Offering up our work!

"And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles, no matter how long, but only by a spiritual journey, a journey of one inch, very arduous and humbling and joyful, by which we arrive at the ground at our feet, and learn to be at home." - Wendell Berry

Tuesday morning of this week kicked off with a number of blessings, including a beautiful homily from Fr. Rick on making our work great for Jesus and a chance to fuel up for the day at breakfast. As we got off and on the road for the day, we got some rough news, and we would like to share it with our blog readers, so you may off up prayers with us for it.


The beautiful lady on the left side of this photo is Madi. She had been counting down the days until joining us on her second summer of LBH this year. When she came on Sunday, with very high spirits, we knew she hadn't been feeling all that well over the past couple of weeks, and after one awesome day of work and play, she left on Monday night to see the doctor. That trip led to Madi being admitted to Children's Hospital in Madison with leukemia, which we found out as we were driving to the sites on Tuesday. The rest of the day was marked by a lot of prayer for Madi and much hard work offered up for her. As Madi assured me on the phone as she delivered the news, she is a fighter and will do everything in her power to beat this! Evidence of that determination is pictured below... She dominated Matt in some intense battles of strength and balance on Sunday night.


Some of that work we offered up for Madi included more weeding, cleaning and a whole lot of gazebo painting. The Schoenstatt sisters are loving the color of the gazebo and our hard work, which they have shown us by baking delicious cookies for us each afternoon for a snack.


The other half of the group returned once again to Monroe for hard work sorting and organizing for the local St. Vinnie's. Much laughter was shared throughout their day! Here is just a glimpse of the massive work they had undertaken.


After our work was finished, we headed home where a delicious taco dinner had been prepared by the wonderful people in Nickay's car, which we enjoyed after praying our rosary together. As dinner came to a close, we finished making cards for Madi, donned some brand new Love Begins Here tshirts, and took some group photos. Much success was had in that department, as you can see below.


Following all of that action, we jumped in our cars and paid Madi a visit. As we came home to join each other after a quick stop at the pool and showers, this entire group came to a mutual consensus that we had seen God most clearly in our days during our visit to Madi - she was full of smiles, courage, funny stories and a whole lot of joy.

It was another long day, arduous and humbling too, but we know we arrived home, having continued to begin love.

We would ask that you continue to pray for Madi, her healing, as well as her family and friends who are making the journey with her.