Today we’d like to introduce you to E.J. Lee.
Hi E.J., so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
My husband, Matthew, and I have loved and played sports our entire lives. We love playing, watching, coaching and officiating all kinds of sports. So when our first son turned 4, our families started to ask us when we were going to start him in sports. Oddly, for people who seem to love everything about sports, there was a resistance in our hearts to sign up for anything currently out there. So we played sports in our backyard and in our driveway as we thought about what we wished was out there. I reached out to a ministry colleague in Arizona, Ty, whom I knew did something with a sports ministry. After a couple of calls sharing what was on our hearts and what our vision was, Ty shared that their Arizona sports ministry had been praying for 2 years to expand out of Arizona but hadn’t found the right people yet. They felt we were the right people! Then began about a year of learning how to start and run a youth ministry and planning how we would do it here in Minnesota. We also saved as much as we could that year, so Matthew could leave his job to be our ministry’s full-time launch man. On February 26th, 2024, we had two babies – our fifth son, Larry Lavern Lee, and we opened up Paladin MN to the world. Our website went live and our first registration was open, t-ball for 3-6 year old boys and girls (3-4 division, 5-6 division). No one had ever heard of us, so how would anyone sign up? We prayed, a lot! “Lord, please send us enough kids to play!” Matthew went around the NW Twin Cities to talk with as many churches, preschools, daycares and homeschool groups as possible. He shared who we are, our mission and our values. Praise God, we had 32 kids and their families play with us that first season. We had two 3-4 teams and 2 5-6 teams. We took a risk, we tried something that we knew could fail. The Lord provided. Play ball! We just finished our second year of Paladin MN. We’re now serving boys and girls up to 12 years old, playing t-ball, baseball, soccer, flag football, basketball and floor hockey. We could not have imagined the growth we’ve seen in our first two years. We will never forget those humble beginnings and we are still grateful (and pray for) every single kid (and their family) who plays with us. We love how sports bring people together. We are a Christ-centered, family-oriented ministry in the local community. We’re always looking for more ways to bring families together. Last year, we participated in a few local town days, did 3 free clinics for our community and hosted a field day for some local homeschool groups. So far this year, we got families together to pack meals at Feed My Starving Children, were a part of the Called Women’s Conference, repeated the homeschool Field Day and are hosting our first Family Kickball Tournament. Creating spaces where families work together, play together and just hang out together is one of our biggest joys in this ministry!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
We’ve had to take a lot of risks as we’ve started this ministry. When we open up a new sport or increase the age range from the past year to this year, the question is, “Will enough families join us?” When we tried launching flag football our first fall, we only had 7 total kids signed up by the time registration ended. We had to call all those families to deliver the hard news. We thanked them for signing up with us as we were so grateful and we told them we’d love to have them play soccer with us instead (which we were running at the same time flag football would have been). We wanted to give them enough time to find a different flag football program to sign up for if that’s what they wanted to do. Delightfully, all 7 were super gracious to us and said they’d love to play soccer instead. They just wanted to be with what we were doing, even if it wasn’t their top sport choice. Last fall, we took another risk. We tried it again, knowing we might need to have more tough conversations. We were so thrilled to have 48 kids that time around. It even ended up being our first sport with 11 & 12 year olds and our first sport with an official. It was a ton of fun and we’re excited to do it again this September-October.
The other challenge has been getting enough parent-volunteer coaches. As a ministry, we keep our registration cost as low as possible for families. So, we rely on parent-volunteer coaches. Because we’re a newer program, many families are signing up for the first time without knowing us personally or what to expect, so most are reluctant to sign up to coach with so many unknowns. Matthew, my dad, my sister-in-law and I all did a lot of coaching in our first two years. Thankfully, as we’ve grown and gotten older, we’ve had more and more volunteer to coach. We even had 5 teams with assistant coaches our last basketball season! This not only allows us to have more teams but it gives Matthew and me the ability to better serve our families including those who coach with us.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Matthew and I have been married for 10 years. In March, I gave birth to our SIXTH son, Stuart! We like to say we now have a half-dozen boys! When we were kids ourselves, we were both very active. Matthew was good at every sport he tried and was especially good at wrestling, basketball and baseball. I was also naturally athletic and enjoyed playing all kinds of sports. My favorites were basketball, tennis and softball. I had the privilege of being inducted into the Mankato East Athletic Hall of Fame in 2023. Another highlight for me growing up was being a fastpitch softball umpire from ages 16-23. Now that we’re parents, not much has changed. We homeschool our 6 boys and can almost always be found playing something. We are outside all the time. We also play a ton of board/card games and are always up for a good trivia challenge.
It’s been pretty amazing to see how God put me in certain positions and gave me opportunities growing up that I am now seeing as a mom, teacher, coach and ministry leader. Although I only had one sibling, I was constantly babysitting and nannying from age 12 throughout college. I started coaching as an assistant to my dad when I was in junior high. Starting in middle school and throughout school into college, I was the student body president of multiple organizations, including student councils/governments. I was Varsity tennis and softball captain. When I was 21, a friend I was mentoring told me I should apply to be the youth director at her church. I ended up getting that job and being a youth director in churches for almost 10 years. Through these experiences, I learned how to speak publicly, how to take risks (to “try” things!) and how to manage my own tasks and time. I grew in my abilities to plan and organize events and to lead groups of people. I’ve made plenty of mistakes, tried plenty of things that didn’t work and gotten nervous speaking in front of people. I am so grateful for all of it. It trained me and shaped me into who I am today.
Our vision for Paladin is to create a place where families come together to learn, play and fellowship. We want to provide a high-quality sports experience that, at the same time, doesn’t come at a huge cost for families or take over their entire schedule. Our mission is to share the Gospel with all the kids who play with us. We pray at practices and games, the coaches do a short devotional/talk going over the week’s Bible memory verse and character trait. Hand-in-hand with that is helping to equip parents to teach and disciple their kids at home. We have free Bibles at all of our games, from storybook Bibles to Action Bibles to FCA Study Bibles. One of the unexpected joys of running a sports ministry has been seeing the friendships that develop between families. Families that set up play dates, parents encouraging one another and sharing advice, teams setting up a cookout after the last game, etc. As a family who has 4 sons (so far) participating in the sports as well, we’ve also made many friends in our first two years of running Paladin MN. Matthew has recently started a “Paladin Dads” pickup basketball night which has been such a great way for dads to get together. Another thing that makes us unique is our “parent tunnel” after games. At the end of each game, the fans make a long tunnel for the kids to run through as the families cheer them on. It is such a joy to see their faces as they run through!
In terms of your work and the industry, what are some of the changes you are expecting to see over the next five to ten years?
In the next 5-10 years, we’d love to expand geographically as well as in our program offerings to families. We have families come from all over the cities to play with us in Anoka. When we find the right people to serve as site coordinators for us, we will add additional Paladin MN locations. Matthew and I will train and lead site coordinators who love the Lord, love people and love sports so that we can provide families in all four quadrants of the Twin Cities a place to play close to home. Right now, we have recreational level programs for 3-12 years old. When we have the right coach, for any sport, we will be able to move into the club sports space. We would also like to have a level that bridges the gap between recreational and club. There are kids who are playing with us right now who will turn 13 and not want to play at the club level. Others want a step up from recreational but not the cost or time commitment of club. We want to create a place for those families. These spaces would still hold to our mission, vision and values. A healthy and positive sports environment in the local community that is Christ-centered and family-oriented. Additionally, we desire to see Paladin as a positive force in the community at large – creating and offering places and spaces for families to get together and grow together.
Desiring for all families to be able to play with us, we offer scholarships to all who need them. We offer both partial and full scholarships.
Pricing:
- 3-9 years old early bird (regular) pricing for 6 week sports program (6 practices, 6 games) = $75
- 3-9 years old late price for 6 week sports program (6 practices, 6 games) = $90
- 10-12 years old early bird (regular) pricing for 6 week sports program (6 practices, 6 games) = $90
- 10-12 years old late pricing for 6 week sports program (6 practices, 6 games) = $105
Contact Info:
- Website: https://paladinsports.org/minnesota/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/paladinsports.mn.nwm
- Other: minnesota@paladinsports.org
