Truly, it's hard enough to just get our family out the door & looking presentable, with noses wiped, and hair combed, AND CLOTHES ON. BUT THEN, we volunteer our efforts by serving in callings, and we teach Sunday school lessons and Mitch works with the Scouts and he's gone to meetings before church, and he also schedules time during the week to teach the Young Men, and I watch the Nursery kids for 2 hours during church so that parents can listen to their Sunday school lessons while I let their kids color pictures of Jesus. And then the Relief Society hold functions and sends out Compassionate Service emails to inform us of when people need help and we volunteer to help them move, and take them meals when we can. Oh, and by the way, if you can squeeze time in between breakfast and lunch and finding clean laundry, there's choir practice, too. And if someone is sick and needs help, you fill in for them on top of doing your own callings.
AND THIS IS THE NORM.
There is NOTHING unusual about this in the LDS world.
Some people have a bigger load--they have MORE children and their callings have MORE committments.
Take the Bishop's schedule for example--with absolutely no monetary compensation, he meets with individuals and couples and counsels with them, and he attends all the ward functions that he possibly can. He goes to all the Scout campouts, all the baptisms, all the Young Women events, he has meetings of his own, he meets with all the leaders of all the auxillaries, he meets with the Stake Presidency, he gives worthiness interviews...oh, and by the way, he has a full time job and a family.
It's amazing, really.
You're asked to give. And then you're asked to give some more. And some days you wonder if it's even possible to get out the door and get your family to church. And sometimes you wonder if it would be easier to stay home. But you know what? If we didn't live this peculiar lifestyle, I truly believe that life would be harder. We wouldn't have the spiritual strength we need to get through the hard times, and our children wouldn't learn the importance of service at an early age, and the house really wouldn't get that much cleaner in the time we would have been at church because we would have been home messing it up.
The miracle is that the members of the church don't throw in the towel and say, "This is too much." The true miracle is that they have testimonies of the gospel that are so strong, they come back every week, and they stay faithful. And when they see that someone in the ward is losing their faith, they reach out to rescue them and bring them in and help them in any way they can. They go on missions (at their own expense)--like my brother Taylor in Guatemala--he lives in a bamboo house and preaches the Word of God. And like my cousin Deaton, who is practically dying of Malaria in Madagascar right now--all for the cause of bringing others to Christ. And they don't throw in the towel. My own husband, Mitch, lived in one of the scariest cities in the US for months on end trying to teach the gospel and bring others to Christ.
I guess that's the miracle of taking your boys to church on Sunday mornings, even if you think it's "insane". There's the hope that they'll grow up to be an awesome Eagle Scout and missionary like their daddy and grandpas and uncles and cousins. I pray someday my boys will turn into men of God who serve others no matter what, even if it's hard, at their own monetary expense, and out of love. And I hope that someday they'll take their kids to church on the days they think it would be easier to stay home, because really life is "easier" when you choose to go.
I love it.
I love church.
And yes--I even love our crazy Sunday mornings.
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