With hot summer days typically come flip flops, swimsuits and beach vacations. However, at First Baptist Church in Greenville, members are experiencing a different type of vacation.

From Monday to Friday, approximately 200 children filtered into the hallways and classrooms for the church’s annual Vacation Bible School.

“We just started Monday and the theme this year is Amazing Wonders Aviation,” Children’s Minister and VBS Director Angie Harris said. “Our motto is Awesome God, amazing power.”

The week ended Friday with a lunch celebration where parents were invited and children sang at a worship rally.

Teachers and parents also volunteered through the week bringing the grand total of people involved with the program to 293.

“This (number) is higher,” Harris said. “This year is above average. We’re excited.”

The committees geared up back in January of this year to start planning for this one week.

“We actually start in January, and we have been preparing since January for this,” Harris said. “We have a children’s committee that helps and so many more people outside of that.”

Throughout the week, collections have been taken up to raise money for the Alabama Baptist Children’s Home, which provides foster homes, group homes and emergency shelters for children, and Operation Christmas Child, a program to provide a small box of toys and gifts for children all over the world who might not otherwise have any gifts for Christmas.

“We had a huge competition between the boys and girls to see who could raise the most money,” Harris said. “That’s a very exciting thing.”

Harris hopes that beyond the arts and crafts, music and games, that the children will learn something along the way.

“Hopefully they will come to know Christ, and make the decision to be a Christian through this,” she said.