My Brother's Mission Call

This past week a very exciting event occurred in my family -- my younger brother received his mission call! He has been assigned to labor as a full-time missionary in the Argentina Buenos Aires West Mission and will report to the Argentina Missionary Training Center on July. It was a beautiful experience watching my brother open something so precious and significant that has come to him through divine authority and revelation. Watching him open his call took me back to a day a little over two years ago when I opened my mission call to serve in Mexico City. At that time I had no idea just what I would experience and encounter during those eighteen months. My brother has no clue of what the next two years of his life have in store for him. The mission is an exciting but somewhat daunting task, bringing with it much uncertainty and nervousness. A few scriptures I read this past week brought me much peace and understanding that I was able to convey to my brother. I was reading in Alma 16 and 17 about Alma, Amulek, and the sons of Mosiah. Each of these valiant men left their homelands to enter strange places and share the gospel of Christ with hard-hearted, ferocious people (Alma 17:14). Indeed, “great was the work which they had undertaken” (Alma 17:13); however, because of their fasts, prayers, diligent study, and faith, they served as “instrument[s] in the hands of God to bring, if it were possible, their brethren, the Lamanites, to the knowledge of the truth” (Alma 17:9). I love the following verse which says, “And it came to pass that the Lord did visit them with his Spirit, and said unto them: Be comforted. And they were comforted” (Alma 17:10). I know that the Lord protects and blesses His servants who are on His errand. He gives them far more capacity to accomplish His work than what they would be able to do alone. He prepares His people to receive and accept the word. Alma 16:16 says, “the Lord did pour out his Spirit on all the face of the land to prepare the minds of the children of men, or to prepare their hearts to receive the word which should be taught among them at the time of his coming”. I know that the Lord is preparing people in Argentina whose lives will touched by my brother’s consecrated service and who will forever change my brother’s life for good because of their love and faithfulness. This is the greatest work upon the earth. It is a wonderful time to be a disciple of Christ and to share His restored gospel. I know that as we put our trust in the Lord and live His gospel that He will guide and protect us as well, using us as His instruments.