Wow! What an amazing final day at Vacation Bible School 2007! There's so much to find out about. Click here for today's VBS photos, or here for the Tailgate Party pictures. Maybe you'd like to watch today's video update? Or perhaps you want to check out tonight's Halftime Show video? It's all online!

Today's Lesson

Today Coach Hunt met the new recruits who have been working hard all week at VBS. Seeing that they were serious about being on the team, he shared with them the "playbook". We learned the 3 B's of Being a Hero: #1, Believe... #2, Be a Team Player... and #3, Be Courageous. We learned about Paul and other heroes who understood these 3 B's! The recruits left fired up to be heroes, and were ready to run their first play... "Go and make disciples of all nations!" We were challenged to take the field and tell others about the victory they can have in Jesus Christ!

Memory Verse

4's, 5's & K... "Tell about Jesus everywhere you go." Acts 1:8

1st thru 6th... "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." Acts 1:8

Meet My Class

Wrapping up the week, let's hear from Chris McMichen's 1st grade class, and Donna Deel's 6th grade class!

The 1st graders began in the sanctuary with music. It's such a blessing to hear these voices come together and sing to our Savior! Today we got up on the stage to practice the motions to all our songs. We went to drama and listened to Coach Hunt tell us about the three B's of being a hero. In homeroom, we learned a new verse and shouted it as loud as we could. This is how we'll tell the world about Christ...boldly! We had a great time at recreation with Suzanne Mastin and learned a lesson about working as a team to "recruit others for Jesus". God has given us a team to encourage us in our effort to tell others about Jesus! We have had such a great week learning and having fun while doing it!

The 6th grade "servants" have been amazing! We have come together as ONE this week. We are practicing daily serving Jesus in the little things (like sharing cookies and games) as well as in the big things (like memorizing His words). We're excited that we have been a large class focusing on God's game plan for us each day. Just ask one of us what we liked about VBS and we'll have much to share with you!

Recreation

We had tons of fun in recreation today! We played "Join Up Tag", "Megaphone Relay", and "Teamwork". Our lesson today was recruit and tell. By this we mean that we Christians should team up to tell the good news about Jesus. Join Up Tag is played with one kid as a tagger and the other kids run around and try not to get tagged. When someone is tagged they links arms with the tagger and both try to tag others. Megaphone was played with the 5's and K's classes. Megaphone Relay is played with cones and a ball. The first kid in the line takes the cone with a ball on it, runs to the other cone and back, then puts the ball in the next person's cone. Teamwork was played with the 4's. The kids are put into pairs, each with a towel. The first pair put a water ball in their towel, run down, and put it in another bucket. We had a great week in recreation and we hope to see you all next year!

Memory Station

The Equipment Store (Equipping Minds for God's Team) had many customers today! We learned memory verses from our Athlete's Playbook all week long, and "bought" items at the store with all our hard-earned points! We now have God's Word in our hearts and minds.

A group of athletes completed the entire book this week! Congratulations to Ben Stafford, Shelby Lamb and Hannah Horton of the 6th grade class, Eric Meadows and Kyra Hunt of the 5th grade class, Emma Lamb and Laura Horton of the 4th grade class, and Riley Lamb and Alex Jackson of the 2nd grade class!

Missionary

Once we were finished at the Equipment Store, we watched a video about the youth programs offered at Wheeler Mission in the inner city of Indianapolis. Wheeler Mission offers several opportunities to help nurture the lives of the entire family. One of these is through their camping ministry. It's devoted to sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with underprivileged inner-city children and families. Like all of Wheeler's ministries, it exists to bring the hope and reality of our Lord and Savior to a hurting world. The hope is to give children a break from the detrimental influences of crime-filled neighborhoods, and give them a chance to focus on nature and the God who created it.

Totals!

We've been in the two hundred's all week long, and Friday didn't disappoint. We had 220 kids and 91 staff members for our final day of VBS! And wow, an offering of $220.49-the week's highest amount-pushed our grand total to $807.02!! The 5th grade class won the award for most bibles, with all 13 athletes bringing one. The K's-one of the smallest classes-had the most offering with $29.74. And finally, the tied winners of the Spirit Award are the 3rd and 6th grade classes!

Tailgate Party & Half-Time Show

What better way to finish off a great week than with a party! At 6pm, our friends and family joined us in New Hope's back yard for food, fun, games and more! Inflatable castles, lemon shake-ups, and even a pie for a friend with a birthday! Click here for pictures of all the fun! Then it was back inside to get ready for the Halftime Show. John David Webster, special guest (and brother of Jodie!) rocked the house with a time of worship. Then our youngest athletes performed some of the songs they've learned this week. After that, the rest of us squeezed onto the stage to sing some songs like "Sign Me Up" and "Talk About Jesus". Finally, we got to watch a video recapping our week at Game Day Central. Click here if you'd like to see it again!

And that was that.

You're Invited...

If your family doesn't have a church home, we'd love to see you this Sunday at New Hope! We have two services, 8:15am and 10:45am, with Sunday School for all ages beginning at 9:30. Click here to jump over to our church website for more information, or call (317) 769-3647.

Thank-You's

Zach would like to thank Caleb King, Emily Kramer, Rachel Kramer, Justin Langford, Hannah Martz, Amy Raider, Andrew Stucky, and Debbie Ward-those who helped with media for Game Day Central...videotaping, photography, projection, sound and newscasts. We could not accomplish all that we did without your dedication; the VBS kids and I are extremely grateful. Special thanks to all the teachers and teen helpers who provided the content for this website each day. And thanks to Jodie Lamb for putting together such an amazing week!

Remember to check out all the photos and videos from today-the links are at the top of the page. Leave a goodbye message on the VBS Guestbook. See you next year!!