What about the deaf kid accidentally called to foreign-speaking mission? What does it do to his “inspired” call when he is switched in the MTC to a British Sign Language mission?

I think we all learn from and value the experiences we have.

I am all for revelation, depending on how you define it. But I think that the most important revelation that occurs in the course of a mission is NOT the call. It is when and investigator feels the Holy Ghost testifying of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You go on a mission for others, not for yourself. Benefits to yourself are a side effect and not the purpose.

If the large scale aspects of the missionary program were being guided by revelation on a case by case basis then your MTC companion wouldn’t have been decided by alphabetical order. Yet many come out of the MTC insisting that the choice of their companion was inspired, either because it was so great and they got along so well or because it was so terrible and they learned so much from that trying experience.

When you have an attitude that no matter what happens it is inspired perhaps you’ve arrived at my position by the back door. My position being that the set-up of this life is so inspired that God does not need to intervene in each little thing in our lives to accomplish His purposes.

In a way it is similar to the debate over evolution vs. creationism.

ARJ,
I’m very aware of those “coincidences”, I think they happen all the time. You say, “life is set up such that for the most part we get what we need out of it without constant divine intervention to set us on a particular path.” This is interesting. Are you suggesting we could use more or less revelation (divine intervention) in our lives?

Alamojag,
That’s a wonderful story. It’s amazing how the Spirit can affect us so profoundly.

Suddenly, all the things I didn’t like about the mission melted away.

As I said above, I think that some calls are inspired. I know someone that wasn’t a particularly good missionary, but he saved someone’s life on his mission. This due mainly to the fact that his fist is the size of my head.

I’ve also seen plenty of odd “coincidences” that might be inspiration or might be people tweaking the system. For instance, most of the people in Brazil that got called to the US happened to be children of stake presidents or former mission presidents. Some guy from the favela wasn’t going to the US, even if he spoke perfect english.

The point is that I think that life is set up such that for the most part we get what we need out of it without constant divine intervention to set us on a particular path.

Yes, I would much rather take cold bucket showers, sleep with roaches, and eat rice and fried plats for 18 months than serve where she did. While I know Honduras was “right” for me for several specific reasons, I agree that any mission could probably have provided the stimulus for similar growth and relationships.

I remember a religion professor once clarifying we are “called” as missionaries and merely “assigned” to a specific mission, and that assignment may change. But even so, you want to believe your assignment is inspired enough to not have to be changed…

ARJ,
I think you’re right, I probably could have gone anywhere and said the same thing, though it is seriously hard to imagine enjoying the experience as much in North Dakota. But who knows…

But, ARJ, do you not believe that mission calls are inspired? I mean, do you believe that we are called to certain places for certain reasons or do you think it doesn’t matter?

For the great majority you’ll find reason why your mission was great for you no matter where you go. This is the nature of a mission. You spend two of your most formative years doing hard work, a long ways from home, with people you don’t know. You’re going to grow and learn things no matter where you go. And to you they’ll be exactly the things you needed because it is you that is experiencing them.

In any case, the idea that each person has a specific reason to go to the specific place they are called was pretty much obliterated for me when I was in the MTC. At the time there were tons of missionaries who had calls to Russia. They all got changed en masse to Spain and Chile. No individuality to it. I’m sure they all had great missions too.