General Officers Mark L. Pace and Ahmad Corbitt Tour Southern Africa

In November, Sunday School General President Mark L. Pace and First Counsellor in the Young Men General Presidency, Ahmad Corbitt, conducted a five-country ministry in southern Africa along with their wives.

They visited Madagascar, Zambia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa, where the two global leaders held devotionals with members and missionaries, leadership instruction sessions, met with local opinion leaders and visited with members in their homes.

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Some of their central messages were about faith, prayer, scripture study and the redemptive power of the Saviour Jesus Christ.

At a devotional for youth, leaders and their parents in Gaborone, Botswana, Brother Corbitt shared how years ago he had regularly visited an elderly lady with dementia. Every time he visited her, they had the same conversation. He realised she didn’t remember him and began to wonder if he was wasting his time.

‘Feed your faith every day’

“But then,” Brother Corbitt said, “I remembered the occasions in which I forget the Saviour. I remembered the occasions in which I forget who I am. I remember the moments in which I forget my true identity and do something in which I shouldn’t be doing, or say something that I shouldn’t be saying, or think something that I shouldn’t be thinking. But the Saviour and the Holy Ghost still visit me – over and over and over,” said Brother Corbitt.

Despite our human tendency to forget our divine heritage, he taught, the Lord is there to constantly help us remember who we really are.

At the same devotional, Sister Anne Marie Pace taught young people to “feed” their faith.

“If we don’t feed our faith every day, what are we doing to our faith? We’re starving it,” Sister Pace taught. “We have to feed ourselves on some faith every day. It’s when we grow in faith that we feel his love for us and we show our love to Him.”

We can feed our faith by doing very simple things,” Sister Pace continued. “Reading in the scriptures; making our prayers meaningful and saying them every day; keeping the commandments. Every time we stay on the covenant path and keep the commandments, we grown in faith.”

Atsile Molefe (16) said that she had felt the holy spirit as she attended the instruction. “Today I learned that faith is something that we have to exercise daily, in order for it to have a strong foundation,” said after the Botswana devotional.

Karayame Lekoko (28) from the Gaborone Young Single Adult ward “We were encouraged to read our scriptures and to make our personal study meaningful, and also to try a little bit harder to hold onto the rod,” he said. “it’s assuring. When you start studying the scriptures at first, it’s a drag and it’s something that you’re not used to,” he said.

‘The more you do it, the more you like it’

“But as when you open a room, it slowly fills with light until the whole room is lit up; that’s how it is with scripture study I’ve learnt. The more you do it, the more you are going to start liking it; the more you’re going to start understanding it; the more you are going to start enjoying it.”

As Sunday School General President, one President Pace’s central focuses was on helping members to improve their scripture reading at home whilst using Come Follow Me as a resource.

Making practical improvements to scripture study was a take-out message for one Gaborone young adult, who said she learned from President Pace that “we should read our scriptures using the Come Follow Me guide, it really helps,” she said. “I used to feel bored when I read my scriptures; I felt sleepy; but what President Pace said is that we should choose a time of day for our scripture reading that we are alert. For the youth out there, we should pray about what we are feeling, and we should pray about the scriptures.”

Following a leadership instruction session with the Corbitts in Bulawayo, Chrispen Matsetlo, first counselor in the Bulawayo Zimbabwe stake, said, “What I learned was that we need to get out of the way and let the youth lead. They are not the future leaders; they are the current leaders”.

And those young leaders said that they were edified from this special opportunity to learn from their more seasoned global counterparts. Celeste Chesa (17) of the Bulawayo stake said, “I am happy that I came. I never would’ve gotten this experience anywhere else.”