Future Missionaries

As I have mentioned a few times recently, I have been very anxious lately about how to prepare our boys for missions. I have seen several great families have kids not go or come home early from missions due to anxiety, depression, and other reasons. I do not judge these families or individuals because I do not know all the details. They have done their best, and that is enough. That being said, I do want to make sure that as parents, Jonathon and I are doing everything possible to prepare our children to serve the Lord, and hopefully have the grit to stick it out even when it is hard.

Since the recent age change that allows 18 year olds to serve, more and more responsibility is falling to the parents to have their kids ready to serve right out of high school. It is certainly not required to go immediately, but many kids choose to, and thus do not live away from home before heading out on missions. This means they will need physical skills like cooking and cleaning as well as social, emotional, and spiritual preparation. As society changes and technology becomes so much more prevalent, kids today are growing up in a challenging social world. I know my two older boys struggle with shyness and talking to strangers. They also really struggle with working hard and doing difficult things without giving up or complaining. I have just been feeling at a loss at what I need to be doing right now to prepare them for the future.

I specifically requested this discussion topic at our family reunion. Many, many family members have sent out missionaries, and I was hoping for some great advice from these great parents. I was not disappointed! We had a wonderful hour-long discussion about specific things that we can do now to help prepare children of all ages for missions. Darren and Melanie led the discussion. They are terrific parents, and I was so impressed with the way that they bring the Lord and the Gospel into everything they do in their home. I felt so much peace and hope about this topic after our group discussion. These were some of the notes I took, as well as a few things I have been thinking about that my parents did to help us. 

For Young Children:

• During family prayer, pray for each child by name and ask for help with the specific things your family is doing to prepare them for missions
• Make missions an expectation/family goal (speak about them often)
• Dress kids like missionaries for church (white shirts and ties)
• Tell missionary stories, including things that were really hard, so they realize early on that missions are difficult 
• Teach them to work hard and finish tasks
• Give them opportunities to talk to people they may not know well in safe, comfortable situations and give them pointers on how to improve those social skills
• Help them read the scriptures
• Expose them to a variety of foods
• Teach them to handle different situations (flexibility)

For Teens:

• Have them go out with the missionaries in your area
• Encourage them to be good home teachers so they learn those social and spiritual skills
• Pray for them by name with help in their preparations (again!)
• Give them experiences to be away from home (scout camp, trips, etc.)
• Take them out of their comfort zones (for girls this might mean doing physically hard things like camping etc. and boys should be comfortable speaking of spiritual things)
• Point out their victories... "You can do hard things!"
• Help them be physically fit (be able to walk 10 miles and bike 25 miles)
• Teach them to get up early
• Teach them to accept criticism
• Talk about the importance of obeying rules and show them specific rewards they receive for being obedient
• Give them tools to be able to work through anxiety, depression, and home sickness (talk to them candidly about it when specific situations arise)
• Have them prepare full meals and do their own laundry
• Encourage them to read the scriptures several times

How to help them STAY on a mission:

• Remind them of the hard things they have already accomplished
• Help them realize that day to day life at home is still the same and not glamorous... life is hard!
• Remind them of blessings that the family receives for their service
• Pray for them (always!)
• Point out that missions are a micro-chasm of life. If they can learn to succeed and endure there, they can make it through anything. The rest of their life will be benefitted by the lessons they learn on their mission.

As we teach our children, we need to remember that it will be difficult on occasion, but we need to just keep pressing forward because "There is little growth in the comfort zone, and little comfort in the growth zone." 

It is interesting that just as I have been pondering these things lately, we had the incredible opportunity to tour the new MTC. When I first tried to get tickets, they were all gone, but thankfully, they added more time slots so that we could go. What better way to prepare your kids than by actually showing them what to expect. I was thrilled!

Our tour was last Saturday. We parked at the football stadium and rode a bus to the MTC. It was a self-guided tour, so as we followed the path, I had Jonathon tell us about each area and what he remembered from his time in the MTC. All along the way, current missionaries were there to help guide the visitors and answer questions. It was so great to see all of them with their missionary tags, excited to get out into the field to serve. We encouraged the boys to ask them where they were going on their missions. At first they were really shy, but by the end, they had asked several of them. It was neat to hear places like Japan, Portland, Boise, Australia, etc. 

Our tour started with a missionary bearing his testimony at the front of the MTC. Then we walked through the cafeteria. Andrew was pleased to see that they served cereal for breakfast, and Christian was stoked for the chocolate milk. Then we got to take pictures in front of the famous world map. We had the kids point to where they wanted to serve their missions. Christian chose China, Andrew chose Brazil, and Hyrum picked New Zealand. We laughed a little because Hyrum was so short that his options were a little limited... Austrailia, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina, and Antarctica. In 15 years, we can look back and see how their predictions compare to the real thing. I love these past and future missionaries! 

Next, we wound our way through the various buildings. There were a lot of classrooms in the main building. The dorms were small and held 6 missionaries each. We made sure to point out how great it was that they got to share a room now, so it would be easier for them later. They were not amused. Ha! The gym was full of missionaries playing basketball and running the track. Jonathon showed us how the bleachers folded out into tons of chairs that made setup easy for large group meetings. 

Across a large grassy area was the new MTC building. It was beautiful and so well done. We got to see some more classrooms, and then we watched a short video on the purpose of the MTC. We finished off with another testimony by a missionary, and then headed back to the buses. It was such a perfect experience for our family at this time. We still have 7 years until our first missionary is ready to leave, but we understand the importance of early preparation. These boys are growing up so fast, and we are excited to see what the future holds for them.