VBS, Vacation Bible School. What thoughts do these words conjure up in our minds? I guess even a better question we need to ask of VBS is why? Why do we take the time, money and manpower to pull off the biggest children's programming of the year? Evangelism. A good plan coupled with a solid evangelism everyday curriculum is designed to introduce children, teens and adults to the word of God so they can have a relationship with Jesus. The gospel has to be packed into every lesson, every day. I know as well as you that many children may only show up at our churches for this one event and for maybe just a day or two at that. For those naysayer kids who proclaim, "I already know all that Jesus stuff and salvation stuff!" are the kids who don't have a 'heart clue' but only head knowledge. The gospel never gets old for true believers and is fresh and exciting to lost sinners who are being moved by God to repent and believe. (See Acts 16:14 for real proof of this.)
VBS is one of those 'everyone wins' programs. If I only had 10 kids in the church and 5 of them were my own, I would still put on a vbs, invite the community's kids and have a great time. Along with summer camps, VBS is one of those ongoing programs that brings back the fondest memories in us adults. Personally, I don't remember one Sunday school lesson from my youth but I remember camp and vbs and know that Christ was first introduced to me there in the mid 70s.
From my own ministry experience, VBS from Gospel Light has been very good to me and faithfully accomplished the 3 key things I look for in any curriculum: (in this order) 1. The gospel of Christ is clearly proclaimed. 2. The kids through all the elements are driven back to the scriptures as the only way to find Christ and that gospel. 3. Fun theme in all the elements that keep the kids coming back day after day so the first two can be accomplished.
Gospel Light always seems to accomplish that for me.
Ditching a tried and true program for other programming and re-allocating budgets may certainly be what you need to do or are being forced to do but, wow!, giving up a week to spend and be spent on creating incredible gospel memories in kid's lives is totally priceless. Implanted memories that last require two key elements that only camps, retreats and vbs supply: length of time and repetitive imprints. My week long camping adventures on rivers, mountains etc come back to my mind in almost perfect recall as opposed to a little weekend trip or overnighter. Don't give up on VBS unless you can replace it with something equal or greater in total memory recall ability!
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