21 Aug 2007 - The Mission President's Day

Now that you know what Morgan and Hunter and I do, it's time we got to the good stuff: life as a missionary. Today we bring you "The Mission President".

First let me give you an outline of a few days of a mission president.

Date: Friday 18 Aug 07 Place: Newcastle about 5.5 hours from mission home.
5:00 Up thinking through issues
7:00 Breakfast and interview with Sr. couple
8:00 Zone Leader training for Newcastle Zone Leaders
9:00 30 min interviews with 10 missionaries while assistants train and review area books
1:00 Leave for Swaziland reading mission presidents handbook, branch handbook, and discussing
items with assistants
4:00 Arrive Mbabane, Swaziland for meeting with ward mission leader and missionaries
5:30 Discussions on Book of Mormon with family of 5
6:30 Family Home Evening discussion with part member family. Lesson on Alma 36 followed by learning primary song in South African sign language.
8:00 Dinner at Lodge with assistants
Notes: *The drive to Swaziland was much prettier than last trip. The hills are starting to turn green.
*Mbabane is up in the hills with big rock formations. Really a pretty area and will be
spectacular when everything turns green next month.
* Lesson at 5:30 was in a one room house. There were no chairs so the elders and I sat on
the floor, taught the lesson and read the scriptures by candle light. Family was wonderful and invited us back for the next lesson. Boy what a humble environment.
*Elders were fantastic teachers and worked wonderfully with the members.

Date: Saturday 19 Aug 07 Place: Mbabane, Swaziland
8:00 Drive to Manzini
9:00 4 missionary interviews
10:30 drive back to Mbabane
11:00 4 interviews
12:00 Zone Leader training
1:30 Exchanges with Zone Leaders
*Follow up lesson with recently baptized 18 year old boy and his older sister
*Follow up lesson with recently baptized 40 year old man and his 12 year old son
*Missionary preparation lesson with young man
*FHE with part member family and friends 8 young people
*Preach My Gospel training with 6 17 year-olds preparing to go on mission
* Visit to less active returned missionary
8:00 Dinner with Zone Leaders
9:00 Back to Bed & Breakfast
Notes:
* Lessons were terrific
* PMG session was lots of fun with all those energetic boys

Date: Sunday 20 Aug 07 Place: Mbabane, Swaziland
8:30 Picked up for Church at Mbabane
9:00 Sacrament meeting at Mbabane
10:30 Drive to Manzini to pick up Elder Larsen and meet Branch President
11:00 Leave for Durban
6:00 Arrive Durban
7:00 Debrief trip, e-mail Logan
10:00 phone calls




Notes:
*147 at Sacrament meeting in Mbabane
* Speaker just before me said she was going back to Jamaica. Turned out she knew Logan
on his mission. She told me they called her momma G and that Logan was a great
missionary. Boy what a small world.
* Boarder crossing from Swaziland to South Africa tells the story of the two countries. On
the Swazi side everything is done by hand and sometimes they don’t even bother. They would rather talk with us. Really friendly. On the S.A. side everything is computerized and business like.
* 3 new members confirmed at sacrament meeting and 10 investigators.
* From the Swazi border to the coast is bush with signs for game parks and lodges every
which way. It will be fun to get up here some time with the kids.

Date: Monday 21 Aug 07 Place Westville (Mission Home)
Couldn’t sleep too well at night due to a cold coming on and a few issues to think about
6:30 Up and dressed
7:00 Office to organize all the action items from the trip and make notes to staff on things to do
9:30 Interview with great missionary needing a little counsel
10:30 Interview with a sister missionary
11:00 Interview with companion
11:00 Presentation by Sr couple employment specialists on their activities
12:30 Lunch with Sr couples
1:30 Presentation by CES couples
3:00 Schedule review with Assistants to plan out December Zone Conferences, Interviews, and
Exchanges
4:30 Call E. Young at area office to review questions and possible District creation
5:30 Dinner and discussion with Susan, Hunter, Morgan
6:30 Back to office to work on this Blog update
Notes:
*This is kind of how days go out here. They are busy busy and go by fast. Everything is
new.
*The assistants ask if the mission was what I expected and I said yes. They asked what was different from what I expected and I said, “The missionaries far exceeded my expectations. They are incredible teachers. They know their scriptures, and they work hard.” You can’t believe what wonderful teachers they are and what great grasp of the gospel of Jesus Christ they have. I really feel privileged to be their mission president and be able to work with them. No kidding every time I go with the missionaries to teach lessons I am taught by them. We are going to have the office elders start teaching the lessons to Hunter and Morgan on Wednesday evenings.

In case you can’t tell from this outline I am having the time of my life. Some days when the assistants and I and the office elders and the office couple get home from teaching it feels like the sons of Mosiah getting together after their missions. We take turns saying, “Wait till you hear about my day!!”
I really am the luckiest man on Earth to be out here.

(So there you have it. We'll share some of the great missionary experiences our missionaries are having in the next post. Love to everybody! Sister President Mann)