Summer Series #2: “VBS Memories” by Christina Gillim

[This is the second installment in our summer series. Each post is written by college students who are spending their summers working for the Lord and not on vacation.]

Today’s post is written by Christina Gillim. She has a site on Tumblr that you can read here. Enjoy her post!

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So a couple of weeks ago we had VBS at my home congregation and it was so much fun! I helped with crafts so I actually wasn’t able to watch the kids sing, which is my favorite part, but that’s ok. I was encouraged by them in other ways. 🙂

Seeing the kids get so excited about God truly inspires me. It also makes me wonder, “what happened?”

I used to be like that! I used to be so excited about learning about God and how wonderful He is. And couldn’t wait to share that information with all my friends!

One of the nights my 10-year-old sister found all the phone numbers she could of her friends and started calling them up to invite them. She asked Daddy to take her down the block so she could invite the neighborhood kids. She was so excited about sharing God!

One of my favorite things about VBS when I was little was having my school friends at church with me. That feeling of sharing the Lord was amazing! And it didn’t stop with VBS. Some of my friends would come with me to church on other occasions, but not like at VBS.

It was really neat to see the numbers grow each day simply because the kids are asking, even begging, their friends to come!

What has happened to that spirit as I have gotten older? I still invite SOME of my friends to church OCCASIONALLY. And when I do, it’s nothing more than a, “Hey I’m on my way to church you could go with me if you wanted…” without feeling…just kind of in passing.

Where is the excitement? Where is that fire?

I know it can’t just be me who has lost this somewhere along the way. I know this because the church is not growing! At least not from what I can see, and if it is…it’s certainly not growing as much as it should.

We should be excited about Christ and the salvation He brings!! We should be calling up all our friends that we know to tell them! To invite them to Him!

But we’re not.

At some point, we forgot how to be like little children.

VBS is supposed to be for the kids. To teach them about our magnificent Lord. And every VBS I’ve been to has seemed to do a great job of that.

But honestly it does so much more than just teach the kids! If the adults would stop being so busy trying to make everything perfect and just observe the kids, we would be the ones learning.

There is so much that can be learned simply by looking into the heart of a child. So pure. So innocent. So..amazing!

“And Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them, And said, ‘Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.’”- Matthew 18:2-3

So how do we get that back?

At first I was just frustrated with myself and so many others because we have let that happen to us, yet I didn’t know how to fix it.

So I prayed.

Last week I was at Maywood Christian Camp (i.e. greatest place EVER!), and if you haven’t been, the singing there is absolutely amazing! Nothing compares to it! The first time we sat down to sing, one song in particular struck my heart. It’s not a brand new song. And frankly I have sung it so much at devotionals, camps, and youth rallies that I seemed to have forgotten the meaning.

But this night the words rang loud and clear in my heart:

“I stand to praise You, but I fall to my knees. My Spirit is willing, but my flesh is so weak. So light the fire in my soul. Fan the flames. Make me whole. Lord, You know where I’ve been, so light the fire in my heart again.
“I feel Your arms around me as the power of Your healing begins. You breathe new life right through me, like a mighty rushing wind. So light the fire in my soul. Fan the flames. Make me whole. Lord, You know where I’ve been, so light the fire in my heart again.”

In that song I found my answer:

Ask.

It is that simple. We must ask our Lord to heal our hearts and make us like little children again! We have to WANT it, and ASK for it.
The Lord will grant us that! He wants to grant us that! We just have to tell Him how much we want it!

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” Matthew 7:7,8