Reminder: No Troop Meeting 28 July 2010

We will not have a troop meeting this Wednesday due to the Nauvoo trip on Friday.

Preparing for Nauvoo Trip

Our last two meetings were used to prepare the young men for the upcoming Nauvoo trip. We reviewed church history and had activities related to that. The Sister Missionaries reviewed the story of Joseph Smith's first vision and events surrounding the organization of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The young men then played Capture the Golden Plates, pulled sticks and leg wrestled. We learned more about what happened when Joseph Smith was tarred and feathered. We learned about Zion's Camp and the Mormon Battalion. We then had an obstacle course competition. The young men all proved themselves to be strong and flexible. Enjoy the pictures of some of our strapping young men!

Bishop Fernandez has asked that all the youth read the following scriptures from the Doctrine and Covenants in preparation for the trip: Section 124 verses 27-44, Section 127 verses 5-12 and Section 128 verses 1-18, 24.

Fulfilling our Duty to God

As any of you who heard any of several talks at the most recent General Conference know, there is a new Duty to God program for the Young Men and Scouts in our ward.

This program is incredible! It focuses much more on helping the young man become what he needs to become. It is not simply a checklist of requirements to be completed, it is an opportunity to grow and progress as a worthy priesthood holder. The program focuses on helping the young man first Learn his duty (D&C 107:99), then Plan and Act on what he has learned, and finally Share with others how he has grown and changed from the experience.

The program booklet and other helps are also now all available online.

In addition, in order to help us as parents and leaders, the Bishopric, in conjunction with the presidents of the Aaronic Priesthood quorums, is holding a special meeting about the new Duty to God program. This meeting will be on Sunday, August 1st at 11:00am at the church. (This will be during the third hour of church meetings.) We want everyone to be there! President Lunt, in speaking about this meeting, said that every parent who has a boy under the age of 18 (even if they are only a 1-year-old) should be included.

Please come out and learn about this wonderful new opportunity to help our young men. In teaching about this new program, President Lunt testified, “I testify that if we do that, we will be doing a much better job at saving our boys and our girls and we'll be doing what the Lord expects of us.”

Thanks, and we'll see you there!

Combined Activity on July 7th, 2010

We had 17 youth and leaders attend our combined activity July 7th. We played Double Dare. The theme was on Faith. No one was brave enough to do a double dare, so the game was tied. To break the tie we played a game where the teams had to reach into a circle and grab hands with eyes shut; then they had to untwist themselves. The first team to untwist themselves into a circle would win. The all-boys team won, but they did have the advantage of having played that game before. For treats, we had ice cream on a stick. Next week we'll have a regular troop meeting.