“VBS sure is FUN! Bring your friends in one by one!” Our pastor’s wife wrote this song as the theme song for Vacation Bible School at our home church. They sing it every year. But let’s face it. Sometimes, for missionaries in a third world country, VBS is not fun. It’s fun in the States when you can run over to Christian Supply and buy the latest packet of VBS resources; you can find everything you need in one convenient place. But my church people here in Haiti are not going to understand anything about the Arctic Outpost or any of the other VBS themes that are the rage for this summer. For me VBS means planning lessons, games, snacks, and crafts, all around a theme that I come up with on my own. And surprisingly, it works (most of the time). A visiting short termer complimented us on how well-organized our VBS was last year. So, how can it be done?
- Decide the length of the VBS.
We have done a 1-Day Children’s Crusade, a 3-Day VBS, and a 5-Day Day Camp. Our decision as to length is based on the amount of help we have. We usually plan these events when we have visiting teams or individuals. It takes a while in your church plant to get your people to the point where they can be leaders on their own. We use visitors as teachers and instructors at the different stations and our church people as guides. Normally we do a 3-Day VBS. It is just long enough for the Holy Spirit to really work in the hearts of the children, but short enough to adapt to a team that is staying only one week. This also allows your team members a chance to be involved in something fun which can see immediate results.
- Decide the audience of your VBS.
What? Isn’t VBS just for children? Not in a third world country where schedules are flexible. In the summer we usually have a VBS for children one month, one for the youth the next month, and one for adults the following month. If we don’t, the adults and youth get mad. We just change the format of the games and the preaching or teaching styles.
- Decide the theme of the VBS.
First of all, I pray about it and seek the Lord’s wisdom and direction. Secondly, I look through old VBS materials that I can adapt to my situation. Usually any 5-day story can be shortened to fit into a 3-day VBS. Here are some good sites to research when looking for Bible story materials to use for VBS. 
I have found that Bible stories, not missionary stories, work the best in third world countries. Our children just do not understand enough about other cultures to completely understand a missionary story.
- Choose verses, songs, games, crafts (more discussion later) and food to go along with each story.
I have found that EVERYTHING needs to be very simple. Most of the time we are dealing with 150-200 children. The more complicated things are, the more out of control they get. A word about crafts – unless they are SUPER SIMPLE, do not attempt them. Most of them are not even going to make it down the dusty road to the house. However, if the craft is one that can be repurposed in the home and is easy, then it might be worth it.
Here is a website that shows an example of one craft we did last year:
Washcloth Fish (We omitted the fins and eyes.)
- Use the Station Schedule.
Most of the time you do not have the space or the qualified teachers to divide your children up by age groups. Also, many of our kids do not know how old they are. We divide our children into 4 groups each with several national leaders per group. We have our VBS set up into 4 stations: Verse, Story, Activity, and Snack. We have visiting Americans run each Station with help from either our children (who speak Creole, 
luckily we have 4 children) or someone who can translate. Students spend approximately 15-20 minutes at each station until someone rings a bell to let them know when to go to the next station. One important thing to remember is to always travel in a circular pattern to rotate stations or your national guides will get confused. Also, we have a beginning assembly to get them started and excited about the day and then we also have a closing assembly where we give the invitation. Both of these assemblies are usually led by the national pastor.
Now, what do you do with all of this information? Have Fun at VBS of course! And to help you with that I am including several things that can take the load off in planning for your VBS for this year, especially if you are in Haiti.
The first is a schedule for a 3-Day VBS with the theme of Beginnings. I included the schedule and the verses in Creole just in case you are in Haiti. We used the visual aids from Bible Visuals International (link above), but you could also use the A Beka Flash cards or any other flannel graph that you have. We made the bubbles ourselves out of dish soap and glycerine and made homemade blowers out of pipe cleaners. The kids really had fun with this!
The second one is a schedule for a 3-Day VBS with a Fish theme. This was fun as well. We translated the song “I will make you fishers of men” into Creole so I have included the visuals for that too in with the document for the verses.
The third is our 5-Day Deaf Camp schedule around the theme of the Wordless Book. We used the A Beka Salvation Series Flashcards for visual aids for this story. This could easily be adapted to a 5-Day VBS. I won’t go into an explanation of all of the crafts or games here, but feel free to leave a comment or email me with any questions.
The rest of the song says, “Fill the church up, way up fill it to the door; then we’ll go and get some more.” VBS can be a lot of work, but a church full of children means hearts filled with child-like faith ready to hear and receive the Word of God. Many blessings to you as you seek to reach children during VBS this summer!
Family Field Adventures 