Isauro has quit smoking!

Hi Everyone!
 
First off, I'd like to thank everyone for making my Christmas wonderful, I received lots of gifts, cards, letters, etc., and of course talking to my family on the phone! Christmas as a missionary can be great, even away from home, thank you!
 
The exciting news is that I'm staying in my area, my companion is leaving and I'll be serving with Elder Acevedo, who I served with about 9 months ago in the other Denver Spanish ward! It's going to be great, since we already know each other there won't be so much of a transition period of getting acquainted, and he's a good missionary and will work hard. So at the beginning of the new year both sets of missionaries in the ward are having the companion with more time transferred out, and me and the other Elder (who's pretty new, only a couple months in the mission) will have to lead everything! I'm really excited for the challenge, I think the Lord's going to work some miracles here and help us have a lot of success!
 
Another really exciting thing is that Isauro, our top investigator, has successfully quit smoking and is ready to be baptized! He was hesitant to make the commitment, but with encouragement from us and members and then daily support through the first few days, he's made it through and is a completely different person! He looks self confident and has an amazing spirit about him, he's helping and doing service at every opportunity and is loving the Gospel! He's going to be a very strong and committed member, he has everything in place with fellowship, responsibilities, and being nourished by the good word of God and we don't have to worry about retaining him! That's one of the hard parts about a Spanish mission, but I've found that by devoting more time and thought to the individuals and preparing them well, retention isn't a problem even if you don't baptize quite as many.
 
I'm so grateful for the gospel, it's a wonderful blessing we have and I know that the Lord's hand is in our work! I love the church and I love being a missionary, I'm deeply humbled and grateful for this opportunity, the Lord has been teaching me so much and it's amazing!
 
Have a great week!

Love,
Elder Damon Janis

No Less Nerdy

Hi Everyone!
 
I'll have to be short today, the library is packed with people so I only have a few minutes, I might not get a chance to respond individually to Taylor, Emily, and Heather, but I'll talk to y'all on Saturday!

Speaking of that, I'll do my very best to make my call in the morning sometime, we're still working to get a family finalized to help us with the call but have several options. They've asked us to try to keep the call to 40 minutes, so I'm thinking that we can do about 10 minutes of a group chat, have some questions ready for me and I'll answer them, and then I'll take about 4 minutes individually with each of the family. :) I don't think they adjusted the time limit for Mormon families....
 
This week has been fairly interesting, I'm finally feeling comfortable with the ward, the confusing streets, and the investigators that I can lead here, but with that comes the challenge of making joint decisions with my companion who is now used to being in charge.

If there's one thing I've learned on my mission about relationships, it's that you have to treat the other person's idea's with just as much value as your own, otherwise there'll be conflict and hurt feelings. It's a really tough one to put in practice, but fortunately the Lord is giving me a 2 year seminar with daily practice to get the hang of the idea.

I'm grateful though for the opportunity to serve with so many different people with so many backgrounds, interests, and even cultures, because it's broadened my perspective and I've developed a lot in my interpersonal relationship skills (and apparently haven't gotten any less nerdy looking at the way I phrased that!) The mission is a wonderful opportunity to learn.
 
We're working with Isauro, an older gentleman who is having some trouble quitting smoking, we're going to try some drastic approaches tomorrow and I don't have time to explain much, but I'll try to report on it next week and see if it works.
 
Thank you all so much for your thoughts and prayers, this truly is the Lord's work and even in the tough times the Lord is always close and really supports His Missionaries. Have a great week!
 
Love,
Elder Damon Janis

Pictures!

Elder Janis and Elder Alvarez and Jesus

Jesus on his baptism day!

Elder Janis' mom sent a wall decoration for a Halloween party if they decided to put one together for their branch. They put it on their door.:) Elder Alvarez leaving for a good days work!

Goodbye Elder Alvarez!

Hello Elder Bustos! And Happy Birthday!

Taylor said to Damon "He's in the zone!" Elder Janis replied that this was the third dinner of the evening and he is sitting next to Elder Bustos, hanging on and feeling too full for comfort!:)

Feeling grateful

Hi Everyone!

We'll see how I do on emails today, I'm under a little time pressure with a far-away dinner and 4 baptismal interviews right after, plus a companionship exchange for 24 hours with Elder Hurtado, but I'm excited to be busy, it makes missionary life a lot more fun!

I'm getting a lot more comfortable about the changes coming with our ward, we've talked to most of the active members on our side now and they're almost all committed to going to the new building.

With that at a little more rest, I'm going to try to focus on getting new investigators because our teaching pool is a little stagnant right now and my teaching skills have gotten rusty. We've got a couple investigators who are progressing well but I think we and the area can handle a lot more.

A cool thing going on is that a family being taught by the South Elders (the other side of the ward) decided last week suddenly that they wanted to get married and baptized, and do it as soon as possible. They were married by the bishop the day after they made their decision, and their baptism is scheduled for Wednesday!Those are the people I'm interviewing tonight to make sure they're ready, and I'm excited for it!

It's only the second time I'll have done a baptismal interview, the first one was for the Zone Leader's investigator last Thursday, and she was awesome and really prepared for her baptism.

The spirit really helped me out, which is good because all day I was worried and stressed that it was going to be really awkward and that the one-on-one setting would throw me off (you wonder when you've been within sight and sound of a companion for more than a year), but it went smoothly and I found out a lot by just a few inspired questions and listening.

I think it's really cool how they have missionaries do the interviews for baptisms, in a real sense it's preparation for being a bishop or branch president by being a "judge in Israel" and deciding if a person is really prepared and worthy for something. It was a very spiritual experience for me, and strengthened my testimony of the Lord lifting and supporting us when He needs us, because I was pretty sick with a mild flu and normally wouldn't have been able to do it.

The mission leadership asked us to tell our families to send any packages straight to our missionary apartments, not to the mission office, so just the normal address:

1325 Garfield St. #111
Denver, Co, 80206.

Thanks!

The Christmas season always brings a little bit of reflection about home and family as a missionary, my personal quart of eggnog doesn't replace it well and neither does actually having snow, but it's also one of the best times to be a missionary as you reflect on the spiritual blessings both you and your family have received from the Lord. I reflect on the sacrifice of our loving Heavenly Father and His Son, the things that it does for me and those I love.

Thinking about it that way I feel grateful and close to my family spiritually, if not in person, and it helps me understand the true meaning of Christmas. I hope you all have a great week!

Love,
Elder Damon Janis

How Tired I am From Rapid Tapping Noises and a Regular Thumping Noise

Hi Everyone!

So the thing currently on my mind is how tired I am, which has sort of a story behind it so I"ll start with that. We live on the bottom floor of an apartment in the metro Denver area, surrounded by busy streets and lots of people (homeschooler's nightmare! :) We have either a neighbor or something that at all hours of the day makes rapid tapping noises right above my bed, which can be quite loud and bothersome at times. My companion is convinced that it's our neighbor (although imagining someone tapping their floor rapidly at 3 in the morning for whatever purpose is strange) Personally I think it's just a weak spot in the building and as the weight of the building shifts it causes a really loud creaking. Also, our fan is off-balance, which makes a regular thumping noise, and last night it all culminated with another neighbor taking a shower and my companion snoring, so I didn't sleep as well as expected. Usually it's not too bad, but I'm going to be buying earplugs for the not-usual nights. :)

The work in the ward is going great! We've been helping the members dedicate themselves to attending church in the new building we're moving to, which is far away, and the attitudes have been changing gradually with our visits, testimony, and persistance. For the most part we're seeing people grow in their committment, with the exception of a few stubborn families who we're still working with. I'm really excited though, because as the people excercise their faith to follow an inspired priesthood leader, this ward is going to unite and become so much stronger!

A cool thing that happened this week was a breakthrough in working with the ward organizations. I had an idea that since almost nobody is doing home teaching, we as missionaries can be paired with home teachers and help them do their visits and at the same time motivate and train them how to do it. Instead of taking my plan to the Elder's Quorum President and trying to convince him to accept it, instead I had a chat with him and explained how the missionary effort is trying to not be so separated from the wards anymore, and that we're looking for ways to help the Elder's Quorum. With a few choice words and questions, I guided him to my idea and helped him shape and craft it as his idea, and he got really excited about it. I praised him for his plan and idea and pledged our help to do whatever he wants us to, and this week he'll be personally sitting down with us to assign us families and companions to help! It was really neat, it's a principle I learned in a book called How to Win Friends and Influence People, and because I presented it as his idea he's totally on board and motivated to make it happen! I felt inspired with the idea, and then the way to do it was "brought to my rememberance" and now we have an incredible opportunity to strenghthen our ward relationships and win the trust of the members!

We have an investigator progressing well, who loves church and wants to be baptized, but is overcoming economic problems as well as word of wisdom challenges, but hopefully we'll have him with a date soon!

I'm so grateful to be a missionary, I love the work of the Lord and I'm so happy to be here! I hope everyone is doing well, have a great week!

Love,

Elder Damon Janis