Why is VeggieTales an Effective Ministry Tool?

CM: This is NOT a review of a Television Show. This is about using VeggieTales in ministry - and they have only recently come to television. This is not about them being on television nor is it a review. It is about ministry. Please delete this paragraph before this is published.

Many people ask what it is about VeggieTales that makes them so lovable and wonder why children love them and learn from them so much. This is a very important question as many youth leaders use VeggieTales in their lessons for young children.

The question isn't so much what it is that they can learn from VeggieTales, but why they learn from them. The veggies retell Biblical stories which is nothing new for Christian children's programming. It's been done for years in many different formats.

What really tends to hook the children into loving the veggies are the silly songs. They are usually "Silly Songs with Larry," but there have been some variations from that norm and other veggies have taken on the task of singing a silly song on different DVDs (episodes) of VeggieTales.

However, by taking a closer look at the shows, it probably really is not all that hard to see why they are so much fun and why children (and even teens and adults) can love the veggies so much.

Larry is a cucumber and it is not right to say he is an idiot. However, he is the young, lovable, uninformed, and creative one. He is smart, and people can tell that he is smart. It is just that he is also very naïve.

If it weren't for his friend, Bob the Tomato, he probably wouldn't learn much at all. However, Larry does learn things. He just tends to put his own spin on them and then keep them that way in his mind, yet it seems to work just fine for him.

The silly songs are just that - silly. In fact, they are very silly. When Larry sings them, he can often get himself into trouble.

Archibald is an asparagus and he supposedly runs the show, VeggieTales (yes, the real name and the name of the program ran by the characters is the same). Thus, Larry has gotten himself into trouble with Archibald quite a few times.