Missionary Week

Mormon Mt. Rushmore

So last week, my little brother, Thomas, received his mission call!! My mom found the envelope in the mail and so we changed plans and drove up to be there for the big moment with everyone and my brother/ sis-in-law on the phone. I am so excited for him to serve the people of South Dakota, and change the lives of the people he was sent there to find. This, of course, got me thinking about and remembering my own mission.  Then, this week for our stake they had "missionary week".

 Each young woman or young man received a call to a mission that one of the leaders had served in.  (We got asked a few times if they really got to fly there... ha ha).  Nate and I volunteered to represent our missions (Mine- Neuquen, Argentina, and his- Albania).  They each were challenged to live the mission standards (music, facebook, bedtime, everything...) At the end of the week there is a fireside about missions and they get points for the parts of the challenge they've completed.

Mate 

Last night was the big mutual activity where we started all together and watched a you tube video with a bunch of people receiving their calls: Mission call video. Then we split into our "districts" (everyone assigned to the same mission) and presented to them something from Preach My Gospel.  I taught about asking good questions, something very emphasized in my mission, and Nate taught about teaching for understanding.  Then we all combined again and went into the gym where Nate and I, and the other presenters, each had tables set up with stuff from the region of our missions.  I made tortas fritas (fried bread), with dulce de leche, and mate (kind of gross herbal tea they LOVE down in Argentina) for my table, and Nate had baklava at his table.  (Which I am pretty proud of, it's my first time ever making it). Recipe here: http://blogs.courier-journal.com/recipes/2012/04/12/baklava/

The Baklava right out of the oven

Every RM loves talking about their missions, and few people love hearing about it for extended periods of time, so this was our perfect chance to share mission stories.  The youth really loved it and were able to get excited about when they serve a mission.  I did something similar to this my freshman year of college and loved getting a more realistic taste of what a mission really is.  I'm glad so many more people are serving missions now, packing the MTC with more instruments for the Lord to use to spread the gospel. It really is miraculous!  Now my mission is divided into two, along with lots of other new missions... 58 new missions.