Pony Express Days

So each year Eagle Mountain has it's "Pony Express Days."  It has everything from a demolition derby to a carnival to a movie in the park...pretty much everything.  Including a parade.  It was held last Saturday, and I went with my family.  I obviously missed last year's parade due to the fact that I was being a missionary down in Peru!  But the year before, I had an interesting experience at the parade, which I though about quite a bit this year.

Pony Express Days parade-first weekend in June 2010.  About 2 weeks earlier I had made the decision to serve a mission, and had started up my papers.  I honestly had no idea where I was going to go.  But I knew I was doing what the Lord wanted me to do, and that made me happy.

As we're at the parade, we see lots of things pass by, floats, princesses, marching bands, cub scouts, everything.  I'm just sitting there, innocently watching the parade when the Latino ward here in Eagle Mountain walks by.  All of a sudden, out of nowhere, I feel this overwhelming love for these people.  It was enough to make me start to tear up (and I don't cry easily).  In that moment, I felt like the Lord was preparing me to go and serve these people.  I felt I was going to go on a Spanish speaking mission.  I didn't tell anyone at the time about my feeling though, just in case I got called to Russia or something, and it turned out I was wrong.  But I wasn't! :)

When I opened my call about a month and a half later, and read the words "...assigned to labor in the Perú Piura mission," those feelings came back.  I felt so good about my mission call, even though I had no idea where it was (no worries though-shortly thereafter I started freaking out about learning Spanish, going to another country, etc.).  I felt that the Lord was helping me to love these people.  And I do.  I think the thing I miss most about being a missionary is the people.  I love them.  And I have since even before my mission :)