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KANSAS CITY – The world is coming to Kansas City this summer for the largest sporting event on the planet. As many as one million additional visitors from around the globe may flood into the city for the FIFA World Cup in June and July, and Missouri Baptists are preparing to share the love of Jesus with them.
The World Cup is soccer’s premier competition, involving “dream teams” of the best players from each country’s best soccer clubs. Overall, 48 national teams will compete in the World Cup in 16 cities across the US, Canada, and Mexico, with an estimated total viewership of six-billion people.
Gregg Boll
By comparison, the combined total global viewership of the last NFL Super Bowl, MLB World Series, NBA finals series, NCAA men’s finals series, and NHL Stanley Cup series was approximately 323 million.
For the World Cup, Kansas City will host six games featuring 12 different national teams.
In addition, four of those teams will use the city as their home base from mid-May into July.
Gregg Boll, Director of Missions for the Blue River-Kansas City Baptist Association (BRKC), said the World Cup is a “great (evangelistic) opportunity because the world is coming to us.”
‘Unfathomable’ impact
Pastor Nic Wilson of First Baptist Church, Peculiar, who is leading the BRKC ministry efforts surrounding the WORLD Cup agreed.
“The World Cup is not just a soccer tournament,” he said. “It is a divine opportunity to spread the gospel … not just in Kansas City, but literally across the world for decades to come. … It’s almost unfathomable the scale of what’s happening” in terms of foreign missions opportunities.
He said FIFA, the soccer organization governing the World Cup, “and community officials are communicating to us that we should expect anywhere from 650,000 to one million extra people to come through Kansas City this summer.”
“Out of that 650,000 to a million people that are coming through (Kansas City) the large majority—75-80 percent—are going to be people from outside the United States.”
Wilson also explained that some of the incoming visitors come from countries where missions work is difficult or prohibited.
“There are countries coming to the United States…that are places we can’t actively send missionaries to,” Wilson said. “Algeria. Tunisia. Iran is coming (to the US).”
“They want to hear about America. They’re open to what Americans do. They want to see the culture. This opens a massive door for the gospel.”
To meet this evangelism challenge, multiple Missouri Baptist agencies are coordinating to meet the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of fans, teams, and other visitors.
Wilson said evangelism efforts will be centered around game days, which in Kansas City are June 10, 20, 25, 27; and July 3 and 11. However, those efforts are not necessarily centered on Arrowhead Stadium—where the games will be played—for different reasons, including security restrictions.
However, both Boll and Wilson said plenty of evangelism opportunities abound away from that venue because of watch parties, FIFA events, organizational soccer themed tie-ins, and other activities throughout the metro area.
When four national teams begin arriving in mid-May to use Kansas City as their base camps for training, their fans will shortly start to follow, Boll said, due to the teams’ popularity.
Of the four teams settling into Kansas City, Argentina—the defending World Cup champion—and England are extremely popular globally. (Algeria and the Netherlands round out the quartet of soccer clubs making Kansas City their home for the tournament.)
Missouri Baptists prepare for evangelism efforts
Nic Wilson
Missouri Baptists are planning various evangelistic strategies and activities to meet the influx of visitors.
Wilson said that any individuals or churches interested in helping with or bringing mission teams to Kansas City for the World Cup can view opportunities and needs online at https://mobaptist.servicereef.com/events/missouri-baptist-convention/word-cup-2026-evangelism-opportunity-kansas-city-mo.
When registering, individuals and churches should choose all possible days they are available to provide planners with flexibility in assigning dates.
Interested parties should receive call-backs within two weeks, Wilson said.
He also said that every Missouri Baptist associational director now has World Cup information, and the associations are the best place to start building a mission trip strategy.
The World Cup, Wilson said, provides Baptists the opportunity to do foreign missions for a fraction of the cost of going overseas.
“I was talking to a team that’s getting ready to go to Africa. They’re going to spend 10 days in Aftica…and to get over there and back it’s costing them almost $4,000 a person,” Wilson said. He said a tank of gas will get many Missourians to Kansas City, and local churches will be opening their buildings as lodging for missions teams.
He said BRKC is hoping more than 2,000 volunteers will have a million gospel conversations throughout the Kansas City tournament.
“Our hope and our goal…is that there are countries transformed because people in Missouri went outside and shared the gospel with people that were in their community for a soccer game.”
Wilson said that because events are scattered around the metro area there will be “intentional missions teams placed around the city at key spots sharing the gospel with people.”
Mission teams will be provided with World Cup-themed gospel tracts that look like the yellow cards soccer referees use.
However, he emphasized that the tract is only one available tool. “We encourage you to use whatever gospel sharing method, whatever evangelism method, that you and your church are trained in.”
Wilson suggested that churches now “start talking about bringing teams. The quicker they can sign up, the better it is for us planning.”
He also suggested churches remember the July dates will require more volunteers because of the importance of the final games. “Those days will be chaos.”
Incoming groups should also keep in mind the KC summer weather, even as BRKC planners work to ensure the safety of volunteers. Many of the games and activities will be in the evenings and teams will be rotated in work areas throughout those days.
“It is going to be June, July in Kansas City outside. It’s going to be 90, it’s going to be 100 degrees. There are lots of opportunities for people to be useful. We are not going to stick you outside for 12 hours at a time.”
Boll said FIFA sets rules on areas it controls – such as Arrowhead Stadium and official event sites – and evangelism activities may be limited in those locations.
However, Arrowhead parking lots will be closed during games and official event sites may exceed available parking capacity. Boll said that creates opportunities for local churches to open their parking lots where they can “hand out water, invitations to their church activities,” or provide other ministries.
There are also ways for individuals, groups, and churches outside the metropolitan area to serve, Wilson said.
Churches and individuals within a one-hour drive of Kansas City can host missions teams of any size. Wilson said mission teams may consist of an individual, a small group, or dozens.
Parties interested in hosting incoming volunteers can contact Wilson directly via email at nwilson@fbcpeculiar.org.
Wilson said Missouri Baptists can now “start praying. Pray for people to come. Pray for gospel opportunities. Pray for church unity. Pray for resources. Pray that everything runs smoothly. Pray.”
MBC evangelism team offers training for mission teams, churches
Rob Pochek, leader for the Missouri Baptist Convention’s Prayer and Evangelism team, said his group is ready to assist individuals and churches in evangelism preparation.
Pochek said churches and mission teams that want help in evangelism training can get it through his team in person or by video.
Rob Pochek
His team can also possibly help churches acquire other gospel outreach resources.
“We’re helping with evangelism grants to underwrite some of those (evangelism tool) purchases,” he said.
As an example, he mentioned a church that purchased evangelistically-themed soccer balls for outreach.
Churches in Kansas City may see increased numbers during summer
Wilson said that, according to local officials, Kansas City churches may be impacted by the coming crowds, and Kansas City churches may need extra resources and volunteers to minister to the additional people.
“We are telling people in all the churches we work with that if they are doing a VBS, if they do camps, to expect double the turnout than they would normally get.”
The World Cup, Wilson added, gives Missouri Baptists “an amazing opportunity to do gospel evangelism work in our own backyard. As Missouri Baptists we feel burdened for this opportunity the Lord has placed in front of us.”
“I want to see nations and people groups transformed because people in Missouri have shared the gospel,” he added.
He also hopes the tournament will build new and stronger bonds between Missouri Baptists. “I am a firm believer that we are better together. As Baptists, when we partner together the gospel goes further than it ever could (alone).”