Preparing With Honor
An assignment was given to me for school to write an essay about becoming self-sufficient. I took this as an excellent opportunity to finish schoolwork and at the same time accomplish something I've been meaning to do for quite a while now: plan my future. My most immediate goal is to finish high school, but I've often wondered what exactly I will do after the fact. Throughout this lesson I have learned the importance of planning before making any kind of big change—be it a permenant or temporary change, I must be ready. The big changes that I see in my immediate future involve taking upon myself more responsibility than ever before; I must learn to be completely self-sufficient in under a year's time because that is when I will go off on my own. Where am I going? I'm going on a mission, and, save for God, I must be completely self-sufficient if I am to succeed then.
I'm male and I'm eighteen, and for a young Latter-day Saint—or Mormon—the eighteenth year is a natural year of preparation because at age nineteen, we go on missions. A mission is a period of two years spent in a place far away from home—often it is in another part of the world—where a missionary devotes his or her entire day, everyday—for up to two years—teaching the people there about God. A mission is not forced upon us, but still I very much desire to serve an honorable full-time mission. There is a Latter-day Saint saying that goes something like this: "Honor; prepare with it, serve with it, and return with it woven forever into the fabric of your being." Serving a mission is not for everyone; it takes financial planning and strict observance of the Lord's moral code in order to be worthy of the honor.This honor doesn't come for free. The going rate per month as a missionary is $400; now strech that out for two years and you have $9,600 to pay, but that's only if you already have a suit and other proper missionary clothes and supplies. The amount I'm really going to save up will be $12,000 so that I can purchase clothing, supplies, and whatever other costs that might come up. Missionary work is a completely selfless work, and it doesn't come without significant sacrifice. I am not yet prepared to make that sacrifice, but when the time comes I will know I have covered all of my financial need for the next two years of my life. How many other people can say that about their finances I wonder. This financial sacrifice won't be a light one for me, nor will it be the only one I make before my preparation for a mission is complete.
I also have to prepare myself emotionally and spiritually for this. If I am to be God's willing servant in this task, then I need to be willing to obey him in all other callings as well. I believe that God has given his children certain rules that he expects us to obey—this is one of the things I will be teaching people as a missionary—and if I do not obey those rules myself, then I would be a hypocrite and anything I said would be completely worthless. I expect I will err and often make mistakes—I do quite frequently, actually—but each week I try harder to be better and each week I repent and get a little closer to where I want to be. Some things you can read about and study in preparation for a mission, but nothing is worth more to a missionary than experience.
To me, serving with honor means doing the best I can possibly do and even if somebody else could do better, I will know that I have done my very best and tried my hardest. I believe that I must prepare diligently if am to be able to serve my mission with honor. Semper fi means always faithful, and that will be my motto as I prepare for a mission right now. I will always be faithful to my God.
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