Crab Football
15 minutes
Very simply, this is a game of football, but with each player adopting the crab position. Split your group into two teams, and set out an appropriate size of pitch and goals to go with the amount of players on each team. There’s not going to be too much rapid movement so don’t go too big with the pitch. For extra comedy, try and get your hands on an oversized inflatable ball. Each player gets into the crab position, leaning backwards with nothing but the soles of their feet and palms of their hands on the floor - no bums! Then, kick off! Don’t play for too long as it’s pretty hard work, perhaps make it first to three goals, or have five minute games.
Scattergories
10 minutes
Give each person a copy of the FIFA Scattergories worksheet (or make your own version with different categories). Players work on their own for this game. Choose among yourselves a letter of the alphabet and write it in the top box of the first empty column. The idea is to, within an allotted time period (two to three minutes), think of something beginning with that letter for each category in the left hand column and write it in the corresponding box. When the time is up, allocate points and score (maybe encourage your young people to swap sheets). If players have no answer for a given category they get zero points. If they have an answer, but it is the same as anyone else’s answer they get one point. If they have a unique answer for that category they get three points. Players are trying to find unique answers for the most points. You can play a few rounds, and add your own categories as suits your group.
Who’s the greatest?
5 minutes
This is the question all good football and FIFA-themed conversations turns to, and a FIFA-themed session wouldn’t be right without it: Messi or Ronaldo? Gerrard or Lampard? Pass and move or solo skills all the way? Let your group spend a few minutes simply talking about their FIFA experiences: who’s the best player in the game? What’s the best goal they’ve scored? What’s their biggest win (and loss!)? Do they attack, attack, attack, or shut up shop and get 11 players behind the ball?
The Ultimate Team
10 minutes
Say: In FIFA, your Ultimate Team plays best when you have good ‘creative chemistry’. You need the right players in the right positions, playing alongside those who best compliment their skills and abilities: a mix of strong defenders, hard-working and creative midfielders, speed on the wings and finesse and clinical finishing up front.
Give a copy of the ‘No “I” in Team’ handout to each member of the group and discuss it as a group. Then read 1 Corinthians 12:14-20 together. Say: Paul is talking about the Church as a body. God has deliberately created each of us differently with different roles to play in his Church. Ask the young people what they think their role might be.
Key Point 1
You are amazing! God created you just how he wanted you to be, with gifts and skills that he deliberately and specifically gave to you, and he wants you to use them for the good of his team - the body, his Church. God absolutely loves his Church, even more than you love your Ultimate Team on FIFA! The Church, you and me, as broken and as flawed as we are, is God’s plan for his world. He wants us to discover the gifts he’s given us, to use them abundantly for him, and to point others to him by doing so.
What are my gifts?
10 minutes
Depending on the size of your group, you can do this all together or in small groups. Give each person an envelope and a sheet of A4 paper that they can tear up into the same number of pieces as there are people in the group. Each person then writes their name on their envelope before passing it to the person on their right. That person then writes on one of the pieces of paper something they appreciate about that person, a gift they perceive them to have, or something they like about them. Continue this process until the envelope has gone full circle and people can open it, have a look, and (hopefully) be encouraged.
Manager mode 10 minutes
This is where we get to be the boss - to buy and sell, to choose tactics and to lead our team to victory. Ultimately there is one person in control in this world: caring for us, leading us, wanting the absolute best for us, loving us. Turn to the following passages together and think about what they tell us about God, about ourselves, about his world, and about his plans for us. • Jeremiah 29:11 • Psalm 139:14 • Genesis 1:27 • Genesis 1:31 • Psalm 19:1-2 • Revelation 21:3-4.
Key Point 2
God has made a world that he absolutely loves. You and I are the pinnacle of his creation and he longs for a relationship with us, so much so that he sent his only son to die in our place so that we might have that relationship. He is in complete control of his world, caring for it, watching over it and he wants us to work with him in that in how we care for each other and in how we care for his world. Ultimately he will fully and finally bring about his perfect kingdom, with no more sin, no more suffering, no more pain, no more tears. He invites us to be there with him.
Sas Cutting is the youth worker at St Andrews, North Oxford.
Andy Mcconville is the youth development co-ordinator at St Michaels, Chester.
