Fruits of Our VBS - Our Pride and Joy!

Our volunteers for the VBS camp this year

August 8, 2015

I have been organizing a church summer camp for years since the late 1990's. It has brought me lots of joy and satisfaction seeing kids having fun each summer.

The most rewarding part for me is watching our young campers coming through the camp years after years and maturing into responsible young adults.

Training volunteers in our song preparation for the camp

Some of the campers like the experience so much that they start volunteering in the camp when they get older. Consequently,  he/ she becomes a camp leader followed by finding a paid summer job as a camp counselor a few years later!

Eventually,  some young people progress to becoming the assistant directors or director of the camp helping to train other volunteers.

This process has repeated a number of times. There have been a number of young people coming through the camp and pursuing a profession in teaching due to the experiences they have gained over the previous camp years.

J. is one of the fruits of our VBS camp

Beside Y., J. is my proudest student from all the Vacation Bible School camps we have organized in the Greater Toronto Area over the years!  J. was one of my campers when I organized the first VBS in Waterloo. He was not a willing participant at the beginning.

 But somehow after the first week of camp, he liked it and continued to attend our VBS year after year. There was one year when his family planned a vacation during the VBS time period. He refused to go on the family holiday and stayed to help out in the camp instead!

Trying the games on the Volunteer Training Day

J. has been coming to our VBS since 2008.  He just graduated from university in May and already landed a teaching job in South Korea!

Before he left Canada, I asked him to help me to train this year's volunteers for camp. He gladly accepted and did a really good job sharing his experience and training the next generation of VBS helpers.

Seeing young people benefiting from the VBS camp experience and maturing to responsible young adults and helping others - that was one of the proudest moments in my teaching life!

R.T.
Director  - TECA
Toronto Education &
Communications Associates
Conducting
VBS Training Camp
Waterloo, Ontario
p.s. Both young people gained a lot of teaching experience from teaching VBS.
       J. is leaving Canada for S. Korea on Sunday, Aug 16, 2015
      Y. is leaving S. Korea for China on the same day! They just missed each other!