Archive for category: Missionary Work

Shaun Gogarty is one of the founders of Pedal With A Purpose, a site dedicated to providing Mormon missionaries with better bikes so they can focus on the real purpose of missionary work. Pedal With A Purpose does this through education on the Pedal With A Purpose Blog, and by outfitting missionaries with the right types of mission bicycles (i.e. bikes better for the urban environment most missionaries work in).

Marathons and Missions

A marathon is a 26.2 mile endurance race and similarly a mission is an endurance event. Read any guide on preparing for a marathon and you will find within the top ten suggestions: do not use anything new on race day! Many would be marathoners have failed because of a new shirt chafing or new shoes causing blisters with each step. Similarly many new missionaries are spiritually well prepared, but physically miserable because they are using new equipment, their mission bike, in a very physical event.

Accomplishing your mission of inviting others to come unto Christ requires that you first go to the people so you can invite them. Crossing continents or oceans to get to your country is easy – buy a ticket. However, getting around in the country is often the challenge. This is the first of a series of articles will help you be prepared to effectively use one of the most common missionary tools: the bicycle. Hopefully you will then be able to avoid the chafing and blistering that too frequently occur when new missionaries meet new tools.

Mountain or Urban?

Getting around on a bike is fun and should be. There are many different styles of bikes but a general division of mountain and urban makes for a good comparison. Which type of bike is really best for missionary work?

Mountain Bikes: Not Ideal for Missionary Work

Every company makes mountain bikes. They are fun to ride and seem durable. It should not be a surprise that mountain bikes were designed for riding on dirt mountain trails. But it is a surprise that many missionaries have traditionally been directed to mountain bikes. The wide, knobby tires are great for dirt but slow on pavement. The heavy shocks (sometimes front and back) add cost, weight, and repair issues while almost never being needed even on the worst city roads. Finally, too often mountain bikes lead missionaries to try off road “tricks” which can easily lead to bike and body damage.

Urban Bikes: Better Suited for Missionary Work

Interestingly bike messengers have led to a revolution of sorts in bike usage. Their bike needs — transportation, reliability and simplicity — have typically led them to single speed, urban bikes. The urban bikes have narrower tires and solid frames. These make them faster on city streets because of less rolling resistance and weight. A fringe benefit is they have fewer parts to buy and repair. Missionaries need the same things bike messengers need: transportation, reliability and simplicity. While you shouldn’t jump an urban bike off a cliff, it still provides fast and durable city transportation.

Either bike type will work for getting a missionary around town. And yes, the mountain bike will be more suited to “p-day activities”. However, since most missionaries are based in urban settings, the urban bike will be provide reliable, easy to ride, simple transportation for daily mission work.

One of my favorite missionary hymns was written by a good woman, who was not a Latter-day Saint, Mary Brown, who’s words express the faithful commitment of followers of Christ in all ages: I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.

It may not be on the mountain height
Or over the stormy sea,
It may not be at the battle’s front
My Lord will have need of me.
But if, by a still, small voice he calls
To paths that I do not know,
I’ll answer, dear Lord, with my hand in thine:
I’ll go where you want me to go.
I’ll go where you want me to go, dear Lord,
Over mountain or plain or sea;
I’ll say what you want me to say, dear Lord;
I’ll be what you want me to be.
(“I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go,” Hymns, no. 270)

Ammon and the other sons of Mosiah in their mission to the Lamanites… Alma and Amulek crying repentance unto the people of Ammonihah… Nephi and his brother Lehi preaching throughout the land of Nephi… Samuel the Lamanite high on the Zarahemla city wall: All of these faithful Book of Mormon missionaries and prophets showed their obedience to the Lord’s call and their faith in His all powerful hand by going where the He wanted them to go.

When you submit your mission papers, you indicate your willingness to serve as a missionary for the Lord wherever he, through his living prophet, sends you. Some missionaries, it has been reported, when they receive their mission call letter, have feelings of disappointment regarding where they have been called to serve. To those missionaries and their families, I quote from Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles:

Almost a decade ago, I read a letter from a returned missionary… He had written to thank those who direct missionary work “for daring to send me where the Lord required rather than where I had deemed appropriate.” He had come, he said, “from a background of proud, competitive intellectualism.” Before his mission he was a student at a prestigious university in the eastern United States. Quote:

“I guess out of a sense of obligation and inertia, I filled out my [missionary] papers and sent them in, extremely careful to mark the column indicating greatest desire to serve abroad and in a foreign language. I was careful to make it apparent that I was an accomplished student of Russian and fully capable of spending two years among the Russian people. Confident that no committee could resist such qualifications, I rested confident that I would enjoy a wonderfully mind-expanding cultural adventure.”

He was shocked to receive a call to serve in a mission in the United States. He didn’t know anything about the state where he would serve, except that it was in his own country speaking English rather than abroad speaking the language he had learned, and, as he said, “The people I would work with would likely be academic incompetents.” He continued, “I almost refused to accept the call, feeling that I would be more fulfilled by enlisting in the Peace Corps or something else.”

Fortunately, this proud young man found the courage and faith to accept the call and to follow the direction and counsel of his fine mission president. Then the miracle of spiritual growth began. He described it thus:

“As I began to serve among the uneducated people of [this state], I struggled mightily for several months, but gradually the sweet workings of the Spirit began to tear down the walls of pride and disbelief that had wrapped themselves so tightly around my soul. The miracle of a conversion to Christ began. The sense of the reality of God and the eternal brotherhood of all men came more and more powerfully to my troubled mind.”

It was not easy, he admitted, but with the influence of his great mission president and with his growing love for the people he served, it was possible, and it occurred.

“My desire to love and serve these people who in the ultimate scale were at least my peers, almost definitely my superiors, waxed stronger and stronger. I learned humility for the first time in my life; I learned what it means to make our valuations of others [without relying on the] irrelevant details of life. I began to feel swelling within my heart a love of the spirits that came here to earth with me.” I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go, by Elder Dallin H. Oaks, October 2002.

It is Not Where You Serve, But How

When I was a 19 year old boy awaiting my mission call, I was hoping to go to France or really just about anywhere French-speaking. I had studied French in High School, instead of Spanish like my brothers.  My older brother got called to Salta Argentina, and was still serving there when I got my call. Prior to opening my call letter, I was hoping to go anywhere outside the US and outside Spanish-speaking Latin America.  I wanted to go somewhere different and unique, but when I opened the letter, I found that I would be serving in Argentina just like my older brother, though in a different part of the country.

For a brief moment I felt the pride and resentment of someone disappointed by where they were called to serve. But those feelings soon left as the Spirit confirmed that Argentina was where the Lord needed me to serve.  And of course, in retrospect, I can’t imagine having served anywhere else.  I met so many good people, and was able to see many families come into the waters of baptism. I had great companions and mission presidents that influenced me to become better. There is no doubt that the Rosario, Argentina mission is where the Lord needed me, and where I needed to be.

By accepting my mission call and seeking to magnify that calling in a manner pleasing unto the Lord, I learned that it is not where you serve that matters, but how you serve. This lesson was taught powerfully, through word and deed, by President J. Reuben Clark, former counselor in the First Presidency of the Church, when he said: “In the service of the Lord, it is not where you serve but how. In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, one takes the place to which one is duly called, which place one neither seeks nor declines” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1951, 154). This he said, by the way, when he was called as second counselor in the First Presidency, after serving for over 16 years as first counselor.

Examples of Willingness to Go Where Needed

Quoting again from Elder Oaks, “I recently reviewed the missionary papers of over 50 senior couples. All had already served at least three missions when they submitted their papers for another call…The priesthood leaders’ comments on the papers of these couples are testimonies of service and sacrifice. I quote several:

• “Willing to go anyplace, do anything for whatever length of time required.”
• “[These] are great examples of Church members who dedicate their lives to the Lord.”
• “Willing to serve in whatever capacity called.”
• “Will go anywhere and do what is asked. It is not a sacrifice; it is a privilege.”

I hope the same can be said about each of you, and about me one day when my wife and I apply to serve as missionaries.

Jesus, the Perfect Example

Of course, our Savior Jesus Christ gave the greatest example of willingness to go where Heavenly Father wants us to go.  The Savior would have rather not drank the bitter cup and suffered for our sins in Gethsemane and on the cross of Calvary (see D&C 19:18), But he, in all humility, said to the Father, “Not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42).

May we follow the example of Christ, and seek the will of the Father, and not our own.  May we, through our words and deeds, always say “I will go where you want me to go, dear Lord.” Truly, missionaries are called by God, and through faithful service, they and their families will be greatly blessed of the Lord.

Mission presidents are called to watch over and lead a mission (a specific region and its missionaries), generally, for the space of three years.   They are responsible for the spiritual and physical well-being of the missionaries in their mission.  The mission president and his wife manage the affairs of the missionaries in the mission and are both set apart as full-time missionaries during their service.

Mission presidents have many duties, including:

• Welcoming and providing orientation for new missionaries.
• Interviewing departing missionaries (an important part of missionary work is the personal growth of the missionary himself/herself).
• Assigning mission companions and the areas where missionaries will work.
• Traveling to and presiding over zone conferences where training and interviews of missionaries take place.
• Reading weekly letters from each of the missionaries in the mission.
• Making sure that the housing and food provided for missionaries is clean and safe.
• Providing for the medical care of missionaries in case of illness or accident.

Relationship between Missionary and Mission President

Most missionaries develop deep respect and admiration for their mission presidents.  Prior to their mission, though, many missionaries, including myself, don’t realize the special bond that will be formed between them and their mission president.  Mission presidents are spiritually mature leaders under whose tutelage missionaries will grow and develop.  Elder Quentin L. Cook said one of the “blessings of serving a mission are having the opportunity of being nurtured under the guidance of a mission president who has been called by inspiration.” (from Be a Missionary All Your Life, Ensign September 2008)

First Meetings with My Mission President

My first mission president, President Coburn, had a reputation for being very strict.  (You may recall some of the strict rules in our Argentina, Rosario mission that I discussed in my post about preparation day.)  I wasn’t too fond of the strict rules at first, but I eventually came to realize the blessings of those rules.  I had a brief interview with my mission president upon arriving the in the country.  He told me that he had been given my picture and other information from my missionary application, and that he felt inspired in assigning my area (the city of Parana) and my companion (Elder Loesener).

After about a month in the country, I had my first zone conference and accompanying interview with President Coburn. I had been having some disagreements with my senior companion, which I had mentioned in my weekly letters, as, perhaps, did my companion. President Coburn spoke very frankly to me at that time because, he said, he felt I could handle it. I felt honored by his statement, but those pleasant feelings vanished quickly as he “bajo la caña” (Spanish for “dropped the hammer”) on me.

My mission president told me to repent, to swallow my pride, to stop “kicking against the pricks”, and do better at following my senior companion, who was, in effect, my Priesthood leader. I went away from that interview fuming inside; I had never been spoken to in that manner by a Church leader.  It took me about a week, but in time I realized that President Coburn was completely right.  I tried to follow his advice and my relationship with my companion did improve.  (I also learned a valuable lesson I would never forget about sustaining Priesthood leaders.)

I will always love and appreciate President Coburn for the things he taught me.

My Second Mission President

Sadly, I was only with President Coburn for 6 months when his term of service was up.  But my new mission president, President Ontiveros, though a different type of personality, was equally wonderful.  One thing that stands out most in my memory about President Ontiveros was a talk he gave on having your “eye single to the glory of God.”  He gave a powerful sermon based largely on the Helaman chapter 5 where Nephi and Lehi are imprisoned and fire encircles them without causing them harm.  Soon, in this chapter, a cloud of darkness overshadows their Lamanite captors.

President Ontiveros explained that these two events were physical manifestations of spiritual realities.  Since then I have always remembered that a spiritual “cloud of darkness” hangs over us when we make bad choices.  But when we choose the right and keep our eye single to the glory of God, we can withstand the fiery brilliance of God’s presence without being consumed.

Conclusion

Always obey, honor and sustain your mission president.  He was called of God to preside over your mission.  He will be one of the greatest influences for good in your mission, and you will develop a great love and bond with him.  He will place you where you need to be, in areas and with companions that are inspired of God.  Write good letters to your mission president every week and let him know how the missionary work is going in your area, how you are getting along with your companionship, and how you are personally progressing.  By so doing, he will be better able to counsel you and help you become the best missionary you can be.