VBS on steroids

The only memory I have of vacation bible school growing up would be the summer our church reconstructed bible times in the back yard of the 1st Methodist Church of Halls. There were tents, adults dressed in robes and head pieces, some donkeys and lots of hay and of course those little round cookies that tasted horrible but on a hot summer day with a Dixie cup full of red kool-aid were pretty yummy!

Fast forward to this week...the big city of Murfreesboro and the bigger church of Belle Aire (I mean Belle Aire Baptist: did I mention that Baptist take VBS very serious?) and you've got over 1,000 people attending a vacation bible school on steroids! This was my fourth VBS at Belle Aire and it was as always a joy to participate in. I am thoroughly exhausted but this year the big difference is I'm very tan, probably a pound or two lighter and I didn't lose any children. Why you ask? Because instead of teaching: aka keeping up with 25 little munchkins roaming through the halls from center to center I was a REC TEACHER!

Do you remember Rec in your childhood VBS? One lady commented this week that growing up Rec was the VBS teachers putting everyone in the gym and yelling, "yall go chase each other and here are some balls...we'll be back in 30 minutes." That's not how we do Rec thank you! Yes, I endured the 90 degree simmering heat for 2 hours each day while shooting water guns, throwing sponges at kids heads, showing children how to properly hit each other with a water noodle while acting as a samuri, and continusously yelling "hurry! hurry! Your team is about to be beat!" even though there was no prize in the end. And of course there were the 1,000 popcycles we cut open for the sweating tweens each day "you get what you get so don't throw a fit!" Although I couldn't say that because these were 4th and 5th graders and they were much too cool for anything I was used to saying around my house!

That was the other obstacle (not the cool one I constructed with a baseball bat, hula hoop, baby push toy, cones, and water guns) but the obstacle of "playing cool" around boys and girls who no longer wanted you to hug them and say "ya'll are doing so good!" or "oh, are you okay?" when they just got plummeted in the head with a dry noodle! No, if you made the mistake of doing that they quickly shot you a look of death and put you in your place. I tried to just stand back, get to the point of the game, and shoot them in the back of the head with my water gun! I tried so hard not to let them smell the fear in me each day! But all in all, despite the awkward ages of my groups, I loved being in Rec!

Back to the overall VBS on steroids though. There are choreographed dances to learn, huge stage props with actors in costume each day acting out a story the entire week to make the bible points more relevant to the children's own little lives. There was even a well planned out snack each day that went along with the theme for the day, prepared with loving hands first thing in the morning by a dozen older women in the church. And crafts...oh don't you remember the craft time when we were kids? Ha! I don't really but anyway. They have a whole auditorium with plastic wrap on the entire floor and tables lined wall to wall prepared each morning for the 700ish kids that come through every 20 minutes to make a craft. They had "youth" (7th grade and up) helpers in each class to do the running around and the 'playing' with the kids (or the keeping up with that one child that just always happens to get lost!) I had three lovely youth helpers in Rec...one boy leaving for his freshmen year at West Point, another 15 year old boy who had football practice each afternoon this week and then a sweet petite little thing who was going into 8th grade and home schooled! They made my week a breeze! Now, the idea of giving up a week to come 'work' at VBS when you are a teenager is inspiring in itself and I'm in awe at these children's devotion to being the hands and feet of Christ to these little kids that look up to them in the church! Not once did they back-hand a mouthy child for dumping buckets of water on their head in a "surprise attack"!

My boys love VBS! They come home doing the dances, singing the songs, telling me about the bible stories and the actors on stage ("Did you see the pirates today mom? They had a sword fight on stage!") They are proud of their crafts made each day and brag about what Rec games they got to play in their class. I'm so thankful that they can attend such an awesome VBS each summer and I'm even more thankful that I get to be a part of it's success! Now, I just wonder what their children's VBS experience will look like?