So we just finished 3 weeks of portable-church VBS activity for the summer of 2010… before I declare it the success that it was… let me establish a couple of baselines:

• Activity in and of itself is not a win. Too often in ministry, we measure the accomplishment of an event without accomplishing the measurable impact of an event. It’s not enough to just pull off VBS, but in this case, wins will be measured in new families connected with, salvation, follow-up and resultant guest visits.

• Not everything is measurable. Too often in ministry we measure based on personal bias, past experience, and what “other” churches are doing and forget that God works uniquely through our obedience to His call to activity. This side of heaven, we might not ever know the impact of VBS in the life of a child who attends and is exposed to the gospel of Christ for the first time.

I know those two baselines seem to contradict each other… and they probably do. And that’s okay.

Because I think we are called to pursue Christ and create opportunities for people to connect with others pursuing Him and connect with the life changing gospel. We demonstrate truths that are sometimes more caught than taught.

And I also don’t think that we should forget that, according to Paul, God is able to do more than we can ask or imagine… more than we can measure. Sometimes obedience is the point, and God’s glory matters much more than ours. And His glory surprises me. Often.

So, all of that said, VBS 2010 was great… we did 3 VBS 3-day events in 3 communities in Cypress. We abbreviated the curriculum, adapted to a portable mindset, and clearly accomplished one of our goals: to take VBS to the communities we are trying to reach. Our great Cypress kids team also involved new volunteers, connected with new kids, and saw almost 20 kids cross the line of faith.

There are things we will do much differently.

There are things we will do much more of.

There is still much left to be done.

It was sweaty…

…and it was good.