As soon as I played Wii™ Bowling for the first time I thought, “We absolutely need to have a Church league.”  So we had one last year and it was quite successful.  So successful, as a matter of fact that the league has nearly doubled in size and now has two divisions in it’s second season.

Folks sometimes wonder, however, “Why on earth are you wasting time running a Wii™ Bowling league?”  It’s a good question.  After all, many Churches plan summer missions trips, or take the youth to a myriad of music festivals, or do some other “Christian” event over the summer.  Wouldn’t we be better off doing something like that?

Well, I’m not so certain that a music festival trip is what our fellowship needs, but I will absolutely agree that a summer missions project is something that Central needs to be involved with, and soon.  I don’t see a Wii™ Bowling league as being detrimental to that desire, though.  In fact, I see it as part of how we’re going to get to a missions project over the summer (and continued missional living over the year).  You see as fun as the league is, and it is a lot of fun, it’s also done a wonderful job of connecting people in the church in ways that hadn’t been done before.  By inviting people into their homes to play a match, even people in the congregation that the host(s) didn’t know that well, the bowlers in the league were able to practice (in a small way) the discipline of hospitality.  In fact, before each match the teams all prayed a prayer asking for just that to occur.  It worked – families that had been only distantly connected before became better connected, and newer families in the congregation began to feel more a part of the fellowship.  It was a great experience.

As the folks at Central begin to become more connected to each other in the giving and receiving of hospitality trust will develop as a result.  When people trust each other, and when that trust is instilled with the power of Christ’s spirit, then a group of people called in Jesus’ name can accomplish some wonderful things.

And that is why I bother with setting up a Wii™ Bowling league for our church.