The Book of Mormon musical came to Spokane in August. I'm not sure if any of you have ever seen it, but it is definitely NOT what the church is about. I had no idea really what the musical was about, but back in July or June even, I don't remember, our stake did a joint Relief Society and Priesthood meeting about it. Our ward mission leaders and Stake presidency and stake PR people all came talked about how awful the musical is, and how it really degrades the church so much, but that the church has really tried to use the popularity of it as a missionary tool, really. They take out ads in the play bill saying things like, 'you've seen the musical now read the book' or ' The book is always better' things like that. So, our stake, and I think all the stakes in Spokane were going to participate in what they called a social media blitz. A few stakes in Ohio had tried it when the Book of Mormon musical came to their town, and they had seen some really great results. I think it's just one more way that our church is keeping up with the times and using social media for good! So, what we did, is is we decided on a Social Media blitz day. It was to happen right after the musical ended in our area. I think the last day of the musical was the 12th of August, so they had decided on the 16th of August as our blitz day. 5 or 6 members from each ward (or branch) in the stake were supposed to go out with the missionaries on the 16th and post to facebook, twitter, instagram whatever you wanted and just post pictures of what you did with the missionaries that day. They wanted members with the missionaries during the whole day, and I was one of the members asked from our branch to do it. We were also supposed to use the hashtags #realmormonmissionaries and #mormonmissionaries and things like that. It was really fun. We were also supposed to post things about what missionary life is really like, and what missionaries really do. And how long they serve, and how they pay their own way, etc... I told them I would actually be at my cousins wedding, so I didn't think I could do it, but they told me that I just have to post the pictures on the 16th, but that I could go out with the sisters a night before I left for the wedding. So, that's what I did.
I brought Tucker with me, too. I thought it would be good for him to join us on the visits we had. We were lucky enough to have Hermana Walton and Hermana Robles in our branch then, and they are both so cute and fun! I loved going out with them as much as I could, so it was a blast! We visited some less actives, and had some good discussions.
Then we went to the Lopez home for a discussion with Jenny and her family. Jenny was a young women who was recently baptized in our branch, and her family was taking the discussions. They have since moved out of our branch, and I'm so sad that Jenny is gone, but I loved her parents and little sister so much, I was sad to see all of them go. I kind of became a surrogate mom to Jenny while she was here. Anyway, we had a discussion at the Lopez home with Jenny and her family.
Hermana Robles, Jenny's dad, Cassandra-her sister, Jenny's mom, Jenny, Hermana Walton and Hermano Lopez:
A beautiful sunset on the way to the Lopez's (which you can't see very well in the picture)
Then we called it a night and the Hermanas were on their way! I love going out with the sisters and remembering, even for a bit, what it was like to be a missionary! I loved being a missionary so much, and I remember how wonderful it was to have members help, but with life and kids and a family, I don't go nearly as often as I'd like.
It was also so much fun to see everyone's posts on August 16th. I was down in Oregon for Stormee's wedding, and I was the photographer, so it was a bit difficult squeezing in time to post my pictures from my missionary day, but I did, and it was fun to see all these awesome missionary hashtags. I know in Ohio they had all these statistics about their social media blitz day, and they had had SO many discussions that day, and out of all of those discussions, there were 3 baptisms, just solely on their social media blitz posts. I haven't heard how things went for our stake yet! But it was a great reminder to me about the importance of missionary work!
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