Programs

I have a confession to make:

I'm not very good at my calling.

I know I have a totally easy calling (I make the program for sacrament meeting), but it just seems really difficult for me. First of all, I have to get people to say the opening and closing prayers. I'm amazed at how many people say no. They don't want to, they're busy, shy, don't pray in public, etc. And even when people say yes, it's more like a 'well, ok, i'll do it if you can't find anyone else but you know, i just prayed in church last week.'

I made the program on Saturday night for this Sunday. I went to church early to use the copier in the library. Usually, I bring my own paper just in case they're out. Well today, the copier only had 20 sheets of paper. Not good. But since 20 sheets are better than none, I started copying only to get the 'paper jam' error message. I cleared out all of the paper, but the error wouldn't go away. I turned off and on the copier, still the error message. I finally gave up, took the 5 programs I had, and handed them to the bishopric member as I asked the new missionaries in our ward to say the prayers. And several times during the meeting, the bishopric member conducting the service kept saying, 'and please refer to the back of your program for all of the announcements'. And we all know how important announcements are in a singles ward (if you don't know, trust me on this one).

Simple task, yet so difficult for me.

Now I've had much more complex and scary callings (gospel doctrine teacher in a ward full of smarty pants). I loved that calling. I love teaching. I just hate doing something that seems meaningless and is totally logistical. I'm afraid it's all I can do to get a basic program printed out every week with people listed for prayers instead of 'TBA'. The person before me experimented with new designs for the program every week, including an eco-friendly version that was so small you needed a magnifying glass to read it. I'm just not up to that.