Five anxious teenagers from Polk County traveled to China July 13-26, hearts prepared to share their love for God and basketball.
Ashley Lynch, a recent Polk County High School graduate, made the trip.
“It was not at all what I expected. I was really nervous about going over there because I thought China was really dangerous and that we wouldn’t be able to share God’s word,” said Lynch. “It was really kind of a life-changing experience because it was very humbling and it opened my eyes to how blessed America is and how blessed we are to be able to worship openly.”
The mission trip centered on the girls sharing their knowledge of the game of basketball with youth in the central China town of Xi’an (pronounced She-awn).
Xi’an is home to more than 8 million people and is known for the 1970s discovery of terracotta sculptures of warriors from the third century B.C. In modern times the area is also known for its love of basketball and the clinics held there to teach youth about the game.
The American group that traveled there also consisted of PCHS soccer coach Will Pack and several missionaries from Virginia and across the Carolinas. When they arrived, they expected about 60 children to participate in the basketball camps.
What they got was twice that many – 120 kids eager and ready to learn.
Fellow PCHS alumnus Brittany Phipps and her sister Sarah also made the trip.
“The first day we walked in [the kids] were lined up… and they applauded us,” Phipps said. “It almost made me want to cry because they were so sweet and excited that an American would actually want to come and teach them what they knew about basketball.”
Phipps said the little kids would run up to them 10 times a day just to say, “Hello,” because that was all they knew how to say.
“We all agreed that we wished the camp could have been two weeks because by Thursday and Friday we were finally getting to know all the campers by name,” she said. “We wish it could have been a little bit longer so we could share what we knew about America and what we knew about Jesus.”
The girls, and adults they traveled with on the mission trip, said they did their best in several small ways to be examples of Christian faith to those they came in contact with each day in China. The main people they were able to witness to were the translators that stayed with them throughout the camp and days after of sightseeing.
Lynch said they made a point of offering to pray for people and their families who were experiencing hardship or who expressed a curiosity in Christ.
At the end of the week-long camp they were also able to provide salvation bracelets to each camp participant. The bracelets came with explanations for each bead translated in both Chinese and English.
Each bead on the bracelet stood for a different theme of salvation. Black, red, white, clear, blue, green and yellow beads stood for themes related to sin, Jesus’ shed blood, God’s purity and growth in a person’s relationship with God.
“We’re hoping that might at least be a seed that will have them think about it later down the road,” Ashley Lynch said. “My friends and I were talking too about how it definitely brought us closer and when we were in China there was no doubt we were there to show God’s love to people.”
The two sets of sisters, Amber and Ashley Lynch and Brittany and Sarah Phipps, are all members of Coopers Gap Baptist Church in Mill Spring, which helped the girls raise funds to make the trip. In all, the teens raised more than $1,000 in excess of their needs, which they put toward starting a fund for future mission trips.
The fifth girl from the area, Kailey Russell, is a member of New Freedom Baptist Church in Columbus.
Lynch said she feels the trip had a profound effect on her spiritually. She said she now believes without a doubt that “anything that happens in my life, I know it is what God has planned for me.”