I am bad at soccer. Like really, really bad. Being a competitive person, it takes a lot for me to admit defeat and say that I am legitimately awful at something. But when it comes to things I’m bad at, so far I’ve got mini golf, waiting until the last minute to pack, cooking, and soccer.
I have the arm of a softball catcher, the height of a basketball forward, and the reflexes of a volleyball libero. All sports where my hands are what are primarily used to react to and defend myself from things flying at my face. So with soccer being everything that has to do with your feet, I am naturally the worst at it. Which for an athletic person is highly unfortunate since it is the most universally played sport around the world.
So yesterday when I decided to step on to the turf and play barefoot, I was asking for it. Now, let me give you a little background on me playing soccer with kids in other countries. It inevitably happens every where I go, and every time I legitimately think that I am going to be able to hang with these kids who came out of the womb kicking soccer balls around just because I’ve played sports my whole life too.
With that, the injuries I’ve succumbed to are less than ideal.
In Nicaragua I came away with two bruises that showed every facet of the ball that nailed me in the leg twice (as in two different times, why didn’t I stop playing after the first time it hit me that hard? That’s a great question.)
In Haiti, the kids thought it would be fun to try and teach me some tricks. What did I do? I tried to so some fancy kick flip and nailed myself (yes, self inflicted) in the face. I do not even know how I did it, but I do know my nose started bleeding and thanked Jesus I wasn’t wearing glasses.
In South Africa, I just flat out ate dirt so many times in one game my knees and hands looked like I did face down snow angels on gravel.
And finally, in Honduras I at last admitted defeat and swore I would never play again after a group of children coerced me into playing a game in the street with them. It ended with me seeing stars after a ball hit me in the back of my head and a finger that got bent way too far back.
When it came to this next year I knew what sport I was going to come up against. My nemesis that is soccer. Now don’t get me wrong, I can hang with the rough and toughness of sports, more often than not I’m the one who provokes it when I play anything, but with soccer, it never works in my favor.
Subsequently, yesterday in Albania when I went for the ball, everything happened in slow motion and I knew it was coming. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the kid coming. He had a glint in his eye that told me to get out of the way. But of course my unjustified highly inflated athletic ego did not listen to the common sense side of my brain that reminded me how awful I was at this sport. So he slide tackled me and ripped my toenail back. I wasn’t even a little bit surprised.
I pushed my toenail back into place to wait for it to predictably fall off and watched as my bright red blood slowly trickled out. My first thoughts: Why was I not wearing shoes? Great question, Kelly Anne, you definitely should have been wearing shoes.
But then I looked up. I saw the feet of at least 10 orphans playing barefoot, in socks, in sandals, or in tennis shoes that were flopping off of them from not being tied they might as well not have been wearing them. They were so content, so joyful to just be playing something they loved.
Here I was with my bleeding toe pouring out on to the turf, almost in tears at the beauty that was before me. These were children of God who were plucked out of their families for whatever reasons, all together in this beautiful place. It was like I got a glimpse of heaven. Their faces were lit up all around me with wide smiles stretched across their faces. They could have played for hours. I barely lasted 45 minutes before I was injured.
“Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as there.” Matthew 19:14
I like to think that when Jesus spoke those words He pictured the joy written on His children’s faces running full on sprint towards His open arms. It didn’t matter the shoe situation going on with them, it just mattered that they ran without abandon to a Father they knew with unconditional love. I was reminded of what it meant and looked like to be a child of the King and to run toward Him with the freedom they did.
I can only imagine that Jesus would be right in the thick of things playing with these children, probably with a few banged up toes himself.
