What Was Old Is New Again

It all started about three and a half years ago. I was sitting in Sunday School waiting for the lesson to begin. I was sitting next to one of the Ward's Sunday school teachers, somebody I knew from priesthood class. We were talking about various things, one of them being that the person he thought was supposed to be teaching that day wasn't there. The class president, who also happened to be my Home Teaching companion, was also waiting for the teacher to show up. I leaned over to the man I was sitting next to and said something like, "I'll bet he's going to have us teach the lesson today." He agreed, and we both got out our class member study guides and began thinking about what we might say.

Sure enough, when the regularly scheduled teacher didn't show, we were asked to fill in. What followed was an impromptu, tag-team Sunday school lesson that actually went off pretty well. We got good comments afterward, and the teacher said he'd keep me in mind if he ever needed a substitute.

That was my first experience teaching in my current Ward.

Shortly thereafter that teacher had hip replacement surgery and asked me to teach in his stead while he recovered. So I prepared and delivered the necessary lessons for the next several weeks. I found that I really enjoyed it. That wasn't a big surprise; I'd served as a Gospel Doctrine instructor and a priesthood instructor on more than one occasion before, and I'd always enjoyed it. And the classes responded well, which is always a bonus.

After his surgery and recuperative period, that teacher decided not to come back. He began attending Church with one of his children and their family, and to my knowledge still does so. So after a while, he was released and I was called to fill his position.

After serving in the class for a few months, I happened to be talking to Brother Horton, a member of the Bishopric, one day. He said they were needing to call a new Sunday school president and suggested that I'd be just the man for the job. I, in turn, suggested that maybe somebody else would be the right man for the job—anybody else, really. I was busy, I told him, what with work and school and an upcoming wedding the like. But those were all excuses. The real reason for the suggestion: I just didn't want the position. I was happy being a teacher, being a valued(?) part of the organization. But I really didn't want to be in charge of it.

So the Bishopric went ahead and called someone else to be the new Sunday school president. And when they called him, they also called a counselor for him: me. So, I wasn't totally off the hook.

I served as the first (and only) counselor in the Sunday school presidency for something like a year. Then, bad news: the president and his wife were buying a home in another part of Salt Lake and were moving out of the Ward. I knew at once that I was going to be called as the next Sunday school president. This time, I didn't fight it. I wasn't thrilled about it, but I figured that if the Bishop was inspired that I was the person the Lord wanted for the job, I'd best do it.

Accordingly, I accepted the call when it came and was sustained and set apart as the new Sunday school president. Somewhere along the way I was apparently also released as a Gospel Doctrine instructor, though I honestly don't remember that happening. But I still continued to teach. Hey, as Sunday school president, staffing was my call (with the Bishopric's approval, of course). I could have anybody teach that I wanted to. So why not me?

So for the past 21 months, I've been serving double duty as Sunday school president and Gospel Doctrine instructor. I've had a couple of really good counselors to help make the burden easier. Alas, I lost them along the way. One of them moved back to the Avenues to be closer to work, and the other was called as a youth instructor. For the past few months, including the Ward's second move of the year, it's been a Presidency of one.

That changed today. Today I was released as the Sunday school president with the appropriate vote of thanks and appreciation for service rendered. They called a new Presidency—including two new counselors—today. It was a funny coincidence; I was scheduled to teach one of the classes today, and Dave, the new President, was substituting for the other one. So I didn't really get to talk to him until the commencement of Priesthood. We chatted for a while, and he expressed some trepidation about the new calling. He'd never been the president of anything before now, not even a Deacon's quorum. So we talked during opening exercises. I gave him all the appropriate manuals, as well as my keys to the building. Then, rather than attend our respective Priesthood meetings, the two of us found an empty classroom upstairs and held a transitional Presidential summit—his Barack to my George W. I told him how I'd been running things and opined on what I thought had worked well and what I wished I'd done better and/or differently. He asked a lot of questions and took almost half a page of notes. We talked right through the Priesthood hour. By the time we finished, I think he felt a lot more calm and a lot more confident that things were running okay and that he wasn't going to screw them up.

And he won't. He's a sharp guy with a strong testimony of the Gospel. He knows when to talk and when to listen. He's going to be fine.

And what's next for me? Often, the release from a calling, especially a leadership calling, is followed by a couple of weeks 'off'. Then you get a new calling, most often completely unrelated to the one from which you were just released, and you start the process anew.

That's not the case for me. The Bishopric decided to keep me on as a Gospel Doctrine instructor. I was sustained and set apart today.

So I'm out of the presidency, but I still get to teach? That's what I call a best case scenario.