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"Hello, Nathan," said the friendly grownup at church the next day, "what have you been up to lately?"

"Oh," responded six-year-old Nathan Axtell, "just changing the world."

And he was right.

The day before, teams of volunteers, Nathan included, had assembled at First United Methodist Church for breakfast before fanning out into the community to change the worlds of some of their neighbors. By the time they came back to the church for supper and a recap of the day, they were pretty pooped and a handful of Johnson City residents were very happy.

"I got tired just watching those guys," said Pat Rumpf, who had needed window and porch cleaning, grass cutting, trash burning and flower planting. "It was a real gift of God. Praise the Lord!"

The crews trimmed bushes and trees, painted, scrubbed and cleaned.

Larry Milner would have been one of the volunteers ordinarily, but his doctor had imposed restrictions on what he could do until his pacemaker surgery heals, turning the tables and making Milner a beneficiary...getting chores done that involved reaching higher than his limit.

"It was a real blessing to get things done that we’d been wanting to do, but couldn’t," Milner said. "And next time, I’ll be out there with ‘em."

"This is the kind of mission work I can really get enthusiastic about," said David Kurimski. "Last year, the church sent money to drill a water well in Mexico, and that’s a good thing to do, but I see plenty of need to help people right here at home, too."

"Giving money to a project can seem like cheap support," Darlene Young commented. "Giving involvement and sweat really costs you. Time is the real sacrifice."

"Kids don’t get a lot of opportunities to help others in meaningful ways," observed Zach Beattie. "It’s very satisfying to see your work make an immediate difference in the lives of other people who really need your help."

Beattie was one of the youth who volunteered for the project, and it was those youth who were the big surprise to the adult organizers. No slacking, no complaining, no loafing. They were there for breakfast at 9 and were there for supper at 5, and in between they put in a solid days’ work.

"I started out thinking of our members as so many youth and so many adults, but by the end of the day, I could see that was the wrong way to look at it," said organizer Paul Axtell. "Our crew turned out to be all adults — the younger volunteers put in a full day’s work right alongside the older ones. They earned adult status."

And at the end of the day, everybody felt good about what had been accomplished. Beneficiaries got needed chores done. Volunteers had improved their community. And lessons were learned.

The tired volunteers gathered back together for supper and an evaluation of their first world-changing day. They hadn’t gotten everything on the list accomplished. They needed to do it again, they agreed. Yes, definitely do it again, with more volunteers.

"What have you been doing, Nathan?"

"Oh, just changing the world."

What kind of lesson had he learned that day? What kind of citizen is the community raising, and what kind of community is he building, even at age six?

Changing the world, indeed.