We had another splendid week at the honbu. All in all, it was eventful, yet less stressful than some of our other weeks. We got a lot accomplished as far as upcoming events and various preparations are concerned. Things are going to be quite a bit busier this next week with missionaries returning home and we are getting ready for Elder Whiting to come here for a mission tour.
I have also been put in charge of planning out a missionary Christmas conference and an intercultural holiday celebration event. We are planning on 150 people being at the Christmas conference and over 250 people being at the intercultural event. Big fun, big responsibilities, and a big resource pool. I have 119 missionaries at my disposal, hopefully everything will go well!
We are in the middle of traveling around the mission and doing Presidents Interviews. While people are interviewing, Elder Medeiros and I practice teaching fake investigators with the missionaries and take them through something called the basic training requirements. It's pretty self explanatory. It's fun to get to interact with all of the missionaries from all over the mission. I have pretty much only been to 1/4 of the mission area, I know the other Tokyo mission really well, but it's been a good chance for me to get out and see the southern half of Tokyo. It has a lot more hills and half of Mt.Fuji in it.
We are working extensively on creating a better reporting system between the missionaries and their local units. Every year, each bishop prayerfully creates goals for the number of baptisms their unit will have for the up coming year. We have taken those goals and with the data we have concerning the missionaries weekly performances, we have created individual standards of excellence for each unit.
For example, in my ward, Kichijoji ward, we have a goal for 12 baptisms next year. They have had two so far this year, so it is a pretty substantial goal. In order for us to have one baptism, on average, it takes 20 new investigators, 9 investigators at church, and 7 baptismal dates. So we need every week, to have 5 new investigators, 11 people at church, and 8 baptismal dates in order to have 12 baptisms this year. Thankfully, we have 4 companionships working in this area right now so maybe that will be do-able. However, we will need to work with members and double our current effort if we want to reach our goals.
If we work with ward members better, we can lower the number of new investigators, people at church, and baptismal date ration down quite a bit. For example, 1 in every 4 member referrals gets baptized. Those referrals are very high quality potential for baptisms, therefore, if we work well with members and help them dendo their friends, then we could lower our new investigator rate down to 10, 7 or 4 new investigators per baptism.
This is what we are teaching and training missionaries about. How do we work hard, smart, and inspired. How can we develop our teaching skills so that members will trust us with their friends. And how do I help people convert to the gospel through teaching them the lessons.
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