The Spirit of Elijah

Last Saturday, whilst going to and fro on campus, and from walking up and down in it, I found inspiration in the form of a quote by N. Eldon Tanner. I didn't have any paper on me, so I wrote it on my arm. The quote was this: "Service is the rent we pay for living in this world of ours." I thought about this quite a bit, because since I've been at college, I haven't been that into service. Sure, I sit at my computer to index for family history every once in a while, but besides that, everything is about me. I need to do my homework, I need to feed myself, etc. This has been a huge change since my last year in high school. I had 2 callings in church, and I volunteered in different organizations. But it just doesn't seem like I have time anymore to take care of anyone else's needs along with my own. Well, last night was FHE. I wasn't going to go, because of all the homework I had (still have . . . ), but we were doing a ward FHE, where we all came together to do indexing together. And there was free pizza. That might've influenced my decision a little, considering I hadn't eaten anything that day except for a bowl of cereal at 8:00 that morning. When I went, I saw that they had a paper up of the top indexers in our ward, and I was sixth place. Which surprised me, considering I didn't think I had actually done that much of it. But apparently, everyone else had done less. It felt kinda good to be doing service though. I was glad I went. I ate an entire pizza while I was there, which was nice too. I think next semester, I'm going to do more service. I can definitely apply myself to do more in that category, especially toward the beginning of the semester, I think. And honestly, I think indexing is a really cool thing. I definitely feel the spirit of Elijah when I'm going through name, groaning at how young the girls got married, trying to figure out what occupation they had, and trying to make out the old fashioned hand writing. As hard as it is, I really feel connected with my ancestors when I do it. And I recommend it to everyone else.