by Annette Lyon
As a preteen, I had a unique view of missionaries and their work because Dad was a mission president. Aside from school, missionaries were pretty much my life. We often fed and housed groups of departing missionaries overnight, then spent the next day prepping to welcome a group of brand-new missionaries from the MTC. During school breaks, I went on the road with Dad, attending zone conferences.

Over the course of three years, I knew dozens of office elders and APs. Many were like extra big brothers. I even learned the old commitment pattern. I became excited about missionary work and was eager to go on my own mission.

In college, my passion to serve a mission almost became a joke. Some male friends quipped that it would be hysterically ironic if, when they returned from their missions, that out of all our female friends, I would be the one married and pregnant. We all laughed.
So absurd.

But life tends to have its own ideas, and contrary to the plan I formed at the age of ten, I married at twenty, and by the time those guy friends returned from their missions, I was expecting my first baby. My girl friends began turning twenty-one. One by one, I watched them enter the mission field. While I didn’t regret marrying, I had a small ache in my heart—I never would serve a mission and wear that shiny black name tag I’d come to love.

At the time, I was a secretary at BYU. Pregnant and about to graduate, I ran into yet another friend who’d gotten her mission call. As we talked, I got the distinct impression that she pitied me—she was going off on a wonderful adventure for the Lord, while I was tied down, so young.

I went to work that day feeling down, wondering about all the people I could have shared the gospel with. I didn’t doubt my choice to marry and be a mother, but I had a lingering worry about my timing—and consequently, about my worth.

Was my friend’s attitude right? Did I deserve to be pitied because she and our other girl friends were off sharing the gospel in other lands? Were their missions worth more than the life I’d chosen?

I sat at my office desk with a sigh, and a graduate student asked what was wrong. Lin, who wasn’t a member of the Church, was one of the sweetest people I’d ever known. I unburdened my worries. Maybe I was missing out on something really important. I was dropping my teacher certificate so I could graduate early and not student teach with a newborn. I wouldn’t even be using my education after graduation. I wouldn’t get to teach.

I assumed Lin would agree. Since she wasn’t LDS, I figured she didn’t value marriage and family like I did. She was in her forties, single, with a great career ahead of her. She probably saw a married, pregnant twenty-year-old as a silly girl who’d really missed out.

Instead, Lin shook her head and said, “Soon you’ll be doing the most important teaching ever.” She nodded toward my swelling tummy.

I knew in that moment that Lin spoke truth. Being a mother would be the most important mission I’d ever serve. It would last far longer than eighteen months.

My original plans would have been rewarding, sure, and nothing was wrong with them. But Lin hit on something important: nothing I could possibly do in this life—serving a traditional mission, teaching high school, or anything else—would be more valuable than teaching my own children.

The day will come (and approaches faster than I’d like) when my kids will be grown. Then I may yet have the opportunity to serve a mission with my husband. I hope when that day comes, I can look back on my “mission” years as a mother—a mission that will never end—and be pleased with my harvest. I pray that my children will know of my love for them, know the love their Father in Heaven and Savior have for them.
That they’ll know for themselves that the gospel is true, that they’ll cling to it—as they raise their own families.

So no, I don’t and have never worn the shiny name tag. But every day, my children are watching me, learning from both my words and my actions.
They hear me pray and read scriptures aloud with them. They watch me go to church and fill callings. They listen to family home evening lessons.
They unburden their hearts, and I—at least, I fervently, hope—give inspired counsel and help them learn to pray and receive personal revelation.

Some days I must remind myself that they’re observing and learning even when I don’t think they are. Other days, I wish I could find Lin again and tell her thanks, that she and President McKay were right: nothing I accomplish outside my home will ever mean as much as the successes I nurture here.

I am a missionary. My invisible tag reads, “Mom.”