After our trip to England, we came back and hit the ground running putting on a Vacation Bible School with our church here in Ādaži. This was the second or third year our church has done this, and it was a huge success! We opened the online registration a couple months ago and had to close it after just a few days because we had so many sign up. Because of lack of volunteers and limited space, we had to cap our numbers at 65 children. The vast majority of these children were from our town, but most of whom are not involved in a church. Their parents were very grateful to have something for their children to do for an entire week, though!

As this is the 100th year anniversary of Latvia’s independence, the theme was all about our country. Each day we “traveled” in a hot air balloon to learn about a different region of Latvia, but also to learn a truth about Jesus. For example, one region of Latvia is known for bread baking – so we learned that Jesus is the bread of life. Another is famous for its clay pottery – so we learned about how God is the potter and we are the clay. We were so grateful for a few ladies in connection with the Baptist union here who wrote all of this curriculum to be used by a handful of churches across the country this summer.

Luke and I both had the responsibilities of leading a rotation all day – Luke led the sports rotation and I led the science experiments! Basically, that included “scientific” experiments that showed the children a truth about the gospel – a visual aid of sorts. We both had to spend quite a few hours preparing to lead these rotations entirely in Latvian. This was no easy task, but it was such a stretching and fulfilling experience. We both were able to share the gospel and our testimonies in Latvian with all of the groups of children, along with all of their leaders (many of whom were teenagers or friends of our church members, who themselves are not a part of a church).

On the final day, the children put on a program for their parents of all the songs they had learned throughout the week. We had many parents come and express true gratitude for what we had done for their children that week. As for the songs, it has been so neat to walk around our neighborhood and hear children who had never before heard the gospel singing songs about Jesus! They and their families have all been invited to come and join us on Sunday mornings, and we are praying for God to grow a big harvest through the seeds that were sown.