Moving chairs for Brother Barrus, the ward janitor, was my first introduction to church service. Oh the joy of it! If we young boys would show a few minutes before Sacrament meeting to help set up chairs in the rec hall, Brother Barrus would reward each of us with a stick of hard, black licorice to eat during sacrament meeting - much to our delight and much to the chagrin of our mothers!
Some forty years have passed since those first chair-moving experiences. "Rec Hall" and "Janitor" have yielded their places in the Mormon vernacular to the more sophisticated "cultural hall" and "custodian." The little boys who assisted Brother Barrus have grown to raise little boys of their own. But we still move chairs. Indeed, we are a chair-moving people!
We still set up chairs in the cultural hall to accommodate families like mine who arrive after the padded pews in the chapel are occupied. We take chairs down after the last meeting on Sunday so we can set them up differently for Pack Meeting on Tuesday or Young Women on Wednesday. High priests and elders take turns setting up chairs for overflow stake conference congregations; Primary teachers carefully arrange chairs in little circles for their young students; Relief Society sisters set chairs in precise rows facing beautifully adorned tables, and Deacons set up chairs so they can coolly lean back to touch the wall.
Is there really any point to this chair-moving business? Wouldn't it be easier to hire a few professionals to set up and take down our chairs? Isn't there a more efficient way that might even contribute to increased order and reverence?
Well, after more than 40 years of moving chairs, it finally dawned on me. Countless Brother Barruses, leading innumerable groups of chair movers, have really been doing much more than shuffling places to sit. They have, without ever giving it much thought, been teaching the essentials of true religion - service to fellow beings and service to God. And they've been doing it, in a consistent, repetitive way, chair by chair, Sunday after Sunday, year after year. How could we ever forget?
You see, we don't pay our chair movers for the same reason we don't pay our preachers. Paid preachers may be more eloquent than most of us, and paid chair movers may be more convenient and efficient, but we are here to learn service, not convenience. We learn to preach by preaching; we learn to serve by serving.
Moving a few chairs may seem insignificant next to serving in a bishopric, teaching a Sunday School class or going on a mission, but all these acts of service are made of the same stuff - a willing response to a call, work without promise of personal gain (black licorice notwithstanding!), and extra effort on behalf of someone else. In a small way, moving chairs teaches us about the selfless service Jesus willingly extended to each of us.
So ... I'm grateful for the opportunity to move chairs. Again last Saturday, my 11-year old son became an "honorary High Priest" for half an hour and helped our group set up chairs for stake conference. It was an honor to work shoulder-to-shoulder with my own son and fellow Saints, simply moving chairs, simply learning again, step-by-step, how to serve. Thank you Brother Barrus, wherever you are, for teaching me to serve. Thank you for numbering me among the chair-moving people!
