Walking to Church

With Summer and the kids gone last weekend, I walked to church Sunday morning, and since I'm addicted to my iPod shuffle, I decided to give a listen while I walked to 20 minutes (by the way--hurray for the intersection of Sage & Unser opening up, sidewalks and all!). But, rather than jam to Bon Jovi or Guns 'N Roses, as is my wont, I loaded the playlist with addresses from April's General Conference. And, being lazy, I left those tracks on for a few more days, so I got to listen to 5 hours of conference over the space of several days.

In doing so, I noticed some interesting themes, the first of which was the emphasis by President Eyring on the new Duty to God program, which I blogged about a few weeks back. In hearing the pattern of learn-act-share several times, I began to reflect on how this corresponds to our lives. While the categories I am going to outline are fluid, they provide a nice model.

Let's start by seeing youth as a time for learning, which is pretty evident by the amount of time children and adolescents spend in school, primary, youth classes and activities, seminary, and the like. This also explains why it is so important that we instill in our children the desire to be curious, to ask questions, and to think critically.

As we come to know more, we begin to serve. Certainly missionary service fits here, marking in many ways a coming-of-age for young people in the church, moving from receiving instruction to sharing what they know. We raise children the same way, teaching and serving, acting, in essence, on what we have been learning all along.

And the, as we amass a life of experience serving, we share those experiences, both in formal settings (I'm thinking of the first counselor in our stake presidency, whose addresses are always based on telling stories from his life of serving others) and casual moments. For parents, this is that exciting time when your children make the transition to adulthood and the act of parenting is less about teaching them things they don't know than it is about sharing with them tings they haven't yet done.

Again, it's not a fixed set of eras, but rather general categories. And knowing that I am squarely in the serving period of my life should inspire me to do more to bless the lives of others. And knowing how my children are going to learn to serve by watching me should also alter how I live my life.