Greetings bloggers!
Hot off the heels of our rather quick vacation, we are right in the hot middle of our Vacation Bible School here at Laboratory Presbyterian Church. The entire building has been turned in to the beach, because our volunteers are awesome, and we’ve had about 45 or so kids join us each night to hear stories about God, dance and sing, and enjoy each other’s company. In spite of an outsized need for caffeine for this tired pastor, it’s been a tremendous week of ministry so far.
My job has been to run the middle school group, which as far as I’m concerned is the best possible job available here at VBS. These kids are right at the point in life where the questions are starting to get bigger, the thinking getting a lot deeper, and their desire for God is getting stronger. Throw in a few games and some outrageous snacks, and you’ve got a recipe for success. Now, I’ve never been much of a cirriculum guy, preferring instead to write my own, so thus far at VBS I’ve been kind of winging it. There’s a schedule, sure. But it’s very much written in pencil. I know some of the big points I want to hit along the way, but I’m mostly letting the journey take us where it wants to take us.
But that said, one of the big points I want to hit along the way is a practice I stole from a previous Vacation Bible School experience, that of God Sightings. With the littlest of kids, it always starts out with them having seen God in a butterfly in the park, or the way their dog licked them when they got home from VBS that day. Which, while we as adults might scoff at a little bit, I kind of wish I saw God more frequently in the butterflies around me or the way my dog licks me. The truth is that while we might be looking for God in the big moments that come with sunsets and orchestra scores, God is available in the everyday kinds of things that we are all too often oblivious to because we’re stuck in our own heads. But these kids are on it. They know exactly where to find God. Everywhere.
What’s that line about from the mouths of babes?
This year with the middle school has been no different. They are seeing God in creation all around them. They are seeing God in their friends that surround them every day. They are seeing God in the walls of our church, sure, but they see God way more outside those walls.
And so part of the reason that I lead these teenagers in this practice is because I want them to get used to noticing God places, and to get used to telling other people about it (Presbyterians…struggle with this). But I also want it for me. I want to be able to see how they see God in the everyday kind of things, in a way that I wish I could.
How do you see God these days? Where has he shown up for you lately?