This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Priesthood Session of the October 1993 Conference.
There is a certain arrogance in thinking that any of us may be more spiritually intelligent, more learned, or more righteous than the Councils called to preside over us. Those Councils are more in tune with the Lord than any individual persons they preside over, and the individual members of the Councils are generally guided by those Councils. In this church, where we have lay leadership, it is inevitable that some will be placed in authority over us who have a different background from our own. This does not mean that those with other honorable vocational or professional qualifications are any less entitled to the spirit of their office than any other. Some of the great bishops of my lifetime included a brickmason, a grocer, a farmer, a dairyman, and one who ran an ice cream business. What any may have lacked in formal education was insignificant. They were humble men, and because they were humble, they were taught and magnified by the Holy Spirit. Without exception, they were greatly strengthened as they learned to labor diligently to fulfill their callings, and to minister to the Saints they were called to preside over. So it is with all of the callings in the Church.
I just keep thinking about all the humble men and women in the ward I grew up in—people who would always tell me what a great talk I gave, praise my attempts at insightful comments, admire my piano playing or my music leading. As a young woman, I suppose I kind of took all of that as only what I deserved (ha!), but now I'm astonished at it! These were men and women who were amazing in their fields—professors, musicians, writers, thinkers—and who had so much more experience that I did in life and in the church. I've been to enough of their funerals, now, that I begin to realize what kind of people they were, in both worldly and spiritual accomplishments. But in that ward, they all just acted as fellow-servants of God, gracious even to awkward teenagers who didn't know anything! It makes me wonder if I have been half as kind, as an adult, to the youth around me! I want to be.
I also love seeing the way that church councils, working together, can accomplish such great things through the Spirit—and the way that individuals in their separate callings are upheld by the Spirit as well. It's comforting to think that no matter where the Lord asks us to serve (and I'm thinking particularly of motherhood, my most challenging assignment of all) he will also strengthen us and make us equal to the task.
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