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I Didn't Go

My memories recently showed me this status. 
They'd just changed the rules saying that women could go at nineteen years old. I had turned nineteen a week and a half earlier. Before that announcement I hadn't even thought about going on a mission. I figured that I'd be married before 21 and wouldn't have to even think about it. Now, not only could I go, but everyone was asking me if I was. It was overwhelming! 

I thought about it a lot. It sounded like a nice escape. I could stop school for a bit and serve the Lord. I could get away from all of the drama going on at the time with in-laws. I could just go. Everyone was saying I should go. 

I just didn't have a desire to go though. I didn't want to go to serve people. I didn't want to go because I thought it was what I should do. I just wanted to take a vacation for a bit. That's the exact opposite of what a mission is. 

All of my former leaders told me to pray about it, and that I would be told to go because it was the right thing. First off, they aren't God. They didn't know what my life would hold. They were coming from the right place, but that really rubbed me the wrong way. I did pray though, and I felt nothing. I took that to mean that I could decide which way my life would go. If I served a mission, I know I would have been blessed and would probably come to love it for the right reasons. Sammy told me that he would have waited for me to come back, but who knows how that would have gone. 

But I didn't go. And I'm really happy with where I am in my life. I'm still a missionary. Instead of wearing a name tag, I share the gospel in different ways. I shared it with my husband. I shared it with my friends and co-workers, one of whom is getting baptized. I have shown my current co-workers that people of faith aren't stuffy, sitting there shoving my beliefs in their faces. 

I can't even imagine what girls now, four years after the announcement are feeling. Do they feel obligated to go? This is an amazing post I read about women not going on a mission. I love it so much and just want to add my two cents to the subject. 

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