Leadership Council

We rescheduled leadership council this month to accommodate a new, church-sponsored initiative called Because He Lives.  Normally, these councils take place on the first Wednesday of each month, but because of the time sensitive nature of the initiative, the April Council took place instead on the last Thursday of March. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We began the council with a short testimony in English about the Book of Mormon.

 

 

Following him there was a short talk about the essential role of obedience in missionary work, especially staying with our companions at all times. 

 The assistants then followed up on our current mission focuses and we counseled together about the miraculous success that God has brought to pass recently in our mission.

 

After the preliminary exercises we studied the prayer of faith.  Several missionaries and President Lovell addressed us drawing upon five key passages of scripture: 2 Nephi 4:20-35, Alma 34:17-28, 3 Nephi 12:9-13, Moroni 7:48, and James 1:5-6. 

 

Following the instruction, we role-played teaching prayer to investigators in a practical way that meets their daily needs and helps them feel the hope of a relationship with God.

These role-plays made us excited to help our actual investigators and so we made some mission goals using a calendar and the names of actual people we are teaching.  We are very hopeful about the month of April!  With our goals in place, President gave us a powerful tool by introducing Because He Lives.  He showed us an amazing video the Church put together.  Share it with your friends and bear your testimony of the power and reality of prayer!

 

 

One of our favorite parts of the meeting was having our daughter Brittany and her husband Alex with us!  They each shared their testimonies and talked about how to stay strong after the mission.  It was so fun for them to meet so many of our wonderful missionaries!

 

Alex was excited to see one of his best friends sister here.  She is one of our amazing Hermana Leaders!

 

All this learning in the Spirit made us hungry, and so we took a break for lunch. 

 

 Elder and Sister Arnaudin surprised us while we were eating with too beautiful cakes!  It was actually my birthday that day!  They were delicious!

  

 

After we got started again they surprised me by singing Happy Birthday in three languages and showed a video the Sister Training Leader´s put together with photos of and notes from each zone of the mission sharing wonderful thoughts about my birthday!  It was so much fun and I felt very special!

 

You have to know this gift is very special.  I am always talking about the importance of eating more vegetables. In an earlier zone conference I explained to all the missionaries how easy it is to cook butternut squash whole in the oven!  These squash are President and I!  They even have little missionary tags on them!  These Sister Leaders are so fun and creative!

 

Elder Arnaudin stayed with us after lunch to teach us important life skills and to remind us of the importance of taking care of our apartments. 

 

When he left the assistants worked with us in another role-play to show us how to use Because He Lives in our daily proselyting efforts

 

 

President Lovell concluded by bringing everything we learned in leadership council back together.  He helped us have a unified vision of the future and understand what the Lord expects of us as missionaries and leaders. 

 

 

 

 We left with renewed faith to share what we learned with our zones.