Opening the Ark

Most missionaries want to be sent somewhere exotic. They want to write home about the bizarre food they had to eat, perhaps including chilled monkey brains or praying mantis larvae served from a human skull. Upon their return, they want to regale their roommates and dates with tales of carving machete paths through steaming jungles, rescuing small children from alligators, or converting an entire tribe of nomadic goat herders.

I was one of those prospective missionaries. Around the time I received my mission call, my close-knit group of high school friends were getting their own calls … to Russia, South Africa, France, Mexico, Uganda, the Dominican Republic, and other far-flung lands. It was with great anticipation, therefore, that I held my mission call.

Some guys make a huge ordeal out of the opening of the mission call. They gather friends, family, and vaguely associated acquaintances to witness the opening of the sacred call, like Nazis congregating on a mysterious island to see the opening of the Ark of the Covenant. (Luckily, I have yet to see any faces melt upon the opening of a mission call.) Others will take the mission call to a secluded place, and will only return to their impatient family after solitary meditation. My own call opening was somewhere in the middle. The call came in the mail, and my mom made me wait until at least my dad and grandma could make it. After I opened it, I called my friends and family to let them know the news.

So there I stood, ripping open the envelope. The mission call goes like this:

Dear Elder [or Sister] _______,

You are hereby called to labor as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the _________________ Mission. You will be called to labor in the _______ language.

[Next follows several paragraphs detailing your duties and giving words of counsel. These are generally the same for every missionary.]

Signed,

Thomas S. Monson [Or whoever the president of the Church is at the time; my call was signed by President Gordon B. Hinckley, who died shortly after I returned.]

Those prospective missionaries who are especially disciplined with read the first couple lines aloud while the onlookers hold their breaths. Others, like me, will skip directly to the actual mission to which you’re getting sent.

“Albuquerque,” I said, with just a hint of disappointment. “English-speaking,” I added after a moment.

They -- and by they I mean generations of well-meaning Sunday School teachers and condescending returned missionaries -- say it’s not where you serve that matters but how you serve. That was only a slight comfort when I remembered that my friends would be hacking their way through jungles or knocking doors in remote villages whilst I was resigned to canvassing subdivisions.