By Lindsey Williams
Writing Specialist
Former IMB missionary kid Elena Hart*, who was born and raised in Southeast Asia for 18 years, is a graduate of Mississippi College and is now an elementary school teacher. Hart recounted how overseas Vacation Bible School (VBS) brought her to a personal relationship with Jesus.
For as long as she can remember, Hart attended and loved VBS at the IMB annual meetings held in Southeast Asia. Hart recalled the tropical theme of a particular year, when she was seven years old, “Outrigger Island: Living God’s Unshakeable Truth.” To this day, Hart remembers most of the VBS songs she learned ever since she was young enough to sing on a stage and strum a ukulele-shaped balloon.
“I didn’t think anything different about that year,” Hart shared, “until the VBS teachers had a sit-down talk with us, where we all sat on the floor, and they discussed with us what a Christian life looks like. They said if you are a believer and you’re walking with God, that means you have a Friend Who is always good, Whom you can always depend upon to be good, and Who is always there for you. Naturally, my very logical brain thought, ‘Okay, so a Friend Who is always there, but also Someone you can always look to, to be in the moral right.
“I have always been someone who thinks about my own thinking a lot. I overthink my own motives, asking, ‘Am I doing this because it’s good? Or am I doing it because I want good things to happen to me?’ But knowing that I’m walking with an always good God Who helps me make these decisions, it gave me comfort to know whatever my motive is, He is going to use it. He’s going to figure it out. He has that plan. That was very comforting.
“And I grew up very fearful,” Hart reflected. “So knowing that an all-powerful and always-there God would be by my side, walking with me, was the greatest comfort in the world, because then any fear can be dismissed by the fact I have a loving God Who is here for me. Even when bad things do happen, there’s a reason they happen. Reasoning was very important to little Elena.
“Throughout this discussion, my brain was going rapid fire, figuring all these things out and thinking, ‘Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.’ I had already believed that God existed, because I’ve been blessed to live in a family who brought me up with the truth that God exists, but VBS urged us not to just know the truth but to commit ourselves to it, and they did it in a kind way. It was never pressured.
“Even as a child, I could tell these volunteers who went across the world for us were so desperately, in a week’s span, trying to show us the love that they had for their God, knowing that we grew up hearing about this God, and just trying to tell us why we needed to commit to Him. So after that discussion, I pulled the VBS teacher aside, and explained to her that I wanted that. I didn’t know exactly what words to say,” Hart laughed. “I just said, ‘Yeah, I believe in God, and what you said about us being friends, I want to be His friend.’
“The VBS teacher was so sweet. She was an older woman, and one of the things that has stuck with me all these years is just how nervous she was as she talked to me, because it was so important to her that she said the right things and that I fully believed everything I said. She told me over and over again to stop her if she said anything that I didn’t agree with or I didn’t believe in. She said, ‘You don’t want to make these confessions if they’re not true’ and she talked me through it. Growing up in the family I have, it wasn’t anything I hadn’t heard before, but now in that context, I thought, ‘No, this is me now. This is my personality now. This is what I’m devoted to now,’ as much as a child can be.
“One of the things we learned at that VBS was the ABC’s of becoming a Christian. ‘A’ meant to admit to God that you’re a sinner, repent, and turn away from your sins. ‘B’ was to believe that Jesus is the Son of God and gave His life for you and me. And ‘C’ was to confess your faith in Jesus as your Savior and Lord forevermore. So she went through that word for word – A, B, C – as a prayer. She said it first, and I would repeat after her. Afterwards, she hugged me so intensely and told me, ‘We’re family now, you and I, because we follow the same God.’ At the time, it wasn’t that overwhelming to me, but now it’s an amazing thought that she embraced me as her sister. In the moment, I was just like, ‘Okay, can I play now?’
“But I do remember the change it had on me that night, as a child afraid of my own shadow. The hotel rooms we stayed in always had a sinister feeling,” Hart said, remembering how the locations of the annual conferences were filled with idol-worship, and that even as a child she felt the darkness of a country lost without Christ. “My sister had gone to sleep in a friend’s room, so I was alone, which would normally terrify me. My parents put me to bed and asked if I would be okay or if I needed to sleep in their room. I said, ‘I don’t feel okay, but I know I will be, because I promised God today that I’m going to try to follow Him the best I can.’
“At that, my mom and my dad cried and hugged me. They had found out about my salvation earlier, but this was their overwhelming moment to really see it in me. So they turned off the lights and closed the door, and I remember sitting there feeling so afraid, but then I prayed, which I had never done myself before. It had always been my parents, and I would just go into la la land. But I was praying, saying to God, ‘I’m so scared. I don’t want to be scared. Please make me not scared anymore.’ And suddenly the room didn’t seem creepy. I remember sleeping completely in peace that night and waking up like, ‘Whoa, that’s different.’ As a kid, there was rarely a night when I slept without a nightmare, but then it became less and less. It seemed like as I grew closer to God, the fewer nightmares I had. And that all started with VBS.
“It all started with the overwhelming care of these VBS volunteers to travel across the world, and that’s what gets me now. Every summer growing up, I was only ever shown complete love and affection by these people. They treated us like they had known us their whole lives and that we were some of the most important people to them. These people put their lives on hold to tell the Gospel to a room full of little kids who may or may not listen. They probably had their own kids and grandkids waiting for them in America, but they put that on hold to make sure these children had someone they could turn to and hear the truth from. Working with kids now, I know you can’t tell if they’re gathering anything you say. But you have to have that bravery to try your best to share the Gospel with these children you barely know and will probably never see again.
“I don’t remember the name of the lady who talked to me. I can barely remember her face. But I know if she knew me now, she would be pleased. And one day, in heaven, I will see her again, and how exciting it will be to tell her my story.”
This summer, be steadfast in prayer for the VBS kids all over the world who will hear about the unshakeable truth of Christ’s love for each and every one of them. Pray that these children will commit their lives to Jesus and pray for the volunteers to bravely and faithfully share the Gospel with clarity and with love.
*As a former MK from a high-security location, Elena Hart uses an alias.
