Stripling Warrior Day – March 4th

Honor the valor and virtue of the Stripling Warriors from the Book of Mormon by celebrating Stripling Warrior Day on March 4th! Learn about the Stripling Warriors and how they did “march forth” (Alma 56:33), then get ideas on how we can apply their examples to ourselves in the latter-days. Join us in commemorating a day of strength, faith, and resilience, and discover how the spirit of the Stripling Warriors can influence and uplift us today with faith-promoting and family-strengthening activities.

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Hi! I’m Anna-Marie and I am a pretty new mom. As my husband and I entered parenthood, we pondered together what traditions we would like to establish and refine over the years as our child(ren, hopefully) grow.

Among the classic holidays and traditions that go with them, I wanted to start something completely new. I wanted it to be Book of Mormon oriented, fun, and an opportunity for learning and great memories.

So this year we have decided to start Stripling Warrior Day!

I chose the Stripling Warriors for several reasons. First, I have always loved the stories of the Stripling Warriors. They inspired me when I was stripling age myself.

Second, I want to raise spiritually strong warriors. The world has some really difficult challenges today with all the dangers that come with living in a tech world of social media and screens that are much more dominant than when I was of stripling age.

I want my kids to be armed with the lessons that come with these stories. I want to be like the mothers of the stripling warriors.

I want to teach and nurture my children in such a way that they develop strong faith, know where to turn for leadership, and become courageous, resilient, and exactly obedient to the commandments and direction from the prophet in the face of an enemy or a challenge.

Stripling Warrior Day (SWD) is going to be celebrated on March 4th (because they did “march forth” [Alma 56:33]).

When introducing this idea to others, I received a lot of positive feedback and interest from other women in also celebrating it. Hence, this post was born out of a desire to share my ideas.

I love the idea that all of us can emulate the stripling warriors, no matter our age or gender.

This holiday can be celebrated as a family, in a group of friends, solo, etc.! The wonderful thing is that it can look a little different depending on age, number of people celebrating, and interest.

Learning About Stripling Warriors

To celebrate Stripling Warrior Day, we first need to find out what the Stripling Warriors were like. By searching the scriptures, I came up with a list of key attributes of the Stripling Warriors.

These are events or virtues of the Stripling Warriors (SW) as found in the scriptures:

1. Called themselves Nephites (Alma 53:16).
2. Entered into a covenant to fight for the liberty of Nephites, even if they had to lay down their lives.  Fought to protect from bondage (Alma 53:17).
3. Picked Helaman as their leader (Alma 53:14).
4. Valiant for courage, strength, and activity (Alma 53:20).
5. True at all times in anything they were entrusted (Alma 53:20). 
6. Men of truth and soberness (Alma 53:21). 
7. Brought joy and great hope to the older Nephite soldiers they joined (Alma 56:17).
8. Were sent provisions by their fathers (Alma 56:27).
9. Acted as decoy/bait by pretending to carry provisions to a neighboring city as a part of a strategy (Alma 56:30) luring the strongest and most numerous Lamanite army to chase them (Alma 56:34).
10. Decided to enter into battle with that Lamanite army, not knowing if there was a snare/trap waiting for them, in order to not leave the older Nephite soldiers to fight them alone, because they knew God was with them (Alma 56:44-46). 
11. Understood they were going to battle only to defend and protect (Alma 56:46).
12. Knew liberty was more important than life (Alma 56:47).
13. Taught by their mothers (Alma 56:48). 
14. Fought with miraculous strength (Alma 56:56).
15. Obeyed and observed to perform every word of command with exactness (Alma 57:21). 
16. Had great faith, firm minds, trust in God (Alma 57:27).

Celebrating Stripling Warrior Day With Babies

This year my son is an infant, and so SWD will be mostly my husband and I starting some basic traditions together.

It will look something like my husband and I reading Alma 53, 56, & 57 with our son in our arms and counseling together on how we can raise spiritually strong warriors together day by day. We will discuss our covenants we’ve made of the laws of sacrifice, gospel, chastity, and consecration and how we can more fully live up to our privileges of the priesthood power we get through our temple covenants.

My husband will make a meal of “provisions” aka shelf stable food storage recipes (or maybe some beef jerky and nuts, hahaha). I will write out my testimony of the things I know to be true and put it in an envelope for my son to have and read one day.

My husband and I will encourage each other in some feats of strength and agility (using those terms rather loosely as someone who needs to get back in the habit of regular exercise!) such as jogging, pushups, burpees, etc.

Lastly, we will discuss how we can defend religious freedom and what that looks like in our modern American lives.

Ideas for Stripling Warrior Day

Below are the overall themes of SWD and some ideas of how this might change as we add to our family and our children grow or if we decide to celebrate with other people we love.

There are also some ideas of how I would celebrate this if I were still single and celebrating solo, or with some friends.

• United in a cause
  • Call yourselves by a unifying name depending on who you are celebrating with (e.g. The Smiths, Christians, Latter Day Saints, Relief Society Sisters, Americans, etc.).  Do a short activity to emphasize this.  Some ideas for example:
    • Everyone put their hands in and say “The Van Everas” on 3!  
    • A chant (think Remember the Titans) “Everywhere we go-o, people wanna know-o, who we are, so we tell them: We are the Franklins, the faithful faithful Franklins!”
    • Take a group photo holding a sign with your chosen name (or if it is just you, a selfie that says Daughter/Son of God!)
    • Resolve to follow the prophet and emphasize the full name of the church when discussing it, “I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.”
• Defend religious freedom
  • Discuss the importance of religious freedom for everyone and how this was what allowed the restoration of the gospel to occur in the USA.  
  • Study talks by Elder Bednar or Elder Hales on this topic. 
  • Read literature that examines a time in history when religious freedom was inhibited or taken away.  
  • Explore what local organizations support protecting religious freedom and make arrangements to volunteer.  
• Choose a righteous leader
  • Discuss how to identify if a person is righteous in their leadership.  
  • Resolve together to follow certain righteous leaders- parents, Bishop, Prophets.  
  • Spend some time looking at local government and upcoming elections.  Study candidates together of all parties and examine their voting history or other components that give insight into their leadership. 

• Courageous, strong, and active
  • Go camping together
  • Face a fear you have in some way
  • Physical activity
    • Go on a long hike together. You can carry “warrior” packs.
    • Go on a bike ride together.
    • March together singing inspirational hymns such as Battle Hymn of the Republic, Let Us All Press On, etc. or cadences you rewrite the lyrics to to fit your family/group. 
    • Feats of strength, agility, and courage with everyone encouraging each person or kid to give their best to try to achieve a personal record (not competition with each other).
      • Pushups
      • Planks
      • Monkey bars
      • Walking on a balance beam
      • Swinging on a rope
      • Running a certain distance
• Entered into a covenant
  • Discuss what covenants we make—baptismal, endowment, sealing—and how we can better live up to them. 
• Brought hope to older soldiers
  • Visit some older, valiant members in your ward.  
  • Write letters to grandparents or other older family members or friends. 
  • Call someone who could use some hope or joy.
• Taught by their mothers
  • Call your mom or someone who has been a gospel mother to you and ask her to share the most important things she knows to be true. 
  • Write your own testimony out for your children to keep. 
  • Read the story of the stripling warriors (Alma 53, 56, &57) with your children.
  • Discuss with your kids how they can live now, so that their kids/posterity will know they had a testimony of Jesus Christ. 
  • Consider ways you can implement more spiritual teaching in your day to day with your children. 
• Sent provisions by their fathers
  • Dad makes a meal for everyone out of food storage/shelf stable foods. 
  • Dad makes a goody box of “provisions” for them.  Beef jerky, nuts, freeze dried or dehydrated fruit, granola bars, maybe even some candy!
• Decided to enter into battle with Lamanite army
  • Hold a Stripling Warrior Battle reenactment. 
  • Have a marshmallow war.
  • Play a SW themed version of capture the flag.
  • Discuss the spiritual battles we face and make strategies together with how to face them.  
• Exactly obedient
  • Host a blindfolded agility feat where someone has to follow your instructions to succeed.  
  • Host a game in which leaders give instructions to their teams via walkie talkie. 
  • Play Simon says. 
• Firm in their faith and trust in God
  • Family/Group testimony meeting

Are you going to celebrate Stripling Warrior Day? Do you have any ideas? Let us know in the comments!

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