Mountaintop Musings: Passing it On!

Well it is Monday morning and it looks to be a beautiful day! I have a fishing expedition to get to with my good friend Jason. But first I have to write this column!

Some days it is hard to decide what to “Muse” about. But today it isn’t; I want to share some highlights from the Vacation Bible School we had last week here in Lincoln. There were eight young people who showed up, and two of them were teenagers who also helped us out quite a bit with the kids. Plus there were at least six adults who helped during the week every day! That makes for a great week (well three days, but five lessons!) of VBS. If you add in all the people who were praying for the classes then there may have been 50 or more people involved!

The theme for the lessons was the “Chain of God’s Promises”. We also had a great mission’s story with “Sunday School Charlie” and his friends Preston and Red Sanders! In lesson one we studied about how sin entered in to the world, but God made a promise to send a Savior (Genesis 3:15). Lesson 1 focused on God’s Everlasting Love (Jeremiah 31:3). In lesson two we looked at a man who trusted God’s promise, Abraham. We discussed real, genuine believing faith and the verse for this lesson was Galatians 3:6. We also looked at how Abraham often gave up his rights, and desire to meet the needs of others. Sometimes he had to go rescues his nephew Lot from bad situations. Abraham not only had great faith in God, but great compassion for others. Those are some things we all need to learn and apply in life. Too often we are focused on our needs and wants.

Lesson three was about God keeping His promise, yes the birth of Christ! Our verse for that lesson was John 1:12…Yet to all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God. That is a wonderful promise and fact! If Jesus Christ had not come in to the world we would be doomed for all eternity. Without a Savior to help us we are each like a 10-year-old getting in to the boxing ring to fight, say, Mike Tyson when he was in his prime. Our opponent the Devil is going to KO us in about 1 second, with no hope of winning!

Then lesson 4 was about how the promised Savior gives new life. We studied the story of Nicodemus from John chapter 3. Our verse was John 3:3…”no one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born-again…” We talked about faith in Christ, the need for a second (spiritual birth), and that a person gets a new name (Christian), a new family (the church) and a new home (heaven) when they trust Jesus as their Savior.

The final lesson was about how the promised Savior suffered. Yes, we talked about the death of Christ, but also the resurrection! We looked at Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53 and the Gospel accounts to see how the death and resurrection fulfilled numerous prophecies and results the greatest opportunity for mankind: new life in Christ! Of course, we had a lot of very good snacks, delicious lunches and awesome crafts to round out the week. Lisa and I made some new friends and were very blessed to be able to partner with so many to share God’s Love with the kids, and each other.

(Dave & Lisa Carroll are area missionaries with Infaith, America’s oldest Christian home mission agency. You can contact Dave at 406.459.8935 or [email protected].)