Primary Graduation/Becoming A Deacon

Day 54

 

My Book of Remembrance contains all of the spiritual, precious, “not of this world” mementos of mine. Today’s post is about some of the mementos attached to the year I turned 12 (which is appropriate, because tomorrow’s blog post is going to be about my 7th grade experiences).

Anyway, turning 12 is a big milestone for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints; boys and girls leave behind Primary and begin attending the young men and young women Sunday school classes. No more Primary songs, Sharing Time, and all things that may be considered childish in connection with Primary; this is the launching pad into young adulthood. And I distinctly remember feeling older and wiser and practically an adult when I graduated from Primary. Ah, to be so young and naïve!

As I was preparing this post I noticed the date on my Primary Graduation Certificate: July 27th 1986! Hey, that was exactly 24 years ago! Oh…my…gosh! I am so depressed now. It’s kind of ironic that all these years later I’m in Primary as an instructor, teaching the 10/11/12 year-olds about the Old Testament. And guess what? I love it! I love singing the songs, sitting in Sharing Time, attending the activities - the whole Primary experience!

Moving on…turning 12 is a big milestone for boys in the LDS church (like turning 13 is a milestone for Jewish boys, when they have a bar mitzvah) because this is the year boys receive the Aaronic Priesthood and are ordained to the office of Deacon. And with receiving the priesthood and becoming a Deacon came new responsibilities. The one that I was most excited about was passing the sacrament during Sacrament meeting at church. An honorable duty that required maturity and reverence (and not to mention steady hands when carrying the sacrament trays of the bread and water!) Side note: I never dropped a tray (whew!!)

What I remember most about turning 12 was that I was given my very first suit (in my mind it was my first suit because I do not count that awful blue polyester excuse for a suit that I had in 1977!) Anyway, I got a new tie to go with the suit and I felt very mature! I looked different on the outside, I felt different on the inside. Little did I know that there would be many other things happening to me in my 12th year that would change me forever…