Adventure Update:
A Labor of Love
Temple open houses are labors of love. They’re huge events intended for thousands of people–which means they need a lot of staff. In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, there are no paid clergy; specifically for the Urdaneta Philippines Temple Open House, the event was staffed by local members of the church volunteering their time.
This is not my first time volunteering my time for a temple open house, and it’s certainly not my first time dedicating a large quantity of time and resources for the sake of my voluntary responsibilities. As far as Church events I’ve spent many dedicated hours on, this one was somewhere in the middle. It was not the worst volunteer experience I’ve had with the Church, but it wasn’t the best either. Church politics are alive and well here in the Philippines.
My favorite part was the people I served among.
I had assignments for two committees. I was an assigned instrumentalist to provide live background music and I was also on the database team, which was supporting tracking how many visitors we had during the event. Initially they were smaller scheduled responsibilities that expanded into all day, every day service. It was needed, and serving the temple open house was one of the reasons for me being here, so I have no personal complaints about the amount of hours I gave over the two and a half weeks. But the investment of time began well before then. I’ve been rehearsing for my music responsibilities regularly for months. I was added to the database team near the end of February, so I worked with that team for a shorter amount of time, but in longer, more concentrated increments.
Some of those prep nights were not great. One night in particular we found ourselves still working late into the night on a project (which was a re-do due to a typo caught late in the process) and everyone was weary. One of the team shared their frustration with the situation, and I realized in that moment I could join in the frustration and add my own fuel to the fire–or I could just listen to them and do my part well so they didn’t have to do more than they already had. What would help my teammates the most?
That night I learned what would make this experience the most meaningful to me would be sharing the burdens of my teammates.
Lift Where You Stand
In 2008, Dieter F. Uchtdorf shared a story about moving a piano, where he described how he and his group only found success in moving a grand piano for an event by everyone surrounding the piano and lifting where they stood. This story has been on my mind while serving with my teams for the past several weeks. Everyone has their role to play. One person isn’t any more important than anyone else and everyone is needed in the place where they are.
I remember one year I was asked to help with a youth conference. The youth would be riding busses from the Washington DC metro area up to Church historical sites in Palmyra, New York. The conference was over the span of two days; the ride to and from was about six hours. There were five sites planned so each bus would rotate on a schedule of three sites on the afternoon of the first day and two sites on the morning of the second. They would end with a testimony meeting before riding the bus back.
Again, everyone involved in this endeavor are volunteers (except for the bus drivers; they were hired). There were at least two training and organizational meetings I was invited to prior to the conference where several leaders of the conference were missing, and by the time the busses departed the first morning, there were multiple versions of plans, schedules, and routes among all the leaders. We had only been on the highway twenty minutes before one of the busses took an exit for a previously planned route. Immediately chaos broke out on the message channels. Rather than take all the individual input of who was going off of what information given at what time and why, the brother in charge decided what we needed unity. He picked one bus to communicate with and give directions to; the only direction the other busses had to follow would be to follow that bus. We regrouped and began again. The leader, in a separate car, would keep a fifteen-minute lead and give any instructions about changes in the route to the lead bus–and it worked. Everyone made it to the historical sites safely and without major issue. The behind-the-scenes was hectic, and more than one leader was exhausted and frustrated. But everyone was there for the sake of the activity: we all wanted the conference to be a success for the youth. And it was.
Years later, I crossed paths with a young man attending an institute class I was administrating. As we waited, we discussed timelines and I realized he had been a youth on my bus that conference. As I reflected on how I had experienced that conference, he was amazed that his experience had been so different. He hadn’t seen any of the chaos. The conference, for him, had been life changing.
In any community, close or general, there are leaders and there are followers. Both are important. Both are needed. I have been in both camps, and there are pros and cons to both sides. Leadership allows for more creativity and innovation, but also demands more accountability and patience. Personally, I always feel it’s inappropriate to ask someone to do something I am not also willing to do. Following allows for more bandwidth and flexibility. Followers can concentrate on a limited task or responsibility, and a specific time frame. Following is about contributing individually; leading is about stewardship for the contribution of the whole.
The Temple Is The Temple
Things always have a way of working out with the temple. I have many stories of serving in the temple where needs were miraculously met. It’s fair to say the temple, regardless of my service, is still going to be what a temple is: a dedicated space for individual, sacred worship. For anyone, anywhere. An individual’s personal choices don’t change the nature of what that space is and what it does. Logically, it follows that opening the temple itself isn’t tied to any individual’s specific choices. Whether I did or did not choose to serve was not going to change the fact that the temple would still open. So why serve?
To me, serving is my opportunity to participate. If I hadn’t served, I wouldn’t have been able to play with the instrumentalists or support them, nor would I have made such good friendships with the fun database team. I feel the blessings of serving in the open house didn’t really have to do with the temple itself, but among the people I got to serve with. The temple itself is a tool, meant to magnify the discipleship of the people of the land it is built upon to serve. I find that when I serve at the temple, or on behalf of the temple, it is easier for me to serve out of love for my team or those receiving my service, rather than to serve from duty or obligation.
All that being said, the open house had special meaning for me and my family. I’m always grateful for the opportunity to participate and serve.
I’ll share my Savior’s love By serving others freely. In serving I am blessed. In giving I receive.