As you begin the new calendar year with your students, you may wish to take a few minutes during one of your first lessons to ask your students to ponder their answer to this question:
"Are you closer to the Savior than the last time I saw you?"
You may also wish to invite your students to write down their thoughts and impressions.
You may wish to take an upcoming activity day and make
it a "Story Day."
There are several ways to do this -- all of which can
be fun. Here are few ideas:
* Look through the Seminary Teachers Manual and gather
the stories that you did not use when you taught
that lesson.
* Invite students to bring a favorite gospel-centered
story to class. (If you're unsure what they may
bring, you can ask them to bring a photocopy to you
the previous week -- so you can check and order them.)
* You may invite students to write short stories that
are based on a New Testament scripture that illustrate
one or more gospel principles.
* Find stories from the Ensign or New Era magazines, etc.
We have so much to be thankful for at this Christmas season!
Here's a favorite story of mine from Elder Dallin H. Oaksthat shows the importance of keeping the right attitudeand perspective:
"Just before Christmas one year, our bishop asked me, as a deacon, to help him deliver Christmas baskets to the widows of the ward. I carried a basket to each door with his greetings. When he drove me home, there was one basket remaining. He handed it to me and said it was for my mother. As he drove away, I stood in the falling snow wondering why there was a basket for my mother. She never referred to herself as a widow, and it had never occurred to me that she was. To a 12-year-old boy, she wasn't a widow. She had a husband, and we had a father. He was just away for a while. I anticipate that glorious future day when the separated will be reunited and all of us will be made complete as the Lord has promised. I testify of Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of the Eternal Father, whose priesthood authority and whose Atonement and Resurrection make it all possible..."
(Source: Oaks, Dallin H., Conference Report, October 2005)
[Seminary-Notes]
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FOR YOUR INFORMATION...
==================================== Thanksgiving is the perfect time of year to follow the admonition of the popular hymn and "Count Your Many Blessings."
Here is a great story of thankfulness (as shared in Chieko N. Okazaki's book entitled Lighten Up!, pp. 45-48.)
Corrie Ten Boom and her sister Betsie were Dutch women and devout Christians who hid Jews in their home during World War II, until the sisters were captured by the Gestapo and imprisoned. When they were transferred to Ravensbruck, the women's concentration camp, and moved into new quarters, their barracks were crawling with fleas. Corrie and Betsie had always been scrupulously clean and these vermin were abhorrent to them. Corrie tells the story:
"Here! And here's another one!" I wailed. "Betsie, how can we live in such a place!"
"Show us. Show us how." It was said so matter of factly it took me a second to realize she was praying. More and more the distinction between prayer and the rest of life seemed to be vanishing for Betsie.
"Corrie!" she said excitedly. "He's given us the answer! Before we asked, as He always does! In the Bible this morning. Where was it? Read that part again!"
I glanced down the long dim aisle to make sure no guard was in sight, then drew the Bible from its pouch. . . . "Here it is: 'Comfort the frightened, help the weak, be patient with everyone. See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all. . . . Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus-'"
"That's it, Corrie! That's his answer. 'Give thanks in all circumstances!' That's what we can do. We can start right now to thank God for every single thing about this new barracks!"
I stared at her, then around me at the dark, foul-aired room.
"Such as?" I said.
"Such as being assigned here together."
I bit my lip. "Oh yes, Lord Jesus!"
"Such as what you're holding in your hands."
I looked down at the Bible. "Yes! Thank you, dear Lord, that there was no inspection when we entered here!
Thank you for all the women, here in this room, who will meet you in these pages."
"Yes, " said Betsie, "Thank you for the very crowding here. Since we're packed so close, that many more will hear!" She looked at me expectantly. "Corrie!" she prodded.
"Oh, all right. Thank you for the jammed, crammed, stuffed, packed, suffocating crowds."
"Thank you," Betsie went on serenely, "for the fleas and for-"
The fleas! This was too much. "Betsie, there's no way even God can make me grateful for a flea."
"'Give thanks in all circumstances,'" she quoted. "It doesn't say, 'in pleasant circumstances.' Fleas are part of this place where God has put us."
And so we stood between piers of bunks and gave thanks for fleas. But this time I was sure Betsie was wrong. (Original source: Corrie Ten Boom, with John and Elizabeth Sherrill, The Hiding Place [New York: Bantam Books, 1971], pp. 197-99.)
But as events turned out, it was Betsie who was right. Both Corrie and Betsie were diligent missionaries, constantly bearing testimony to God, bringing the hope of Christ to women trapped in that dreadful place. Betsie was too sick to go out with the brigades of women workers into the forest where the women had to gather wood. She was assigned to knit stockings for German soldiers; and because there were so many women, Betsie was in a group that had to work in the barracks instead of the work room.
She was a lightning knitter who completed her quota . . . long before noon. She kept our Bible with her and spent hours each [afternoon] reading aloud from it, moving from [sleeping] platform to platform.
One evening I got back to the barracks late. . . . Betsie was waiting for me, as always, so that we could wait through the food line together. Her eyes were twinkling.
"You're looking extraordinarily pleased with yourself," I told her.
"You know we've never understood why we had so much freedom in the big room," she said. "Well-I've found out."
That afternoon, she said, there'd been confusion in her knitting group about sock sizes and they'd asked the supervisor to come and settle it.
"But she wouldn't. She wouldn't step through the door and neither would the guards. And you know why?" Betsie could not keep the triumph from her voice: "Because of the fleas! That's what she said, 'That place is crawling with fleas.'"
My mind rushed back to our first hour in this place. I remembered Betsie's bowed head, remembered her thanks to God for creatures I could see no use for. (The Hiding Place, pp. 208-9.)
Regarding thankfulness, President Monson has noted:
"Gracias, danke, merci -- whatever language is spoken, 'thank you' frequently expressed will cheer your spirit, broaden your friendships, and lift your lives to a higher pathway as you journey toward perfection. There is a simplicity -- even a sincerity -- when “thank you” is spoken." (Source: President Thomas S. Monson, "Think to Thank," Ensign, November 1998, p. 17.)
Here's a website where you can learn how to write "Thank You" in over 465 different languages.
[Seminary-Notes]
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FOR YOUR INFORMATION...
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Many Seminary-aged students actively listen to General Conference, but may not often think about reading and reviewing the guidance and advice when it is published in the Ensign magazine.
Here is a recent request from President Monson (October 2008 General Conference) that we can all participate in -- especially if we bring it to our student's remembrance and attention:
There remain ... areas of the world where our influence is limited and where we are not allowed to share the gospel freely. As did President Spencer W. Kimball over 32 years ago, I urge you to pray for the opening of those areas, that we might share with them the joy of the gospel. As we prayed then in response to President Kimball's pleadings, we saw miracles unfold as country after country, formerly closed to the Church, was opened. Such will transpire again as we pray with faith.
Source: President Thomas S. Monson, Ensign, November 2008, p. 6.
This can be a great (and simple) way to infuse a missionary spirit into our classroom -- and remind us that it is important to first recognize and then do what the Prophet has asked of us. Best wishes,
[Seminary-Notes]
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FOR YOUR INFORMATION...
==================================== As you discuss the Savior's mortal life with your students and what it might have been like to have the wonderful opportunity of associating with Him, you may wish to share the following experience of Elder Melvin J. Ballard:
Away on the Fort Peck Reservation where I was doing missionary work with some of our brethren, laboring among the Indians, seeking the Lord for light to decide certain matters pertaining to our work there, and receiving a witness from him that we were doing things according to his will, I found myself one evening in the dreams of the night in that sacred building, the temple. After a season of prayer and rejoicing I was informed that I should have the privilege of entering into one of those rooms, to meet a glorious Personage, and, as I entered the door, I saw, seated on a raised platform, the most glorious Being my eyes have ever beheld or that I ever conceived existed in all the eternal worlds. As I approached to be introduced, he arose and stepped towards me with extended arms, and he smiled as he softly spoke my name. If I shall live to be a million years old, I shall never forget that smile. He took me into his arms and kissed me, pressed me to his bosom, and blessed me, until the marrow of my bones seemed to melt! When he had finished, I knelt at his feet, and, as I bathed them with my tears and kisses, I saw the prints of the nails in the feet of the Redeemer of the world. The feeling that I had in the presence of him who hath all things in his hands, to have his love, his affection, and his blessing was such that if I ever can receive that of which I had but a foretaste, I would give all that I am, all that I ever hope to be to feel what I then felt.
This quotation is found in several published sources. Here are two:
Bryant S. Hinckley, Sermons and Missionary Services of Melvin J. Ballard, p. 156.
Leon R. Hartshorn, Exceptional Stories from the Lives of Our Apostles, pp. 11-12.
[Seminary-Notes]
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FOR YOUR INFORMATION...
==================================== If you make and/or give birthday cards to your students, here's a fun website you can use to easily personalize them:
1. Visit www.dmarie.com/timecapsule 2. Enter the student's birthday (mm/dd/yyyy) 3. Click the Quick Page link
This website will list the following information pertaining to that birthdate:
Top News Headlines
Top Songs
Current Prices (for things like bread, gasoline, cars, eggs, stamps, homes, etc.)
Famous People Born on that Date
Popular TV Shows
New Toys
Top Books
You can include any, or all, of the information in your birthday card.
