Responses to Stake Planning Guide in preparation for Elder Costa's visit to our stake conference in February 2017

How does your leadership help members of the stake increase their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ?

·   Temple service (many serving as temple ordinance workers or volunteers)

·   Emphasis on “Teaching in the Savior’s Way”

·   Conducting the Self-Reliance Initiative – we are a “pilot” stake in the area

·   Bringing the gospel closer to families to meet their needs — two new units added in 2016-17, a YSA branch and a Spanish branch

How does your leadership help strengthen parents and their families?

·   Blessings of temple flow into homes with so many temple ordinance workers

·   Reduced financial burden on families with Summer Camp Funding plan (no fundraising)

·   Emphasis on Covenant Path to help ward councils take ownership of the missionary effort and thus increase visits to families by ward leaders

·   Emphasis in ward conferences on 2017 Area Plan showing families how to conduct family councils to implement the plan in their homes

What are the most significant spiritual and temporal challenges facing the various members of your stake?

·   Family devotion, especially family prayer and scripture study

·   Putting the world or temporal choices over gospel-living and spiritual choices

·   Lack of full-time missionaries, under 20% of our YM leave for full-time missionary service and only 3 senior missionaries

·   Mental health (depression, ADHD, etc.) concerns among parents and children

How are you addressing these challenges and how do you know if you are succeeding?

·   Emphasis in ward conferences, involving families and asking them to share

·   Self-Reliance Initiative helps families focus on understanding that the solution to temporal matters is attention to spiritual matters

·   Emphasis on helping families and ward/branch organizations to participate in regular community service (JustServe)

·   A focus on teaching doctrines of the gospel, recognizing that the doctrines of the gospel will have a greater influence on affecting behavior than anything else

How can this conference help increase the faith and devotion of the Saints in your stake?

·   Ministering visits will bless those we visit with a renewed love for the Lord and desire to live the gospel

·   Help the members of the stake understand and focus on what is of greatest importance to Prophets today