As families plan summer holidays to exotic destinations and to visit friends and family, often local community churches focus on the development of young minds and souls, making plans for vacation Bible schools.
Stettler Alliance Church held its vacation Bible school for a week on July 20–24, teaching kids about God and how to create a deeper relationship with Him, through activities and lessons presented in an environment of fun.
This year the focus of the vacation Bible school program was Everest: Conquering Challenges with God's Mighty Power!
Each day of the week had a different theme and all activities on a given day were tied into the daily theme.
During the three hours, kids were moved along the five stations that had been created for them – games, Bible stories, video and imagination, before ending with snacks.
The children started every morning at the base camp, watching a skit, singing praise songs and discussing how God’s presence can be felt in our lives.
Then they moved on to one of the five stations.
The games station had various activities such as clothes-pin tag, yak race, telephone and finger tag. At the Bible story station, kids learned what the Bible had to say about the theme of the day. With science experiments like snow making and creating rubber balls, the imagination station was one of the most sought after. And finally the video or KidVid station was where the theme of the day was reiterated through videos of children talking about God.
Crew leaders who had volunteered were in charge of various groups and would lead and supervise children through the activities.
“It is an amazing week of fun and fellowship,” said Angela Wildeboer, supervisor and coordinator of the program. “This year we had 80 kids go through the program. Many hands work hard at making this a success.”
Children of the program were also asked to fundraise for developing countries. Through this program, participants raised enough funds in five days to purchase 137 bibles, which were sent to Thailand.