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Buhay Basketball
Faith and Fun
Buhay Sports brings Good News, good basketball to fans
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Joshua Manthe soars in for one of his crowd-pleasing dunks during his Buhay Sports team's tour in early October.
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By Called and Sent Staff PHOTOS
LILOAN, SOUTHERN LEYTE, Philippines—The Harlem Globetrotters have to work hard to get this many laughs.
But the crowd pressed in four-deep around the concrete basketball court here isn’t laughing at Joshua Manthe’s dribbling or shooting tricks. What has them roaring is the sight of a 6-foot-8-inch American dunking over people a foot shorter than him.
Manthe enjoys this little game within the game—the grin on his face as he drives the lane gives him away—but it’s not laughs he is after. It’s audiences open to the Gospel. And in the basketball-mad Philippines, sports evangelism ministries like Manthe’s Buhay Sports team draw big crowds.
And little wonder. Dirt and concrete basketball courts can be found in the poorest squatter villages in the Philippines, the first Asian country to launch a pro basketball league. The Philippine Basketball Association, founded in 1975, currently has 10 teams and is the second-oldest pro basketball league in the world (after the United States’ National Basketball Association).
As classes let out for the day, a torrent of students from nearby Catholic high schools pours in and around the public court right across the street from City Hall. By tip-off, more than 1,000 spectators have crowded in.
Joining Manthe on this trip are three missionaries on staff with his parent agency, First Love International Ministries, and two sons of other missionaries in Metro Manila. They are playing a team of local athletes here as the finale to a six-game tour of Leyte and Southern Leyte, neighboring islands in the central Philippines (see map).
Town to town, the game format remains the same: First Love missionary Dave Clinton plugs his guitar into a portable sound system and kicks things off with a song in Tagalog, the national language. At halftime all the Buhay players sing “Jesus is Alive” in English and Tagalog after introducing themselves.
The basketball might seem the natural draw for the 6-foot-5-inch Clinton, but it’s the music that keeps him coming back.
“I’m a musician first,” says Clinton, 31, a former rock band leader whose parents were missionaries in Manila. “The Philippines probably loves music second to basketball, which makes it a great place for me to be. It’s fun to expand that element with Josh and Buhay.”
The tip-off itself is usually fun. Snickers from the crowd erupt as Manthe squares off against a man who maybe comes up to his chin. Games usually are 20 minutes to a half, with lots of action. Most of the local teams are comprised of quick passers and playmakers who clearly have played some ball together. But Buhay’s height (this team averages 6-foot-3) typically gives it the advantage, especially if Manthe decides to dunk a few, like today.
Manthe doesn’t like to lose—the team went 5-1 on the trip—but he’s adamant that Buhay is here for a much bigger reason. The ballgame paves the way to win hearts.
“It’s fun,” Clinton says. “In the Philippines, you’ve got a captive audience, because you’re playing basketball. You get them thinking they’re going to see basketball, and then you catch them by surprise when you start talking about Jesus. If we came to town saying ‘We’re having a revival meeting,’ we’d get half the crowd [that we do].”
Not that people seem to mind. Most people at the games reach for the Gospel tracts that the players hand out at halftime, and crowds typically are as big at the final whistle as at tip-off.
Buhay recruits Manila-area missionaries to play but also organizes school and church teams from the U.S. and Australia. A sports ministry trip organized by former Faith Academy Athletic Director Jeff Long turned Manthe on to ministering in the Philippines, and he hopes Buhay can do the same for other young people who might not otherwise come.
“There are so many different dynamics in this country that you can’t see in a promotional video or ministry presentation,” says Manthe, 26, who doubles as business administrator at Faith Academy, the world’s largest missionary children’s school. “You have to experience it. I am here because I came on a short-term trip. I didn’t fully understand the ministry opportunities until I got here and saw how these people live.
“It’s an anomaly in a country like this for basketball to be so popular,” he says. “We want to take advantage of those circumstances. I just see so much opportunity to help, to get involved, to make a difference.”
Part of Buhay’s strategy is to work with local pastors. Pastors follow up with spectators who show interest in the Gospel, and Buhay helps to fund pastors that Manthe feels God would want them to support (see Sidebar).
“The poverty these people live in doesn’t allow pastors to have an income,” he says. “The goal is to mobilize them to be able to focus on ministry.”
Better Laboca is one pastor Buhay is helping to mobilize. Better makes about 1,100 pesos ($22 USD) per month pastoring a tiny Christian Church near the city of Bato (map). To supplement his income, he does a little farming and fishing. To help alleviate some of those distractions, Buhay has begun to support him at 500 pesos ($10) a month—a small sum, perhaps, but significant to a pastor who receives less than $2 a week in offerings from his congregation.
“Ten bucks a month, and we’ll increase Better’s salary close to 50 percent,” Manthe says. “It frees up time for soul-winning and tending to the needs of his flock.”
Better met some Buhay players last year during another team tour of Leyte. He helped to organize this tour, reserving court time and putting the word out so that towns would have time to organize teams. And though sports evangelism is popular in other places around the world, this tour was Better’s first chance to take part in it.
“This is a new, unique strategy,” Better says. “Everyone loves watching and playing basketball here. People are not expecting something other than basketball, but we bring God’s word also.”
LILOAN, SOUTHERN LEYTE, Philippines—The Harlem Globetrotters have to work hard to get this many laughs.
But the crowd pressed in four-deep around the concrete basketball court here isn’t laughing at Joshua Manthe’s dribbling or shooting tricks. What has them roaring is the sight of a 6-foot-8-inch American dunking over people a foot shorter than him.
Manthe enjoys this little game within the game—the grin on his face as he drives the lane gives him away—but it’s not laughs he is after. It’s audiences open to the Gospel. And in the basketball-mad Philippines, sports evangelism ministries like Manthe’s Buhay Sports team draw big crowds.
And little wonder. Dirt and concrete basketball courts can be found in the poorest squatter villages in the Philippines, the first Asian country to launch a pro basketball league. The Philippine Basketball Association, founded in 1975, currently has 10 teams and is the second-oldest pro basketball league in the world (after the United States’ National Basketball Association).
As classes let out for the day, a torrent of students from nearby Catholic high schools pours in and around the public court right across the street from City Hall. By tip-off, more than 1,000 spectators have crowded in.
Joining Manthe on this trip are three missionaries on staff with his parent agency, First Love International Ministries, and two sons of other missionaries in Metro Manila. They are playing a team of local athletes here as the finale to a six-game tour of Leyte and Southern Leyte, neighboring islands in the central Philippines (see map).
Town to town, the game format remains the same: First Love missionary Dave Clinton plugs his guitar into a portable sound system and kicks things off with a song in Tagalog, the national language. At halftime all the Buhay players sing “Jesus is Alive” in English and Tagalog after introducing themselves.
The basketball might seem the natural draw for the 6-foot-5-inch Clinton, but it’s the music that keeps him coming back.
“I’m a musician first,” says Clinton, 31, a former rock band leader whose parents were missionaries in Manila. “The Philippines probably loves music second to basketball, which makes it a great place for me to be. It’s fun to expand that element with Josh and Buhay.”
The tip-off itself is usually fun. Snickers from the crowd erupt as Manthe squares off against a man who maybe comes up to his chin. Games usually are 20 minutes to a half, with lots of action. Most of the local teams are comprised of quick passers and playmakers who clearly have played some ball together. But Buhay’s height (this team averages 6-foot-3) typically gives it the advantage, especially if Manthe decides to dunk a few, like today.
Manthe doesn’t like to lose—the team went 5-1 on the trip—but he’s adamant that Buhay is here for a much bigger reason. The ballgame paves the way to win hearts.
“It’s fun,” Clinton says. “In the Philippines, you’ve got a captive audience, because you’re playing basketball. You get them thinking they’re going to see basketball, and then you catch them by surprise when you start talking about Jesus. If we came to town saying ‘We’re having a revival meeting,’ we’d get half the crowd [that we do].”
Not that people seem to mind. Most people at the games reach for the Gospel tracts that the players hand out at halftime, and crowds typically are as big at the final whistle as at tip-off.
Buhay recruits Manila-area missionaries to play but also organizes school and church teams from the U.S. and Australia. A sports ministry trip organized by former Faith Academy Athletic Director Jeff Long turned Manthe on to ministering in the Philippines, and he hopes Buhay can do the same for other young people who might not otherwise come.
“There are so many different dynamics in this country that you can’t see in a promotional video or ministry presentation,” says Manthe, 26, who doubles as business administrator at Faith Academy, the world’s largest missionary children’s school. “You have to experience it. I am here because I came on a short-term trip. I didn’t fully understand the ministry opportunities until I got here and saw how these people live.
“It’s an anomaly in a country like this for basketball to be so popular,” he says. “We want to take advantage of those circumstances. I just see so much opportunity to help, to get involved, to make a difference.”
Part of Buhay’s strategy is to work with local pastors. Pastors follow up with spectators who show interest in the Gospel, and Buhay helps to fund pastors that Manthe feels God would want them to support (see Sidebar).
“The poverty these people live in doesn’t allow pastors to have an income,” he says. “The goal is to mobilize them to be able to focus on ministry.”
Better Laboca is one pastor Buhay is helping to mobilize. Better makes about 1,100 pesos ($22 USD) per month pastoring a tiny Christian Church near the city of Bato (map). To supplement his income, he does a little farming and fishing. To help alleviate some of those distractions, Buhay has begun to support him at 500 pesos ($10) a month—a small sum, perhaps, but significant to a pastor who receives less than $2 a week in offerings from his congregation.
“Ten bucks a month, and we’ll increase Better’s salary close to 50 percent,” Manthe says. “It frees up time for soul-winning and tending to the needs of his flock.”
Better met some Buhay players last year during another team tour of Leyte. He helped to organize this tour, reserving court time and putting the word out so that towns would have time to organize teams. And though sports evangelism is popular in other places around the world, this tour was Better’s first chance to take part in it.
“This is a new, unique strategy,” Better says. “Everyone loves watching and playing basketball here. People are not expecting something other than basketball, but we bring God’s word also.”
© 2006 Called and Sent Magazine. All rights reserved.