Following up on the success of the “Meet the Elders” musical program in 2018, missionaries serving in the Denver North Mission are preparing a 2019 “tour” of a new performance called “Meet the Missionaries.”
Meet the Missionaries promised to be a candid glimpse into the life of a
On the afternoon of February 7, 2019, representatives of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints met with leadership of the Intermountain Division (Colorado, Montana, Utah and Wyoming) of The Salvation Army. Elder Thomas T. Priday (Area Seventy) was joined by Jonathan Toronto (Director of Public Affairs, Denver North Council), Heather Scott (JustServe Director, Denver Area) and Aaron Titus (Area Welfare Specialist), represented the Church of Jesus Christ, while Major Mike Dickinson (Commander), Major Richard Pease (Secretary) and Bernard Lodge (Deputy Director of Emergency Services) represented The Salvation Army’s Intermountain Division.
The meeting began with a tour, led by Deputy Director Lodge, of The Salvation Army’s Emergency Disaster Services Warehouse in Aurora, Colorado. During this initial stop, the group discussed the many resources and assets of The Salvation Army which can be used in the event of an emergency to administer relief to the hungry and displaced, as well as to facilitate communications among a variety of government and non-profit organizations. This discussion included a brief tour of a fully equipped “Mobile Feeding Unit” truck which can be used to deliver meals, on site, in immediate proximity to a disaster site.
In the fall of 2018
Abbie Adams sought out the necessary signature from a principal and obtained a teacher sponsor. Then she set up a booth during their school club sign-up fair. Sixty students signed up to participate.
This club fills an important niche in the school because there are many clubs and some classes that require the students to do service such as National Honor Society, Spanish club, ROTC as well as Civic classes there in Colorado Springs.
It also provides an opportunity for students not participating in other clubs to complete service hours for college applications and other various reasons without any requirements such as grades or expense.
The JustServe.org
Dropping off the donations at Samaritan House
This fall, as John Fielding Toronto was preparing to plan and organize an Eagle Scout project, his father suggested that he contact Mark Hahn, who is over Volunteer and Parish Relations at Catholic Charities, for service project ideas. Mark was a great help to John Fielding, putting him in touch with Denver’s Samaritan House, a Catholic Charities shelter for homeless members of the Denver community. Mark also volunteered that Arvada’s St. Joan of Arc Catholic church might also be interested in announcing and supporting the project.
Inspired by these contacts, and leveraging relationships of his own, John Fielding immediately set to work organizing a project to collect travel-sized personal hygiene and other related items to be donated to the Samaritan House. In particular, John coordinated announcements at Arvada’s St. Joan of Arc parish as well as in his own home congregation (the Arvada First Ward) of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in addition to using the “Nextdoor” neighborhood social media platform and making door to door contacts throughout his own neighborhood.
Following weeks of announcements, distribution of flyers and posters, and ultimately coordination of an extensive collection process, John Fielding and a number of fellow scouts, friends and family members gathered and organized products donated for the project.
Jessica Carney of Arvada felt inspired to do a Christ-centered flash mob during this year’s Christmas season. She invited people from various Christian faiths and held a single rehearsal the night before.
“I want to light the mall with the true spirit of Christmas” said Jessica in the week leading up to the event. She chose the busiest day of the Christmas season and organized the event with the Flatirons mall in Broomfield Colorado.
On December 22nd at 2pm a 4 person mini orchestra began playing “Angels We Have Heard on High” for some surprised shoppers outside of the Nordstrom store in the mall. Soon a small number of voices joined in and before it was over more than 100 voices and instruments were heard singing the message of Christmas. The group included 25 to 30 missionaries and President Savage of the Denver North Mission was present to view the event.
Here is a video recording of the event:
Thank you to all who find their own way to Light the World this Christmas season!
Have you seen a few of these around? Wondering what the big deal is?
For the third year in a row, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is choosing to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas via a campaign known as “Light the World.” Each year some of the details change but there are always a few things you can count on…
You can learn all about the campaign and this year’s suggestions from the Prophet by (more…)
This week I spent some time with Elder Tyler Vail who is serving in Boulder right now as a full-time missionary. Elder Vail has about 7 months left to go on his mission and when you meet him he seems like any other missionary but behind the kind smile and the quiet appearance, there is something major going on in Elder Vail’s life right now. Last week his parents, sister, brother, and dog barely escaped the flames that engulfed their home in Paradise California.
I’m not a hero, I’m just a grateful survivor. -Col Coates
This Monday a church member from Littleton was honored in a Veteran’s Day celebration. Originally meant to be a joint service project cleaning up and performing maintenance at Fort Logan Cemetery and then culminating in a ceremony at noon; the service project portion of the event was postponed due to weather.
The ceremony was held to honor Brother Bob Coates who served in three different wars. Coates was born in 1924 in Arizona and enlisted in the US Army Corps in 1942 when he was 18 years old. During WWII he flew 36 combat missions as co-pilot in the 381st Bombing Group, dropping bombs on military targets in Germany. Despite being shot down over German-occupied France, he (more…)