Additional thought on the Law of Consecration

I wanted to continue a little on my thought about the Law of Consecration and how it can be more applicable in our lives today. I was so glad to receive Andy's comments. Andy was my Elder's Quorum President in the 3rd ward at BYU-Idaho. We both met our wives from that ward and had great times together. I was his counselor and he taught me a great deal about the gospel. I thought his comments were of some great value so I am going to place them here for all to see and then I will continue on with my thought. I hope he doesn't mind me putting his comments here. He said, 1.) "I don't remember anywhere in the Temple where we are told that the law of consecration is on hold. In fact I don't recall any talk or message from the church stating otherwise. So we should live it now as much as we can. That means serving others and mentally living it by realizing all we have is given to us to help those around us and none are better than others because of money. 2.) We actually have to prepare a ZION society before it will be established. Its not that we are suddenly going to be rescued out of the world while we still toil to have more than others. There will need to come a shift on our thinking and behavior then the Lord will establish Zion and send the city of Enoch back to the earth to join an existing Zion society." I love those comments.
Now back to some of my thoughts. Considering for a moment that money is nothing more than a means of exchanging service from one person to another. If this is the case, then in all due reality it does not matter what means of currency we use. Obviously the best currency is one backed by a common value such as gold, but for the point I am trying to make, it really does not matter so much the currency as it does the service we perform. We do not need currency to exchange services among people who are of the same mindset and understanding. We all have talents and skills that we can share with each other. In a ward, in a stake, and in the church as a whole their are many things that we can do for each other that requires no currency exchange. What do we do as home teachers and as visiting teachers? We are taught to share our talents and skills with those we serve. As we serve, we are also served. In the church as a whole, we live far below our potential to serve and lift each other up.
How ironic is it that we will go to work for 8-10 hours a week and spend half the money on gas, food, babysitters, etc. and then we will go pay someone the other half of our day's paycheck to fix a simple appliance in our house. All this when the talents and skills to fix that appliance were right there within our ward or stake. It is even more ironic when you consider the fact that the very person who could have come over to fix your appliance will spend a good part of his paycheck to get the very service that you could have gladly exchanged for the fixed appliance. This exchange would have left both of you with more freedom, a chance to have served one another, and more time to have spent with your family. I am not saying we do not need to work at all on the outside since many services can only be provided by larger entities. I am saying that many times we could alleviate much of the heartaches we have by just living a simple version of the Law of Consecration.
When you think of groups of people who live this lower law better than anyone else, who comes to mind? It may be kind of hilarious, but college students at the church schools seem to live this lower law better than any other people. This is probably more by necessity in many cases than by desire, but they still show how it can be done. A college student has little money but quite a few resources and skills available to them. So what do they do with these skills and talents? They share and serve in as many ways as possible so that all can be blessed. In most all of these exchanges, their is no currency exchanged, and yet the service is still rendered.
Now why is this so significant? Their are two ways we can use this knowledge to bless our lives. First, right now we are all in wards and stakes and organizations with people who could use a helping hand with one thing or another. None are excluded from this category. Although many are not quite at the state where this law can be implemented in its entirety, we can rest assured that it will be implemented fully some day, hopefully sooner than later. But inasmuch as the law is able to be lived, it needs to be lived. We have our daily schedules that seem to be so busy, but why are they so busy. What if we spent Saturdays as ward members and as families serving one another? What a great family activity. Then on Sunday, as time permits, we can do the same. One of the reason's we seem to have no time is the very fact that we do not spend the time to give people time if that makes any sense. If we banded together as members of the church, we could alleviate much of the suffering and pain that is felt by many.
The second reason why this is so significant is that if something were to happen to our economy, we would have to realize real fast that we do not need an economy to perform the basics that will keep us alive and happy. The economy does provide for many luxuries, goods, and services, but it can never compensate for actual people helping people and serving one another. Service is eternal, but our currency and economy are very fragile and can fluctuate on a daily basis. If we truly and sincerely learn the essence of true service, which is the key ingredient to the Law of Consecration, we will be able to weather whatever comes our way. When others are fighting each other because things go sour, we can be serving each other and have smiles on our faces!