Tag: activity levels

Isaiah 53:7

Isaiah 53: 7 states:
 
“He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.”
 
These three references to Him refraining from “opening his mouth” and being “dumb” (meaning silent) are referring to more than His failure to respond to Herod’s inquiries.  (Luke 23: 8-9.)  This is a reference to Christ’s “Word,” which if employed, could have moved mountains, held armies at defiance, and summoned “twelve legions of angels” to His defense.  (Matt. 26: 52-53.)  Pilate was told that he may have been the Roman Procurator, but he had no power over Christ which Christ did not permit.  (John 19: 7-11.)
 
Christ remained silent, choosing to exercise meekness in the face of the threat aimed at Him.  (“Meekness” as explained in Beloved Enos, which is really a great power.)  It was in this sense the Isaiah found His silence to be prophetically remarkable.  One of the great signs of the Messiah.  He would be the One whose words could have exercised power to defy armies, but who refrained from speaking those words.  He would, instead, voluntarily submit to the abuse and scorn of those who hated Him.
 
As to our Lord being shorn, Isaiah also foretells His beard being plucked by those who would smite, abuse and strike Him.  (Isa. 50: 6.)  Surely our Lord was indeed “shorn” as a “sheep” before His sacrifice.

My calculations

I was asked about the numbers in activity used in an earlier post. (Sorry no link, the moderator can’t remember which one) That calculation was one I made based on the statistics we were given by the Mission President on our area.
By way of background, I did a two year stint as the Ward Mission Leader, followed by five years on the High Council over missionary work in my stake. During the last two years on the High Council we would meet quarterly with the mission presidency.  During those meetings we would be updated on the numbers throughout the mission and the church.  The numbers worked out to approximately 37% activity rate church-wide.  HOWEVER, the definition of “active” included anyone who attended a single sacrament meeting during a quarter.  This had the effect of inflating the number by all those who attended during Easter and Christmas (because they all became instantly “active” during two quarters of the year).  They also were affected by the count of sacrament meeting attendees who came for missionary farewells and missionary homecomings.  
I did a count of my own to try and come up with a “distortion” number to attempt to calculate who was really carrying the load as an average.  I couldn’t get a consistent result using my own ward to allow for Easter/Christmas and missionary farewell/homecoming additions.  But it appeared to me the distortion was somewhere between as little as 5% and as much as 10%.  I took a mid-point between the two and made my overall estimate of 4,000,000 out of the total church membership as those who are really serving regularly, attending regularly, and who are not merely “active” by virtue of quarterly appearances in a sacrament meeting.  I hope that serves your purposes.