Just Different

Posted by Braden

Before history class starts each day, we say a prayer.
Before every sporting event or performance--a prayer.
On Sunday nights, we get together as a ward, for ward prayer.

Sacrament meeting is eerily quiet--no whispering 10-year-olds, crying 3-year-olds, or even snoring 70-year-olds! And I almost miss the fruit snacks and squished cheerios...

I home teach people my age, and I'm not a junior companion to a high priest anymore! Our conversations aren't about my home teachees' upcoming surgeries or their kids.

Firesides don't always start at 7 p.m. at the chapel anymore . . . sometimes they happen at 11 p.m. on Tuesdays, right between classes, in just about any room that has a projector in it!

I see my school friends on Sunday; it still feels wrong most of the time, actually. I'm used to saying, "Sorry, it's on Sunday! But I'll see you at school on Monday!" But now my next-door neighbor, classmate, Sunday School teacher, and make-shift family are all the same person!

In Sunday School we're talking about the Book of Mormon. I also go twice a week to a classroom where we talk about the Book of Mormon--in my religion class. Hour long religions discussion: now not only reserved for Sundays!

The executive secretary for the ward isn't "Brother ______"--it's the guy downstairs! The ward choir director is 18. There is one RM in my ward of 150 people. The brother who sets up the ward bulletin is in my chemistry class.

None of these changes are earth-shaking or even all that unusual. But they're changes.