“Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might.”

—Ecclesiastes 9:10

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It was spring in Bear Country. And that meant that it was spring cleaning and fix-up time at the Bear family’s tree house. Mama, Papa, Brother, Sister, and even Honey all had jobs to do.

Mama and Papa got right down to work. Mama hung up rugs on the line to beat the dirt out of them. Papa started to fix the broken railing on the front steps.

Brother and Sister had a job too. They were supposed to clean up the old playhouse in the backyard. Honey was going to help them.

They all got off to a good start. The sun was shining, and the air was fresh and clean. Birds were singing, and bright flowers were blooming in the garden.

Mama whacked at the rugs. Huge clouds of dirt flew out of them.

Papa’s tools were everywhere. He knelt down to carve a piece of wood into the right shape for the railing.

Brother, Sister, and Honey had everything they needed for their job. They had brooms and brushes, cloths and mops, buckets of hot water and lots of soap. First, they were going to sweep out the inside of the playhouse.

“Uh-oh!” said Brother, looking inside the playhouse. “Spiders!”

Sister and Honey peeked inside. Sure enough, there were some big, hairy spiders sitting in their webs up in the corners of the playhouse. Brother, Sister, and Honey hated spiders!

“Yuck!” they all said.

“What should we do?” asked Sister.

“Hey, look!” he said when he got to the back. “We left some baseball stuff out here.”

There was an old baseball, a bat, and a glove behind the playhouse.

Meanwhile, back at the tree house, Mama and Papa were hard at work. Mama was nearly done with the rugs. She was absolutely covered with dirt.

Papa was nearly finished with the railing. He fastened the wood in place, then straightened up and stretched.

That’s when Papa noticed Honey sitting in the middle of the lawn. He couldn’t see Brother or Sister. They were behind the tree house.

“What is Honey doing just sitting there?” wondered Papa.

A baseball came sailing into sight and landed near Honey. She grabbed it and threw it back.

“Hmmm!” said Papa, rubbing his chin.

Papa walked around the tree house and saw Brother and Sister playing baseball. Their brooms, brushes, cloths, and mops were all lying on the ground.

Papa stood behind Brother and Sister.

“Baseball is a fine springtime activity,” he said, “but so is spring cleaning!”

Brother and Sister spun around and hid the ball and bat behind their backs.

“Oh, hi, Papa!” they both grinned. “We were just taking a little break.”

Papa looked into the very dirty playhouse.

“It looks like you’ve been taking a big break,” he said. “You’ve hardly touched this playhouse.”

“But Papa,” started Brother.

“There are lots of spiders in there!” finished Sister.

Papa smiled. He remembered how scared he was of spiders when he was a cub. He still didn’t like them very much. “Well,” he said, “I’ll chase the spiders out for you. But, then, you need to get the job done.”

Papa chased the spiders out of the playhouse with a broom. They ran off and hid in the storage shed, which was a better home for them, anyway.

Then, Brother, Sister, and Honey went back to work.

“Did you know that the Bible has something to say about working hard and getting the job done?” asked Papa as they cleaned.

“No,” said Brother.

“What does it say?” said Sister.

“It says,” said Papa,” ‘finish your outdoor work and get your fields ready; after that, build your house.’”

“Did you build a house today, Papa?” asked Sister.

“Well,” said Papa, proudly, “I built a new railing.”

“And,” added Mama, who had come up to see what was going on, “it says in the Bible that God made work for us to do and there’s nothing better than to enjoy your work.”

“Did you enjoy your work, Mama?” asked Brother.

Mama rubbed some of the dirt off her face. “Well,” she said, “I enjoy my clean rugs—and you will enjoy your clean playhouse.”

“Especially without all those spiders!” agreed Sister.

“Yuck!” said Honey.

Mama, Papa, Brother, and Sister all laughed.

Copyright

ZONDERKIDZ

The Berenstain Bears and A Job Well Done

Copyright © 2009 by Berenstain Bears, Inc.

Illustrations © 2009 by Berenstain Bears, Inc.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.

EPub Edition © AUGUST 2010 ISBN: 978-0-310-42345-4

Requests for information should be addressed to:

Zonderkidz, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Berenstain, Michael.

The Berenstain Bears a job well done / created by Stan and Jan Berenstain; written by

Mike Berenstain.

p. cm. -- (Berenstain Bears)

Summary: Mama and Papa Bear tell their children what the Bible says about hard work as the family does spring cleaning projects.

ISBN 978-0-310-71254-1 (saddlestitch) [1. House cleaning--Fiction. 2. Bears--Fiction. 3. Christian life--Fiction.] I. Berenstain, Stan, 1923–2005. II. Berenstain, Jan, 1923- III. Title.

PZ7.B44827Bc 2008

[E]--dc22

2008033726

All Scripture quotations unless otherwise noted are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Zonderkidz is a trademark of Zondervan.

Editor: Betsy Flikkema

09 10 11 12 • 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

About the Publisher

Founded in 1931, Grand Rapids, Michigan-based Zondervan, a division of HarperCollinsPublishers, is the leading international Christian communications company, producing best-selling Bibles, books, new media products, a growing line of gift products and award-winning children’s products. The world’s largest Bible publisher, Zondervan (www.zondervan.com) holds exclusive publishing rights to the New International Version of the Bible and has distributed more than 150 million copies worldwide. It is also one of the top Christian publishers in the world, selling its award-winning books through Christian retailers, general market bookstores, mass merchandisers, specialty retailers, and the Internet. Zondervan has received a total of 68 Gold Medallion awards for its books, more than any other publisher.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Begin Reading

Copyright

About the Publisher