How does everyones church feel about your sanctuary being decorated for bible school? We ran Monday through Friday this year with a Sunday family night (tonight). I had assumed that to make life easier that all decorations would have gone up last Saturday and came down Monday, but that is far from what happened. Does anyone else have this problem?

eagleguy, yes, we are having the same problem. It's only a handful of people, but they are absolutely against having decorations up during worship service on Sunday morning. I would love to be able to convince them that children are more important to God than any building, but I had to learn to keep my mouth shut on this one because there are other battles that are more important for me. Anyway, we are running Sunday night through thursday night with family night on Friday. Our VBS team is going to have lunch right after church Sunday morning, then meet in the sanctuary for prayer, decorate, and start VBS at 6:00 that night. Then we're going to have to take decorations down the following Saturday. It's a time crunch, but will be worth it to keep the peace in the church. With any luck next year we will be in our new children's building and won't have this problem! Anyway, I know how you feel about it.

I guess we are one of the lucky ones. The people let us decorate the santuary for VBS the week before VBS and on Sunday morning the preacher and the choir are seating on the first few pews of the church. No one seems to mind the relocating for a day. We will have VBS Sunday night - THursday night.

Our family night was tonight, and yes, I took my afternoon to redecorate the sanctuary for the parents, after being made to take everything down Saturday night. Our "core" group of members (you know, the ones that actually come to Sunday morning and Sunday night) showed up for the service tonight. Many of them made comment about the decorations and wondered why they weren't up this morning. Sadly, I think the main person who wanted the decorations down was our Pastor (or his wife the music minister). Oh well, I'll keep them in my prayers, and ask that you all do as well. I'm sure we're not alone as a church that has a lot of problems, but ours are getting ready to finally erupt, and it's quite scary not knowing what the outcome will be.

I guess I'm really blessed like craftsarefun is. We've never had anyone say anything about us decorating the sanctuary. Since we have our family night on Thursday night and that means either missing a lesson or having 2 on 1 night, we start our VBS on Sunday morning. That means that our VBS teachers teach the first VBS lesson during Sunday School. Since we start on Sunday morning, we have all the decorations finished, including the sanctuary,and our morning service is built around VBS. Last year we did our "Heroes Hall Of Fame" induction ceremony and the music was build around heroes (Legacy and Thank You). Even the sermon was based on being a hero. On Thursday night after we're finished we have a marathon "take down" session for the main areas and classrooms. We have the option to work on Friday or Sat. but we're all pretty tired and want to get things put away.

We decorate for promotion/publicity purposes all around our church months ahead of our VBS, but I make sure none of the displays are in traffic areas, inconvenient, etc. - I set them in corners next to entrances. I do usually decorate the sanctuary the Saturday before VBS, and our choir is given that Sunday before VBS off, since their choir loft will hold a volcano this year! They also have the Sunday after VBS off, since we have our Family Night then. The classes used for VBS are allowed to stay decorated, but I always ask the teachers to make sure there are chairs and tables set up as they found them for the Sunday after VBS. It's a balancing act: show enthusiasm for the children and VBS, but not to inconvenience others in the church.

I changed our family night to Friday evening a few years back. We have about twice as many out. I think many forget by Sunday. We went from about 125 to about 250 - 300+ last year. That way you can take it all down if you need to on Friday night or Saturday.

Out Pastor is awesome. He has asked that we have our decorations up before Sunday. That is the last effort for promotion. The kids and parents get really excited about it when then see the SET up. We hold our VBS Sun-Thurs evenings. Then we get most of the things taken down that night when most adults are there to help. Some teachers take theirs down after their last class leaves so they do not need to come back yet another time. This past summer was tough with the price of gas. The only thing I find frustrating as the "Decoration" person (Sanctuary, halls and last year a class room for another person who was stretched thin and was not able to decorate, is the clean up. So much of it falls on me ALONE and it tiring. Some of the things are heavy and difficult as a woman to do alone. I have asked for a clean up committee - hopefully we will have one that are all available on the same night. I think this is also a struggle for our director as she also gets stuck with STUFF to find a new home for!

We're also really lucky. Our sanctuary is decorated for about 2 weeks before Bible School starts and for about 1 week after it's over. Everybody loves seeing the decorations, so we leave them up as long as we can.

We are lucky, too. We decorate the week before VBS. Our VBS begins on Sunday evening. Last year during Outrigger Island a lot of our workers, Pastor and Music Director wore Hawaiian shirts on Sunday morning. We have maybe two or three people who do not like the sanctuary being decorated, but they are not too vocal about their opinions. VBS has changed through the years and I think it important to make sure that our church is kid-friendly. Some people may think that decorating takes away from the emphasis of VBS. I really think that all of the elements work together to share the message of Jesus. The Game Day Central theme was one where we really got into the decorating and everyone really enjoyed it. The kids loved it and could not wait for Outrigger Island last year. They are already wondering what we will have for Boomerang Express. I think that it is important that we do everything we can to reach children for Jesus. Are the decorations our number 1 priority? No, but if the excitement and involvement of our workers helping to decorate and spend time in their classroom causes them to put in more time studying and preparing to teach, then everything we do is worth it. Our VBS was blessed last year with 14 children accepting Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. This was an answer to many prayers. Before Game Day Central, we had to beg people to work in VBS. In 2008, we were not able to have an Adult VBS because every classroom except for two were in use and the majority of our older adults were helping in some capacity throughout the week. The two classrooms that were not used, were utilized to store chairs from classrooms so that we could seat more children on the floor. For the past two years other churches have passed on their decorations for us to use. On Friday evening after our Family Fun Night, our members are really good about helping to take down the stuff and put things back in order. Also, for the past two years, we make arrangements in advance to pass on the decorations to another church.