“Is a mission more important than two years of college?” New Era, May 1979, 39–40
“Is a mission more important than two years of college?”
Answer/Brother Henry B. Eyring
It’s not fair to compare a mission and going to college, because, in an important way, they are opposites. One is paying on a debt. The other is creating a debt. One is mostly giving. The other is mostly getting. When you’ve accepted the blessings of the gospel into your life, you’ve created a massive obligation. And by far the most effective way to begin paying on that debt is to qualify for a full-time mission and take the gospel, with all your energy, to other people.
Attending college is creating a new debt. Most of the cost of your education is given you by society, even if you earned the money for your expenses and tuition. Attending college creates an obligation to pay society by added skill in your work, service in civic life, and by support of educational institutions.
I know this may sound upside-down to many young people. At 18, I thought that a mission was an extra sacrifice some members made for the Church. I didn’t understand that it was payment on an eternal obligation I already owed. And I thought college was an investment on my part for which society should repay me in better salary and greater opportunities. I didn’t understand that society was investing in me, expecting I would return that investment, and more, in service.
Whether you feel a mission or two years of college is more important depends on how you feel about debts. By delaying a mission you run the risk of not getting the chance to make a unique payment on the greatest debt you will ever have. By serving a mission you run little risk of failing to pay your obligations to society for college training. On the contrary, your experience in devoted service as a missionary will make it far more likely that you will be willing and able to serve society as repayment for your education.
President Spencer W. Kimball talked about obligations this way:
“A mission is not just a casual thing—it is not an alternative program in the Church. Neither is a mission a matter of choice any more than tithing is a choice, any more than sacrament meeting is a choice, any more than the Word of Wisdom is a choice. Of course, we have our free agency, and the Lord has given us choices. We can do as we please. We can go on a mission or we can remain home. But every normal young man is as much obligated to go on a mission as he is to pay his tithing, attend his meetings, keep the Sabbath day holy, and keep his life spotless and clean.” (“Circles of Exaltation,” p. 3. Summer School Devotional given at Brigham Young University, June 28, 1968.)
At least part of the reason for that obligation must go back to the promises we made before we were born. It’s my belief that we were permitted to come into the world at a time when and in a place where we could hear the gospel in return for our covenant that we would then take the gospel to others. That’s how I interpret this scripture, where the Lord told Abraham,
“And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee above measure, and make thy name great among all nations, and thou shalt be a blessing unto thy seed after thee, that in their hands they shall bear this ministry and Priesthood unto all nations;
“And I will bless them through thy name; for as many as receive this Gospel shall be called after thy name, and shall be accounted thy seed, and shall rise up and bless thee, as their father;
“And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee; and in thee (that is, in thy Priesthood) and in thy seed (that is, thy Priesthood), for I give unto thee a promise that this right shall continue in thee, and in thy seed after thee (that is to say, the literal seed, or the seed of the body) shall all the families of the earth be blessed, even with the blessings of the Gospel, which are the blessings of salvation, even of life eternal.” (Abr. 2:9–11.)
You and I have been blessed with that gospel. It’s our obligation now to try to bless all the families of the earth. A full-time mission is the best way I know to do that. I’d put opportunity to pay debts ahead of creating new ones. Of course, there’s this about a mission: the harder you work, the more the Lord blesses you, and the further you get in his debt. The happy problem in the kingdom is that the Lord keeps his blessings far ahead of our payments, as long as we keep paying.