Back in October, which was quite a while ago I feel like, I received my mission call, and
now in a couple of weeks I am going to be heading off for my mission in Leeds, England. When
I was making the decision of whether or not I should serve a mission, I thought a lot about the
reasons why I might want to serve one. I was able to come up with a few answers, a couple of
which can be found in 2 Nephi 31:20, this year’s your theme and our ward’s mission statement,
specifically: “having a perfect brightness of hope and a love of God and of all men.” I decided to
serve a mission because of the great amount of hope the gospel has brought to my life and
because of the love I have for God and for my fellow brothers and sisters. I want to be able to
share this message of hope and love with all of the people that I come in contact with in the
mission field.
While I was preparing to give this talk, I asked some of my friends who are either
currently serving a mission, or returned not long ago, what a perfect brightness of hope means to
them. I got a lot of great responses. One point that was brought up is that hope has to be centered
in Christ. There is nothing else in this life that is as sure as Christ’s gift of hope because of His
atoning a sacrifice. In Dieter F. Uchtdorf’s talk entitled “The Infinite Power of Hope,” he stated
that, “Hope is a gift of the Spirit. It is a hope that through the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the
power of His Resurrection, we shall be raised unto life eternal and this because of our faith in the
Savior.” I have seen this in my own life when things have been challenging. I have always been
able to look to Christ to find peace and happiness through the power of the Atonement, even
though I may have been struggling. And I know that when I go and serve a mission, I will
continue to have hard times. So because of my earlier experiences, I know that I will be able to
continue to rely on the Lord for His help and peace. Uchtdorf went on to describe that “hope of
salvation is like a protective helmet, it is the foundation of our faith and an anchor to our souls.”
I have also found this aspect of hope to be particularly comforting in my life; to know that there
is something that I can always rely on even when things seem to be going badly. We always can
have hope in our Savior and for a better and brighter future. Elder Holland teaches us that
through His mediation and Atonement, Christ became “a high priest of good things to come.” I
am excited for the opportunity to share this with those I am able to teach on my mission, because
I know I am not the only one to experience tough times.
Another friend brought up the idea that a perfect brightness of hope endures both trial and
hardship. There are many examples of this in the Book of Mormon. One I would like to talk
about is Alma and Amulek. They were faced with a lot of opposition when they tried to teach
their people. When Amulek was testifying that through Christ is the only way to achieve
salvation, he stated: “But that ye have patience, and bear with those afflictions, with a firm hope
that ye shall one day rest from all your afflictions.” This aspect of hope has had an important
place in my life as I have had to deal with different trials. Like Alma and Amulek, I have had to
deal with my personal afflictions. My dad was diagnosed with cancer when I was eleven years
old and died when I was thirteen there have been different times in my life where I have
wondered “why did this happen to us?” “when will this get any easier?” “how is this supposed to
this ever get better?” I have learned that these questions are honestly pointless to ask myself. In
fact, asking these questions just made me more miserable. Instead I was able to find hope
through God, specifically the plan of salvation, otherwise known as the plan of happiness, which
I find much more appropriate. Because of this plan, I have been able to find hope in the
knowledge that my family will be reunited and have the opportunity to live together again
someday. With that hope, I have been able to find happiness in this life, despite the sadness I had
to face. In Uchtdorf’s talk, he said, “Hope has the power to fill our lives with happiness.” I have
seen that hope born happiness manifest in my life as I have changed my attitude from one of
sadness to one of hope through my Savior’s help. My desire is to bring the same kind of hope
and happiness to those I serve on my mission.
The last aspect of hope I would like to focus on, is that to have a truly perfect brightness
of hope, you need to have a clearer understanding of what hope’s role is in this mortal life.
Something that I have kind of had to get over is the fact that perfect hope does not mean that you
have a perfect knowledge. It has actually become a bit of a comfort when I find I don’t fully
understand something, not that that has stopped me from continuing to expand my knowledge in
the gospel. As an example, I have known about the Atonement basically all of my life. And as I
grew older, I gained testimony of it as I exercised my faith and applied it in my life. I didn’t
understand how it worked or anything like that, but it didn’t stop me from believing in its truth
and power. And then when I was at BYU, I took a Book of Mormon class where I had to write a
paper. I wrote about Abinadi testifying to King Noah about the Atonement. I was able to increase
my knowledge of the Atonement. Which because I had that faith and hope, my appreciation and
understanding grew exponentially as I learned more about Christ’s atonement. And with that
greater appreciation and understanding, my hope for better things in my future has continued to
expand. Elder Holland said, “Considering the incomprehensible cost of the Crucifixion and
Atonement, I promise you He is not going to turn His back on us now. When He says t the poor
in spirit, ‘Come unto me,’ He means He knows the way out and He knows the way up. He knows
it because He has walked it. He knows the way because He is the way.”
As I mentioned earlier, hope is not the only reason I want to serve a mission. I also made
my decision to serve because of the love I have for God and for my fellow brothers and sisters.
And as Uchtdorf explained, “hope is one leg of a three-legged stool, together with faith and
charity.” These three things work together hand in hand to stabilize our lives. Ether 12:4 reads;
“Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place
at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men,
which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to
glorify God.” I love that. Faith, hope and charity build on each other; it is almost impossible to
have one without the other. When you have hope, you will have greater faith. When you have
greater faith and hope, you will have more desire to perform charitable acts. Since receiving my
mission call, I have struggled from time to time about my decision. I have had sudden self-
doubts, thinking I’m not good enough, that I am crazy for going so far away for so long, that I
won’t be able to help anyone. I have been able to remind myself in these moments that I do have
faith in this gospel, that I desire to bring others hope, and that I want nothing more than to serve
my brothers and sisters. Reminding myself of these things has helped me remove those
uncertainties from my mind. I know that while I am gone, not only will I be able to do many
physical acts of service for those I come in contact with, but also a service of loving people and
helping them come closer to Christ.
In a different talk by President Uchtdorf, entitled “The Love of God,” he talks about
many aspects of love and what it means in relation to the gospel and to being a disciple of Christ.
When I was reading this talk, something that stood out was when he stated; “No, God does not
need us to love Him. But oh, how we need to love God! For what we love determines what we
seek. What we seek determines what we think and do. What we think and do determines who we
are—and who we will become.” I can’t think of anything more true. When you love something
or someone, it is constantly on your mind. You just can’t help it when you truly love whatever it
may be. I can look back at different points in my life where God and serving Him was more of
my focus and I can see how I was happier. I hope I’ll be able to help others have a greater love
for God as they learn more about him and strive to be more like him, because I know the
difference it can make. I am excited to have this year and a half where I will have the luxury of
only having to worry about serving the Lord, no school or work to distract me from my number
one goal!
“Love is the healing balm that repairs rifts in personal and family relationships. It is the
bond that unites families, communities, and nations. Love is the power that initiates friendship,
tolerance, civility, and respect. It is the source that overcomes divisiveness and hate. Love is the
fire that warms our lives with unparalleled joy and divine hope. Love should be our walk and our
talk.” Basically, anything that matters in this life involves love, and this love needs to be
centered on Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Uchtdorf also said, “When we truly understand
what it means to love as Jesus Christ loves us, the confusion clears and our priorities align. Our
walk as disciples of Christ becomes more joyful. Our lives take on new meaning. Our
relationship with our Heavenly Father becomes more profound. Obedience becomes a joy rather
than a burden.” I don’t know about you, but I want this for my life. And there have been times
where I have experienced this. I can’t remember when exactly, but I was probably about 16, and
I was feeling really down about myself. I had made some mistakes that in my mind were huge,
and I was just completely discouraged about everything. I was feeling miserable late one night,
and I was praying, when suddenly the Holy Ghost reminded me that I am a daughter of God, and
he loves me so much. That reminder brought me to tears, it still does, as I thought about what
that means. It means that even though I had made some wrong choices, even though I didn’t
even really like myself at that moment all that much, even though other people may or may not
like me, God still loves me. And that made all the difference. With that reassurance, I was able to
help myself get out of the more or less self-pity hole I was in and have a greater hope for things
to come as I found the courage to change myself and my situation. I hope I will be able to share
the power of God’s love with others on my mission so that they too may know that they matter
and they deserve to be loved and forgiven, no matter what.
I want to be able to help the people I will encounter on my mission find greater love and
hope because of the love I already feel for them. They aren’t really strangers; they are my
brothers and sisters and deserve just as much love as anyone else. As the Lord explained in 1
Samuel 16:7, “Look not on his countenance or on the height of his stature; because I have
refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but
the Lord looketh on the heart.” That is when you really know you love people, when you can
completely ignore someone’s outward appearance and only look at what really matters about
them. I pray that I will be capable of that sort of love when I serve. Until I get to that point
though, I am just going to have to try my best and hope and pray for a more Christlike love as I
I would just like to express how excited I am to serve and how grateful I am for the
opportunity that I have to go. I love the Lord and I love that I get to serve my brothers and sisters
nonstop for a year and a half. I have hope that I will be able to touch the lives I come in contact
with and that I will be able to help others come closer to our God. I would like to just to close by
repeating some of lyrics of the hymn we sang a few minutes ago and I pray that the lyrics will
stay with me and all of you as we strive to bring others and ourselves closer to Christ. “Then let
my lips proclaim it still, and all my life reflect they will. Overrule mine acts to serve thine ends.
Change frowning foes to smiling friends. Chasten my soul till I shall be in perfect harmony with
thee. Make me more worthy of thy love, and fit me for the life above.” In the name of Jesus
Christ, Amen.
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