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Why I Love to Teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ After My Mission
“Though a man should say but a few words, and his sentences and words be ever so ungrammatical, if he speaks by the power of the Holy Ghost, he will do good.”1
I began to more fully understand the gospel of Jesus Christ when I was serving in the Nigeria Lagos mission from 2015 to 2017. The understanding came when I sat down to read and ponder the scriptures and the lessons that I taught my investigators. Sometimes I asked myself how my parents became members of the Church because teaching people the gospel and their understanding of what you teach became a concern to me. I knew that I was teaching the truth, but their commitment was not enough to convince me that I was doing my best as a missionary.
I had a good trainer who always advised me to write down concerns and questions from our investigators to guide me how to study and teach, to meet the needs our investigators, as the Spirit directs. I did what my trainer told me and during my personal and companionship study I did my best to review all the concerns and to pray for God to inspire me with divine truths to teach people.
During my missionary service, I felt the love of teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ because I knew our Heavenly Father loves me and wants me to understand how my parents became members. I have the need to feel others’ understanding about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and the need for me to improve my learning and teaching skills as a missionary.
My desire to teach the gospel
Before you can be perfect in what you do, you must first have the desire. Having the desire is the foundation of every good work done and without it, there will be no output or reward for your work. The Lord said, “if ye have desires to serve God ye are called to the work”2, which testifies that we all need to have the desire in everything we do. On my mission, my desire began to grow as I prepared myself spiritually to meet, contact, smile and to bear my testimony of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and of being converted to the lessons I taught.
Because I love to teach, one night I cried in my closet because my companion and I walked the whole day without anyone’s receiving the Book of Mormon, after I had studied and prepared to contact people the night before. The appointment we had was also cancelled.
Sometimes people you meet can discourage you in the course of introducing the gospel to them, but when you trust the Lord, especially when our heart’s desire is to progress and serve Him, He shall prepare a way for you to accomplish what He wants you to do to save His children.3
When I came home from my mission, I began to study and to help others in my branch during the Sunday School lesson and and to help those preparing to go on a mission. My first calling after my mission was as the Sunday School president. I enjoyed this calling because I was able to study as I did when I was on my mission, applying the lessons to myself as I taught every Sunday.
I learned a lot from my branch members, and seeing them every Sunday smiling and looking good was my desire and my prayer to God, because I saw them as my responsibility, to minister and always remember them in my prayers as I was doing to my investigators on my mission. Honestly doing so, I came to realize that Heavenly Father has been with me every step of the way to magnify my calling as a Sunday School president.
Blessings from teaching others
Teaching others the gospel of Jesus Christ is an eternal gift from God, and it can only be understood when we show our commitment to assist God’s work and glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.4 My journey as a returned missionary has strengthened my testimony of serving and teaching others with joy. I have gained knowledge of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and I have grown in the confidence to teach the gospel with love and assurance from the Lord.
Teaching others provides a way to minister, to stand for truth and right, and to live a life as full of joy as our Heavenly Father wants for us. Because I love teaching, when I started my university education, I was called to be the elder’s quorum president in the Tamale Education Ridge Branch.
At school, the Lord blesses my efforts with good grades and better decisions to serve as an instrument in His hands. I enjoys the Lord’s infinite goodness always blowing towards me as I teach His gospel.
I came to know some the spiritual gifts I have when I had the desire to teach or share the knowledge I have of the restored gospel. Terryl and Fiona Givens once said, “God’s work is therefore first and foremost educative and constructive, not reparative. Life is pain but it is not punishment”5. This quote encouraged me to understand and to know the need for me to minister effectively to my less-active members and others when I returned from my mission because the restored gospel educates, constructs, and shapes humanity for good.
When it comes to the restored gospel, we should remember that we all have a role to play in someone’s life and with ministering we can achieve it.
I suppose that all returned missionaries regain their missionary energy to teach others the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and to feel the love and happiness from teaching after a mission. I know that love is why we are here on this earth and when we love to teach the gospel after our missionary work service, our Heavenly Father will ease our burdens as returned missionaries and replace them with a lot of blessings, more than we can comprehend because I am a witness of it.