This week I have centered my studies on leading in the saviors way. Some back story for this weeks study. We have had interviews with president and I was expressing my feelings on my district being quite difficult to remain a certain sense of order and mutual respect.
Because to be honest it felt like I was just becoming a single parent trying to put 4 kids to sleep every other night, in my fathers own words " it's like pulling teeth with them". As I was expressing this to President Stevens he stopped me and told me that in the interviews of my district there was a common theme of respect of me. This took me back a little bit because I didn't think they liked me little alone
respected me. So I thought how could I use this and build upon it to help my district sanctify themselves. So I have been studying in the Topical Guide about Leadership and listening to BYU talks about it. Some of my major take away safe this. To become a more Christ like leader you can not dictate or manage people, this will get the results you want but maybe not the best results possible. Like the Saviour, He invited through asking questions. When one had a problem His advice was always the same "Come
and follow me". The word "Come" is such an inviting word, I guess the opposite would be "get over here and follow me". To be a Christ like leader you need to allow people's agency to be exercised so growth will take place, allowing them to use the knowledge hey have at the time to solve the problem of the moment. Some leaders assume that "no
one can solve it with out me, that's why I am a leader", this
diminishes people and in the long run does not allow personal growth of the leader or the person needing the help. Because the leader knows how to do it and is not edified by doing it; and the person needing the help doesn't know how to do it, never ended up doing it and therefor never learned to do it, and is not edified. My favorite quote of my mission so far is "The Lords way isn't always going to be the
most efficient way, because it would allow people to grow". I know this is true, because if it was the most efficient way I would just find, teach the assigned lessons, baptise on the assigned date and go on my way. Both the investigators and myself would not be edified, it takes struggle to learn and good leaders realize that and help others learn through struggle. I wish this was beneficial for someone, but this is the results of my studies this week
Updates:
- I'm teaching this family from Ghana that has an interesting problem. The boys Joel (8 yrs old) and Ceral(5 yrs old) read the Book of Mormon every day (about one column a day), and the mother Lidia reads it every day with out fail. They are working towards baptism and love
every bit about the gospel and eat up every doctrine we give them, but the husband who Lidia is separated from is against the church. Longstory short he doesn't believe we have the gift of tongues ( he is way Pentecostal), but said if his boys go to the Mormon church again he
would stop visiting his kids. To be honest that is pretty low, Lidia wants to come to church and believes it's true and is extremely fellowshipped by the ward, but her husband will stop visiting the boys
if they come to church. So that's my problem that I will have to solve this week.
- My district is still struggling with motivation and doesn't want to work, and it has been effecting my motivation as well. My zone leaders
offer my counsel just to keep me going, it is always helpful. My zone leader is elder sharp, he was my district leader in London and i would say he is a life long friend. He is from st. George so not too far to go and party with, but he is super enthusiastic and it lightens my
mood. But I don't know about every one else😂
