I thought some of you might be interested in how we spent our week with our grandkids.  Normally, we would have enrolled them in the VBS (Vacation Bible School) program at our local church.  This year, their vacation schedule didn’t line up with that, so we decided to put together our own homespun Bible School!  We had a blast!  Everyone was tired at the end of each day, which meant we all slept really well!  And everyone was excited to get up the next day to see what new lessons we would learn from Scripture.  The object lessons helped as did the stories we used at bedtime each night to reinforce what we were learning.  So, let’s take a look at the highlights from our VBS week! We will look at Day 1 and Day 2 this week.  

The Basic Format

The format we used was pretty simple.  Mornings were for the teaching, object lessons, crafts, and activities.  Afternoons were just play time –  bike rides, baseball, and slip and slide.  Our evenings involved a bedtime story or two that introduced the topic for the next day. It was interesting that the kids noticed how everything tied together.  Our middle grandchild commented that he liked the way that bed time stories tied into what he was learning.  Neat, right?!  

Day 1: Creation

Our VBS week started with creation.  The evening prior included a bedtime story of creation from the Jesus Storybook Bible followed by God Made Boys and Girls by Marty Machowski.  Our morning started off with the children making a habitat for an animal of their choice.  They had to think about what things they would need in the habitat in order for the animal to thrive.  Each child had a box and an assortment of craft supplies.  We ended up with some very creative habitats!  And Mimi and Pappy had to guess what the animals were based on the habitats. 

We then shifted to the Bible and focused on each day of creation (Genesis 1:1-31). As we worked through each day, we talked about how God created everything from nothing. Unlike the kids, God didn’t need craft supplies, he spoke things into existence.  The children used stickers to record what they learned about creation each day.  We also talked about how the things God created made a perfect habitat for mankind. God called his creation “good’ and his creation of mankind “very good.”  Those are the highlights from Day 1 of VBS week.

Day 2: The Fall

Day 2 was all about the fall.  Bedtime the night before we read Don’t Blame the Mud Only Jesus Makes You Clean and the story of the Fall from the Jesus Storybook Bible.  The next morning we started off by talking about the importance of instructions.  I told the kids they would be making brownies.  All of the ingredients were on the table.  But there were no instructions.  They were pretty confident in their brownie making abilities until they discovered they were not making them from a box!  Deciding for themselves  how much flour, sugar, etc and the temperature and time required to bake the brownies proved more difficult.  We baked the brownies and would have them at lunchtime.  I’m pretty sure you know what happened!  I had a real batch ready for after our taste test.

This launched us into our Bible lesson from Genesis 2:8-17 and Genesis 3.  I reminded them that Adam and Eve were given some instructions by God.  But Adam and Eve wanted to decide for themselves what to do.  And you know what happened there, too!  They decided they knew best and did NOT follow the ONE rule God had given them.  Their decision had consequences that affected all of mankind.  Their spiritual DNA was passed along to us in the form of a sin nature.  We must decide if we will obey God or choose our own way.   After we talked about that, I had them do the Stickiness of Sin activity, which you can find HERE. Believe me, they had fun with that activity!  

Stay Tuned for Days 3-5 

Using object lessons to help children understand the Bible is a great way to get them excited about studying scripture.  And the lessons they learn will stick with them.  Try out some of these ideas with your own kids and grandkids and let me know how it goes.  Next week I’ll give you the highlights of Days 3-5 from our VBS week! 

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