Regional VBS Training Readies Churches for Summer Outreach

By Stephanie Heading

Is Vacation Bible School worth it? Wendy Hammock and the SCBO Vacation Bible School Training Team say “Yes!”

For the past few months, the VBS Training Team has been busy traveling to the six regions of Ohio, training VBS directors and leaders how to navigate the Twists and Turns of this summer’s VBS theme. Twists and Turns is the game-based theme of the 2023 LifeWay VBS material. However, conducting VBS is not a game--it is an important outreach to communities around Ohio. 

“Studies have shown that for every person who attends a VBS Training Clinic, 1.1 people accept Jesus as their Savior,” said VBS Training Team Member Wendy Hammock. “We could have 350-400 salvations as a result of our efforts.” In addition, a one week three-hour per day VBS provides the equivalent of seven months of Bible study for kids who attend church twice a month. “VBS really gets kids grounded in the Word,” Hammock noted. 

VBS really gets kids grounded in the Word

The VBS Training Clinics across Ohio saw 288 VBS directors and leaders in attendance, according to Hammock. “We are coming back from Covid,” she said. “We had 250 last year. We used to have 400 attend, but it will take a little while to ramp back up.”

In addition to six clinics in Ohio, the team was invited to hold a training in Michigan. “The host church in Michigan had not done VBS in fifty years,” said Hammock. “They are excited to start VBS again. They were super appreciative of us coming.”

Hammock was happy to see Ohio directors excited to prepare for VBS in their churches. “We want people to get excited,” said Hammock. She was also encouraged by the number of churches who were having VBS again after years of not having it or preparing to have it for the first time. “Of the four churches that attended the VBS Clinic at Bowling Green University in May, three of them had never done VBS before,” said Hammock. “They came with the intent to get a feel for it, but they were so enthused that they told us they were going to try to pull it off this year.”