Rico Tice has a passion for rugby and Jesus Christ. Together these twin loves led him to develop a new course which helps make evangelism easy for the average Christian, discovered JEREMY HALCROW.

Evangelism is a lot like a game of rugby, believes the Rev Rico Tice, evangelist at All Souls’, Langham Place in London.

“There can be a lot of pain and you just have to get back up and keep trying,” said the bull-necked former prop forward.

Rugby Union and the Christian faith are constant themes in Rico’s conversation and it is obvious that both ‘the game they play in heaven’ and our Heavenly Father play a big part in his life.

Born in Africa to a nominally Anglican family involved in the tobacco industry, his early education was at mission schools in Zaire and Uganda. His strong conviction is that the missionaries’ prayers for him at that time were answered ten years later.

He remembers little of Africa, saying his early years were very ‘privileged and protected’.

“When I think of those years the main thing I remember is the love of my mother.”

At eight, Rico was sent to boarding school in England, which he described as a ‘Lord of the Flies’ experience.

“You put choir boys together and they won’t love each other, they’ll try to kill each other.”

During this time Rico started keeping a journal that allowed him a degree of self-reflection on his survival in this dog-eat-dog environment. He found he could not deny the innate selfishness of himself and his schoolmates.

“I had the realisation of the utter depravity of human beings. I found out that I was a selfish swine,” he says.
But it was his godfather’s death on August 6, 1982, that made Rico think beyond the present and into eternity.

A 19-year-old friend offered to comfort the 15-year-old Rico with a game of tennis. In between sets, the friend shared Psalm 103.

“Thank God he was brave enough to open the Bible with me because God just opened my eyes as the words were read,” said Rico. “The answer to both the selfishness I had experienced at school and death, which I had just confronted, was Jesus.”

At school, rugby had become Rico’s identity. And this did not completely change when he became a Christian.

“The other boys saw me as a prop forward who just happened to be a Christian.”

A different sort of conversion experience came in 1985 in the ‘gap’ year between school and university. Rico spent the year assisting with youth ministry in the north of England. He said that it was here that he heard God’s call to give his whole life to service of the Kingdom.

“I saw that the leaders’ lives were so self-sacrificing, that their lives were modeled on and belonged to Christ,” he said.

The ‘gap’ year taught Rico there are opportunities to serve Christ in every context. While his rugby career continued to thrive as captain of Bristol University and selected for a English universities representative side, ministry had become the focus.

Indeed Rico’s recently released Christianity Explored course grew out of teaching the Bible to his teammates on a rugby tour. Rico read Mark’s Gospel through with his mates and asked three short questions of each passage: Who was Jesus?; Why did Jesus come?; What does Jesus require of his followers?

One of the first times Rico used this approach, six or seven guys were converted.

“The Bible spoke so powerfully,” he said. “If you open the Bible then God’s word will do the rest. We fluff about with all this other stuff. But all we need to do is open the Bible with our friends.”

Rico is engaged to Helena, a physiotherapist who shares his obsession with sport. “I’ve been ringing her twice a day,” he said, pining over their long-distance separation. “I’ve really been enjoying Australia, but I’d be enjoying it a lot more if she was here.

“It’s all part of a soldier’s life,” he adds.

But there is still some time for fun and games.

Rico describes Helena as an ‘outstanding’ tennis player and they are currently enjoying a ten sport challenge against one another that includes tennis, squash, golf, swimming and pool.

“Much to my humiliation she beat me in rugby conversions,” he said. “We currently stand at two all.”