WEEK 43 - The Veins Of An Orange Seed
This week has felt like an entire transfer but smooshed into seven days. We started up “Phase 2” of Seal Team 6 with so many projects in the work–my anthropological training is paying off. Our goal this transfer is to continue to change the culture of the mission for the better: to make the THSM truly utilize all three fishing lines in the water (i.e. Missionary work, member work, and media work) and to make sure that what we are teaching, what we are implementing, sticks. Each mission has a distinct culture, but each revolve around a six week cycle where–at the beginning of each cycle or transfer–a new focus is announced by the Mission President and the Assistants. Whether that be a specific thing, like extending baptismal invitations, or a broader principle or topic like consecration, the focus is distributed from the Mission President to the Assistants and then to the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders and then to District Leaders and Trainers. This is how the mission is organized, its power also being distributed from the top and to the bottom of this social pyramid. What happens after those six weeks conclude is a distinct change of focus. At the end of six weeks, missionaries get moved to new areas, get called to new leadership positions, and it makes for a time of change. Naturally, the Mission President and the Assistants change their focus, too. Hopefully by the end of those six weeks the thing they have been fighting to be implemented will have come to pass and they are able to focus on another area of growth that the mission needs. The inherent problem with the way that this is organized is the fact that by the time another six weeks pass, the thing that was the focus of the last transfer–now twelve weeks ago–has become less of a focus (sometimes rarely ever mentioned again) and deemed less important in the minds of the missionaries. Every six weeks a new wave of cultural focus is introduced, but instead of adding to the last wave that is just now concluding to create an even bigger wave that washes over everything, the mission starts from scratch. Granted, there are times where this is not as drastic as I have explained but in the end the mission does not see as much success as they could have if, instead of shifting gears at the start of every six weeks, they maintained the same focus, only adding in specific concepts and principles that enhance that focus, while–this is the key here–sustaining the things that they have been implementing and changing, there would be a greater cultural change that comes about, but after a longer period of time than six weeks.
The focus of any missionary should be their missionary purpose, which is to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. Most mission leaders understand this and take the time to focus on each individual part of this missionary purpose hoping that it will come together to create a greater whole. For example, one transfer period might be focused on faith in Jesus Christ, another might be focused on baptism, but by doing so the other parts of the whole are lost.
What I’m proposing and actively fighting for, with what little influence I have in the nurturing of each cultural revolution that occurs during each six week period (and there very much is a mission-wide cultural revolution that happens during each transfer as well as the chance that the mission does not accept the focus of that transfer, also creating a revolution of disobedience), is that we shift our views from six week periods to longer periods of time like six months to a year, while utilizing each six week period to slowly but surely implement specific concepts that can be directly applied to a complete, unchanging focus. Gone should be the days of stating at the beginning of the transfer and throughout that, “this transfer’s focus is BAPTISM.” Instead, there should be less of a change, less of an emphasis on a particular thing, but a focus on a missionary’s purpose and a focus on how, specifically, we are to get there (not through broad focuses like baptism, but specific foundational focuses like how consecration can lead to greater faith in Jesus Christ). These principles and plans should never be forgotten or ignored at the start of each transfer, however. They must always be talked about in relation to the overarching focus, even to the point of redundancy so that when a new principle is introduced, the missionaries continue to implement what they have learned and been doing for the past three–or more–months.
What I’m talking about isn’t that far off from what my mission, and most missions, do. I just think that this reframing and refocusing of how a mission sets goals and sets plans could completely change the trajectory, efficiency, and culture of the mission–just after some time. It’s only a matter of whether or not a mission wants to drudge through the start of an exponential curve where there are little results in the beginning, but greater results soon to come or if they want to have distinct cultural spikes with an oscillating curve over a six week period.
Holy, he yapped. Anyways. Seal Team 6 is more unified than ever. I have been studying prayers and how to improve my own. We met with cô Hiền and the gift of tongues told me to tell her that I voted for Donald Trump even though I did not and now she wants to be baptized. I am starting to understand Vietnamese even though I can like not speak more than introductory phrases. I went to Minute Maid Stadium again and it was fuego. I went to Galveston yesterday and filmed a service project and contemplated life eternal while on a bench in the middle of downtown Galveston as Elder Phan taught one of our new friends in Vietnamese. I am grateful for everything in this life. Like, literally everything. I admired an orange seed the other day because I thought it was so beautiful how God is in so many small details of this life. God is even in the veins of an orange seed. I love life so much. I am in love with living. Have an amazing day. I hope you enjoyed reading the first few scattered thoughts of my new dissertation I am writing whilst on my mission.
HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/
If you want to see just this week’s pictures go here.
WEEK 43:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/
Comments
Post a Comment