Elder D. Todd Christofferson (Oct. '19): "The Joy of the Saints"

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The Activity:

  1. Designate three areas of the room as follows:
    1. Joy of keeping the commandments
    2. Joy of overcoming through Christ
    3. Joy of serving as Christ serves
  2. Point out these three divisions (mirroring the three parts of Elder Christofferson's talk) and ask the class members to choose one of the three and move to that part of the room.
  3. Ask these groups to review the section of the talk that applies to them and to answer the following questions (you may want to type them and give a copy to everyone or to each group):
    1. What thoughts of Elder Christofferson do you find especially powerful from this section?
    2. How does this particular source of joy help us become more Christ-like?  Why does being more Christ-like bring us joy?
    3. What experiences have you had with this source of joy?  What other stories or experiences have you heard about?
    4. How does Satan try to keep us from doing these things?  How can we combat these tactics?
  4. After the groups have had to time to discuss each question, come back together as a whole class and ask each group to share (some of) their answers and discuss them.
Using the Activity:

We have a tendency to feel like we have to cover every aspect of a talk when we teach a lesson on it, and often that is fine.  However, being able to dig deeper into a particular aspect of a message can be powerful.  This activity is designed to give class members the opportunity to think deeply about a single aspect of the talk.  Also, by allowing them to choose what they wish to discuss, it allows them to make choices that will most impact them spiritually.  

Of course, you could alter or delete any of the questions I have listed or add your own.  These are questions that are fairly general so they apply to each section.  However, you may feel impressed to create a unique question or two or three for each section that the class members will discuss.  That would be great.

As always, I hope that you find this idea useful.  Please let me know how it goes with this or any of the other ideas.  I enjoy hearing from you.  God bless.

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