Vacation Bible School Is Unbiblical - Part 1

I believe that Vacation Bible School is unbiblical. It's a shame that Baptist churches with all the apostate churches partake in this yearly ritual of bringing in kids for a week at their churches. I have several reasons for why I believe that VBS should not be part of any serious, Bible-believing church. And this is coming from a person who has attended, volunteered, and eventually worked on VBS's at different churches. I'm totally against it. The following post will address point one about why it is unscriptural.

VBS Is Not Fulfilling the Great Commission

Vacation Bible School stems from a flawed misunderstanding of the Great Commission which Christ gave all believers. Here's what Christ said,

Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19-20) 

Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. (Mark 16:15)

The command was to "Go," not "Come." Why is the plan to corral kids into church and try to save them there? This model of pulling people into church is the direct opposite of what Christ commanded. Expecting to get people saved by doing things contrary to the way God dictated is not going to result in reaping tremendous amounts of souls for Christ. When God tells us to "GO," He didn't tell us to go invite them to Vacation Bible School, but to preach the gospel unto them.

Am I saying that nobody can ever get saved in Vacation Bible School? No. I am against Christian private schooling as well, yet I went through a Christian school and was saved there. I know that there are well-meaning individuals in Christian schools and in VBS programs, but the souls that are won are fewer than had it been done properly, through God's method. Despite our shortcomings, God can still use a soul-winner even in these circumstances.

Consider this: had the time, energy, and effort that went into organizing, setting up, and teaching VBS been used to go door-to-door soul-winning, how many more souls would have been saved?  If VBS takes up roughly 3 hours an evening for 5-6 days, that's 15-18 hours which could be done soul-winning, and if this is a good-sized church with about ~200 people each Sunday morning, it's feasible to have at least 25-50 people out soul-winning those evenings. Extrapolate those numbers:

• On the low estimate, that's 25 people organized into groups of 2 (12 groups)
• Average would be about 2 people saved per 3 hours of knocking doors
• Over 3 hours, that's 24 people saved each night
• On the low end, that's about 100 people potentially saved with 12 groups over 5 days
• On the high end, with 25 groups out, that's about 200 people saved over the course of the week

Some would balk at those numbers. If I go out soul-winning, I would expect to find at least a couple people who would listen to and believe the gospel over the course of three hours. That's not unreasonable. If you have dedicated, knowledgeable soul-winners out reaping hard, this is certainly doable with the help and leading of the Spirit. Recall how Christ fed a crowd of thousands with a little fish and bread. Or better yet, recall in Acts 2 where a church of this actual size won thousands to Christ through preaching the gospel one-on-one with people from all over the world at the day of Pentecost. God is able to do much with a little - but those few have to be in the fight. You can't have one or two people bearing the gospel-preaching responsibility of the entire congregation. Everyone has to be involved for God's blessing and provisions to be upon the effort.

Do the numbers here reflect how many get saved in an average week of VBS? I highly doubt it. I gave the gospel to some kids the last time that I taught VBS (awhile ago!). That was over the course of the entire week, though. On an average Saturday where I put in hours, I can get just as many if not more people saved. Instead of focusing on fulfilling the Great Commission by going out, VBS workers are slaving away at decorating, buying supplies, organizing, and entertaining that week. This is a case of seriously misplaced priorities.

The gospel that is presented at VBS is often shallow and approached far too broadly. I've been instructed before in the past to go over the gospel each night at the end of the lesson. Firstly, that doesn't give me an appropriate amount of time to touch on every point of the gospel that I would like to. Secondly, by the end of a Bible lesson, the kids are ready to go and have lost all interest at this point. And thirdly, most people in general will tune you out if they don't feel you are addressing them directly. One-on-one is the most effective form of winning a soul for Christ.

A broad reading of the gospel up in front of everybody does not capture an individual's attention like if you were to go up to them privately. My success in soul-winning comes from interacting one-on-one with a person. That way I am able to address any questions they have and go over the gospel at their own pace. The key to winning a soul is to make sure that they comprehend the gospel and don't make a quick, unbelieving prayer at the end. I believe many kids end up repeating a prayer to no avail at these VBS events. When a teacher or a pastor gets up in front of the kids to touch on points of the gospel, such as "Jesus died for you," that's not exactly thorough. Jesus said teach all nations. That means that an unsaved child needs to be sat down and taught how to be saved - why did Jesus die? How did he die? What did he die for? And that's where you come in with the Word of God, preaching it to the child so he can believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved from an eternity in hell. Every time I've been at these VBS's, the preaching has been shallow and broad. I hardly ever see the kids taken aside and given the proper amount of time to comprehend and believe the gospel. And that leads into another point.

At VBS, it seems that the kids are supposed to initiate the questions about salvation. The teachers won't talk to the kids unless the kids approach them first. They call this the "conviction" or what have you, and the teachers should watch for the Spirit's working of "conviction" before they talk to the kid. Matthew 28 and Mark 16 are clear, the Spirit has told YOU to go, not for them to come. How can the kids comprehend what they need to be saved from when the things of God are foolishness to them? How can they understand when the Bible says they CAN'T understand? The responsibility lies on the saved, born-again Christian to approach every single soul he or she can with the gospel. The GO command doesn't just apply to going into the cities and highways, but also on an individual to individual basis. If there is a new person visiting church, GO to that person and approach them with the gospel. If VBS was really about winning souls, I should see countless kids being taken aside and taught the gospel. 

But in truth, it's a dead, vain attempt at fulfilling the Great Commission because it is done in blatant disregard for the command to GO!

God never ordained a school, much less a Vacation Bible School. This is a concoction of man's attempt to do better than the Bible. One last verse in regard to this, 

Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss. (1 Corinthians 3:13-15)

Don't let the wood, hay, and stubble of Vacation Bible School keep you from laying up rewards in heaven. Fulfill the Great Commission by going outside the walls of the church building and asking those you meet that so very important question, "If you died today, do you know for sure that you would be in heaven?" I guarantee you can get more kids saved out soul-winning house-to-house than you can in Vacation Bible School.