GOING DIGITAL!!!

 PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINE FOR ALL PHOTOS OF THE HIKE AS WELL AS THIS DIGITAL TRAINING

It has happened.  We have known about it for a while, and kept it secret from the missionaries.

As a test mission for both online proselyting and digital devices, we have been asked to go COMPLETELY DIGITAL!!

 We were told we would be digital by February, but received word last month that our date was actually the end of October...and here we are!

So, President Taylor, who loves a good surprise, arranged to have Lee Donaldson of the Missionary Department, hide out in another room while we got our leadership council meeting started.  Then he got on Skype as if to do a video-conference training from Lee, who rather than being in Salt Lake City was in another room in the building. After visiting for a while, Lee started walking as he skyped and came into the back of the room where we were...holding an ipad box and announcing that he had over 200 of them for our mission.

 Smiles were everywhere as they handed out ipads to every member of the council.

 It is pretty exciting to be on the cutting edge of missionary work.


Do you see the big binders on the tables near these elders?  Those are AREA BOOKS.  They contain the teaching records and contact records for their ward areas that they cover.  There is one big binder for each ward.
All this information will be programmed into the ipads and be carried around by each missionary.  They will update it as they go all day long.

Their MISSIONARY PLANNER will also be completely online.  Their ward mission leader will be able to see exactly what they have going on...as will their Mission President.  They can be scheduled by those leaders as needed through their planners online.

Here is a pretty excited group of mission leaders, who will be training their own zones later this week.

Brother Amistad helped train along with Brother Donaldson.  They got everyone all set up and running.  The hard part will be getting all the information transferred to the ipads by the end of the year.  It is a long process, but eventually will give them so much more time to really be teaching!

   We had one NOVEMBER BIRTHDAY to celebrate in the council this month.  HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELDER WARDLE!
I owe him a cake!  I forgot to bring it since we usually meet at the Mission Home for this meeting.

It meant I brought lunch to this meeting and we had rather a working lunch.

 Brother Donaldson showed the missionaries the graphic that President Taylor sent him showing where in the world we have already proselyted online.  The Missionary Dept. is using his slides of the US and World in their presentations now.  Good job President Taylor!!

President Taylor is in his element during this training.  He has always been tech savvy and will be a great leader in how to stay consecrated as we HASTEN THE WORK OF THE LORD.

Please understand that the need for OBEDIENT missionaries is greater than ever.  These tools are a great benefit for the work, but only obedient missionaries can pull it off.  We are so grateful for your children/friends that are obedient servants.  They know how to have fun and be obedient at the same time.  Help us as we need help in staying focused on the work.  If you have suggestions, please let us know.
We know that as more and more missions go online, you will see examples of less than consecrated missionaries in some missions with less expectations.  Our expectations will be HIGH.  We expect and TRUST that our mission will use these great tools appropriately and with an eye single to the glory of God.   CONGRATULATIONS APM!!!