My Friend, Ivoga Green

By Liz Adair

I’m late writing this blog, because I’ve been searching through http://www.lds.org/ for a scripture. Several years ago, in a Sunday School class, the teacher interpreted a scripture to mean that prior the Second Coming, the continents would have to move back together in fulfillment of prophecy. Do any of you know it? I thought it was in the Doctrine and Covenants, but I couldn’t find it. I was skeptical at the time we were discussing it, but you know, I think it’s happened. If I’m remembering the scripture correctly, I think the prophecy is fulfilled.

Let me explain.

Do any of you know about yourLDSneighborhood? It’s a commercial web site for Latter-day Saint businesses to advertise and sell their wares. It’s set up with different ‘blocks’ of merchants with the bonus of a blogger on each block, too. I blog on the ‘Services’ block, and my blog is all about service. It’s hard to describe, but if you check it out, you’ll see what I’m trying to say.

They also have a non-commercial site called Neighborhood and Friends, a Facebook-type setup where you can join discussion groups and gather friends for easy mass communication of news about yourself.

There are book groups and home decorating groups—even one about service (I moderate that one). One of the most popular Neighborhood groups is The Neighborhood Jukebox, a place you can go to listen to music posted by LDS composers and artists.

Some ANWA members already have pages on Neighborhood and Friends, and I was looking through the membership list thinking I’d ask them to be my friends, when I came upon the name and picture of a lady from New Zealand. She's not one of my ANWA sisters, but on a whim, I sent her a friend request. With her acceptance, she asked me to listen to some music she had posted on The Jukebox. It’s music she and some other New Zealanders composed for a production about the life of the prophet, Joseph Smith.

I listened to the music, and that’s when I felt the continents shift and thud together. Though we’re half a world apart and from different countries, we’re no longer strangers . With the internet tools we have at our disposal, and with the ability to fly from one continent to another in the same day, we truly all inhabit the same land. We are of the same household. Check out my music, Liz, she says. Sure, Ivoga, I reply, and two minutes later, I’m listening to this marvelous tribute to Joseph Smith, and I feel a connection to this internet friend because I know we're grounded in the same faith.

I hope you'll check out Ivoga Green’s music, either on The Neighborhood Jukebox or on the web site for the musical production, and feel the miles disappear.