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"