Today I want to say thanks to every VBS promoter, teacher, transportation provider, ice cream churner, learning center participant, craft artisan, and hoarse Booster belter in our great fellowship. I’ve been to VBS somewhere for at least 60 years, excepting one COVID year, and most years, to multiple ones. I’d say I’ve been a booster. I’d say, in all of that time, I’ve had hundreds of people encourage me through the various Bible schools in ways that I can never even fully know. Here’s to all of the people that made some great VBSes happen this summer.
You’re tired. But I know you. You are already on to the next evangelistic opportunity. But the next one might not be as effective as all that amazing tender-heart-touching that you just finished at those learning centers after those kids quietly filed out hoping to win the quiet banner.
A friend, Bob, told me a true story a few years ago, about the power of one invitation to VBS. Bob was visiting in another area of the country and was eating supper with the local preacher, Dan. The conversation went something like this:
Bob: So how did you become a gospel preacher?
Dan: Well, I grew up in a non-religious home and I went to college and married Sara. But marriage was harder than we thought. We were young and selfish and the children were taking a lot of energy and, to tell the truth, we were both ready to call it quits. We fought all the time and our marriage was in bad shape.
Bob: I’m sorry… but you made it!
Dan: Yes. As you can see, we have survived and we are very happily married. To make a long story short, one night was very bad and Sara said “Let’s just get a divorce.” We had thought of that many times, but this time it was an awfully dark time and I said “Why don’t we try to go to church somewhere before we give up? Let’s just try that one more thing. Who knows? Maybe there will be someone there who can help us…talk to us…direct us.
But Sara said “Where would we even go? I don’t even know where to start. Church seems like a big thing to do if you have no clue.”
Bob: Well, she was right about that.
Dan: Well, I knew that, but I was desperate. I told Sara to wait a minute and I went upstairs and pulled out a little trunk of things I’d kept from my growing-up years. I rummaged through and found a little Bible that I had been given when I was a little boy at a Vacation Bible School in our community. I could not remember the name of the church, but I opened up the Bible and there it was, stamped on the inside cover. It was the church of Christ in the little town where I grew up.
Bob: Well, how about that!
Sara (beaming at Dan): He said, “Why don’t we try the church of Christ?” The rest is history.
Dan: The people were kind. The preacher there and his wife became our friends. They helped us immensely.They studied with us and he baptized us. They modeled a good marriage. A lot of people did. Christianity saved our marriage. We kept learning and growing and one day, a couple of years later, we decided to go to a preaching school and here we are.
I don’t need to comment further. This couple was doing a great work in a place where the gospel was desperately needed. Their providential direction was on the inside cover of a VBS award Bible. No one in that little Bible School likely ever knew of the great good being done because of one invitation to VBS, one teacher, one effective Booster, Booster. Colleyanna sat at my dining room table and carefully thought about friends and made her little invitations for them to come to our VBS last week. She sent out a bunch of invitations. (Ezra did his at home.) 
Wouldn’t it be so great if some marriage is blessed, some soul is baptized one day, or some little boy grows up to be a gospel preacher because Colleyanna or someone else who brought visitors to Bible School, took the time to invite?…And then all that army of people took on the massive effort to build, craft, churn, teach, sing and be a Booster?
Photos credit: Katie Holder.
My uncle, who was a great gospel preacher, was traveling once in California. Preaching there in a gospel meeting, he met, for the first time, the local preacher in that California town. In casual conversation, my uncle learned the story of that young preacher. Raised in a non-religious home, he’d been invited by an elderly lady in his community to attend a Vacation Bible School at the local congregation of the Lord’s church. He had been given a little New Testament as a “prize” for attending the VBS as a visitor. That little boy grew up and married and, as is often the case without the Lord, began experiencing serious marriage problems. Before throwing in the towel and giving up on their marriage, the husband suggested that they try attending some church together. They agreed to go somewhere, but neither knew where to begin to choose a church, Then, this preacher remembered that packed away in an old foot locker, was his New Testament, given to him so long ago at that church where he had attended that VBS, as a kid. “Let me go get that and see what kind of church that was. We could try that one.” He looked in the front of the Bible, and sure enough, it was inscribed and gave the name and location of that church.
I do not know if such a contact was made at the VBS that we just completed last night at the West Huntsville church. I do know that four amazing accounts of Biblical bravery and obedience were etched into the minds and hearts of a pretty big group of children. I know that they will never forget Jonah, Naaman, or Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. I know one little boy who became very pumped about bringing visitors to hear these lessons. I know about a little train that choo-chooed up and down the halls, a candy bandit, a coloring contest and about little bottles of water from the “real Jordan” that the kids counted as a prize possession. I know about puppets that taught application stories from the lessons and about Cole the Mole, a rodent who helped facilitate the contests for knowledge at the end of each evening.
I know my husband went from yard mower to ice cream maker, to Colley the miner, to Elisha and back to Colley and then to child taxi homeward each evening. I’m having a hard time getting songs like “Go dip in the Jordan” and “There is no God like in Israel” and “He was angry…Naaman” out of my head. I know it was a privilege to be a singing wave in the Pharpar river this week. I know it was amazing when we plodded right on through on Tuesday night with no power/lights in the building during that storm. (It was kind of perfect for the mining theme…hot and dark! And I loved that the video of that night was to the a cappella soundtrack of “Send the Light.”) I know it was powerful when a man, coincidentally made the decision to be baptized at the conclusion of the week’s events… and our children were privileged to witness this right in the middle of the ice cream supper in our fellowship hall.
I don’t know if this event will produce a gospel preacher one day. but I know as we sang in one of our Naaman songs “The power in the hand of God, nobody can ever tell.”