Monday, December 26, 2016

Christmas



I'll probably write a little bit shorter today cause we just finished up skyping! 

It was an awesome week! Monday we went on a sweet hike with Renee and the Elders in Neihu! Then that night we went on exchanges with the assistants. It was a really good exchange and I learned a lot! Tuesday night Renee and her mom fed us an awesome dinner! I love them so much! They unfortunately decided they weren't ready to be baptized yesterday for Christmas, but they are still moving forward solidly! Especially Renee! 

Thursday we had our Christmas conference as a mission! It was really really fun! There was a talent show and some of the people in this mission are incredibly talented! It was also super funny! Then we spent Saturday and Sunday doing the Christmas concert at the temple. Christmas was awesome! Sister Trouble in our ward spoke about missionary work and all the members came up to us after and apologized for not giving us more people to teach and stuff.. Sister Troubles talk just really touched everyone.. All of the investigators we had a church also told us we are amazing after the talk.. They are all nice! I don't think we do anything worthy of that much praise though, but it felt good! 

I had a wonderful Christmas! A wonderful week! Life is amazing! We have several people who are looking really solid and preparing to be baptized in the next couple of weeks! 

I love the scripture in 3 Nephi 1:13! It says lift up your head and be of good cheer! I know that because Christ came and set an example for us then died for us we always have a reason to raise our heads and cheer. Our saddest moments or hardest trials cannot compete with the hope that comes from the message that Jesus Christ lives and loves us and died for us! 

I love you all! Have a great week! Talk to you next week. I'll let you know who my knew companion is! 

Love, Elder Jensen

Pics:
1. Hike
2. Dinner
3. Tasty octopus
4. The concert









Funny pics with SongShan Elders










These are the two pictures taken on Dec. 24th.










Monday, December 19, 2016

Progress

This week was really great! On Monday we went to Choir practice for the last time and it was really enjoyable! I love the missionary Christmas choir. I'm super excited for the concerts this Saturday and Sunday. 

Monday night we met with Renee and Elain. They are still coming along! Renee more quickly than Elain. We are hoping Renee will be ready on Christmas but she may need a little bit longer! 
Renee also came to English class and we met with her after and answered some of her questions. Then on Friday we took her to do a temple tour and it was so awesome. Right from the start the spirit was really strong and we helped her sort out some more of her questions and she really liked it! She says that she is waiting for the "moment" when she knows she should do it. So we are trying to help her have that moment! We are going hiking with her today! Should be a lot of fun and we are hoping to make the last few things click! We'll see soon:) Also she wore a skirt to church for the first time! She must be getting close if she decided it was time to dress like everyone else;) 

Her mom is really awesome too. She really loves the scriptures and has told us she knows Book of Mormon is true. But it hasn't clicked with her what that means. And she told us she likes us but doesn't come to anything because she's not interested in coming to church or being baptized! But she is feeding us dinner tomorrow night! And we are going to figure out what she needs:) 

This week most of the excitement all had to do with Renee's progress. But there were also a couple of other exciting things that happened that I'll talk about really quick! 

We met with a man on Tuesday and he told us he thinks the church is what he is looking for. He had a bad accident about 4 months ago and is just trying to put his life back together and he feels like the church is what he wants! He is super awesome and he set a baptismal date! 

Thursday we went on exchanges and Elder Zhou and I set up a mom and her daughter. On Saturday we met with her and she spent a long time explaining to us how she is super busy and also Buddhist. That usually means "I'm not going to want to meet with you again" But as she kept talking she ended up telling us how she grew up in a singe parent family and her mom took awesome care of her and her siblings and worked super hard and then 4 years ago she got in an accident and died suddenly and she never got to thank her and she was crying and then she said she wants to keep meeting and she feels like this message has power. That was a really cool experience! We didn't even say anything! 

Also that night we went Caroling with the Sisters in the Train station and it was super super fun! We met several cool people too:) 

To wrap up I want to invite everyone to read 3 Nephi 18:24! That is the scripture that I'm ponderizing this week! I feel like it fits perfectly for #lighttheworld it tells us to hold up our light and then explains that Jesus is the light and as we do what He did we hold him up! So cool:) I love Christmas and the scriptures! I hope everyone has an awesome week and a wonderful Christmas! 

Love, Elder Jensen

Pics:
1.Birthday party for a little girl in our ward
2.Nice sky
3.The mom and her daughter 




Monday, December 12, 2016

Singing

This last week was great! Monday Amber came over with the Elders in Tianmu and she brought a cake! She is so nice! Then we went to a french Christmas market thing at the 101 and had crepes and stuff! It was a lot of fun!

Tuesday we did our Zone training meeting! It was a good meeting I thought! We got to do a role play in it where I acted as "Briggs" in high school! It was really weird, but it was just to practice working with members. As I was acting as myself I realized that there were actually lots of opportunities to share the gospel growing up that I didn't take! It made me really excited to try to share more with the people I know and love! 

That evening we went on exchanges with the Elders from Luodong. We had a really good time and met some really cool people. I was with Elder Clyde. We contacted this one lady and we asked her if she believed in God and her response was that she had a devil and "666" tattooed on her back. We determined that she must have a lot of things she regretted in her past and shared with her about baptism and a fresh new start. She didn't live in our area but she seemed really touched by that message and gave us her phone number to give to the missionaries in her area! I thought it was a really powerful contact! It is so cool to see how this message is for everyone, no matter what problems they may have or what things they have done in the past. 

Then on Saturday we spent almost all day singing in the missionary Christmas choir. For one event at a junior high school and then that evening for the english wards nativity performance. I really enjoyed being able to sing and spread the Christmas spirit! I also really really liked watching the English ward perform the nativity! It brings back lots of great memories and helps me to remember how grateful I am for the birth of our Savior! We went back last night as well for the last performance of the nativity! 

Renee is getting closer and closer to being ready for baptism! We are super excited for her! She has been to church 4 weeks in a row! 

Also yesterday morning at church we were waiting by the door and all of the sudden Tim came out of nowhere!! It was awesome because we weren't expecting him! He says that he hasn't felt anything yet and that he's slowly giving up and we having been doing everything we can to help him find a testimony! But it was really cool to see that he is still trying and he was able to come to church so he just came even though we weren't expecting him. He's a really awesome guy! His restaurant closed down and he got a normal job now so meeting with him will be a bit more difficult but I'm sure there will be a way! 

I love my mission!! I've learned so much and am still learning so much. My companion is awesome and a really good missionary and there are so many opportunities to learn from him! 

Last of all I just want to say again I"m so grateful for Jesus Christ! This is such a wonderful time of year to really focus on becoming more like him! I've been more aware than usual the last few weeks that I still have a really long way to go. I'm really glad for that because it helps me become a better person and in turn better help those around me! I love you all! I hope you have a wonderful week! 

Love, Elder Jensen

Pics:
We woke up a little early and ran up a mountain with the Luodong Elders for exercise! It was sweet! It is called Elephant Mountain.





Amber surprised me with a cake for my Birthday!!










Monday, December 5, 2016

Another Solid Week!

Thank you for all of the birthday wishes! I'm sure today will be a wonderful day! It is off to a great start!

I don't have a ton of time so I'll just share some of the highlights of last week quickly! It was a really enjoyable week! 

We went on exchanges with Xizhi and it was a lot of fun! Elder Jorgensen and I were together. He has only been on island for about 2 months but he is a really good missionary. He taught me a lot! We got to go teach Renee and Elain together and it was an awesome lesson! They are both progressing really well! Elain doesn't want to come to church but Renee loves church and is learning so much there! One of my favorite moments from the week were yesterday when I called her and she said she was answering the questions in the back of one of the pamphlets we gave her! She is so cool! Also we rode our bikes with her to the temple yesterday for stake conference! It was sweet!

Then on Thursday we saw a huge miracle as we started to light the world! It was almost time to head home and we hadn't had any chances to serve yet for day one and so we started looking especially hard and didn't know what to do so we just ended up pulling over to pick up some trash we found on the side of the road. Well it turned out that one of the things we picked up was someones insurance card! So we started trying to find a way to return it and we asked a few people what to do and they told us to take it to the police station so we started over there and then asked one more guy and he told us that he would take us there! So we got to walk with him and get to know him! Then when we got there we asked him if he could meet again to learn more about the gospel and he willingly accepted! He was the most willing to set up of anyone I've met here in songshan! Christmas miracles have begun! And serving others is wonderful! 

Then Friday we had MLC at the mission office and it was fun to see lots of friends and learn and now we will be bringing it back to our zone this week! Should be fun! 

Those were the highlights of this week:) We have a few people we are hoping will be ready to be baptized in the next couple of weeks! Renee and then Alan and hopefully a couple of others! I love this work! It is so fun and fulfilling! 

I read a little talk about mastering our thoughts yesterday and I thought it was really interesting! As we become more aware of our thoughts we can weed out all of the negative ones allowing us to have more control of our situations and ultimately everything about our lives! I determined to try to be more conscious of my thoughts and make sure they are all going toward things that will be useful as I strive to serve the people here! I would like to invite everyone to try to be more positive this week! We can't control people but we always have control of how we respond to things! We can get beat down and upset or we can use the challenges as steps to help us grow faster! 

I love you all! Love, Elder Jensen!

Pics
1. Light the world in English class
2. Forgot this highlight! This family was so cool! A member in our ward set them up to come over to their house and meet us and it was awesome! Hopefully we can find another time to meet them. They weren't super interested but their daughter was!
3.Renee
4. Sweet family in our ward









Thanksgiving picture - Another blurry one with Renee


A couple of the people we started our mission with! The sisters will be going home the end of this month.


Monday, November 28, 2016

Great Week!

We This last week was great! 

I'm so grateful for Thanksgiving and how it reminds us to have gratitude! 

Monday night a family that I met a month ago and have been trying to find a time to visit them finally had time and let us over to their home! We got to meet them and then the mom came to church on Sunday! That was one of the biggest highlights of my week!! So awesome! 

Other than that our week was pretty normal! Really really good though! Thursday we went to Ikea for lunch.. They had mashed potatoes so that was like Thanksgiving! Then that night we had all you can eat pizza! It was pretty fun! 

The other highlight of our week was our wards Thanksgiving activity on Saturday night! They had turkey!! And we had 8 investigators come! Including Renee and Elain who are progressing really well! At the activity Elain told me her reason for attending was to tell me that she wasn't going to come to church again, but then she proceeded to tell me that she knows the Book of Mormon is true! So I consider that amazing progress! Now we just have to help her understand the importance of church and baptism and she'll be there! And her daughter Renee has now been to church twice and is really seeking to find the truth! She said she wants to assure that her soul can go to a good place when she dies! They are both so amazing!! It was a really fun activity and the ward here is incredible! 

We are super excited for the month of December! We have a lot of great investigators progressing! Tim also came to church on Sunday for the second time because his wife was in Japan! I think he enjoyed it. He said he didn't feel anything special though! It's all good.. He is going to find his answer eventually! 

The other exciting thing that happened was that our Bishop got released and a new one was called during church! We are really excited to make a big push to get the ward excited about missionary work as we work with our new bishop! He is feeding us lunch today! He is an awesome guy! He has 2 sons in high school and they are both really great as well! I can't wait to work with them! 

I'm super excited for this Christmas season! I just want to share my testimony that Jesus Christ really is our Savior and Redeemer. I feel the spirit most strongly at church and in lessons as we focus on Him. He is the light of the world and He can be the light of each of our lives! As we commit to follow Him we do not need to worry about anything except trying our best. If we do that all will be well! I love you all so much! I want to invite everyone to do the light up the world activity that the church is putting together!! 

Have a great week! I love you all! 
Love, Elder Jensen!

Pictures:
Thanksgiving lunch on exchanges! 

Thanksgiving Dinner!

Got to help decorate a tree!!! It was the best!







Thanksgiving,  Elain


Lunch with the new Bishop



Monday, November 21, 2016

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving this week! 

Last week on Tuesday we ended up talking a little bit about gratitude! And it was really powerful! I was reminded once again how truly grateful I am for so many wonderful things! Everyday I go out the door and I'm grateful to see the beautiful streets and building of Taiwan! I have seen the constant blessing and guidance of Heavenly Father throughout my mission! And I"m so so grateful for every day I have to be here! 

This week we saw lot of miracles! Wednesday we found out that Elder Seamons and I would be staying together for another transfer and we were excited about that! Then we went to lunch with our neighbor! She said she wanted us to help her translate something but then it turned out she just wanted to be our friends! We are hoping that that will lead to starting to teach her and her family here this week! 

Thursday we had a blast and a lot of success.. We were sitting in studies and we were thinking about how we haven''t ever felt that street finding was very successful and then we were brainstorming what else we could do and then we thought "What does our ward need?" and we decided we need leaders. Then we were like well lets go to businesses.. And we remembered a missionary had made a survey a few months ago so we decided to try going to businesses and asking them to take the survey! Well when it came time to go do it we were both pretty scared.. It felt pretty foreign and we weren't sure how it was going to go! Going to businesses where people are working doesn't seem like the best idea.. But we decided to just exercise some faith and courage and go for it! Well it was so much fun and super effective!! Everywhere we went we met people that never have opportunities to meet missionaries and we found several people willing to meet again! Most lived in other areas, but we found one awesome man that lives in our area! It was a really great experience and will definitely be something we keep trying! Especially in the early afternoon because people are on there lunch break or just coming back and they are pretty nice! 

Then Sunday we had 2 small families come to church! A mother and her daughter (Elain and Renee) And then another mother and her 2 year old son! It was nice to have some new people come! Also a man walked in and said he hadn't been to church in 3 years and now we'll be able to start working with him too! There are miracles everyday!! 

I love you and miss you all! Don't forget all the things you are grateful for! 

Love, Elder Jensen!

Pictures:
1. Our old district
2.Lunch with our neighbor and her friends
3.One of the businesses we went to gave us this picture! Super sweet!
4.After a lesson! 




Monday, November 14, 2016

Christmas

We've started listening to Christmas music in our house and hearing it outside in some places as well!! Christmas is coming:)

This week went by pretty quickly.. This entire transfer has gone by extremely quickly! I miay be getting a new companion on Thursday. But I'll share some highlights and things! This week as far as people with baptismal dates go we lost almost all of them! But that is exciting because now all we have is room for improvement! I expect this week things will get back up to where they should be! We just have a lot of really solid people that haven't been able to meet or come to church so we will have to find some new ones and hopefully their time will free up as well! 

Also I want to say we live in the same building as our church just a few floors above it and it is so nice! Haha going to church Sundays is so quick! I love this area!

On Tuesday we went to Jilong and attended their district meeting! It was really cool to go there! Got to see the port and see how the Jilong district was doing! At the start Elder Zhou had us all go in the bathroom and talk in the mirror again! It was pretty fun and effective! 

Wednesday I started talking about Christmas for the spiritual share of my English class! I'm planning to get everyone really excited about Christmas so that we can really enjoy the spirit of the season together:) Also I'm hoping to be able to help some people be baptized on Christmas Eve! That is the perfect time! 

Thursday I went on an exchange to Neihu with Elder Cheney! It was really cool to be able to go over there and see what they've been doing to establish the church there! I also had the chance to perform a baptismal interview for a 10 year old boy! He and his mom were baptized together last Saturday! Super awesome:)

Friday we met with Tim for the second time of the week and had a really powerful lesson! We talked more about recognizing the Holy Ghost and finding feedback and also shared some things he thought were really interesting from the Doctrine and Covenants! He's finished the Bible and Book of Mormon I don't remember if I said that last week! But now he is working on the Doctrine and Covenants! The member we brought shared a really powerful testimony and the spirit was really strong and we asked Tim how he felt and instead of saying he feels nothing like he has in the past he said it feels like the courts of Heaven!! He is starting to slowly figure it out! We love Tim! 

Sunday 2 families said that they'd be coming to church but neither of them did. That was too bad! But Sunday night we saw a big miracle! We went to a less active members home and asked if we could meet his wife! She came down and had a big smile and welcomed us and then we shared a little scripture and set up to come and help their family do a family home evening this week! They are both currently members of 2 separate churches! The One that was baptized into our church has some troubles because he is a strong believer in the trinity! They are a really interesting family and I can't wait for family home evening with them! 

Now for the big miracle! Christmas! In addition to being able to hear awesome music and share great stories, scriptures and songs with my English class we have also been talking about Christ and Christmas in member visits! It has been really powerful as we ask them their favorite stories about the Savior and what influence He has had in their lives and then start to talk about how happy Christmas is and how great it is to believe in Christ! We then ask who they know they could share this message with and we have received several referrals on the spot! That is something I've really struggled with my whole mission but Christmas is working miracles:) 

So in preparation for Christmas I'd like to close with my testimony of Christ. I know that He lives and loves us. I know that He atoned that each of us can overcome our personal weaknesses and sin. And I have seen as I strive to model my life after His that a different kind of peace and happiness comes into my life. Something that can't be found anywhere else. I'm so grateful for Him and His perfect example. 

I love you all! 

Love, Elder Jensen

Pictures:
1. Sunny
2. Jilong
3. Vests
4. Some old friends





Monday, November 7, 2016

Solid Week

This last week was pretty good! Monday we went to the mission office and played basketball with a bunch of people! It was only like my second time playing since being on my mission! Haha it felt really good! I was pretty sore after though! 

Tuesday we did our Zone Meeting! It was a lot of fun! I think that it hopefully helped out our zone a lot! I think my favorite part was one invite which was to look in the mirror each morning and say "I'm going to baptize families" It has been fun and brought a lot of excitement and focus to working with families! 

We went on two exchanges this week. One with yilan and one with Jilong! It was really fun to work with each of their companionships and learn from them! They are all super awesome! 

The rest of the week was pretty normal! Nothing too exciting, but I'll share two of my favorite experiences from the week! So many amazing things happen every week and everyday! There's no way to share it all! But you just have to trust me when I say that it is the best!

Okay so the first happened on Tuesday while I was on exchanges with Elder Leonhardt! We went to meet with Tim who I have been talking about the last few weeks! Well we sat down and the first thing he said to us is "I went to church on Sunday" We were shocked because we didn't see him there! I guess he just left a few minutes early and he didn't tell us he was coming and we completely missed him! But He came to church!!!!!! It was so awesome to hear that!! His wife went out of town so he came! Well then he told us that he has also finished the whole Book of Mormon! He is so close but he says he still hasn't felt anything.. Still no answer! So the next time we met we invited him to fast with us and he said he already fasted last week! He is doing everything he can to get an answer and it's got to be super close! We love him! 

The second awesome thing was that we met with a man in our wards 13 year old son and he is really prepared to be baptized! The dad shared how he wants his whole family to be able to enjoy the blessings of the gospel and how happy that would make him and then his son accepted a baptismal date for the end of this month! Super sweet! 

I love and miss you all! 

Love, Elder Jensen!

Pictures:
1. Our Zone meeting
2. Lunch with some friends! Also we went to an all you can eat pizza hut this week! Pretty fun!
3.93 year old man
4."I'm going to baptize families"





Monday, October 31, 2016

Happy Halloween!

This last week was a really great week! Really busy! 

Tuesday we went down to Yilan to attend their district meeting and go on exchanges with Elder Shi and Elder Lawrence who were down there! It was a ton of fun! Yilan is a super super beautiful area! I was on exchanges with Elder Lawrence. He is in training right now, but I learned a lot from him! He had a super selfless attitude and wanted to help others. I have been trying to implement what I learned from him and really help those around me feel of my love and care for them! 

We came home Wednesday afternoon and went straight to Neihu to do a baptismal interview for another member of our zone! The interview was for a girl named Debbie and she passed! She also fed us dinner after! She is super excited to get baptized and it was awesome to see that!

Friday we spent all day at the mission office for our leadership conference! It was awesome to learn from President and all of the other missionaries there! I'm really excited for the trainings they shared with us and can't wait to share them with our zone tomorrow! I think they will help a lot! I'll share an experience from the meeting that was really powerful to me! Thursday night as I was kneeling in prayer I was feeling that the quality of my prayers was really lacking and that I needed some help to figure out how I could make my prayers meaningful and so I prayed that I might know what to do! Then during the meeting the next day we were talking about being good shepherds and then all of the sudden President started talking about prayer and using it as a time to really ponder and think and have a conversation with God. It seems simple, but it was exactly what I needed and what I had prayed for the night before! I was really surprised how directly and quickly that answer came. The next day I spent a lot of time in prayer trying to ask Heavenly Father what I could do to help our investigators and then listening to my thoughts and feelings for His answers. It was by far the best experiences I've had with prayer in a long time and I was able to do some extra things to help in the progression of the people we are meeting with that I wouldn't have come up with without those prayers! I'm so grateful that through prayer we truly can communicate with our Father in Heaven! Don't take that for granted:) 

Saturday we met with a man named Eric that we met a few weeks ago! But this time his wife joined us and we had a girl in our ward come as well! Eric and his wife have 2 little daughters and they were really impressed with the member we brought and how independent she seemed and stuff! It was a really really good lesson and they have a really huge desire for a happy successful family! They are already super awesome! But we shared the restoration with them and invited them to read the Book of Mormon as a family daily! They accepted! It was awesome:)

Saturday night we also met with Tim. He is doing awesome! He will probably finish the Book of Mormon this week! He hasn't gotten an answer yet that it is true though and he feels like its been a long time.. He is also still concerned about coming to church until he gets a sign or testimony! So we are really praying for him and hoping we can help him find his answer and bring him to church! 

Also I heard from Elder Mueller this last week that Dharma who we began teaching together got baptized last week!! I'm so happy for her! She is a super super awesome lady! It sounds like the ward is just going nuts with missionary work over there too! Can't wait to bring that to our ward here!

I love you all! Have a wonderful week! 

Love, Elder Jensen

Pictures:
1. Playing with my camera
2. We went ice skating as a district
3. cool
4.Dinner with some members in Tims restaurant