Letters abroad

Thanks to all who took the time at Sunday's fireside to write a quick note to three of our dedicated YSA currently serving missions. I am sure that Elder Campbell King, Elder Mark Dowe and Elder Sam Watson will appreciate receiving our words of encouragement and support and be happy to know we are thinking of them. The letters have been posted off to the respective elders so they will be receiving them very shortly! We will be writing to three of our missionaries every month at the stake YSA fireside, these three being the ones who have been out serving the longest, and we will rotate through so all are equally blessed!

Institute

At institute this week, after establishing that Abraham did not have a son named Isabella, and that Collette has sharpened her pencil since last week, we reviewed the lineage of Abraham a little, both through his son Ishmael who had 12 sons and from whose seed comes the Arab people, and also Isaac, whose son was Jacob (aka Israel) who also had 12 sons. By looking at lineages provided in the New Testament we discovered that John the Baptist was of the tribe of Levi through his father Zacharias, and that Jesus was of the tribe of Judah, through his mother Mary.

We also compared the time-lines of the ministries of John the Baptist and the Saviour, and studied in some detail the temptations the Saviour went through whilst fasting in the wilderness and discussed how we can learn from His example in resisting temptations in our lives.

Next week we will study lesson 5 from the manual.

The link on the sidebar for the stake/ward website login has been fixed, sorry to those who tried to use it before and found it didn't work. If you haven't already, you can obtain an LDS Account from the login page. Don't forget to check it often so you can know what's happening in your ward and stake!

This Sunday's fireside - 22nd March

Just a reminder for this week's fireside to bring a) a plate of food to share! mmm munchies. And b) questions of the soul (see Preach My Gospel ch. 5 for ideas) to be answered as we study the Book of Mormon at the fireside. Oh and I guess c) a copy of the Book of Mormon/scriptures would be useful too! After the fireside we will also be writing to the missionaries serving from our stake and will do this each fireside, focussing on different missionaries each time. This month we will write to Elder Campbell King, Elder Sam Watson and Elder Mark Dowe.

The fireside will be at 7pm at the Stake Centre (15 Elmsleigh Rd, Glenorchy). If you need a lift please talk to your ward reps who can help organise one for you :) Hope to see you all there!

An eventful timeline

At institute this week we studied chapter 3 of the institute manual, "The Son of the Eternal Father." We identified the traits that the Saviour received from his Heavenly Father and those he inherited from his mortal mother Mary, and the necessity of both. We also read in the scriptures how no human could offer the infinite sacrifice that the Saviour offered, due to the demands of Justice. It needed to be offered by one free from the demands of justice, or in other words, someone sinless and infinite.

We also wrote up a timeline of the events leading up to the birth of the Saviour and through his childhood. There was quite a lot of information and I know I definately learnt lots! For one I learnt that the wise men visited Jesus when he was about 12 - 18 months old! How about everyone else, what did you learn?

Next week we will study lesson 4.

So, we have a blog.

Yes, that's right. The Hobart YSA now have their little niche in cyberspace - their very own blog. On here will be upcoming events, photos and recounting of past activities, as well as anything else random we want to add! We invite you to submit photos from activities to put in the slideshow, and also posts about the activites you went to and how they were. You can send these (and any suggestions and feedback) to Alex (ajmenzie@utas.edu.au) or Mari-Anna (tassiemazzy@gmail.com) and we'll add them to the blog for you. We also encourage you to comment on these posts and add your 2 cents worth about the acitivites so that those who couldn't make it can read how it went. So, let the blogging begin!