Re: Really Old Missionary Discussions

On 3/29/06 3:16 PM, in article 122lqpiq1uo0iab@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "David
Bowie" <db.news@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Paula wrote:

<snip>

Going to a staff meeting for work gave me a good analogy for this. I
work for a nonprofit agency that is staffed mostly by people straight
out of school and on their way to other things after getting a little
experience. So this is often their first "real" job and there is a
lot of turnover. This results in many many staff meetings being
terminally boring to me just on the basis of subject matter alone. To
add to the problem, when they do go over how to fill out your
paperwork correctly and turn it in on time and how to do the various
tasks that we are supposed to be able to do, the emphasis is on what
will happen to you if you don't figure it all out...

This is a lot like church--lots of stuff for the new and clueless, which
gets annoying for those of us who are little less new and clueless.

How long does it take to get annoyed? I am coming up on my 30th anniversary
in a few years, and annoyance hasn't set in just yet.

I
realize that there's value in going over the basics again (and again,
and again, and...), but can't we have a little love for those of us
who'd like to spend the entire SunSch year just dealing with the minor
prophets?

The purpose of Sunday School is to strengthen members' testimonies and their
commitment to living the gospel through study of the scripture.

If it's just intellectual interest in an area, then there are other outlets.
I took a BYU home study course on the writings of Isaiah some years ago.

Nevertheless, a high priority of gospel doctrine teachers should be praying
for how to meet the needs of their class members. So if you have a
NEED....but you described it as "would like to."

In our ward, there are two GD classes, young marrieds and other. I teach
the other, a class that includes a half-dozen former bishops, two
patriarchs, and usually any visiting stake visitors. And lots of widows. I
know that not hearing the exact same thing for the 40th time is important to
some of my class members.

So when we had a lesson on missionary work during the D & C year, I talked
about the history of missionary work in our area (first missionaries in
1896, and the church archives had some interesting journal entries from some
who served a bit later, etc.).

Last week, lesson 12, I carefully read through the lesson and somehow
through my preparation did end up doing some slightly different things. We
started by opening the Bible Dictionary to "Egypt" and talking about the
Hyksos and how the sociopolitical climate affected Joseph. For one thing,
it seems strange that Isaac and Jacob have to marry so carefully, but Joseph
gets to marry a random priest's daughter and still have his sons considered
part of the house of Israel? It makes more sense when you realize that
there was a substantial and powerful Semitic population in Egypt at the
time.

We reviewed the story of Joseph, but not in too much detail because I knew
everyone there had read it (if not this week, then other times). So then we
spent about 12-15 minutes discussing how the story of Joseph in Egypt was a
type or parable of Jesus Christ. This was all class participation, and I
was incredibly impressed with the creativity of my classmates. I had read
some talks on the subject, and was prepared to add details if needed, but
they came up with some things that none of the other sources had thought
about.

And we closed with a discussion of Joseph's example in forgiving his
brothers, with some applicable quotes from modern general authorities (I
sometimes bring my ipod in with recent General Conference addresses that are
applicable).

So I think I provided my class with something a bit different. But I'm sure
it wasn't as intellectual as some would like.



.

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