Sunday, January 10, 2016
It is a Happy New year for Visiting teaching!
It is most definitely is a Happy New Year for Visiting teaching! The world is at our feet, and it is all determined by our attitude about just how happy we will make this New year will be for ourselves, as well as those we visit teach. It's up to us, its all about choice, and most importantly, it's all about loving and serving others. The scriptures tell us what God thinks about loving and serving others when we read in Matthew 22:37-39: "Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all the heart, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. The second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." If we ask ourselves who are neighbors are, and the answer is "EVERYONE".
Visiting teaching is a very important part of the Gospel, because when we do it with all of our hearts, we are showing God that we not only love Him but we obey His commandments of loving our neighbors.https://www.lds.org/media-library/images/visiting-teaching-901054?lang=eng
Quoting from the Extraordinary Visiting Teachers Facebook group, one woman (Tia Fowles)said this:
"Visiting Teaching fills a variety of needs, including fellow shipping, building friendships, increasing faith and personal testimony and watch care over one another. I think one of the most important things Visiting teaching can do is let each person know they are remembered, cared for and wanted. I often get the requests that people want to have good visiting teachers. I rarely have "good" visiting teachers, that is, visiting teachers who consistently reach out to me. I have done my best to BE a good visiting teacher so that at least someone out there can say that they have good ones. I am ot perfect, far from it, in fact but I hope the sisters I am assigned to know that I think about, pray for, and genuinely enjoy getting to know them."
President Monson said:
"We are surrounded by those in need of our attention, our encouragement, our support, our comfort our kindness.... We are the Lords hands here upon the earth, with the mandate to serve and to lift His children. (2nd great commandment) He is dependent upon each of us."
And Julie B. Beck said, "Visiting teaching is an expression of our discipleship and a significant way to honor our covenants. This element of our discipleship should closely resemble the ministry of our Savior." As committed disciples of the Savior, we are improving in our ability to do the things He would do if He where here." Tia Fowles
Can Visiting Teachers actually make a difference in peoples lives? Yes, yes they most definately and most certainly can. Sister Rochelle Miller shares her experience in this way:
"I joined the church at age 19. But at age 21, I found myself back to my old ways and friends. I remember one day seeing two women coming to my door dressed in dresses and I immediately knew they must be from the church. They knocked and I hid!!! I remember hearing them finally leave and at that moment my heart was touched and I began to cry as the spirit entered my heart and my home and a feeling came to me so strongly that I needed to return to church. I did and went on a mission, was married in the temple and my mother joined the church when I returned from my mission. I have been active ever since that day. (25 years) Those two RS sisters took the time to search me out, and even though I never answered the door or spoke to them or even today know who they were, the spirit spoke to me and to this day they do not know their visit to only a knock on my door, changed my whole life."
Sister Miller goes on to say, "Never give up because you can't get in a door or get a phone call answered or returned. We can touch lives just by doing our duty of trying every month."
Sisters, you simply never know how or if your visit will touch the life of a sister, and in Sister Miller's example, her life was changed forever because two unknown, loving sisters were obedient, following the second great Commandment, and following their own promptings to visit her. Sister Miller said that those Visiting teachers must have walked away thinking, "If we could just get in to see her, then maybe we could invite her back or help her," but the Spirit of the Lord can go through the walls and touch hearts, simply by your visit.
Yes, It can be a very Happy New Year, both for you and for your sisters. It is up to you, but I know that by loving your sisters as the Lord has commanded, He will help and bless you in your righteous desires, and those things you do for others come back into your own!
HAPPY NEW YEAR--- Now go out and do your Visiting Teaching!
Visiting teaching is a very important part of the Gospel, because when we do it with all of our hearts, we are showing God that we not only love Him but we obey His commandments of loving our neighbors.https://www.lds.org/media-library/images/visiting-teaching-901054?lang=eng
Quoting from the Extraordinary Visiting Teachers Facebook group, one woman (Tia Fowles)said this:
"Visiting Teaching fills a variety of needs, including fellow shipping, building friendships, increasing faith and personal testimony and watch care over one another. I think one of the most important things Visiting teaching can do is let each person know they are remembered, cared for and wanted. I often get the requests that people want to have good visiting teachers. I rarely have "good" visiting teachers, that is, visiting teachers who consistently reach out to me. I have done my best to BE a good visiting teacher so that at least someone out there can say that they have good ones. I am ot perfect, far from it, in fact but I hope the sisters I am assigned to know that I think about, pray for, and genuinely enjoy getting to know them."
President Monson said:
"We are surrounded by those in need of our attention, our encouragement, our support, our comfort our kindness.... We are the Lords hands here upon the earth, with the mandate to serve and to lift His children. (2nd great commandment) He is dependent upon each of us."
And Julie B. Beck said, "Visiting teaching is an expression of our discipleship and a significant way to honor our covenants. This element of our discipleship should closely resemble the ministry of our Savior." As committed disciples of the Savior, we are improving in our ability to do the things He would do if He where here." Tia Fowles
Can Visiting Teachers actually make a difference in peoples lives? Yes, yes they most definately and most certainly can. Sister Rochelle Miller shares her experience in this way:
"I joined the church at age 19. But at age 21, I found myself back to my old ways and friends. I remember one day seeing two women coming to my door dressed in dresses and I immediately knew they must be from the church. They knocked and I hid!!! I remember hearing them finally leave and at that moment my heart was touched and I began to cry as the spirit entered my heart and my home and a feeling came to me so strongly that I needed to return to church. I did and went on a mission, was married in the temple and my mother joined the church when I returned from my mission. I have been active ever since that day. (25 years) Those two RS sisters took the time to search me out, and even though I never answered the door or spoke to them or even today know who they were, the spirit spoke to me and to this day they do not know their visit to only a knock on my door, changed my whole life."
Sister Miller goes on to say, "Never give up because you can't get in a door or get a phone call answered or returned. We can touch lives just by doing our duty of trying every month."
Sisters, you simply never know how or if your visit will touch the life of a sister, and in Sister Miller's example, her life was changed forever because two unknown, loving sisters were obedient, following the second great Commandment, and following their own promptings to visit her. Sister Miller said that those Visiting teachers must have walked away thinking, "If we could just get in to see her, then maybe we could invite her back or help her," but the Spirit of the Lord can go through the walls and touch hearts, simply by your visit.
Yes, It can be a very Happy New Year, both for you and for your sisters. It is up to you, but I know that by loving your sisters as the Lord has commanded, He will help and bless you in your righteous desires, and those things you do for others come back into your own!
HAPPY NEW YEAR--- Now go out and do your Visiting Teaching!