Our Church The Lighthouse Christian Ministry – Ormoc is currently conducting Vacation Bible School. For some Churches, Vacation Bible School or VBS is a yearly activity that the Church is hosting to cater the spiritual needs of the children creatively. However, VBS at times can be expensive which is an impractical activity (financially speaking) becomes for some churches.
Thanks to some friends and cooperative work and partnership from some other ministries, conducting VBS has become a lot easier. So why do it? Why do we need to conduct VBS given the chance?
It gives an opportunity to convince children to study the Bible – Convincing the children to attend a Bible Study may not be too appealing for them. Children want to play. They don’t like sitting for a long time listening to your exegesis.
However, telling them that they’re going to have some fun like playing and most of all it comes with snacks. It will certainly give a ring to their ears and inviting other children is certainly a bonus. So it’s not just about sitting in the classroom and just listening but it’s a fun way to experience the Bible.
It gives an opportunity to engage with the children creatively – VBS is not a bunch of brochures and modules that you are going to present to the children. It comes with creatively made visual arts. Some of it will be made by the students themselves. So it’s not only the teachers who will be creative, but also the students who will be attending.
Children listens to the stories, do some crafts, sings, and even dance. It brings out creativity in each participant to VBS.
It gives an opportunity to experience the 7 ways of learning – One of the best things that a child can get from VBS is that, they experience the 7 ways of learning:
- Visual – Visual arts are present.
- Aural – They hear the story.
- Verbal – Teachers ask questions and students answer.
- Physical – They have physical activities like play time.
- Logical – They are encouraged to think.
- Social – Coming to VBS is socialization itself.
- Solitary – They are given some crafts that their need to do alone.
It gives an opportunity to reach the parents – The best part is the last part of VBS, graduation. What we do here is we invite the parents to attend the graduation time. Part of the program is a short exhortation, a simple gospel presentation. Now it’s planting seed to the parents. Remember that children do not decide on their own. Often times, parents do have the control over their children.
So if that heart has been opened to the gospel, then parents can be convinced that their children is in good hands if they continue going to the church and attending more activities.
In our personal experience as church, parents has never been so opened to send their children to the church when the seed planted in their hearts starts to grow.
So there you have it. If you have a chance to conduct VBS, then do it.
