Village VBS

Ethan, Helen and Dan Buckwalter, and Weston flying out to the villages of Alaska.

Last week Ethan flew to Perryville, Alaska to help with Vacation Bible School. The two previous weeks he had spent several days a week preparing for the VBS by memorizing skits, coloring posters, learning songs and motions, and getting familiar with the program.

Ethan was asked by Helen Buckwalter of Northern Harvest to help out with the village VBS this year. A friend of Ethan's and Helen's grandson Weston is also helping out. Buckwalters have been village missionaries for 30 years, circuit-flying preacher all year and VBS in the summer to many villages on the Alaska Peninsula.

They are making two stops this summer for a 5-day VBS program in the village of Perryville and then Port Heiden. They flew out several days late from Homer because of bad weather, but hit the ground running with VBS the day after they arrived. I talked to Ethan today as they were packing up their supplies and getting ready to fly to Port Heiden for their second 5-day program. He said the first week was great...they had a lot of fun...and the weather was nice to be able to be able to play games and have a picnic outside with the kids. When Ethan returns this weekend(weather permitting) I will get him to write and post some pictures of his adventures!

Ethan was also very excited about flying in a small plane out to the villages! He has been talking for the past year of someday being a pilot for missionaries, so this adventure was perfect timing. He was thrilled to see first hand what it means to be an Alaskan bush pilot...hurry up to get ready, then wait on good weather...fly around tall cloud pillars...fly under rain clouds...observe beautiful landscape below...and bring the gospel to the village kids! On their return to Homer Ethan gets to fly "co-pilot", I'm sure he will have many stories to tell!

The plane Ethan is in taking off from the Homer runway (you can see the plane against the hillside).