Okay, if you've ever met a Mormon missionary,
you know that they will not shut up about
their mission.
And now we're literally gonna talk about it
for like 10 minutes.
It's gonna be great.
And you're forced to listen!
Haha.
Just as much as missionaries love
talking about their missions and will never
stop talking about them, they also will never
stop wearing their ties that they found on
their mission.
And to help us out, Statesman Ties gave us
some personalized mission ties.
And we haven't opened them, we haven't seen
them, we don't even know what they're like,
what they feel like.
It says it's 100% woven silk.
I guess we'll see if that's true.
So, are you ready?
Let's do it.
So they give you a tie that's based on your
mission country, right?
Both of ours have a little Mexican symbol
on it.
And then on the back, you can have something
inscribed.
Solid tin, good.
That's expensive right there.
Good for delivery, ya know?
Look at that.
Mexico, there's the little eagle.
Agula.
This is great!
Ah, okay so they also let you put a personalized
phrase on the back of your tie.
So I put on the back of mine, "El futuro es
tan brillante como su fe."
That was one of my favorite quotes by Thomas
S. Monson that I shared every day.
That's special.
What does yours say?
I put, "Oh Remember Remember" on the back
of my tie.
And we're not talking about V for Vendetta,
we're talking about-- I was gonna say, "The
fifth of December."
We're talking about a scripture in Helaman
which existed long before V for Vendetta existed.
It's just a good reminder to remember all
the things I went through, both good and bad
on my mission.
I went from having 5 at the beginning of my
mission to a little over 50.
Wow.
Yeah, 60 ties.
That was nothing in my mission, like that
was low.
Most elders had more than that.
We spent most of our time preaching the gospel
soo...
It was on P-day, David.
Oh my gosh.
Just kidding.
There is a P-day and we're gonna talk about
that and it's not about anything that has
to do with the bathroom.
It's preparation day.
Here we go.
But yeah, so missionary work!
So we've got this suit and tie and people
knocking on doors but first of all, missionary
work in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints is voluntary.
Right.
100%.
And you, for men, it's much more expected
than it is for women.
Men can go on their mission-- it's usually
expected they go for 2 years, 24 months, women
usually go for 18 months.
And men can go starting at 18 years old, it
was 19 when I went.
Ahhhh I'm old!
And girls can go at 19 now and we're gonna
talk about the process of kinda what it's
like cuz we've both been in their shoes.
Literally wearing missionary shoes.
Um so missionaries, when you want to serve
a mission, you have to do a series of steps
to prepare.
First of all there's-- walking over hot coals,
you have to do that.
You have to shoot an arrow through a hoop
500 yards down.
And if you don't do that then you can't go
on a mission.
Luckily we practice bow hunting since-- no
just kidding.
This is a lie.
All you need to serve a mission is the desire.
You just have to say, "I want to serve."
And then you go to a church leader and talk
about the steps.
There's paperwork involved about eligibility.
You're going to represent the Church and to
teach the gospel of Jesus Christ.
As such, you have to be living standards of
worthiness.
Right.
You have to be keeping the law of chastity
and the Word of Wisdom and obviously the 10
commandments.
Right.
You've gotta be trying your best.
And you fill out paperwork and you get immunizations
usually if you end up going to a foreign country.
You've gotta do your visa, you know.
Any visas.
That actually affects a lot of missions is
some countries only allow so many people to
go because of visas but your paperwork gets
sent in and the church leaders then decide
where you get to go based on revelation.
Right, I think they, as far as I know, they
literally put your information up on a screen
and they look at it all and they assign you
to a mission.
And depending on where you are, that process
between turning in your paperwork and getting
a call can take from 3 weeks to a month but
those weeks before you get your call are tense.
Because missionaries do not know where they're
going to go on their mission beforehand.
And so I remember, I put in my paperwork and
they kinda ask you when you want to leave
on your mission and so I said I'd like to
leave by August of 2015 And so I got my call
right before August-- what's the month right
before August?
Um January.
July.
Perfect.
So I got my call in July and I remember the
anticipation after I turned in my paper and
waiting to get it.
Cuz it could come any day and usually within
a couple weeks.
And I remember my mom-- like I went out and
I was like, "Mom, I'm gonna go check for my
call."
And she was like, "It's not gonna be there.
It's gonna be a little bit longer."
And so I open up the mailbox and there it
is-- this big, white envelope and I'm like,
"Oh, it did come."
But I was like, "But she didn't believe me
so I'm gonna pretend like it didn't come."
So I walk into the house and I just kinda
put the mail on the counter like normal and
just left it and I didn't say anything even
though I was freaking out inside cuz I wanted
to know where I was gonna go, what language
I was gonna speak or anything and then later
in the day, like 5 hours later my mom's like,
"Hey, so did your call come?"
I was like, "Oh yeah" and she was like, "Okay."
And then she's like, "Wait, it came?!"
And so my whole family got together and this
was like a lot of the time when you open your
call, it's really exciting and you get your
friends and family there or your skype people
that you know want to see it and you open
it up and there's a letter that says, "Dear
so-and-so, You've been called to serve for
2 years or 18 months."
And then it says where.
And that moment really sparked, I don't know,
that's when it becomes real, when you see
the name of the place you're going to gonna
serve because that's-- it determines your
fate for 2 years of your life or 18 months
of your life, it's a big deal.
And it's super exciting.
And from then on, it's just um, then they
give you the date that you're going to enter
and like you were saying, I had to wait--
I got my call in August and I didn't leave
until December.
I waited a few months as well.
And you ended up going to which mission?
Tijuana Mexico.
And I opened up my call and it said, "You've
been called to serve as a missionary for the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,
your area of service will be Chihuahua Mexico."
I couldn't pronounce it and that kinda made
my family-- I said that before I read it--
and they were like freaking out because they
thought it was gonna be some like crazy mission.
Yeah.
Which it was but it was Chihuahua Mexico.
There is a place called Chihuahua.
Gotcha.
I mean, the dog is spelled the same-- Yeah--
the dog chihuahua is spelled the same as the
place.
Exactly.
But that's okay.
You didn't know Spanish.
Right.
We didn't even know where it was.
We had to go on the internet and look up a
map-- a world map and find Chihuahua on there.
That's awesome.
And the first thing that came up when you
type it in is just all the horrible murderers--
same-- terrible things that happen cause we
were both near the border and-- right-- of
Mexico.
When I said, when I said Tijuana, like all-
cause I'm from Oregon-- me too!- oh yeah,
that's right!
So it's like we're closer to the border of
California and Mexico and I just grew up hearing
the horror stories of Tijuana Mexico and bombings
and shootings and my mom screamed.
When I said Tijuana Mexico it was just this
audible shout.
And I'm like, this is gonna be fun.
Yeah, our mothers had a very stressful two
years.
So.
We get our calls.
And what you do first before you go into the
field is you go to a training center.
And usually you go to the MTC, the missionary
training center, in Provo Utah but there are
smaller other ones scattered throughout the
world.
And that's where they train you to be a missionary.
That's where you train as much as you can
in whatever language you're going to be speaking,
you practice teaching the principles of the
gospel using Preach My Gospel-- using Preach
My Gospel-- which is the missionary manual
that has everything you're going to be taught,
is in Preach My Gospel.
It's a fantastic resource.
And really the MTC is just kind of a, it's
just preparation because nothing can really
prepare you for what's like actually being
in the field-- that's what they call it, like
out in the mission field.
But really it's just kinda getting the idea
like what you're going to teach, how you're
going to teach it, and it's just this transition
period, you know?
And you realize in the MTC that missionaries
are totally human.
Like growing up, I always thought missionaries
were epitome of-- right-- the righteous people
on earth.
Well cause you just see them in their shirt
and tie walking-- and they're knocking doors
all day.
In my mind they must be like superhuman perfect.
Right.
And then you go to the MTC and you realize
that they're just, they're literally 18 year
olds that are just like you.
I think one of my favorite stories was like,
I was in the MTC for 7 weeks, I was there
during Christmas, and you're just kinda bored
because you're taking classes all day so some
days are more exciting than others and when
you're in the MTC you don't leave, you don't
go out and whatever, you're living the missionary
life but within this little confined space.
And so one day I was just eating lunch and
I had a spoon and I put a spoon on my nose
and one of the other elders was like, "That's
funny, haha."
And then I'm like, "Oh!"
I put one on my cheek, on my cheeks, "Wow
that was impressive!"
I'm glad you motioned your face-- yeah.
And then I put them over my eyes.
I had like I think 7 spoons on my face, balanced
completely and I like stood up and the cafeteria
was cheering, people were clapping and I felt
so good and there was this silence.
And I'm like-- I take a spoon off my eye and
I just see the security guard just like...
But it's just a fun-- the MTC is a great once-in-a-lifetime
experience.
Right.
And it's a place, I mean, you don't automatically
turn into an amazing missionary just because
you have a call.
It's a process.
You have to learn and you mature tremendously
on your mission and hopefully you become that
missionary that you always wanted to be by
the end.
But you stay in the MTC-- I was there for
3 weeks, you were there for 7 weeks-- sometimes
you have to stay there longer if you need
a visa.
A lot of people spend 12 weeks at the MTC
and go crazy out of their minds.
But then you go to the field and you realize
that you're not prepared at all.
For anything.
And it's like, and you're excited, but everything
in the MTC was like -- it's a controlled environment.
Right.
And then suddenly you're in the real world.
Suddenly it's an actual Mexican who speaks
Spanish.
Right.
And the thing is, each mission is extremely
different.
I mean, there are similarities but missions
are different from each other.
Like my mission was extremely strict.
There's the rule book for missionaries, the
missionary handbook colloquially called--
that's a long word-- colloquially called the
white bible which is, which is a blasphemous
name.
But it's funny, it's just a little white handbook--
yeah, it's a little white handbook.
It has all your mission rules and your schedule
but it's subject to change by your mission
president who leads the mission.
My mission was very, very strict.
Same.
Yours was too?
Yeah.
And some missions aren't.
So really we're going to share our experiences
as missionaries but your mission besides some
of the basic similar rules could be very different
based on who your mission president is and
what part of the world you're in.
And can I just go back to when you're getting
ready for a mission, going on a mission is
that I paid for my own mission.
Like this service isn't-- the Church isn't
paying us to be there.
So like, when you're out in the field every
day is money you've saved up so that you can
pay to be there to serve.
And if you can't afford it, there's also like
there's people that will help and there's
like ways that the church can help you like
save the money or be able to pay for it.
But like, when you're out there, you're not
just there to like mess around.
You're paying your own money, you've worked
hard to be there.
And so every day is with that in mind, that
I'm here to serve, and so even though it is
hard, if you have that in mind that like,
I've worked hard to be here, you can focus
on that.
So what do you do on a mission.
Your whole purpose is to, oh my gosh, we can
say the missionary purpose!
From Preach My Gospel!
Do you remember it?
Okay, we're going to try it.
I can do-- wait, how does it start?
It's "Invite others to come unto Christ--
todas las personas-- por medio del evangelio--
al venir a cristo-- por medio del evangelio
restaurado de jesucristo?"
Ah!
It's to invite others to come unto Christ
through the gospel of Jesus Christ; faith
in Jesus Christ, baptism, repentance, receiving
the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end.
That is what you're doing for two years and
you do it any way you possibly can, every
day for 14 hours a day.
Yeah, well I mean, cuz yeah, you have a schedule,
you know, you do.
You have a strict schedule where you wake
you wake up at 6:30 every morning.
Unless your mission president changes it.
We had to get up at 6, 5:30 sometimes.
Really?
So that was fun.
Woah.
That's impossible for me.
No, that sounds terrible.
So you get up at 6- or whatever time- in the
morning-- but yeah.
You do some exercise-- first thing?
Thirty minutes of exercise- thirty minutes
or so of exercise.
You get ready for the day, you have breakfast,
you-- there's a lot of study that goes on
in the mornings.
At least 2 hours.
At least 2 hours there's usually an hour of
personal study and an hour of companionship
study, missionaries are always, they go two-by-two,
you've seen them on the streets.
They're assigned a companion for a certain
amount of time and you take an hour every
morning to study together and to talk about
the people that you're going to be teaching
that day and you talk about things that they
need or things that they're struggling with,
lessons that can help them, and then you prepare
for those lessons.
Right.
And then you're ready, you've studied, you're
ready for the day and then you go out.
And you have a missionary agenda, that's what
they're called?
Yeah.
I should've brought an agenda.
But so you've got an agenda and this agenda
is made so that you can schedule every hour
of the day, even to the half hour, know who
you're going to visit, what your goals are
for the day, and then you just kinda go through--
maybe you have an appointment so you go to
your appointment.
Or maybe you don't have an appointment and
you're just going to knock on doors for an
hour hoping to find someone who's interested,
you know, we call that like contacting or
tracting.
Tracting is a word, I think it's a really
weird word but...
Some missions don't knock doors at all.
That's true.
There-- my mission didn't the first year.
We were only allowed to teach people that
a member had referred to us as a friend.
Just cause it's not a super effective way
to teach.
You get a lot of doors slammed in your face.
So if anyone of any religion comes to your
door trying to share a message, be respectful
of them because it sucks.
Yeah, you don't have to say yes but offer
them-- that was a nice-- offer them a glass
of water.
That was the best.
My mission, I was in a city called Mexicali,
it was 125 degrees and I'm walking in the
street and I'm just dying.
So we would just knock on a door and they
would offer us a glass of water, they'd be
nice, they'd be like, "Yeah, we're not interested
but here's some water.
Have a good day."
That was the best.
Once a week, there is a preparation day.
That's the P-day that we mentioned earlier.
And that's the day that you go out and you
get groceries for the week and you do your
laundry and all the things that don't have
to do with teaching the gospel, to prepare
you for the rest of the week when you will
be teaching the gospel.
Once a week, you'll also have a meeting with
missionaries in your area that's called your
district and you'll do that also once a week.
My district meeting was on P-day.
So our P-day ended at like-- mi corazon--
at like 3pm.
Are you serious?
It was a rough time.
How would you-- yeah, right?
Cause half of P-day, half of P-day is just
being able to like relax like actually not--
didn't happen.
Wait, was that mandated by your mission president?
Yep.
Stop.
Yeah, it was rough.
So, when you go on a mission, sometimes people
get kind of uncomfortable because these missionaries
are like very persistent and sometimes almost
robotic.
And I think, there can be a lot of reasons
for that, one of them is that you have such
a strong desire for someone to accept the
gospel that it kinda comes off like standoffish
and a little pushy and that-- we're over-zealous,
what can we say?
We love the gospel and we want you to know
what it's about.
But at the same time, I think as a missionary,
if you're going on a mission, you need to
be careful because you have goals.
There's a structure and everyday you say like,
"I want to teach this many people and I want
to contact this many people and even baptize
so many people because you want them to be
happy, you want them to know the gospel.
But those goals, they're just goals.
They're not like rules, they're not commandments.
Like you if you don't baptize this many people,
you're a bad missionary.
And so some elders kinda get that confused.
I know there was a time where I just felt
so much pressure in my mind that I like, I
needed to baptize this many people and, which
is just wrong, and so I'd show up and I wouldn't
even care, I wouldn't even ask them how their
day was.
I'm just like, okay sit down, I'm gonna teach
you so that you can get baptized.
And it just comes off all wrong.
Yeah.
And the people we were teaching just felt,
just didn't feel the spirit and so as a missionary,
you need to remember that you're there to
help people come unto Christ.
And it's not about, there's this culture in
the Church of what success is on the mission
and, which is like come home and say, "Oh,
I baptized this many people and I was this
successful" but that's not what it's about.
Success is just giving it your all everyday.
Yep-- and some-- my wife served a mission
in France.
Right, oh yeah.
There's nobody-- it's difficult to do missionary
work in some parts of the world.
I hope she doesn't mind me saying this but
she baptized one person on her mission and
that person ended up leaving the Church later
on.
The amount of people you baptize is not reflective
AT ALL of your quality, the quality of missionary
that you are.
And it is really easy to get caught up in
the numbers but if you're going on your mission,
be obedient and do your best but don't obsess
over obedience.
Right.
Or the numbers.
You're just there to help people.
You're not going to get kicked out if-- out
of your mission if somebody doesn't get baptized.
You're there to spread the gospel of Jesus
Christ and to be an example of what it looks
like to live that gospel.
Amen.
Missionary work is hard.
It is extremely difficult but there is nothing
that has been more rewarding in my life except
maybe my marriage.
A mission will change your life 100%.
It is hard, you will mature tremendously over
it, and if I could go back in time and live
any moment in my life, it would be the day
I got home from my mission.
Because you just, you feel the mantle of a
missionary slowly leave you and it's just
so good to see your family again.
And it's a beautiful, beautiful time.
And for me, I'm so glad that my mission happened.
And I think about it every day and I cherish
it but I'm also so glad that it's over, if
I'm being honest because it is work.
But it's rewarding.
It'll change you forever.
And the people you meet will be a part of
you forever.
And you will want nothing more for them than
to be happy and to see them, just to get everyone
back together in the celestial kingdom, that's
the goal.
But that means when you come home, you need
to keep living the gospel, you need to live
what you taught and I think the end goal of
being a missionary is just knowing that you're
that much closer to the Savior, that much
more like him.
Your conversion is the most important conversion
that will happen on your mission.
I bought this suit on the last-- the day before
I came home from my mission.
That's really the only time I had to go buy
a suit because it was just crazy all the time.
But I always keep my missionary name tag in
my pocket to always remind me or to help me
remember-- remember that time on my mission.
And I don't know if you can see it on the
camera but these letters used to be very white.
And that's one of the things I'm most proud
of is these yellow letters because it's evidence
of-- it reminds you that you were out there
in the sun, in the sand, in the dirt, walking
on those gravel roads-- rain, mud-- til the
sun goes down-- the dogs biting at your ankles
and uh-- you can't--- doors slamming in your
face.
We could go on forever.
But we won't.
We hope that this sheds a little bit of light
on what a missionary does and hopefully you
can not wait for a mission to share the gospel
but prepare for one.
There's no way we could sum up our missions
in 10 minutes, in 15 minutes, however long
this video is.
But the gratitude we feel for our missions
is overwhelming and I wish there was a way
that we could express that to you but your
mission is going to become something so beautiful
to you if you choose to go on one.
And I envy you for the experiences that you
will have and the spirit that you will feel
while you're there.
It's such a beautiful thing.
And hopefully we could answer some questions
you've had about it in this video.
Yeah, so we'd love for you to subscribe, comment
if you have any more questions about missions
or if you wanna hear any more fun stories,
we would talk your ear off-- so many stories.
And like the Facebook page, that's what you
do.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram and check
out Statesman Ties while you're at it.
They've got some cool stuff.
Do you remember the Mexican anthem?
I don't remember how it goes at all, I just
remember it goes-- Me gusta tacos?
Dos por uno?
Elotes!
