Many, if not most, churches plan a mission trip for their teens during the summer. Some are quite the major undertaking - even on an international level - while others may be more locally based. My daughter and son went on mission trips each summer with their youth group - mostly to other areas of the country - but they also went on additional mission trips with groups like Reign Ministries (my son went to Nepal/Thailand, England, France, Spain, Italy, Greece and the Island of Rhodes), Youth for Christ (my daughter went to Mexico) and ZJAM (my daughter went to Costa Rica). I strongly believe in the value of teens being involved in summer mission trips big and small. When youth groups plan a mission trip, typically there is a component of the trip where the teens work with children . . . this is the ideal opportunity to re-use your VBS resources! If your church's VBS is before the mission trip, the teens can help with your VBS - great opportunity for them to prepare for their mission trip and more importantly, helps communicate to the teens serving is not just something they do once a year on a mission trip, but is something they can do in their own church all year!
Engage the teens in your church - 16 and older - as small group leaders, station leaders and helpers for your VBS and then the teens will be able to take what they learned and experienced in their church's VBS and use it on their mission trip! They will be familiar with the resources you used and know what to expect . . . and your church will be able to get more out of the materials they invested in by re-using them on the mission trip! You can even have a mission project for your VBS where children gather supplies or resources for the teen's mission trip! Talk with your youth leaders and see if you can work together to involve the teens in your VBS this summer and provide them with some of the resources they need for their mission trip!
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