bluebell Posted November 16, 2020 Posted November 16, 2020 6 minutes ago, nuclearfuels said: I see this being accomplished by the re-org that moved YM to the Bishopric. Those youth callings w/ BSA were incredibly demanding I don’t know that it’s less demanding having the bishopric over YM though.
Rain Posted November 16, 2020 Posted November 16, 2020 On 11/8/2020 at 12:20 AM, Bernard Gui said: A calling is simply an opportunity to serve someone. Usually. Sometimes I find that leadership will seriously hamper your serving and that gets frustrating. 1
Rain Posted November 16, 2020 Posted November 16, 2020 On 11/10/2020 at 9:50 AM, bluebell said: I remember when a very active and faithful teenage girl stood up in testimony meeting and cried about how upset she was that her mother was called as the stake RS president. She talked about how she had been a ward RS president and was never home and how happy she had been when she was released and then devastated when she was shortly called to the stake because she knew her mother was going to be busy again. I felt so badly for her. Sometimes I think we have a mindset in the church that callings are supposed to be all about sacrifice and struggle and putting family second and that if we aren't doing those things we are failing. I think that is a cultural expectation that we should let die. Most callings can be done without making our families suffer or being absent from them, if we would just utilize the resources (and people) God gave us to help us, and stop thinking that elaborate activities and/or other "busy work" is how God judges whether or not a calling is being fulfilled. I think that a lot of male leadership callings could especially benefit from a re-working of what the fulfilling the calling should look like, with more thought taken for keeping the husband in the home more than he is away from it. Some sacrifice is necessary. But I don't believe God is wanting us to put our children and spouses on the altar and trade them for a few years in a leadership calling. I have started thinking we should be where God wants. Not calling first. Not family. Not work. My thoughts with this is if you are where God wants then you do in any given specific time what He wants you to do. Sometimes he wants you to fill your own cup. Sometimes it means spending time with family. Sometimes it means doing your calling. I think sometimes when we focus in family first or calling first etc then we justify a lot of things we shouldn't, but if we ask where God wants us then it helps us figure out the priority for that moment. 3
Bernard Gui Posted November 16, 2020 Posted November 16, 2020 6 hours ago, Rain said: Usually. Sometimes I find that leadership will seriously hamper your serving and that gets frustrating. Please explain.
Rain Posted November 17, 2020 Posted November 17, 2020 (edited) 4 hours ago, Bernard Gui said: Please explain. When leaders wouldn't give me specific info I needed to do my calling and then told me to pray about it. I did pray about it. A lot. And the answers said get the info from the bishopric. So I kept trying. And kept getting the same answer. Now I have never got an answer like that so it wasn't me just being lazy or trusting their prayers more than mine. Besides the handbook actually said to work with the leaders in this calling. It was not a job where I was supposed to run off do things on my own. The biggest problem is, I think, that the bishopric didn't actually know what my calling involved. They just assumed it was what was popular to do at the time. When I tried to share what I needed with the counselor over me he didn't really listen and gave me answers that didn't work for my question. This went on for months. I finally set up an appointment with the bishop and said, "most people in this calling do this ______, but the handbook says do ________. Which job do you want me to do? If it is the handbook one then I need _______ info and support from the ward leaders." He thought about it, told me I was right and that he would answer my question when he had discussed it with the ward council. I was released sometime later when they found they didn't have need of someone in that calling. In a stake calling the SP counselor would rah rah me in private, but wouldn't show me much support with leaders under him, giving them the impression that they didn't need to work with me so they wouldn't. It was interesting to speak with others in my calling at the same time. If SP showed the support the other leaders would work with them. If the SP wouldn't show it the other leaders wouldn't. Luckily I don't have many experiences where I was frustrated because something leadership was doing didn't allow me to either magnify or serve in my calling, but it does happen sometimes. Edited November 17, 2020 by Rain 2
Bernard Gui Posted November 17, 2020 Posted November 17, 2020 16 hours ago, Rain said: .......Luckily I don't have many experiences where I was frustrated because something leadership was doing didn't allow me to either magnify or serve in my calling, but it does happen sometimes. Sounds like an unfortunate situation. Sorry you had to go through it. 1
Rain Posted November 17, 2020 Posted November 17, 2020 15 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said: Sounds like an unfortunate situation. Sorry you had to go through it. Thanks. The good news was in that first calling they just released me and didn't give me a new calling. At first I was wondering what I should do now. Then I realized what a gift it was - that I could make up my own calling and just serve the ward in any way I could see. Not that I couldn't do that before, but now I kind of felt it was time to magnify my calling in that way. Not sure if that makes sense. 3
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