[Editor's Note: Damon will be transferred but we don't have his new address yet. As soon as we have it, we'll put it on his blog: http://damonsmission.blogspot.com]
Hi Everyone!
Well, the call came in last night and it's verified that I'm leaving Rifle for good and will be serving as a District Leader in another part of the mission.
We don't know exactly where of course, I'll find out right before I get in the car tomorrow, but by process of elimination we've narrowed it down to either Grand Junction (where I was trained) or Denver 1st North (the other side of the ward in my second area).
Our guess is that it will be Denver 1st, and my personal feeling is that it's likely because the Lord would be giving me a second chance at an area that was really difficult for me and I probably didn't do as well in as I should have. It's amazing how the Lord works like that, every time on my mission where I haven't measured up to what the Lord expected, later on down the line he gave me back companions or assignments so I could re-do the experience and make it positive.
I love the Lord and his mercy that way, if I do go back to Denver 1st I'll make it the best experience of my mission and can leave with no regrets!
This week was exciting for us, we were teaching like crazy and saw 7 investigators come to church as well as like 25 other people we've been working with (either inactives or semi-actives or recent converts) and it made me feel really good to see the fruits of my labors!
Probably the most exciting for me was to see Steven and Mindy there, a couple we've been working with really hard, all dressed up and Steven almost looking like a member in a white shirt and tie I'd given him! (the earrings gave him away though :) Both of them have really come a long way, even though they still have a long ways to go, but we're still working hard to help them change the addictions and habits to almost every imaginable word of wisdom substance you could imagine!
During the week I was thrown off a little by the comment of our stake high counselor over missionary work, he asked us "do you think it's a good idea to be spending so much of your valuable missionary time working with Steven and Mindy?" implying that he thought they wouldn't ever progress because of the kinds of things they were involved with.
It bothered me a little bit, and made me analyze it and I decided to redouble my efforts with them instead! :) The result was Mindy softening a little bit and deciding to come to church and commit to read the Gospel Principles manual with Steven each night! Our ward mission leader on Sunday made another comment about Steven and Mindy, saying that they'd been talking about them in the ward council meeting and a similar though to the stake guy had come out, nobody had very much confidence that they would really progress but he made the comment that it's good that missionaries are the ones teaching and not the members, because we tend to have more faith in people.
Honestly, I think it's within all of us to really believe in people, after all we do have the Atonement of Christ on our side and we believed enough to change our own lives and take hope when we though that we were hopelessly lost, and the extension of that is that it can work for anyone! I'm convinced that Steven and Mindy will be baptized one day and I'd love to be there to see it, and to me the change that I've seen in their lives already is an evidence that the gospel is for all of God's children, to any who will "come unto him".
I love the Lord and love the Gospel, I hope you all have a great week!
Love,
Elder Damon Janis
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