Well, a few minutes ago I was set-apart by my Stake President as a full-time missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!
I am so excited to be able to get up at 3:15 a.m. tomorrow morning and fly out to the Mexico City MTC for six weeks and then transfer to my mission field in Long Beach, California where I can proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who will listen, as well as act as a representative of the Savior as I go about the city trying to do good.
Every week I will email a letter home and my father will post my letters on this blog. If you want to comment on these postings, or write me directly, feel free to do so. If you don’t have my email address, just post a comment and my dad, the moderator who approves the comments, will give it to you. Missionaries love letters; almost as we love boxes of goodies!
Before I leave, I am posting one of the most famous quotations ever given to missionaries. It it called, My Missionary Commission and was written by Elder Bruce R. McConkie, an apostle of the Lord:
I am called of God. My authority is above that of kings of the earth. By revelation I have been selected as a personal representative of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is my master and He has chosen me to represent Him—to stand in His place, to say and do what He Himself would say and do if He personally were ministering to the very people to whom He has sent me. My voice is His voice, and my acts are His acts; my doctrine is His doctrine. My Commission is to do what He wants done; to say what He wants said; to be a living modern witness in word and in deed of the divinity of his great and marvelous Latter-day work. How great is my calling!
It is my desire to be this kind of missionary. But I need all the help I can get. So if you have a chance, please pray for me—and all of the rest of the missionaries—so that we may be able to love and serve those we meet the way Jesus loves and serves Heavenly Father’s children.
See you when this mission is over!
—Elder Matt Bryce