Each church has its own rate of turnover, and at my church it seems to happen fairly quickly. Whether it is the turnover of pastors, or members of the congregation, or Christian-ed directors, it seems every two years or so the church is almost completely different. This means that the people I worked with going into 6th grade when I started are no longer there. Sure, some of the kids I had in my crew have grown up and are crew leaders themselves, but not many. Since no one knows just how long I’ve been doing this, the older adult volunteers treated me this year as if I had no clue what I needed to do. It also seemed to slip their attention that I’m going to school for Elementary Education.
So this year, I was in charge of Chadder’s Dockside Drive-In. All I had to do was do a little talking and show that day’s section of the movie. No big deal. They make it so anyone out of elementary school could do it. Except that I was put with an adult who signed up the morning it started, and had never done anything like this before. Okay, fine, I can deal. Except the directors made it sound like I was helping her. I know I’m young, but would it not make sense to have the inexperienced person help the one who knows what they’re doing?
It turns out, in the end, that she only came for two days out of the five. Which means that her little assistant had to run it almost the entire time. Good thing I knew what I was doing. Except the directors kept jabbing at the wound they had already made and the first day my helper wasn’t there, they went and scrounged up someone to help me. I still to this day do not know why. It couldn’t have been for adult/child ratio, because we had way more crew leaders than we needed, since at the moment we don’t have very many kids at my church. I understand that in, oh, about two years, that will change though.
So lets just say, that this year did not go as I anticipated.
I’ll admit, I grumbled through the rest of the week. Until one of the last days. We were at the Firefly Finale portion of the day, and sitting up on the “dock” was a cross with rope lighting on it. I figured that it was for some sort of skit, and I was secretly hoping that Pastor Jenny was not going to be portraying Jesus like she had portrayed Pharaoh earlier in the week. However, it turned into something so much more. Miss Holly had the crew leaders grab a black garbage bag and then have the crew members hold on to it. They were told to think of something bad they did, or a sin, and to put it into the bag. The leaders then put the bags over the lit cross. It was sad to see that our sins extinguished the light of the cross. Then, we sat and started to sing “You Are My King (Amazing Love)”. Down the main aisle walked a figure dressed as Jesus(and no, it was not Pastor Jenny). As we sang, he took the bags one by one, crumpling them in his fist. Then, at the key change of the song, he held his arms out like on the cross, the “sins” in his hands, and the light shining again.
I can not even begin to tell you how moving it was. I looked around the room, and noticed that there was a difference in the faces of some of the kids and adults alike. Any anger I had felt fled, and despite every bad thing that had happened in the past few days, I realized this is why I come to Vacation Bible School; to see the growth of children in God’s love. I hope through your lives you get to experience something similar; the feeling of complete humility and awe as you behold such as amazing love that spans from the youngest child to the oldest adult.
“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.” 1 John 3:16
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