Mission reflections: Members increase missionary success
E-mail story
It's easy. Send a link to the story you were just reading to a friend. Just fill out the form on this page and we'll send it along.
Your name and e-mail address are transmitted to the recipient. Otherwise, it is considered private information; see Privacy policy.
The Church News invites mission presidents returning from their fields of labor to share their experiences.
The South Dakota Rapid City Mission includes the entire states of North Dakota and South Dakota, as well as parts of Minnesota, Nebraska and Wyoming. There are six stakes, one is nearly as large as the state of Utah — a six-hour drive from one end of the stake to the other. The mission is approximately a 20-hour drive from Martin's Cove on the southwestern corner to Bemidji, Minn., on the northeastern corner.
When Preach My Gospel was introduced, we were impressed with the importance placed upon member involvement.
In October 2004, when we received the new Preach My Gospel manual, our missionary companionships were teaching an average of one lesson per week with a member present. At the beginning of 2005, we increased member involvement by teaching two lessons with a member present. Later in the year we increased to three lessons per week, and then four.
It soon became evident that the more members were involved, the more converts came into the Church. A year-and-a-half later, when missionary companionships were teaching an average of nine lessons a week with member participation, the number of baptisms per missionary more than doubled.
Another mission president asked me, "How do you get so many members to teach with your missionaries?"
My response: "We ask them, and they come." I was not trying to be simplistic. This really happened. Missionaries called the members, asked them to select times when they could participate, and then scheduled teaching appointments to fit the availability of those who had volunteered.
I asked one set of missionaries how many members participated with them that week. "We had 17 different members in our lessons this week," they responded. This was a dramatic improvement from the one member participating per week prior to Preach My Gospel.
The more the members taught with the missionaries, the more excited members became about the work and the more confidence they developed in the missionaries.
We found that the more closely we followed the counsel in the book, the more success we had in fulfilling our purpose as missionaries.
— Russell Osguthorpe served as president of the South Dakota Rapid City Mission from 2003-2006 with his wife, Holly.
