From New Member to Missionary

Michaela Cinkaisova was just 15 years old and didn’t speak any English when her family moved from the Czech Republic to Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Michaela knew that life would be different after the move, but she had no idea just how different until she met some Mormon friends at her new school.

During Michaela’s sophomore year, one of her new friends invited her to attend seminary for the first time. She didn’t know what to expect but decided to give it a try. She immediately noticed that on the days she attended seminary she was much happier and things seemed to go better, which was enough to spark Michaela’s interest. Unfortunately, Michaela’s mother was not as excited about the gospel as Michaela was and struggled to accept Michaela’s desire to learn more about the restored gospel.

By Michaela’s junior year, her mother allowed her to enroll in seminary. Michaela didn’t waste any time in learning everything she could. “I love going to seminary,” she said. “I hate when I miss because I’m grumpy, and my friends can tell.”

Michaela loved seminary so much that she did extra work to make up for the two years she missed as a freshman and sophomore, allowing her to graduate from seminary and possibly attend a Church school for college. Thanks largely to her involvement in seminary, she was baptized and began to prepare to serve a full-time mission.

What was it about seminary that made Michaela feel grumpy when she couldn’t go? Besides learning new things and feeling the Spirit, Michaela loved the opportunity to invite her non-LDS friends to seminary and to answer their questions about the gospel. “Because of seminary I know how to answer their questions,” she explained, and as the only member in her family, she has plenty of opportunities to use her seminary knowledge.

Although living in a different country with new people, new surroundings, and a new language has been hard, Michaela knows that she traveled here to find something that was worth all the difficulties—the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.