Tired out of my mind

I can't believe how tired I feel. I think I've been more tired every day this week than I have ever been any other week of my life. Maybe that's not true, and it's probably not, but I'm definitely more tired than I am in a typical week. I just get so tired. And today I wasn't just mentally and emotionally exhausted, but I was physically exhausted too. I spent the day painting a woman's living room and dining room, and I also helped move boxes into her house. We worked from 9-5, and then I cleaned up the paint tools until just before 7. I am just not used to a day packed with manual labor like that. Even though it was tiring, it was good to be helping someone like that and good to be using my body more than my brain for a day. Plus I got to make $!! : )

The reason why I worked today was because it is something we do with the students every other Tuesday. We do landscaping, moving, painting or any other handy job someone might ask us to do. It's such a great idea. We charge $10/hr for each person working, and we usually have 5 people at each sight. We do these work days so that students can raise money for their mission trip to St. Louis. It's a pretty amazing idea. It has so many purposes and great things that come from it! Not only is it a fundraiser, but it also helps people out, builds character in the students, teaches them good work ethic, and helps them gain practical skills for life. It's such a good idea. Alan makes sure the students work hard all day, with only a few 3 minuteish water breaks and a lunch break. Something else that I really appreciate Alan doing is the way he meets with the students beforehand to talk about the purpose of what we are doing. That's something I was challenged on a lot in my Evangelism in Youth Ministry class this past semester. So often we do things without explicitly sharing our intentions and motives behind what we do. That all too often leads students into participating in things that they don't actually know the purpose of. It's so important to help students to start thinking about what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how God might want to move in it.

At 8 this morning, we met with the students and Alan talked about why we have these work days. Then he told them he expects them to work hard all day. Then he asked them why it is important for them to work hard. It was great to hear their responses and you could see that our discussion started their brains working in a new direction that would more benefit them throughout the rest of the day.

After thinking, talking and writing about the importance of guiding students towards the purpose of everything we do through discussion, it was awesome to see it played out.