Shining the light of Christ can inspire others to do the same.
On a recent Salkehatchie mission trip to South Carolina, my group was working on a roof. If you don’t know anything about roofing, you first have to remove all the old shingles and every single nail. Then you have to replace any boards that have rotted underneath those old shingles.
It takes a while and it’s a lot of manual labor to cut out the old boards and haul up the new ones with the right measurements.
On top of that, the new shingles have to be hauled up on the roof. They come wrapped in bundles and they are heavy, very heavy, but if you broke the packages and carried them a few at the time, it would take forever.
This year, our site leader asked the man who delivered the shingles if he knew anyone with a shingle lifter. That’s a cool little contraption that lifts the shingles to the roof on a little elevator. Turns out he did know someone with one. His son-in-law had one.
Our site leader called him and he agreed to come and help us out. He drove from an hour away to get to us and it was understood that there would be a fee for the services.
When they arrived in a big white van, we found that he and his partner were very nice guys. They joked with us and picked at the kids as they lifted the shingles to one side of the house.
When they were finished, the owner asked our site leader if he was making any money on the roof. When he told him not only was he not making any money, but that the teenagers he saw before him had all paid to be able to come and help with this project, he was stunned.
He actually stopped and addressed the teens and told them in a world where kids only cared about themselves and their electronics that he was thrilled to see a bunch of them giving up time in their summer to help someone. He was well aware they could have been doing something else.
He left without charging us a penny for his services and offered to come back to lift the shingles to the other half when we were ready.
I thought about that man long after he drove away, long after that roof was done. I thought about how we so often talk about being the hands and feet of Christ and letting our light shine. But, we often miss how our doing that inspire others to do the same.
Some teens doing their part in light shining encouraged someone else to be a part of our mission too. Isn’t that what we are all called to do?
Have an awesome day!
Wendy 🙂