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This Sunday we had a husband and wife team that both talked on the assigned talk of reverence. I wondered why they were both given the same boring topic. Are we supposed to be bored into reverence? The husband read 6 or 7 different definitions for reverence – including from the urban dictionary. :eh: In EQ they were discussing how the devil wants people to not believe in him. The teacher talked about how the devil plays a role in the plan and will eventually be vanquished but he just can’t help himself. The devil is addicted to self defeating behavior.
To the positive – my ministering brother sat next to me in the foyer and asked about the family. He is a good man with genuine interest and concern. The misionaries appear to have invited one of my daughter’s classmates to church. DD invited her to come to YW and showed her where the class is. I love that my daughter is getting leadership opportunities that I believe will grow her self confidence and self worth.
If you substitute the Ego in our minds for those descriptions of the devil…there are lots of similarities. Sometimes I feel that is what people are describing with God and the devil…the forces within ourselves and our struggle between light and darkness…just personified for story telling. Glad your daughter is getting the experience. Those things are so good for them, I think (most of the time).
Good to hear.
A funny thing happened on the way to the forum…. I get in my car this afternoon and there was a text from a number I didn’t recognize (we can’t bring our phones into the secure government facility where I work). The message was “Sister X needs a blessing, would you reach out to her?” plus her phone number. I do know Sister X, she is a very high needs person who doesn’t like me (which is OK because I don’t like her either). I call the number, it turns out to be the ward executive secretary and I get his voice mail. Meanwhile I text my BFF who is a counselor in the EQP and say “Why am I getting this message?” He knows I don’t have time to do such things except perhaps in serious emergency and to my knowledge Sister X (also inactive BTW) has no connection to me other than our mutual dislike. He looks on his phone and say “You’re her ministering brother” to which I respond “What? That’s news to me.” So I do a sync and not only does she not show up on my ministering list, she doesn’t show up on my directory, which I relay to him. We figure she must have the privacy lockdown set, but if her ministering brother can’t see the info then that’s a bit of a glitch/bug. He also says he doesn’t remember discussing her being assigned to me, and he doesn’t know her. I then call my ministering interview guy (the other counselor) who also doesn’t know why or how I was assigned but knew I was a little hot at that point and said he’d follow up with Sister X and make sure the assignment got changed. In the meantime I had blustered a bit about assigning people without asking and if you did ask you’d know about our dislike for each other and you’d know I’m not willing to take on any more than I already have, and I especially can’t do any high needs individuals (he thought I said Chinese at first
😆 ).Anyway, just goes to show things are not always what we think. I will get to the bottom of who assigned her and why though and let them have a little Force lightning zap too. They’ll not do it again. I don’t consider myself an expert on ministering, but the SP might – this weekend is the third time in the last 6 months I’m part of a presentation on the subject to stake/ward leaders. If they need to know how to make (or how not to make) ministering assignments, I’ll let them know.
A few days out I do have a little more detail on the surprise ministering assignment. It wasn’t a surprise to everyone. 1. The change was actually made in February at a joint meeting with the RSP and EQP. The counselor who does my interviews was absent and wasn’t informed. (My BFF for some unknown reason didn’t think it significant although he knows my take on most things.)
2. Sister X has her privacy settings on leaders only, so she does not show up in LDS tools on my directory nor on the list of people I minister to (I think that’s a bug).
Nonetheless, it is now very clear to all of my ward leadership that they are not to add more than what I have on my list (two empty nest couples, one very inactive sister) and to consult me (that is do a ministering interview) before any changes are made to my list. I’m good with Chinese people but not high needs ones. And I will apologize to the ES today for the seemingly brusque message I left him (it really wasn’t as bad as some of the texts I sent to the EQCs). I don’t know if she got her blessing, my BFF didn’t know either.
Unrelated, last night was stake priesthood meeting. Second week in a row I at quoted at from
Miracle of Forgiveness. (You probably already guessed the topic of that talk was porn.) Dusting off the old MoF, eh? Are the people giving the lessons that old to where they can’t think of any other resource to talk about porn other than something that was written 50 years ago? :angel: I wouldn’t mind a lesson on Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti, Yowie, Wendigo, Skunk Ape, Abominable Snowman, and other aliases of Cain.
nibbler wrote:
Dusting off the old MoF, eh? Are the people giving the lessons that old to where they can’t think of any other resource to talk about porn other than something that was written 50 years ago?:angel: I wouldn’t mind a lesson on Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti, Yowie, Wendigo, Skunk Ape, Abominable Snowman, and other aliases of Cain.
That is my pet peeve about it. You really can’t find a reference less than 50 years old in an out of print book? When looking for a reference did you wonder why that might be? Did you stop to think that maybe of you couldn’t find something more current you shouldn’t talk about it? Are you sleeping through the restoration? You love to quote RMN and follow him to the letter of the law – that’s why you harp on reading the BoM. What has he said about repentance and porn? (I guarantee you it’s not the same thing SWK said about either subject).
While I’m here, today’s “testimony” meting was pretty much devoid of any testimony, starting the Bishop Bloviator.
MoF… porn… Hmm… I wonder if with changes at church (2 hour meeting, etc) your SP wants to reinforce the need to be very devoted and striving for perfection. Not letting up or accepting mediocrity. I wonder if that makes them want to return to things taught strictly in the past. Heber13 wrote:
MoF… porn… Hmm… I wonder if with changes at church (2 hour meeting, etc) your SP wants to reinforce the need to be very devoted and striving for perfection. Not letting up or accepting mediocrity. I wonder if that makes them want to return to things taught strictly in the past.
I don’t know if it’s the SP as much, although he is big on the porn issue. He spoke twice in meetings yesterday and noted the correct definitions of perfect (whole, complete) in context and repentance (change). His repentance talk was actually the highlight of the meetings since he made it pretty clear it isn’t what most people think it is (penance) and specifically spoke to the youth about it not being difficult and he tied it all in with the atonement being something active in our lives now and not only something for the future. The SP himself didn’t mention porn in any of the meetings, there really was just that one talk – but it was the other headline talk in the general session (the others were a youth and the SP, one other planned speaker had a medical emergency and didn’t show). I think our SP is actually OK with mediocrity – he puts up with me and of late has been chatting privately with me quite a bit (which is a bit worrisome). I can honestly say that priesthood meetings were way more uplifting than today’s F&TM. (FWIW, I did not present in the general session but did in both other sessions.)
DarkJedi wrote:
Heber13 wrote:
MoF… porn… Hmm… I wonder if with changes at church (2 hour meeting, etc) your SP wants to reinforce the need to be very devoted and striving for perfection. Not letting up or accepting mediocrity. I wonder if that makes them want to return to things taught strictly in the past.
I don’t know if it’s the SP as much, although he is big on the porn issue. He spoke twice in meetings yesterday and noted the correct definitions of perfect (whole, complete) in context and repentance (change). His repentance talk was actually the highlight of the meetings since he made it pretty clear it isn’t what most people think it is (penance) and specifically spoke to the youth about it not being difficult and he tied it all in with the atonement being something active in our lives now and not only something for the future. The SP himself didn’t mention porn in any of the meetings, there really was just that one talk – but it was the other headline talk in the general session (the others were a youth and the SP, one other planned speaker had a medical emergency and didn’t show). I think our SP is actually OK with mediocrity – he puts up with me and of late has been chatting privately with me quite a bit (which is a bit worrisome). I can honestly say that priesthood meetings were way more uplifting than today’s F&TM. (FWIW, I did not present in the general session but did in both other sessions.)
I wanted to expand on this a bit. My SP is very much into the simplification of things. He often says you only need to do what you can do and references the running faster than you are able thing but also clarifies that there other priorities in our lives. He’s told all the bishops in the stake he wants them out of the church building by 2:00 on Sundays and no more than one evening per week doing interviews. This weekend he said he’s fine with one in-person ministering interview per year – they can do more if they want and as circumstances permit, but he told them not to overburden themselves with the idea that “ideally” they’d be in person with both companions. He said those same interviews shouldn’t be longer than 10 minutes and only need to ask 3 questions: what are the family’s needs, how are you helping them, and what can the quorum/RS or ward do to help? He said he is not a travel agent for guilt and neither are the quorum presidencies. He similarly said that each ward should have a simple mission plan and simple temple/FH plan – with each having no more than 4 bullet points and no longer than one page.
So mediocrity is probably not the right word – but he’s OK with relaxing things considerably. I’m didn’t know him at all before he was called as SP and called me to the HC. He is an executive for a large international corporation and he does travel for work fairly frequently (not as often as his counselor). He was branch president for a while. He has a wayward son with whom he has a very strained relationship. I think he may be repenting of his own past over-committal misdeeds and trying to help others not make the same mistakes. I sincerely hope he becomes an AA or GA.
That’s an interesting approach. We recently changed wards due to boundary realignment. In the old ward a bishopric counselor set up a time to visit in the home of a member to issue every single calling. We thought it was a bit excessive, something that a busy body counselor took upon himself to do, plus he was an empty nester. Maybe he enjoyed it.
My wife got a calling in the new ward… and a counselor in the bishopric made an appointment to stop by in our home to issue the calling. He’s got lots of small children. At this point I’m thinking it’s direction from the stake, not something that the previous counselor took upon themselves to do.
It’s a personal touch in extending callings, that’s nice I guess, but it does seem like it can be a burden for BP counselors. Our stake doesn’t appear to be overly concerned with reducing the church footprint in people’s lives.
DJ, thanks for sharing more. Sorry if I assumed too much. But if they are preaching “do not run faster than you have strength” then it sounds like a loving message. Perhaps his son is teaching him some perspective, or perhaps he is open to that perspective already. He sounds like a good leader. Nibbler … Your area is whacked. That’s all.
Yes, in this particular case I mostly lucked out on leadership roulette and Nibbler has mostly been screwed. Unlike the true gospel where there’s enough ice cream for everyone and just because I won doesn’t mean you lose, there are winners and losers in leadership roulette. I like to think that my area is so hardcore because they have to counterbalance the chi that I give off. 😆 Maybe your chi is there and you are planted there to balance their whackiness. :thumbup: nibbler wrote:
I like to think that my area is so hardcore because they have to counterbalance the chi that I give off.😆
There is something to be said for bringing balance to the Force.
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