Reason #24 - Missionary work

It stands only to reason that if God hoped for us to return to Him one day that He would send out messengers. As our desires develope towards a closer relationship with Him and to more closely follow His commandments, it makes sence that as He sences our desire that he would send these messengers to teach us. We currently have 53,000 missionaries in the Mission field, of which I am happy to say, that one of them is my daughter. My daughter is being sent to the Phillipines, but many are sent to the Missions within the United States and throughout many other places in the world. These missionaries are expected to pay for their own missions, so they often get jobs and save money (well, their parents help them save money) for this future mission. If for some reason a missionary cannot afford the mission on their own, then they will solicite help from family members. In our case, my husband and I are contributing what we can, our daughter Amanda is contributing what she and her family can, one of her friends mother is helping and I am using a portion of some insurance money from my late daughters claim because I feel that she would want some of the money to go to this purpose. IF there are funds that are still required the local church will help. It is believed that those who help with this work will be blessed, however, so it is strongly encouraged for as many family as possible to assist. After all, who couldn't use extra blessings from Heaven? Anyway, our elders serve missions for 24 months and our sisters serve for 18 months. They often walk long distances or ride bikes and they talk about the truths of the gospel in a world that often is not interested in hearing the "good news". They are good examples of good clean living and of Christians in general and are responsible for assisting in the building of the kingdom. Our missionaries help assist approximately 250,000 people each year in finding the spirit that leads them to know the truth.