Ward Mission Plan

I was released from being an Elder's Quorum instructor and called to first be a ward missionary, then as the assistant ward mission leader. I'm not the most social person by nature but I can still be engaging if necessary, especially one on one. I can also be very organized. I think this means I have the tools to do a good job, and this calling is forcing me out of my shell. I think it's a good thing. It's nice to have a more active calling where I'm actually doing stuff and going out with the missionaries and coordinating things to get done, not just teaching theory on Sundays. It's a change of pace.

We've been working on a new ward mission plan. We fasted and prayed as a ward council to come up with it, and this is what we got:

I think we were all pleased with the result. Hopefully it helps the ward.

FHE with young kids #21 -- Missionary pictures

I'm the assistant ward mission leader now. Yesterday I did a third hour presentation on the new ward mission plan. For FHE we encouraged the ward to go over the plan and set some personal goals. We really ended up mostly just talking to the kids about missionaries, showing them pictures, singing the i hope they call me on a mission song, talking about how old you have to be to go on a mission, and then showing them some of my mission pictures. They thought that was cool.

Found these missionary coloring sheets

FHE with young kids #20 -- Follow Jesus Maze

The kids love mazes, and I found this maze about Jesus in one of the friends.

We talked about why we're supposed to follow Jesus. Then we played follow the leader, which was actually really fun. Then they did the maze and we talked more about following Jesus. Success.

Some thoughts on ordain women

I responded with a comment to an article that was posted on facebook about the Ordain Women Movement. Since the comment turned out to be quite lengthy, and since I haven't ever taken the time to write down my thoughts on this issue prior to now, I wanted to post my comment here as well so I can easily find and reflect on what I've written and thought in the future. I am sure my thoughts will evolve on the issue. I reserve the right to change my mind!

Here is the article from The Style of Being:

http://thestyleofbeing.blogspot.ca/2014/06/mormonism-feminism-and-being-snarky.html?m=1

And here's my thoughts about it:

I thought she had some great points. I also thought she seemed to have a tendency to diminish or dismiss the thoughts and feelings of other women. Men too, for that matter. I understand snark is the name of her game, but I think it’s an insulting way to approach an issue that means so much to many people. I believe her post failed to bring the requisite level of compassion that is necessary for this topic. Some examples of things I had problems with:

She accuses some feminists of "telling us what to think," slyly marginalizing anyone who doesn't think similar to her, then proceeds with the rest of her post to tell women what to think about the priesthood. “I also believe we need to be true to ourselves…” that’s a loaded statement just begging to come across as insulting. She says “It’s the other women who are scrutinizing and patronizing…” and then rants about feminists seeking a brass nameplate and comparing this issue which is genuinely important to these women as a mosquito bite, using her personal incredulity as evidence that it’s not really an issue worth fighting for. She uses her status as part of the in group to generalize and make sweeping claims about women, that the “priesthood responsibilities teach men to develop and use skills that women are already darn good at”, when in fact many women do not feel that is the case. She says “And God's plan for our progression would be thwarted, because if this was something we needed to be doing right now, we'd already be doing it…” which seems to go entirely contrary to the idea of being anxiously engaged and not gliding along saying all is well in Zion, with a fatal appeal to nature saying that just because things are the way they are it’s the way they should be. Then she says “Only God knows how to become like God. So perhaps we should all pay closer attention….” What does this even mean? It’s a straw man combined with an unfinished appeal to authority. “The world knows how it feels to have God tell them no and ask them to follow a better way…” I’m not sure I could think of a better way to blatantly call those feminists sinners and persuade my audience to dismiss anything they have to say. And then, after an entire post of accusations and mockery, she tries to come across empathetic with a few lines about sorely missing anyone who leaves. I’m not convinced.

I’m not sure whether or not I personally feel that women should be ordained. I’ve heard many arguments from many different directions, and I still feel like I don’t know enough facts to really make an opinion. I’m sure there would be many wonderful consequences if woman had the priesthood, and there would of course be trade-offs. But I can say I am not comfortable with some of the inequalities in the church between men and women, and it bugs me when I hear women use their own anecdotal experience of not feeling unequal to dismiss others who do.

I do believe that there has been a change in rhetoric about woman in the priesthood. In October general conference last year, Elder Anderson admitted that we don’t know why women don’t have the priesthood. Elder Oaks recently gave a confusing talk about how women have priesthood authority, but not the priesthood. This seems to be a shift in how the general authorities approach this issue, which seems to imply to me that there really hasn’t been a final revelation on the topic. I am certainly glad for all the agitation that people in and out of the church did to end both racial discrimination and the priesthood ban for blacks, and I can’t help but think that the agitation back then helped nudge the apostles and prophets to get a revelation – a revelation which put the church more on par with the civil rights movement that it had lagged behind. How am I to not consider the similarities between now and then, to not consider that our canon is not closed, and to not wonder if maybe the time is now right for women to have the priesthood? So I’m personally glad that people like Kate Kelly are doing what they are doing. We need more conversations like this.

People sometimes say to the OW movement “what if the prophet met with you and told you no?” I think it’s telling that this hasn’t happened. I believe they have requested to meet with church leadership 4-5 times and never got an answer. Part of me wonders if this might be intentional, because church leadership isn’t entirely convinced that the answer should be no, but they sure as heck aren’t ready to say yes.

FHE with young kids #19 -- The Temple Maze

Our oldest loves mazes. He always breezes through them. I spent some time looking for the hardest maze I could find, and then I took it and made it fun by adding pictures into it and added a temple at the end. Enjoy!

For the lesson we talked about temples, how you need to keep the commandments to go to the temple, you need to be nice, sometimes we mess up but it's OK we can keep going, eventually you'll find your way there, etc.

It was a surprising and fun moment when our 4 year old son asked what we do in the temple. So we got to talk about that, too.

FHE with young kids #18 -- Honesty and lies, getting all tied up

Honesty is always a good lesson for toddlers and preschoolers. We've found that our 4 year old has lied to us a few times recently. We're not sure he understands why that's bad, despite our best efforts. Usually it's just simple stuff, like telling us he pooped in the toilet when he really didn't.

We played a game where I had a cup of water and some food. I had mom ask me if I finished my water. I said I did. Our kids realized there was still water in my cup, and I told them that I lied. Mom started wrapping twine around my hands and tying me up. Then mom asked if I finished my food, and I said yes. The kids saw the banana wasn't finished, and I admitted I lied. She tied me up more. Mom asked me if I pooped, and I said I did. The kids ran to the bathroom and saw the toilet was empty, and I admitted I lied.

I explained that lying hurts people and it makes people not trust you. We lose our power and it's like being tied up. The way to get untied is to start telling the truth.

Then mom asked me a bunch of questions and I told the truth to all of them, and I got untied.

Our oldest thought it looked pretty fun to get tied up and tell lies. Uh oh!

I told him it's not fun and it really hurt. He didn't believe me, so I tied him up really really tight and made sure it hurt.

That convinced him!




Got this idea from here:

http://thatgoodpart.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/fhe-honesty/

FHE with young kids #17 -- The Bully cartoon

One particularly lazy Monday, I saw this bully video on the mormon channel on our Roku, and it was basically our entire FHE. I think we watched it 3 times.



It is a fun cartoon with some complex subjects. Being nice to other people even when they're not nice to you. Generally when you're nice to people, they are eventually nice to you. Sometimes people are mean because they are struggling with hard things like not having any friends.

Our 2 and 4 year old kept on requesting to watch it in the days after this FHE.

FHE with young kids #16 -- Tithing

A while back we got a bunch of coins from a mardi gras parade. It seems like all kids love playing with coins. For one home evening, we just decided to talk about tithing. Our kids are still young enough where they love to count. They thought it was a fun game to count ten coins and "give one back to God". Then we really spiced things up and gave them 20 coins and saw if they could figure out how many coins they should give back to God.

It was fun. Not sure how much actually stuck, but they might be more familiar with the concept of tithing in the future.

FHE with young kids #15 -- The hardcopy scripture books

We realized recently that our kids never see us read the scriptures. We do read them, but both of us read them on our tablets. I can imagine if I were my kids, I would probably think that my parents were just playing on their tablets and not doing anything productive. I think years back when everyone read the hardcopy scripture books, that sort of visualization provided some sort of foundation. Kids see people reading these fancy books and then they think scriptures are important. That's missing with iPads, though!

So we really just wanted to help the kids understand more about what scriptures are, and that some people read them on fancy books and some people read them on their electronic devices.

We had to go find our hard copies and dust them off and then we showed them to our kids.

Notice the book of Mormon is upsidedown... :-)

Then we played a fun color by number game from LDS.org

https://www.lds.org/bc/content/shared/content/images/magazines/friend/2011/05/fr11mayf01-color-by-numbers.pdf?lang=eng

This was the result:

It was a fun little night and I think it was important for our family.

FHE with young kids #14 -- The ten lepers

Had a lesson about the ten lepers the other day. It was great. Started out by looking at the following picture, talking about leprosy, and coloring in all the dots on everyone with a marker. The kids loved that.

Click on the picture to go to the PDF at funtasticfamilyhomeevenings.com

Then we read the story about the ten lepers in Luke 17

Then we watched this awesome lego movie about the 10 lepars. The kids loved loved loved it. We watched it many times since then.





Talked about gratitude, saying thanks, etc. A succesful FHE!

FHE with young kids #13 -- Writing letters

One really simple idea that we did for the first time for FHE was write a Valentine's day card to send to the kids' cousins. Their cousins send them cards for time to time and it's fun to write something and put it in the mail. It teaches about the importance of family and strengthens those distant relationships. And it's fun for the kids to get stuff in the mail!

FHE with young kids #12 -- Duplo Wise and Foolish Man

Wise Man and Foolish Man reenactment with Duplos. The red duplo base is the rock, and the carpet is the sand with a destroyed house on top of it

The meet of today's activity / lesson was singing The Wise Man and the Foolish Man, then discussing it. When we asked if it's better to build a house on a rock or on the sand, our three year old said "sand!". We talked about it for a while, then got the Duplos out.

I asked if rocks are hard or soft. They said hard. I asked if sand was hard or soft. They said soft. I asked if the big red duplo plate was hart or soft. They said hard. I asked if the carpet was hard or soft. They said soft.

Thus, we set up an analogy of the duplo base being a rock and the carpet being the sand. We had fun building a house on the carpet and the duplo base, and the kids had fun seeing how much easier it was to destroy the house on the sand.

It took a while to get the point across even still, when asking why the house on the carpet was easier to destroy. Eventually, our three year old really seemed to get it, however.

I think this one might stick!

Teachings of Joseph Fielding Smith Chapter 3: The Plan of Salvation

Teachings of Joseph Fielding Smith Chapter 3: The Plan of Salvation

Have a missionary come to the board. Give them 4 minutes to draw the Plan of Salvation and teach it as if we were investigators. Time them for fun.

Anybody mind sharing what this diagram means to them? Why it's special?

If you look at the headings of the sections in the chapter, the editors pretty much just take us through that drawing on the board. There’s a section on the premortal life, emphasizing how joyous we were to learn about the Plan of Salvation, basically quoting Job 38: 4-7. Then there’s a section on the fall, saying how it was actually a good thing. Then there’s a section on the the Savior. Then there’s a section basically on Earth Life, then there’s a section on the resurrection, and last there’s a section on judgement and how we’ll get to live with our families forever if we do good.

It’s really quite a lot to cover, which is why this is one of the longer chapters, and there’s a large variety of directions we could go or talk about. In my opinion, however, there is a theme running throughout all of it. Everything points to our experience here on Earth. JFS constantly implies that this mortal life is the crux of everything. This life is a big deal, it's our big moment. We looked forward to it, and we will forever look back on it.

The Premortal life points to now (last paragraph in section, page 60)

We learn from the Pearl of Great Price, that there was a council held in heaven, when the Lord called before him the spirits of his children and presented to them a plan by which they should come down on this earth, partake of mortal life and physical bodies, pass through a probation of mortality and then go on to a higher exaltation through the resurrectionwhich should be brought about through the atonement of his Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ [see Moses 4:1–2; Abraham 3:22–28]. The thought of passing through mortality and partaking of all the vicissitudes of earth life in which they would gain experiences through suffering, pain, sorrow, temptation and affliction, as well as the pleasures of life in this mundane existence, and then, if faithful, passing on through the resurrection to eternal life in the kingdom of God, to be like him [see1 John 3:2], filled them with the spirit of rejoicing, and they “shouted for joy.” [See Job 38:4–7.] The experience and knowledge obtained in this mortal life, they could not get in any other way, and the receiving of a physical body was essential to their exaltation.5

The Fall of Adam and Eve Points to now (last paragraph in section, page 61)

The fall of Adam brought to pass all of the vicissitudes of mortality. It brought pain, it brought sorrow, it brought death; but we must not lose sight of the fact that it brought blessings also. … It brought the blessing of knowledge and understanding and mortal life.

The atonement of Jesus Christ points to now, since he suffered for what we did now, and it is our duty now to teach others of him, since every day we can improve and repent now because of him (3rd paragraph in section, page 62)

First ask how atonement points to now

It is our duty to teach the mission of Jesus Christ. Why did he come? What did he do for us? How are we benefited? What did it cost him to do it? Why it cost his life, yes, more than his life! What did he do besides being nailed on the cross? Why was he nailed there? He was nailed there that his blood might be shed to redeem us from this most terrible penalty that could ever come, banishment from the presence of God. He died on the cross to bring us back again, to have our bodies and spirits reunited. He gave us that privilege. If we will only believe in him and keep his commandments, he died for us that we might receive a remission of our sins and not be called upon to pay penalty. He paid the price. …

……...

Now do not ask me how that was done because I do not know. Nobody knows. All we know is that in some way he took upon himself that extreme penalty. He took upon him our transgressions, and paid a price, a price of torment. (can point out that we make a choice, now, to believe, since we don’t know how it works)

This mortal life, obviously, points to now.

Since this is the crux, we’ll read more about what JFS says about our mortal life in a bit.

The Resurrection points to now, as a restoration of what we have now (3rd paragraph in section, page 67)

Every fundamental part of every body will be restored to its proper place again in the resurrection, no matter what may become of the body in death. If it be burned by fire, eaten by sharks, no matter what. Every fundamental part of it will be restored to its own proper place.25

The day of judgement will point to now (5th paragraph in section, page 68)

We are taught in the gospel of Jesus Christ that the family organization will be, so far as celestial exaltation is concerned, one that is complete, an organization linked from father and mother and children of one generation to the father and mother and children of the next generation, and thus expanding and spreading out down to the end of time.30

These glorious blessings of eternal inheritance … do not come except through willingness to keep the commandments and even to suffer with Christ if need be. In other words, candidates for eternal life—the greatest gift of God—are expected to place all that they have on the altar, should it be required, for even then, and should they be required to lay down their lives for his cause, they could never pay him for the abundant blessings which are received and promised based on obedience to his laws and commandments.31

….

I stand now, in what I might call the twilight of life, with the realization that in a not-far-distant day I shall be called upon to give an account of my mortal stewardship. …

I am sure that we all love the Lord. I know that he lives, and I look forward to that day when I shall see his face, and I hope to hear his voice say unto me: “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” (Matt. 25:34.)

So it seems that everything in the Plan of Salvation is centered around 2 things: the atonement, and how we live our lives. A plane ticket to heaven is something so expensive that nobody can afford it, but Jesus bought one for all of us. However, he does ask we give him something in return. According to JFS, it’s placing all that we have on the alter.

That’s pretty intimidating, what do you all think?

I think it’s helpful to take things one step at a time. Luckily, in the section about our mortal life, JFS indeed takes us through what we’re supposed to do, one step at a time:

(Building on the foundation of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, we work out our salvation during mortality)

Building on the foundation of the atonement, the plan of salvation consists of the following things:

First, we must have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; we must accept him as the Son of God; we must put our trust in him, rely upon his word, and desire to gain the blessings which come by obedience to his laws.

Second, we must repent of our sins; we must forsake the world; we must determine in our hearts, without reservation, that we will live godly and upright lives.

Third, we must be baptized in water, under the hands of a legal administrator, who has power to bind on earth and seal in heaven; we must, through this sacred ordinance, enter into a covenant to serve the Lord and keep his commandments.

Fourth, we must receive the gift of the Holy Ghost; we must be born again; we must have sin and iniquity burned out of our souls as though by fire; we must gain a new creation by the power of the Holy Ghost.

Fifth, we must endure to the end; we must keep the commandments afterbaptism; we must work out our salvation with fear and trembling before the Lord; we must so live as to acquire the attributes of godliness and become the kind of people who can enjoy the glory and wonders of the celestial kingdom.

Sounds a bit easier, right?

Since everything about the plan comes down to what we do with our mortal life, and the first step of the gospel that the plan of Salvation requires is faith, how important is step #1? Why is belief the first step? How necessary a part of “The Plan of Salvation” is it? Do you have to believe to be saved? What do you have to believe in? The Plan of Salvation? God? Jesus? The “gospel”? How do you know if you really believe? What if you want to believe, but there’s some things about the gospel you just have a hard time with? Can you force belief? Will we be penalized for our doubts? Is it OK to admit that we have any? Is belief like a cornerstone of the gospel, where a seed of doubt will make everything come crumbling down? If not, and we can still go to heaven without perfect belief, then why is belief even necessary in the first place?

Notice that steps 2-5 are actions. They are things we do. It is true that we build upon a foundation of the atonement, and that the first step is belief. But the important stuff comes next. And how could it be any other way? The first step to doing anything has to be believing it will be for our good. Nobody goes on a diet or starts doing crossfit or goes into debt for school unless they believe it will do some good. Unless they believe that it will be worth it. Everyone’s live is an investment, and we all spend our lives in a way that we think will give us the maximum return.

Nobody becomes Mormon unless they believe it will pay off. Even if someone joins the church for less-than-traditional reasons -- like welfare or friends or social pressure -- they do it because in some way or another they believe it will pay off. And if you join the church and keep going to church and live the gospel because you believe that there is a God, that there is a Jesus who is our savior, that we have prophets to show us the right way, then you believe being a good Mormon and a good Christian will pay off. If you don’t believe that steps 2-5 that JFS outlined are worth doing, you’re of course never going to do them.

So how do you know if you have enough faith? If you really believe?

It’s pondering this question that it really starts to make sense when James said faith without works is dead, when he says he will “shew thee my faith by my works” (James 2:18). The entire point of faith and belief is getting us to do stuff! To help people, to love others, to engage in service, to covenant with God that we will try and do better. Faith only makes sense when it’s accompanied by good works.

It’s in this context that Alma’s sermon on faith in Alma 32 makes sense. He begs for us to “experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you”. What is the experiment, and what is it that we should desire to believe? In the very least, we can desire to believe that God is there, that he loves us, that he will bless us if we keep the commandments. As Alma says, that is the beginning of faith -- wanting to believe that God is there and he loves us. And ultimately, it’s a choice we all have to make. We can choose to want to believe, or choose not to want it.

FHE with young kids #11 -- CTR Chutes and Ladders

Our 3 year old son loves the Chutes and Ladders game he got for Christmas. I found a CTR chutes and ladders game at this blog.

To start the lesson, I drew the letters CTR on the iPad. My son surprised me by already knowing it meant "Choose The Right". Then, I let him write CTR on the board.

The top left was scribble by our 2 year old, top right is a "C", bottom left is "T", bottom right is "R".

Then we talked about what it means to choose the right, and I showed them various pictures I prepared from Google and discussed if it was a right or wrong choice

• Boys sharing toys (right choice)
• A boy screaming (wrong choice)
• A boy playing in the pool by himself (wrong choice)
• A boy smiling (right choice)
• Boys fighting (wrong choice)
• Boy cleaning up (right choice)

Then we played the CTR chutes and ladders game, which was a hit. They really had a good time and will probably play it again for fun. Their favorite parts were when Mommy or Daddy or Grandma landed on a "wrong choice" spot. Our 2 year old loved that. 

The fact that he was excited about us making a wrong choice meant he understands what it means!

FHE with young kids #10 -- Service Superhero Kids

Grandma made the boys superhero capes for Christmas. They like to run around like crazy people with their capes on.

We started by talking about superheroes, looking at pictures of superman, spiderman, etc. Then I asked them what supeheroes do. Besides flying and getting bad guys, we talked about how they help people.

Then we read this story from the friend about a boy who likes to wear capes and pretend he is a superhero, who also helps his mom around the house.

We talked about how the kids can help out around the house, and got them excited about the idea of putting on their capes when it's time to clean up toys so they can be superheroes.

It went well!