Awkward Objects Training

I was a bit worried about today because I thought I was going to miss my workout. Little did I know, God had another plan in mind. For those of you who don't know, I'm a youth minister and traveling motivational speaker (check out www.biggodlittlestu.tk for more on that). Last night I spent the night at the church with some of the youth from my ministry and today we headed downtown to help out at an amazing place called City Life Shawnee which is a branch of a larger ministry called Youth For Christ. These ministries exist to reach out mainly to middle and high school students in the area and equip them to be leaders in their communities. It is so incredible to see the work they are doing, so my students and I headed downtown to be a part of it.

When we arrived, Gregg McMullen (a City Life Shawnee/Youth For Christ employee) showed us around, told us about the things they were doing in the community, and then set us up for work. We all got our jobs, and I was assigned to the "cellar team". No, it was not a wine cellar. It was a creepy cellar that looked as though many people could have died there. And from all the clutter, we wouldn't have been able to find the body.

(This is a picture of me with two of my students. They wanted to do the "Charlie's Angels" pose.)

We started cleaning and in the middle of our job, we realized there was a non-functioning water heater right in the middle of everything we were trying to accomplish. Not only that, but it was full of water. My students immediately realized that we were going to need to move the heater in order to finish our job. One of them looked at me, smirking, and said, "Hey Bane, why don't you just pick it up and move it out of the way? You're strong now, right?" Though I wanted to, I was unable to move the water heater on my own. After several minutes of "walking" it towards the long staircase we had to carry it up, the time came for me to prove whether or not I was indeed strong. We tipped the water heater toward the stairs and started pushing it up. It was a slow, grueling process, and I definitely was not as strong as I needed to be to move a filled water heater, but we made it to the top. Once we got to the top, the bottom fell off, and I was forced to grip the heater with only my fingertips (a feat which did impress the student who had made fun of me earlier).

Then, as a team, we had to lay the heater on 2 by 4's; then, using the boards, carry it around the large building, cross a busy street with it, carry it up a slick grass hill and then finally approach a slender staircase to carry it downstairs to their other property. Gregg looked at me and said, "We're just gonna have to lift it now. No 2 by 4's. You ready?" Of course, because I didn't want to look like a wimp in front of my students, I nodded my head and gripped the heater again. We moved it a few feet and finally Gregg said, "Forget it. This is far enough. We're not gonna be able to take it down the stairs. We'll tuck it in the corner up against the fence and wait till I can find our dolly."

I was so relieved, but I did feel as though we had given our all and really done the best we could have done with that water heater today. It was the workout God gave me because He knew I was concerned about missing my real workout in the gym.

See, sometimes life will throw us a total curve ball. Those can be amazing or terrible. Either way, we just have to do the best we can with it. A few days ago I talked about how not all days are good days and not all days are bad days. What I remembered today is that, typically, days are what you make of them. So if you have what you would consider a "good" day - that's mostly your fault. And if you have what you would consider a "bad" day - that's also mostly your fault. Today was a good day. My students helped a lot with that, but in the end the choice was mine.

Why would you ever choose to have a bad day?

"Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. And give thanks for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." (Ephesians 5:16, 20 NLT)

Workout:
Lifting the crap out of a hot water heater
Moving planks of wood around
Lifting/pushing a filled Coca Cola vending machine

Till next time homies...
Peace and much love.