Transfers & Trying versus Doing

HEY YALL!! The news of Transfer #2 was just published and much to my surprise, I will be leaving Show Low after a month and heading out of the mountains to the valley area to live in Scottsdale and serve in a Spanish-speaking congregation. Up to this point, I have spoken a lot of English, but I have continued studying Spanish each morning in anticipation of this day when I would need to speak Spanish more often.. I look forward to speaking Spanish and following my mother’s footsteps as she served a Spanish speaking mission in Mexico City a long time ago.

This past week was an interesting week. We have continued to prepare our young friend for his baptism. He has a strong desire to grow his testimony of the Book of Mormon. This young man has changed my life forever and because of him, my testimony of how the Gospel of Jesus Christ can change lives for the better has been strengthened. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ is true and that the Book of Mormon teaches true principles about how we can grow closer to our families and live with our them in the eternities.

As I begin to prepare to leave the mountains of Arizona, I want to thank all the Members here who have showed me how to become a better person in life. I am grateful for each one of you back home in Texas and in other places. You all are the reason I am out here on a mission serving our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am excited to live in the Valley and excited for the Spanish work I will be doing down there. In the Bible there is a Scripture found in the Old Testament in Joshua 24:15 that talks about the daily choices we make to serve the right God. I am motivated by Joshua’s words, which I have thought about often in my life (after all the prophet Joshua shares my name! 😊):

“And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, Choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the Gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the God’s of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, WE will serve the Lord.”

I love this scripture because it invites us all to search for the right God and once we have found Him, to serve Him with all our heart, might, mind, and strength. And here I am in Arizona for two years striving to do exactly that. I have a favorite line from the Star Wars movies when Yoda says to Luke: “Try Not. Do or do not. There is no try.” And I am doing my best whether serving in the mountains or in the valley, or speaking English or Spanish.