The Wheelbarrow Full of Bricks
Growing up, my dad often imparted wisdom to me in the form of short stories and word pictures. In Thailand, I lived the story about the wheelbarrow full of bricks, a lesson about perspective.
A story is told of a man who walked down the street when he happened upon another man pushing a wheelbarrow full of bricks.
“Excuse me sir, he asked, “what are you doing?”
“I’m hauling bricks” he replied.
The man continued walking when he came upon a second man pushing a wheelbarrow full of bricks.
“Excuse me sir”, he asked, “what are you doing?”
“I’m building a church!” the second man replied.
—
Some days on the Race feel like hauling brick. When team dynamics are strained or conditions are physically exhausting, perspective can easily be limited to the weight of bricks in a wheelbarrow.
In Thailand, my team literally moved stacks of brick with wheelbarrows. We spent long days in the hot sun working manual labor at a construction site. We dug up dirt, dragged bamboo from the woods, hauled buckets of sand and mixed concrete with shovels. We got blisters, cuts, sores and sunburns.
Physically spent, we collapsed at the end of every day. And every day we learned a little bit more of what it meant to depend on God and on each other. Something about pouring sweat equity into a project that was once an impossible dream awakened my spirit to keep perspective. I was building a church; a boys’ home for H.E.L.P Thailand.
H.E.L.P Thailand takes in boys and girls from surrounding villages who are at the highest risk of being sold into sex trafficking. It reaches far beyond the basics of providing food, shelter and clothing. House parents create homes where children belong; homes where childhood innocence is the norm rather than the exception, where hopes and dreams for the future are not only encouraged but are tangibly supported. H.E.L.P Thailand is not a social justice project, it’s a Kingdom Promise.
Yes, I hauled brick, but I was part of the generational shift to end child tracking in Thailand. I spent days at the construction site and evenings with kids. Bricks became blessings as I got to know the boys who would be moving into the house we were building.
—
About two weeks in I pulled my back lifting bamboo and was out flat for a week. The team’s last day of construction was my first day back on site. I was useless. I couldn’t shovel dirt or carry weight. I was forced to slow down, to redefine productivity.
Our assigned task for the morning was to create orderly stacks of brick on the ground floor as bricklayers prepared to build the walls. I sat still next to the pile waiting for my teammates to wheel over another load.
In the stillness I noticed the mute girl out of the corner of my eye, the daughter of one of the local construction workers. Every morning I smiled and greeted her with a friendly “Sawadeekaa” and every time her response was a blank stare.
It was my last opportunity for connection. She sat next to a completed stack, playing with the bricks, undoing the prior day’s work. Feeling a little unsure I walked over and picked up a brick.
She looked up at me with that blank stare. I placed my brick on top of another one close to her. I smiled; she stared a little bit longer. I picked up another brick. She followed, cautiously. One by one, we took turns taking bricks out of place and stacking them on top of each other. One hundred percent counter-productive to the task at hand, together, we built a brick tower.
As our tower grew taller, the pile grew unstable; a life-size game of Jenga. Each new placement provoked new facial expressions, nervous cringes anticipating a crash. When the pile did collapse, she threw her hands above her head and laughed…she laughed! And it hit me.
This is the Kingdom. If I took delight in the counterproductive activity of making brick towers with this little girl just to make her laugh, how much more does Jesus delight in pursuing these moments with me? He is not concerned with creating orderly piles of neatly stacked brick, He is passionate about authentic connection. He is not hauling brick, He is building the Church.
Much Love,
Steph
