WORK WORK WORK

Chapter 13, the meaning and blessings of family work. This should be fun, right? Thats what I thought. What IS work? When I think of work, i think of 5-9, i think of Chad working late and coming home all covered in black dust from the workshop. I think of my dad coming home from work and taking excedrine on his way to bed. Parden my french but work sucks! But thats just one side of work. there is a whole other side that Ive seen. SOMETIMES when I think of work i think of laughing with my sister as she and I create a fast assembly line to put up her stuffed animals, and sharing secrets about boys with my other sister as we hang up all her clothes that were scattered round about her room. I think of rolling out sod with my dad for hours our in the blazing Arizona sun and getting big gulps to cool off. I think of pulling weeds with my mom before breakfast and picking out flowers to plant when we finish. Obviously one seems much more pleasant and enjoyable than the other . . so why do we use the same word. its about How you get the work done.

I was thinking about chores and how grueling thay seem sometimes. I remember many time in high school having to stay up late because I hadnt completed my daily chores. One time inpatictular I really was able to see the line between the 'bad work' and the 'good work'. I was 17 and exremely emotionally compermised, (as most teenage girls are) I had been up all night doing homework (that i had procrastinated on) and at 12:30 I was headed down stairs when my dad remindes me that I needed to finish the dishes before I could go to bed, I was tired and the dishes were completly piled up and over the sink. I was SO angry with him, he knew i was tired and that they could wait til the morning but he wanted to make me work, the bad work. And just as I started in, my dad comes in and starts scrubbing at the sink next to me. I knew he had work about 3 hours earlier than me and he had had less sleep the night before, I was completly humbled and touched that despite how quickly I judged his intentions, saying that he was trying to ware me down even more, he was there to help and serve me when I really needed it and the things that needed to be done where completed..

I think that thats the very difference of the good work and the bad work. the bad work is done because it has to be done and you do it becasue your forced to do it. The good work is also done because it has to get dont but the difference is that you do it because you want to serve and help someone else.

I think children can give such a great example of how work should be done. My little sister, tessa is SUCH a good cleaner, but she hates doing it alone, she loves working together. I can remember learning this when I was babysitting. i would tell her to go clean her room, over and over i would tell her and I would have to take away her privlages to play when she wouldnt complete it, so as I sat on the computer doing nothing and tessa sat in her dirty room, 'thinking about why she cant play with friends' I realized that if i showed her how and helped her to see that is she did it and finished quickly, she might be able to understand how much easier it is to complete your chores and have your privilages too. We had a blast together, throwing stuffed animals at eachother trying to get them in the right places, scrubbing the walls and doors, she even wanted to go the extra mile and wash the windows and dust the fan. because i was there with her, helping her and serving her, she was able to see that we BOTH wanted for her to be able to have fun, she wasnt mad at me anymore becasue she saw that I dropped what I was doing to help her and the task became a game.

I know that from these experiences I have learned that I really want to BE THERE, I want to teach my kids how to clean and how to work by cleaning and working with them. I want to teach them that work is GOOD, even the 9-5 kind of work. There is a sense of accomplishment and drive that need to be developed through good hard work. I want to tech my children to respond to a need! Work is about needs, when you go to work its becasue someone needs you to accomplish something, when you do chores its because the NEED to be cleaned so that the family can enjoy a clean house. I want my family to understand that doing work can be seen as responding to a need and an opportunity to serve instead of seeing work as having to respond to orders and complete them independently.

Lastly, I had such an amazing realization in class the other day, we were all asked to think of a time where work brought our families together. I thought about my husband and our family, When we first got engaged, my husband was working and doing well in his company, then, a week later, him and 500 other were laid off with no serverance . . . thanks economy . . . thanks alot. Needless to say a new couple with new bills and new needs for a new car and everything else in our empty house, we...were...stressed. I had a very shaky job and was barely making enough for us to get by, we were pulling up side jobs everywhere, weekend babysitting jobs, research clinical studies and everything else we could get our hands on. It was really rough but we really pulled together and paid all our bills and paid them all on time. We grew together so quickly and as hard as it was to start a marriage under such pressure but i know that Chad would agree with me, we wouldnt change our circumstances for anything, it strengthened us so much. Bro. Williams reminded us of Adam and Eve and the garden of eden. Even in the garden of Eden, the beautiful perfect place, adam and eve where still commanded to take care of the garden, evn they had chores. When they were cast out of the Garden of Eden, Adam ate his bread by the sweat of his brow; and Eve, his wife, labored with him (Moses 5:1). Thier burdens became so much heavier and they had to work together.

23And unto Adam, I, the Lord God, said: Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the fruit of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying—Thou shalt not eat of it, ^acursed shall be the ground for thy sake; in ^bsorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life.

cursed shall be the ground for thy sake. When chad and I were first married the ground was cursed for our sake. we had to struggle to grow together, and being able to understand that makes the trials so much more spiritual and comparable to the gospel. Im grateful for work, Im graful for the chance that chad and I have to work together and be unified in a common goal.