"I Need Your Help!" + Pictures

This week was so awesome.. I'll start by telling you all that for the first time in my mission I got bashed for celebrating Christmas by a fellow Christian! Then a seventh day Adventist joined the mix and bashed us for worshipping on Sunday. I was really tempted to just laugh at them because it reminded me so much of the Pharisees and Sadducees in Christ's time that were so hung up on little details that they lost sight of the important things. Anyways.. It was a good reminder to keep my focus on the Savior and also keep an open mind. The only kind God can teach is an open one. I tried asking the Christian woman that if God asked her to do something if she would do it. Avoiding the question she said, "I don't worship God, I worship the Most High." Alright.... Time to move on.

Dad, you'll like this! A Brazilian lady at in-n-out grabbed my companions arm as we were leaving and dragged him to her table where her mother and her daughter were sitting saying "I need your help." What she needed was to know the scriptural reference in the New Testament where Christ talks about the mote in your brothers eye and the beam in your own. We gave her the reference and she said, "Yes! I'm going to send it to my husband. Thank you!" Hahaha I love being a missionary in public! People are so funny.

We started working on the transfer board this week. I've been looking forward to participating in this inspired process ever since I received the assignment because it's talked about so much. We've spent about 9 hours with President Toone talking about the mission and what needs to happen. We're combining two zones because we're losing a lot of missionaries these next few transfers and we're creating an all Spanish zone. I'm impressed with how well president Toone knows individual missionaries and knows what they need. This whole transfer I have been really surprised with how frequently missionaries are talked about. When I was first out I didn't think any of the leadership of the mission knew me. My experience has totally disproved that.

I'm really looking forward to this week. We're finishing up all the exchanges with zones we haven't gotten to which means we get to go down to Yuma! That's the only part of the mission I haven't seen yet.

Thought: Discipline weighs ounces. Regret weighs tons.

Love Elder Janis

P.S. - "I totally forgot to write in my email that we got to go to Phoenix for a specialized training for all the Spanish missionaries! We didn't participate in the program but president Toone wanted us there for the beginning and for dinner. For the rest of the meeting he let us see the area a little bit and since elder Wallentine served here before we found the corn guy and some cool graffiti."