Be a Missionary All Your Life | Quentin L. Cook | 2007

This speech was given on March 13, 2007.

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https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/quentin-l-cook/missionary-life/

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"I consider it a great privilege and responsibility to be given this opportunity to speak to you. After I received this assignment from the First Presidency, I asked President Samuelson what I should talk about.

He said, “You are the executive director of the Missionary Department. Why don’t you talk about missionary work?”

I have decided to follow his counsel.

You are a magnificent sight! Many of you are recently returned from full-time missions. Many of you will soon be full-time missionaries. I hope all of you are committed to being lifelong missionaries.

Some feel this is a difficult time to do missionary work. A Gallup Poll three weeks ago found 46 percent of Americans view “Mormons” unfavorably, 11 percent don’t know who we are, and 18 percent think of polygamy when our name is mentioned.1

Let’s put this in perspective. In 1842 John Wentworth, editor of the Chicago Democrat, wrote to Joseph Smith requesting information about the Church. The Church had been organized 12 years earlier and had just over 20,000 members. The Prophet Joseph replied and concluded his response by using the Standard of Truth as a preface to what we know today as the