V.B.S. Blues

Summer in Odyssey means Vacation Bible School at Community Church, and this year Ned Lewis has come up with something new. Ned is a teenager who teaches the sixth grade class, and he has written a sketch for the kids to perform in the little theater at Whit's End on the last night of the week. The costumes are ready. The scenery is painted. Ned, however, is standing in the middle of it all muttering "Why me?" under his breath.

When Whit finds him there and asks what is wrong, Ned explains that the trouble is not the props. It is his cast. Eugene Mumford - a boy everyone calls Muggsy - has shown up at Vacation Bible School this year with his two friends, Hank Shorter and Junior Bascomb, and Muggsy is the ringleader. The boys hardly ever come to church except when there is a picnic, and their first few days were spent swiping cookies and staging chalkboard eraser fights. Then Ned announced that the class would put on a sketch about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace, and the three boys began whispering to each other. Ned knew right away that something was brewing.

Sure enough, when Ned asked for volunteers, Muggsy's hand shot up first. Nobody else in the class was willing to take the three lead parts, so the boys got them - even though Muggsy cheerfully called the characters "a pool rack, tool shed, and a billy goat." The rehearsals went downhill from there. The boys had never heard the story before, and they peppered Ned with questions about who exactly was going to throw them in the furnace and whether they could bring along a fire extinguisher. They wanted the idol music to be rock and roll. They played cards inside the furnace. And to top it off, Pastor Williams stopped by to say that the fiery furnace is his favorite story, that plenty of parents will be watching, and that if the evening goes well, the church drama program Ned has been dreaming about might finally get started.

What bothers Ned most is not the embarrassment. It is his fear that the boys are not learning a single thing. Whit gently points out that nobody but God can really tell what is sinking in, and he reminds Ned how Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego got out of the furnace in the first place: they trusted God, and God took care of them. The lesson, Whit says, is not only for the sixth graders.

That night the sketch goes on, and it is every bit as wild as Ned feared, complete with ad-libbed lines and a "That's all, folks!" at the curtain. Ned is ready to find another church. Instead, Pastor Williams tracks him down to apologize for doubting him, because parents have been telling him all evening that they have never seen their children have so much fun with a Bible story. He invites Ned to his office in the morning to talk about that drama program.

Then Muggsy and his friends come over. They admit they gave Ned a hard time, they say they are sorry, and they tell him the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego was pretty good after all. Best of all, they ask whether they can come to his class on Sunday. As they run off, Whit reminds Ned that the Bible is a powerful book, and that even when kids look like they are only goofing around, something is getting through. Ned admits he owes Whit an apology for doubting it - and Whit tells him everybody needs that reminder once in a while, then leads the tired young director downstairs for refreshments he has more than earned.