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Visiting Teaching - It Really Works
By Joni Hilton
LDS women could almost be divided into two groups-- the lonely and the
overwhelmed. The lonely ones are crying out for Visiting Teaching,
while the overwhelmed ones are wishing the whole program would
evaporate. And, of course, sisters always seem to be assigned
from one of those groups to the other! Letters poured in with
fury and frustrations, as well as some excellent advice about
how to make Visiting Teaching (and Home Teaching) really effective.
Pass this column along to your Relief Society president; it
will no doubt prove enlightening. Our first letter is from
a reader whose problem, I suspect, is all too common:
I
was so glad to finally get rid of my visiting teachers after
their visit. I have never had quite an experience like this before
and I couldn't quite believe it was happening. I am a widow and
I live with my son, his wife and children. We lived in this home
for two months before our visiting teachers showed up, complaining
that they didn't get the information that we were now on their
route, in general badmouthing the RS presidency. Although I have
lived in this neighborhood for several years, my daughter-in-law
is new to the area.
The
sisters visited the whole time they were here, WITH EACH OTHER,
and not with us! They went on and on about how the neighborhood
has changed, who used to live in which houses, who had moved
in, and moved out. They talked about the children who have married
and moved on and who is now a widow, etc, etc, etc. They seemed
oblivious to us and hardly ever looked our way. They didn't ask
about our welfare, nor did they seem interested that they were
in OUR house, to visit US. Anyway, I was glad to have them leave,
they overstayed their welcome, that was for sure. If this is
an example of what visiting teaching has become, we need an overhaul.
Maybe some of the sisters who are visited each month feel that
it is a waste of time too. Who knows? I just needed to get this
off of my chest, thanks for a listening ear!
I once attended a RS luncheon featuring a hilarious skit that sounds almost
exactly like your real-life experience (which is what makes
comedy work). Sisters were portraying self-centered, insensitive
VTs who had completely lost sight of their purpose, and were
making their “visitee” feel worse by the moment. I think we’ve
all had visits like that. A friend of mine even had a sister
literally do “drive by visiting teaching,” hollering out her
car window, “You doin’ okay? See ya!” This is not the
program, obviously. I hope the guilty will read your letter
and resolve never to do their job that way again.
Here’s a letter from a sister whose companion is the problem:
Having
recently moved into a new area and a new ward, I was looking
forward to Visiting Teaching being a way to get to know more personally
some of the sisters in my ward. I was totally delighted with
the V.T.s assigned to me;
they are definitely the kind of ladies I would call with a problem or to ask
a personal question.
The
woman assigned to be my visiting teaching companion, however,
fits the stereotype of the Mormon mama so bogged down with the
chores of living that she misses the spirit of the assignments.
She did everything by the book but in such a whiz of activity
that I never got a sense of who she truly is as a woman or friend
in the gospel. In fact, after several months of doing visiting
teaching together, I can recite the number and kinds of easy-bake
goodies she gave to me and the ladies we visit taught, but I
can't tell you one thing about her life, her family, her pains,
struggles or triumphs. I find that sad. In reflecting on the "whys," I
question if it isn't a matter of trust --being able to trust
enough to share the meat and potatoes of who we are. I really
enjoyed Joni Hilton's article and look forward to sharing it
with our R.S. president. It captures an ideal I hope we can all
strive for. -- Ann in Utah
Thanks, Ann. Sometimes it’s our companion who needs our influence the
most. And, just as with missionary work, we also grow by learning
to get along with all kinds of companions. I recommend some
time alone with your companion to develop a friendship, totally
apart from visiting teaching. Every woman needs some “girlfriend
time,” and you can ask about her ambitions, her hopes, the
things she feels a passion for when she’s not overwhelmed with
the chores of living. RS Presidents, how about an enrichment
night for just this purpose?
A sister from England sympathized with Sister Anonymous this week:
I
really don't want that lovely sister who wrote to you to be drowned
out by a chorus of energetic visit-loving people who say "What?
You heretic! How can you say that about visiting teaching? If
you'd just work harder you'd be happier!" I guess I really
felt her cry from the heart and hope she will find relief soon.
You’re right-- not everyone feels the same amount of zeal for the same
programs. We see variations of enthusiasm for genealogy, food
storage, scripture study, and, obviously, visiting teaching.
Thanks for the reminder that we’re all struggling, just in
different ways. This reader agrees with you:
No
wonder Sisters are discouraged... "exhibit enough love and
caring that our sisters will confide their real concerns to us,
so we can help them"..."share burdens"..."love
[your] sisters, and treat them as family"... just be darn
sure you get all that done in 20 MINUTES!!! I personally don't
see any point in the VTs OR the HTs coming to my home for a few
minutes each month and READING to me from the Ensign.... I can
read when I'm alone (which is 90% of the time). It would be nice
if those monthly visits were truly about friendship and compassion
rather than just making the quotas. -- Cynthia Bennion, St. Paul,
MN
You’re not alone. Here’s what a busy home-schooler and bishop’s wife had
to say:
I
know that serving one another is the heart of the gospel. Well,
the fact of the matter is that I DO serve others...everyday of
my life. I serve myself into exhaustion on a daily basis just
meeting the needs of my large family. Would things go smoother
for me if I stretched myself even further to serve some person
that I was assigned to serve, assigned to be their friend, assigned
to learn to love, assigned to develop feelings for? Maybe. But
honestly, hand holding is not one of my better virtues. THE GOSPEL
IS TRUE!! And I have a hard time with people who know that but
need me to hold their hand every step of the way or they won't
come. Maybe that is harsh, but it's the way I feel.
I just can't see past (my own family) to others around me who may need me to
serve them. I have 7 grandchildren. I've spent the past year watching 3 of
them (under five years of age) 3 to 5 days a week while their parents worked
hard to purchase a home for them to live in. Sometimes I wonder how we survived
that. But we did. What is left for me to visit teach with? My own visiting
teachers, while I am sure they are wonderful women, are honestly an intrusion
in my day. All of my needs are very well met within my own family. My older
daughters and I serve one another on almost a daily basis. I just don't know
how I can squeeze out anymore at this point in my life. So, I am left with
guilt month after month after month as I don't go visit sisters I've never
heard of before with my companion whom I don't know and have no desire to know.
I guess I'm just hopeless.
Hey-- you aren’t hopeless-- you just need a good visiting teacher! Ha
ha. No, seriously, a good one won’t take your time when you’re
already stressed-- she’ll figure out how to reduce that stress.
She could watch the grandkids on occasion, or simply help you
cry or laugh, as family life often makes us do. She could send
you a funny card on occasion, to let you know you’re thought
of, and bring you a smile.
As for being a VT, my own personal opinion is that you need a break
until you can come up for air. The prophet has told us this
is a divinely inspired program, but he hasn’t said that every
single woman in every single circumstance needs to get all
strung out and overburdened. Ask your Relief Society President
to give you some time off, and see if you can replenished your
well by then. Meanwhile, read the experience of a woman who
did just that:
I
sat down with my R.S. President in our "PPI" and told
her bluntly. I hate visiting teaching. Then she released me.
For a whole summer she released me as a Visiting Teacher. I had
been a VT since my Freshman year at BYU--how could she release
me? But she did. Every once in a while a pang of guilt would
spring up, but then relief would settle in. My husband was a
high councilor, I was serving as Stake Primary Secretary, Primary
President of our ward, and we had 2, 4, 8, and 9-year-old children.
Then
September came. I told her I was ready to do it again. I thanked
her for the break. She gave me 5 inactive women in their late
70's and she didn't tell me that my companion would be leaving
for Palm Springs for the winter in a couple of weeks. It generally
takes about 8 hours a month to visit them all and I take my 2-year-old
with me.
At
first I was a little shell-shocked. I questioned how she could
give the person who had openly declared her disdain for the VT
Program this kind of route. But the last year has been such a
blessing to me. I live in the Pacific Northwest after moving
here from Utah. I usually begin to suffer from depression by
about January, early February. But these ladies helped me to
lose myself. The first visit we went to I pulled up into her
driveway and told my daughter we would say a prayer before we
went in. At the next visit, my little girl said as we pulled
up, “Don't we need a prayer?” I had just taught my daughter something
about visiting teaching.
Each
one of them has their own needs. One sister is in a rest home
and doesn't know me, but she likes her chocolate. One sister
just wants to make sure that she gets the hugs from my little
one because "her little ones are all grown up." One
sister doesn't really like visits, but because of her diabetes
she would love to take a walk now and then. One sister stayed
mostly at home and each visit was accompanied by her husband.
They recently moved out of state and there were tears in my eyes
as I said goodbye to a couple who had become good friends to
me and my daughter. We have had one couple over for dinner and
FHE. My 31 year-old self didn't feel like I had much to teach
these late 70-year-old women who were set in their ways about
home and church (Most will be celebrating their 80'th birthdays
sometime soon), but I have learned that it's mostly giving of
ourselves.
I'm
getting very frustrated about how "busy" we LDS women
have let ourselves become. We don't do our visiting teaching
well because we are too "busy" to give ourselves to
others. I have 4 kids, I'm PTA President, my husband's now in
the Bishopric, I'm still in the Stake Primary. We have every
excuse in the book to be too "busy." But I believe "busy-ness" is
an attitude.
I
recently had the most awesome Visiting Teachers in the world.
They probably weren't much different then most visiting teachers
that I'd had. They came, we visited a little about non-essential
stuff. But they listened. One visit the lesson was on getting
more out of the temple. One sister shared a special experience
she'd had at the temple. I stated something about it having been
over a year since I'd been to the temple. One sister said, "I'm
driving down on Friday. Come with me." I said, "I'd
love to, but I'd have to find somewhere for my daughter to go.
(It takes about 6 hours total for a temple trip). Her companion
stated, "I'm free on Friday, I'll take your little girl".
And they did. The sister who took my daughter didn't have any
children home, they were all in school full-time. It was not
convenient for her to suddenly have a 2 year-old around all day.
But she gave of herself. They will never know the blessings I
received by attending the temple that day. Answers to problems
I had been dealing with were given. I will forever be grateful
to two women who were where they needed to be when I needed them
most.
I
am slowly gaining a testimony of the Visiting Teaching Program.
I have truly learned that it cannot be one visit during the last
week of the month. It is knowing their birthdays, recognizing
holidays, checking up on doctor visits, knowing about their families,
checking on trips they've taken. It's coming to know them and
love them, for Doctrine and Covenants 42:38 For inasmuch as ye
do it unto the least of these, ye do it
unto me." -- Blessed in the Northwest
You did it-- you kept giving past the point when you felt you could--
and you will forever know that exhilarating feeling. Ghandi
said that if you haven’t found the joy in sacrifice, you need
to go back and sacrifice some more. He was right.
And bless your RS president for following the prompting she had to assign
you to sisters who weren’t obvious “matches.” When I was a
RS President, I had very specific guidance in many such cases,
and I was humbled when several sisters asked me later how I
could possibly have known that this person would be the answer
to their prayers.
Here’s a letter from another sister who shows what can happen when it’s
done with sincerity and determination:
Great
visiting teaching really "saved" me - I was inactive
and didn't like being visited. But my visiting teacher called
me and chatted me up for 20 minutes every month to build a friendship
with me. She started very gently at first but later managed to
get some gospel input into those talks without being overbearing
or bearing her testimony formally. It made it a lot easier to
return to activity when I made that decision, because I already
knew her at church.... I cannot minimize the importance of the
impact my visiting teacher and also a very caring home teacher
the previous year had made. They had truly gone above the call
in a way because they visited with me ad hoc on the phone or
on my driveway during the time when I wouldn't let them in.
Now
I do the same thing as Sister Joni - I have sought out two of
my inactive neighbors who are tougher cases and given back to
them they way I received that love. I owe the Lord that much
and more. My own life is blessed from making the effort.
Allison Sullivan, Atlanta area
Thank you, Allison-- you’re an example of the ripple effect that sincere
visiting teaching can create. Sasha Nunley of Citrus Heights, California, agrees
with you:
I
was recently released as the Visiting Teaching coordinator in
my ward. Let me just say, its all in the attitude. As Sister
Anonymous said, we are all busy and schedules do not always blend
well. But how much time does it really take? We can make phone
calls while doing the dishes. And we can skip our favorite television
shows a couple times a month. Its very possible. In my experience
in gathering reports at the end of the month, the sisters that
did it were not laying around the house with nothing else to
do. They were just as busy as any of us.
Now to the heart of visiting teaching (or home teaching). We have Christ as
the perfect example. He did not spend His time as only an administrator.
He met with people and blessed people personally. He lifted burdens, cleansed,
healed, and laid His hands on them one by one. And He did this for us all,
through the atonement. Now we are asked to be His instrument for just a
handful of our sisters at a time. When I think of Visiting Teaching this
way, my attitude changes and I commit to do a better job. For Him.
So many of you shared similar testimonies-- many of you crediting your
visiting teachers for your activity in the church today. You’ve
then reached out and given that gift of caring to others, and
I just want to throw my arms around all of you. Here’s another
inspiring story:
Thanks
for the article. I enjoyed reading your thoughts and input from
both ends. Hooray and thumbs up to the visiting teaching program
that is still trekking across all walks of life!!!! I love this
calling I get to do with other sisters in my branch. I see visiting
teaching as my "picker-upper" and putting smiles on
those darn frowns. I'm in a branch on the Navajo reservation
and VT can be very challenging, but we make the best of it. Just
to go out (remote areas) and sit down with our people is rewarding
and something to look forward to. Yes, it can be tough to stay
focused on the purpose of the visit, but to at least share our
love and our prayers makes it even better and we are welcomed
to return again. I enjoy and love serving in my little branch,
just in hopes someday of seeing more brothers & sisters coming
back. VT is definitely part of planting little seeds and returning
each time to water and nurture them in some small way. I will
always be grateful for VT program no matter how hard, slow, tough,
and challenging of a task it can be at times. It's there for
me and you to share, bit by bit-- this is what the Lord wants.--
Shirl Jensen, Leupp Branch, Arizona
I vote for cloning, and let’s start with Shirl Jensen! Now on to another
letter I love:
Here
is my testimony of visiting teaching: I believe it is one critical
way the Lord is teaching us to become celestial beings, line
upon line. You see, we are counseled to love everyone, to "feed
His sheep". Being human, we simply can't love everyone all
at once, but we can learn to love 3 or 4 sisters in our
ward at a time, if we truly want to learn to be like Jesus. Then
our assignment changes and we learn to love 3 or 4 more, while
still cherishing our relationships with those we used to visit.
Think of how many sisters we can learn to love over a lifetime of visiting
teaching! As a former R.S. president, I know how much time I spent
in prayer making visiting teaching assignments, and so every time I get
a new set of sisters to visit, I think of it as a calling from Heavenly
Father to visit some of his other beloved daughters. In addition, I know
that often we are given a companion because the R.S. president feels that
our partner needs us at this particular time in her life, or that we need
her.
Let me end with a personal experience. I was once assigned to a sister from
Utah whose husband had been transferred to New England. She made it very
clear to all that she didn't want to be there and she put up a wall of
unfriendliness that made it hard to get to know her, but each month I would
prayerfully visit her in hopes that a friendship might develop.
One day I had finally gotten my two preschool children in for naps and had
a canner full of tomatoes on the stove when I got a prompting to visit Sister
-. What a time to get a prompting!! I thought to myself, "I'll go as soon
as these tomatoes are done and I can let the boys sleep a little longer." The
prompting came again, "Go Now!" Still I resisted. "I will call
her instead, to see if she is O.K." Her line was busy each time I tried.
I got the impression her phone was off the hook.
The prompting said, "GO NOW." So I sighed, turned off the
burners, woke up my children and drove to her house feeling really dumb and
sure she would think I was crazy.
When the sister answered the door, she burst into tears. She then explained
to me that she had been feeling particularly lonely and discouraged that
afternoon.. She had bitterly poured out her heart to the Lord saying she
was convinced that He really didn't even know that she existed. And then
I showed up on her doorstep.
Because
I was willing to simply obey a prompting, a dear daughter of
God knew the Lord was mindful of her. I cherish this experience
of being an instrument in the Lord's hands, as a visiting teacher.
Just sign me, A sister with a testimony of visiting teaching.
How right you are. And how blessed we are as women, with sisters like
you who are tuned in to the spirit, and thus usable by the
Lord. He answers so many of our prayers through others-- thank
you for being one of them.
You’ll appreciate the following letter:
Visiting
Teaching and Home teaching are opportunities to "get up
in the middle of conference and go to Martin's Cove." We
have been called to build up the kingdom, not add to some statistical
report. These reports have their place because you can get a
good deal of useful information from such data- such as whether
people in the ward talking to one another and so on. But the
real reason for VT and HT is to give service and become like
Christ, and by so doing, we build up His kingdom.
I
am in my own Martin's Cove right now. My VT and HT don't have
a clue about my life because it "ain't exactly Ensign Quality." That
seems to be the way VT and HT are today. In order to survive
I have taken another road in fulfilling my duties as a VT. I
am very selfish, I like getting it done early in the month so
I can go as a friend during the rest of the month to those sisters
that I have been "assigned". That is my way of getting
around, past, and through the stigma of an "assigned friendship".
I
wish my own VTs felt this way but I have not waited for this
to happen. I have been "assigned" to a 92-year-old
new member of the church. What a blessing she is in my life.
Today I went and spent three hours with her on her birthday while
her daughter (her primary care giver) was at work, talking about
her friends, and family, funerals and memories, J Scott Featherstone's
great work HALLELUJAH (story of Handel's Messiah and about as
long as Harry Potter), looked at pictures of her home and friends
that she had to move from in her old age, old church and new
church, and so on. We just had a blast. As I left to go home
she kissed me goodbye and told me she loved me. This truly warmed
my heart and lifted my soul off the wintry ground of my own suffering.
A rescue was being made.
I
should have been home working ( I am self employed and in today's
tough market, no minutes can be wasted in the pursuit of the
all mighty dollar- it might mean your mortgage or car insurance
won't get paid!!) It is after midnight and I still feel the glow
of the day. I feel ready once again to face my own trials in
my own Martin's Cove. I know Heavenly Father gave us Visiting
Teaching to sustain us. And the beauty of it is, that it comes
in two ways. If we are lucky enough to have VTs who want to bear
one another's burdens, they will help build the kingdom and sustain
themselves in their own journey through Martin's Cove. And as
I serve others as a friend and anxious rescuer, I build the kingdom
by helping to bring them out of their Martin's Cove, and I am
sustained and delivered from mine. I know this works. I have
a personal testimony of Visiting Teaching because of what it
has accomplished in my life.
Amen. You’ve said it all, and the Spirit rings from your letter. Here’s
another success story:
I would just like to tell you about my first real experience with a visiting
teacher who truly changed my life. I was married very young and I had my
first child before my first wedding anniversary. I have been a member since
I was 8 years of age and had always thought that I was a good Mormon. I
ended up marrying a non-member. After we were married he became a member.
We lived in a ward where numbers meant more than anything. Soon we were
starting to fall away. We had moved from my home to my husband’s territory.
I had left my entire life long support group behind. I was now all alone
in a ward in the gospel where I should have been able to feel all of the
love and support I had left.
Well,
a few years went by and we were totally inactive. We had moved
into a new home and a new ward. I wasn’t very inclined to reactivate
because of fear and laziness. One day I received a note in the
mail. All it said was “Hi my name is so and so and I am your
visiting teacher. I know you don’t know me but I would like to
get to know you. If you would like to have me visit here is my
number.”. Well I was pretty sure that would be the end of it
because I wasn’t going to call her.
The
next month, however, there was a flower on my doorstep. The next
month it was a plate of cookies. I guess she finally broke me
down because the next month I was actually home when she came
by and I let her in. She never did give me the message for that
month or for the next few months but she always came and shared
her time with me. One day she asked if my two children would
like to go to Primary. I thought, Wow-- three hours of free childcare
on a Sunday, why not? So for the next year she would come and
visit me and on Sunday take my two small children to church.
At
that time things in my marriage were not going well and I knew
that something had to change. I decided to go to church. I thought
just one Sunday couldn’t hurt. My children were very excited
that I was going, but my husband was less than supportive. I
realized that I couldn’t please everyone and I needed to start
pleasing myself. Well to make a very long story short that was
five years ago. My husband and I are now active members; our
family is sealed in the temple; and we have two more children
who were born in the covenant. I now take visiting teaching very
seriously. You never know when that extra touch may change the
course of someone’s life for the better. Had I not had a very
loving sister I don’t think that I could have gotten over the
guilt and fear to come back to the Lord. I am grateful for the
opportunity to share my story and I hope that it can help someone
else. Thank You. Very Gratefully, Rachael I Nys
Hillsboro
Ward, Beaverton Oregon West Stake
It really works, doesn’t it? An inactive sister wrote the following:
Thank
you for this wonderful article. I hope it will inspire ALL visiting
sisters to put the pure love of Christ into their assignment.
As an inactive sister, my visiting "Sister" is my life
line that keeps me connected to the Church. She has to work hard
to catch me at home because of my work schedule but she never
fails. I can truly feel her love for me when we share time together,
or when she calls me or even though her emails. I am so grateful
for this wonderful program and pray that someday soon I will
receive this calling again. Please have your wonderful husband
write an article like this for ALL the home teachers, mine haven't
been here since Christmas.
Marie
Burnett, Gonzales, La.
And I just know you’ll be a fantastic VT, too.
Our last letter gives some great advice-- as women, we often hesitate
to speak up, but that’s often exactly what’s needed:
I
loved this article because it exposes both the misconceptions
and the real purpose of visiting teaching. Being a VT is my favorite
calling, because it means I get to know sisters I'd never otherwise
think of being friends with. Visiting teaching IS about service,
and it's about something much more fundamental in the gospel:
creating a Zion society. We can't ever become Zion as a church
if we don't know and love one another. I think it's tragic that
we have to be assigned to do this because we're all too busy
trying to keep our individual families and lives together.
But
I don't think there's a better solution now, and won't be until
more members in general come to view home and visiting teaching
as so much more than a checklist or additional burden on the
schedules. Until we all catch the vision that visiting teaching
is one of the vital links to making the Church a Zion society,
being on someone's checklist is what we'll have to put up with.
Or not.
What
I would suggest to Sister Anonymous is to be obnoxious enough
with her VTs to wake them up: actually disclose some of the milder
challenges she's facing and say, "Hey, I need some help
with this one." Sometimes the visit-ees have to make their
visiting or home teachers do their jobs by giving them something
to do that will make it impossible for them only to check the
name off the list. I haven't had to do that with my VTs very
often, but ALWAYS have to do it with my home teachers. You have
to make them feel needed sometimes, because they won't always
see what their your needs are. Things have changed a lot in my
relationship with VTs or HTs that I've done that with. Don't
expect them to see your needs or have the Spirit tell them. That's
what we have mouths for. Be assertive! Ask for help if you need
it! It'll give them an opportunity to make a choice as to whether
or not they want to care about you. And if they don't, then it's
their problem, and you can ask for new VTs.
Sue
Neimoyer
Good advice, Sue. Too many of us
don’t say anything, and then fume or pout afterwards. It’s
crazy, when you think about it. We would all do well to follow
your suggestions.
Last, I want to applaud the efforts
of some wards around the world who are experimenting with flexible
visiting teaching methods that let sisters handle huge geographic
areas more easily. For example, one sister wrote about a monthly
get-together similar to a women’s retreat, when they could
all join to support each other and share testimonies. I wonder
if a “Sisters’ Camp” wouldn’t be a great idea in other remote
areas, or even church-wide!
Thanks to everyone for your great
responses-- I wish we could have used them all. Be sure to
sound off next week when I’ll share a reader’s ethical dilemma
with you.
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