What I Learned from VBS Last Night

Vacation Bible School has been a blast.  The Cave Quest theme deals with man being in darkness and Jesus being the light of the world.  The church has been transformed into a cave, especially the upstairs!  The workers have been phenomenal.  Last night, I was sitting outside observing the outdoor activity.  It involved two people having to walk through a gauntlet and cross over three hurdles all while being pelted by wet sponged, shot at by assailants carrying super soaker water guns and having buckets of water dumped on them at various points along the path.  It was a real eye-opening experience.  Without consultation from the coordinators, I quickly figured out what this event was representative of. 

Of the two people walking, one of them was blindfolded and the other was not.  The un-blindfolded person was to act as the guide for the blindfolded person.  They helped them maneuver through the gauntlet and all the while they were also taking the exact same punishment.  My spiritual eyes were opened immediately and I thought "Wow, that is the exact same way that Christ walks with us!"

What did I learn?  Here are my thoughts about that event and how we can apply it to our lives:

1. We NEED a guide in the Christian life.  None of us are equipped to walk the narrow path alone.  We have Jesus and we have the Holy Spirit to assist us.

2. We WILL be attacked along the way.  The water guns and the sponges were indicative of the fact that the Christian life is not a perfect life.  We will face challenges every day of our walk.

3. At NO POINT does Jesus leave our side.  Through the obstacle course the guide and the blindfolded person were joined at the hip and the guide could not leave them.  It is the exact same way in the Christian life.  Jesus said in Matthew 28 that He would be with us even to the ends of the earth.  The Moses said to Joshua, "Be strong and courageous...He will never leave you nor forsake you." (Deut 31:6)

4. There is an END to the attacks.  The obstacle course had an end point.  So do troubles in our lives.  David said that weeping endures for a night but joy comes in the morning.  We know that God can bring good out of bad and therefore we endure until the good comes.

5. We MUST walk by faith and not by sight.  We will not always know what is coming around every corner of our lives.  We must have faith in Christ to see us through our difficult moments.  Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.  Faith is not blind, it is based on God's promises.  We must hold on to those promises even if we do not see them at the moment.

I believe that VBS this year will have a transformative effect on our church and on the youth that we are reaching.  I pray that God would illuminate the minds of everyone involved.  I know that He definitely illuminated my mind last night.  God's grace and peace be with you.