Sometimes VBS is Hard.

We were asked to do a VBS for the Agta kids in the village we were staying in...there we about 20 of them...ranging in age from 2 to 15...and no one on our team spoke their language...the person who was supposed to run the VBS had gotten sick and was resting in another village many hours away, so we were starting from scratch. So the 4 women in our team prayed and asked God what in the world we should do...

Our supplies were: some colored chalk, 2 packs of crayons, some lined paper and one very sassy Tagalog speaker (Hazel, she's on staff with me..and she speaks the closest dialect to what the kids could understand..but for those kids not in school yet, they were lost....)

"Mga Anak ng Hari" means "Children of the King." We used the week to teach the kids about their importance to God, and how as princes and princesses in His kingdom, they could talk to Him (intercede, pray) about their country and their concerns, also that He loved to hear them worshipping Him.

We ended up buying about 20 manila folders and tiny little vials of glitter in town, borrowing some broken scissors and making crowns together. We cut out the folders into fancy shapes and then had the kids design their own crowns...even the teenage girls were so excited and wanted to fully participate in the event. The moms that had gathered with us that day, each got to make one too...for the tiny babies they had swaddled to their chests, and for the toddlers who were too young to make their own. I wish you could have seen the joy and excitement on their faces as they wore the crowns that night at the closing graduation. They all marched proudly in wearing their mark of royalty.

Understanding that what we did in those days was impossible, we were simply walking in obedience to what God had shown us to do. It was hot, frustrating and felt pointless at times. But I believe that if even one child or one mom understood their importance to God and that their identity has nothing to do with the poverty they live in, but in the fact that they are children of God, then it ALL was worth it.