But if you insist it does, woe unto you if you attempt such a conversation with a Three Lions fan after another disappointing attempt at replicating 1966.
God has ordained that the world sojourn in our backyards next summer, albeit briefly, seeking glory from twenty-two men running after inflated leather. You sure can show them greater glory, can’t you? But whatever you do, don’t call it soccer from June 11 to July 19, 2026, for then, it shall be football.
