Paul Banta’s Life Testimony

In 1952 my life got saved by polio Vaccine. In 1965 I got saved from an automobile accident and in 1983 I got saved from hell.

Jeremiah 29:11-13 says, “God has a special plan for me and it’s a plan that is good and not bad and I will receive it if I pray and seek God wholeheartedly”.

Sure wish I read that verse and followed it years ago, but I realized His plan and His will for my life were for me to go through allot before He had my whole heart. What a friendship I now have with a living Savior and a wonderful calling which he gave me as the passion He had planned all along.

In 1952 I contracted polio. I was 7 years old and remember that I lost the use of my legs. I remember getting vaccinated and passing out cold from the site of a needle at the doctors office. Soon I got the use of one leg back and then eventually the other. I believer I would have died if the polio vaccine had not been invented.

In 1965 my girl friend and I (now my wife) where drive from Massachusetts to NY to visit my parents. On a curvy country road I reached behind her head to adjust a pillow to make her more comfortable and the next thing we were doing two 360′s in mid air. While in mid air my Christmas present from my dad, a brand new bible, came out of the locked glove compartment and my hand somehow landed on it while in mid air. I yelled out God save us. It was open to the book of John when we landed. I broke my nose and she lost a pair of nylon stocking. We were both shook up pretty bad but we both alive and very thankful.

On December 12, 1983 I was coaching at a college in IL. I was heading that evening to a meeting to receive what I thought was to be a raise and a promotion. That night I lost my job and for several hours I don’t remember much after that decision can down on me. It was like I died. I was devastated, embarrassed and I was a looser. I didn’t like that word, “Looser”. Never part of my life being one and yet I found myself in this position for the first time in my life. Where was God in this? How could this happen to a hard working man like me. They told me they had to let me go because of my professional deportment. I was addicted to my work and nothing was more important, not how I treat my players or how I conducted myself to win games.

I got in the car and went home to Joy, my wife. I don’t remember the drive, getting out of the car or even remember much of what I said to her that night. I do remember that getting on my knees in her lap asking the Lord to save me, clean up my life and that I deeply need Him as my Savior. I had been faking being a Christian. Went to church with the kids and wife and really didn’t care much about Christ. I did not take the time to figure it out. I was always so engrossed into being successful in coaching and winning matches.

I grew up in a Christian family. My mother had been a Catholic, but turned Protestant when marring my dad. We started off as a family in a Dutch Reform Church, then a Presbyterian Church and at the end my teenage years attending a Community Church. I think it was Baptist. It was so borrowing and uninspiring. When church life could have been so full for a teenager I found it was borrowing. As for our family we never read the scriptures or were not encourage to a youth. I got my first Bible at age 18, late for getting an early start on life scripturally. We did read the Christmas story every year! We were though loved and disciplined when needed. Being the middle son I usually did the most to deserve the strap and got the best of it from Dad. Later on I look back on it all a do feel sorry I put him through the agony of having to strap me many times. He did however teach me to work hard and encouraged me in my sports endeavors, as he was a former athlete. His teaching and mentoring me to play and work hard proved to be my way to life and later my destruction.

In 1984 I got a new coaching position at NCAA Division 1 University and went onto be again very successful as a coach as in every other position I had since I started coaching in the 70′s. The job started off great but in time I again started to over work myself and neglect all else around me at the expense of my spiritual life. I knew Christ but He did not have my heart completely. My heart was with Him but soccer still controlled my life. The addiction of being successful and winning was more import than my complete relationship with my Lord.

I had a boss who was out to fire me and I gave him a good opportunity to put his hopes into motion. After an incident with one of my players in early September of my 13 season, I was suspended by my boss for the remained of 1997 season. He told that I needed a rest and a break and would come back to my job in January. In January he fired me. The immediate response was a huge hurt and pain for me, family, players and friends, but later in time and as the days, weeks and months flew past me, I really believed God wanted this for me. He wanted me and my heart fully. All of this caused me to I begin to rely big time on God, falling deeper in love with Him. I began to read His word, sharing my testimony, mentoring men and going on mission trips. I went on a trip with a bunch of guys in my church to the Dominican Republic to help build an orphanage. The trip was lead by a friend of mine who would later help me influence my life’s path for the Lord. Our last night there the group of guys starting talking about getting committed together to raise enough money to buy what it would cost to build another home for orphanage. I’ll never forget what my friend said to us, “God doesn’t want your money he wants your heart”. Those words cut deep into my heart. I need to give Him all of my heart.

Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understand. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He’ll make your path straight.”

While walking on the beach one day in February of 2001 I became convicted to fully to make a big effort to only lean on Him only and that I would not use my strength anymore, something which I had done for so many years. I actually felt so comforted that I committed myself that day to what ever I was to do next in my life, that it would be for Him always and never for me again and that if He wanted to take soccer away or use it to sever Him than it was up to Him and not me. I gave up soccer that day for me. My cry would be forever, “for Thee and not me Lord.”

In the Spring of 2001, I was challenged by the same friend that lead the D.R. mission trip I attended to use my passion for the Lord and soccer to serve Him in ministry. Quite frankly I was unsure to think that I was to serve the Lord by using soccer, not knowing where this was to start or what it would even consist of or where it would happen. After another mission trip that Fall, this time to Guatemala, I realized that around the world there was a huge need to bring youth and adults to know Christ through soccer. Global Soccer Ministries, International was created.

Philippians 4:13 says, “I can do all things through Christ who give s me my strength.”

It has been through the empowering of the Holy Spirit an in my life and the increasing of my Faith in a living Savior and stepping out using the talents that He has given me to pursue a path to pursue for Him and not for me.

If you are a soccer coach, I’d like to hear from you. pbanta@sc.rr.com