A few weeks ago I was trying to come up with a good Family Home Evening. Our ward had organized a night when all of the youth would learn about how to be a missionary and were coming over to our house to give my family the first lesson. We were to feed them dinner and then listen to their lesson and help them feel like a true missionary. I decided to use some of the foods that I had to eat while I was on my mission. I served an LDS mission to both Cali Colombia and to Quito Ecuador. So, I went to our local Latino grocery store and found some items that would give them a taste of what I ate while serving in South America. I fried up some platain bananas. I made a bunch of rice. I bought some Guayava candy and made some agua de panela.

Before these young men and young women came over to our house, I thought I would try out all of these things on my own kids. Of course, they all turned up their noses and didn’t taste all of the items with curiosity. They knew the tastes would be different so they only tried a little tiny bit.

In any case, I decided to pull out my mission treasure box and show them some cool stuff from Colombia and Ecuador. While rummaging through my box of stuff, I came across this little poem. I don’t remember when I found this on my mission but it was perfect for how I felt while serving for 2 years. I thought I would share this little poem with the world on my LDS Family website.

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A mission is a strange experience
It is a trial and a test
A mission throws you at the worst
Yet teaches you the best

I’ve never been so happy
I’ve never been so depressed
I’ve never felt so forsaken
I've never felt so blessed

I've never been so confused
Things have never been so clear
I've never felt my Heavenly Father so distant
He's never been so near.

I’ve never been so discouraged
I’ve never been so full of hope
I feel I could go forever
I think I’ve come to the end of my rope

I’ve never had it quite so easy
I’ve never had it quite so tough
Things have never been so smooth
Things have never been so rough

I've never traveled through more valleys
I've never ascended so many peaks
I've never met so many nice people
I've never met so many freaks

I've never had so many ups
I've never had so many downs
I've never worn so many smiles
I've never worn so many frown

I've never been so lonely
I've never had so many friends
Boy, I hope this is over soon
Gosh, I hope it never ends

———–

Last Sunday we had a missionary in our LDS Ward return from his mission. He spoke in Sacrament Meeting and talked about his experiences while he served and LDS mission in Cambodia. What made this particular missionary important to us was that he was our neighbor. His family lives just across the cul-de-sac from our family. He had even helped coach my son’s baseball team a few years ago. I know that our boys look up to this young man as an example of what they want to be when they get older.

This return missionary gave a wonderful talk in church and really gave inspiring specific examples of how his testimony and the testimony of investigators grew. I could tell that my boys were soaking up this information and were interested in what he had to say. At the end of his talk, this return missionary bore his testimony in Cambodian. All of our kids were astonished that he could easily pronounce words in a foreign language.

While in Elders Quorum, I couldn’t help myself from commenting that this was a “big deal” in our family. We are so proud of this young man and his willingness to serve a mission and dedicate two years of his life to serve Jesus Christ and spreading the gospel around the world. We are blessed to have such a wonderful young man live next to our family so that he could show such a good example to our kids on how to live a righteous life.

Every time one of the missionaries from our LDS Ward leaves for a mission I try and send them a couple of notes using DearElder.com. I then try to send them a package while at the training center. The package I usually send is a small box of microwave popcorn. Below is the story.

“While I was spending my 2 months in the MTC (Missionary Training Center) to try and learn Spanish, I was walking with my companion one day up the steps to my room. I am sure we had already been in the MTC for over a month so we felt like we knew everything there was to know about all of the buildings. Anyway, our district was on the 2nd or 3rd floor of the building we were in. As we were walking up, I smelled something delicious. We followed the buttery smell downstairs and walked around. We discovered that in the basement of our building there was a small kitchen area. This kitchen was supplied with a microwave and someone had just popped a bag of popcorn. It smelled soooooo good. Anyway, it was a memory of mine from the MTC I wanted to share with others.

The MTC is very intense and really goes by fast. Even though I was excited to go to my field of service, the MTC was a wonderful place to start my mission. I think it was in the MTC that I learned of the seriousness of the call to serve as a Mormon Missionary. Even though some of the Elders goofed around, they were all serious about there dedication to their missions and the gospel of Jesus Christ. I had some great role models to look up to while I was there.

The last story I'll tell you was about a song we sang while there. It seemed like several times a week our entire floor would meet in one room and have a devotional. It was great to sit with all of the other Elders and learn about the Scriptures and the Gospel. My favorite part was when we sang songs together. All of the Elders on our floor were going Spanish speaking so we would sing songs in Spanish. Our favorite song was "Secret Prayer". We really got the room rocking with that song even though it was supposed to be a quiet song we sang it loud and strong. The harmony in that song was awesome as the music reverberated off of the wall in that dorm room. I loved those moments.