Western Hills Baptist Church, Topeka, Hosts Upward Basketball and Cheerleading Awards Night
April 2008
The multipurpose room at Western Hills Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., was a hive of excitement on Monday night, March 3.
Nearly 800 parents, grandparents and other loved ones gathered for the Upward Basketball and Cheerleading Awards Night at the church.
Upward is an evangelistic sports ministry for children in kindergarten through sixth grade. It emphasizes salvation, character and self-esteem. In addition to basketball, Upward offers cheerleading, soccer and flag football programs. Visit the Web site at http://www.upward.org/about.aspx
For Western Hills, the Upward program offers the chance to reach out to its affluent, highly unchurched community. And a sports program fulfills a need for
families there. That was one of the insights from a demographic study prepared by KNCSB.
“A lot of people visit our church because of the program,” said Susan Ladenburger, who directs the basketball program.
Western Hills offers Upward basketball, cheerleading and soccer. Soccer is held both in the fall and spring. Basketball and cheerleading take place in the winter.
Both practices and games offer many opportunities for children to hear the gospel. In addition, spectators at games hear the gospel at such times as half-time during games.
Many parents comment, “My child’s self-esteem grew tremendously,” Ladenburger said.
The church is seeing an especially positive response from children with autism. A couple wrote the church a “Thank you” letter describing the dramatic change in their son who has autism:
“… He loves to play with other children, and his autism has made it more difficult for him to `read’ the social cues of others. So he has been bullied and hurt
because he didn’t understand what was happening.
“We have tried other soccer, basketball, T-ball, etc., opportunities with age peers. As long as our child was in preschool, this worked fairly well. As he has aged, his autism has become more apparent and his age peers have moved on to more competitive play. He has not been able to move on with his age peers. This loss of group sports play was a sorrow to him and to us.”
“[Then] along came Upward sports. At first we were quite hesitant. We were fearful this would be yet another confusing and painful experience ... [But] from
the very first, the ministers, coaches, umpires, other parents and children have been a blessing....”
“Our son’s team of therapists are delighted with the growth we all see as a result of Western Hill’s Upward sports. We are very grateful to your church and people for this ministry.”
Upward is just one of the ways Western Hills reaches out. Mission trips planned for 2008 include the Omaha Baptist Center in Omaha, Neb., Webster Conference Center, Salina, Kan., Greensburg, Kan., New Orleans, Brazil and China.
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