Week 87-January 23, 2017

Week 87-January 23, 2017

Dover is the place to be! It has been FREEZING this week but elder Webb and I have been working hard and we have some people to teach now! 

We met a english guy last week and kept in touch and got to see him and his family (wife and newborn son) last night with a great member of the ward. They seem pretty interested, it was exciting! it was Elder Webb's first solid lesson, all the other lessons this week have been in the street or in someones home unexpectedly so it was awesome to have a scheduled solid lesson with a member present. their names are Alex and Emily and thier kid is Eddie. We have some lessons set up for this upcoming week and we are still planning to keep the pedal to the metal and keep finding. little by little catch a monkey! 

other than that, just a few cool things. we met a member who is pretty less active but shes got 2 kids (middle aged) living with her who arent members. we stopped by and met them, and her son ended up saying he'd be interested in having the discussions. great dude. excited to teach them. hope to get two birds in one stone, bring the mom back and help her son come with her! not to mention he made us some delicious hot cocoa. His name is Mark. 

met a woman who has had luikemia out of nowhere since the summertime and could die pretty much anytime. she has two kids, aged 5 and 4 and a husband we havent met yet. she said this situation has brought her questions about God to the forefront of her mind so she said we can come back and teach her. Very excited to  help this young family learn about the possibilities of their family being together forever. her name is Rachel and her kids are Alice and Cameron. 

heres my invitation this week: see if you can reach out to someone at church who doesnt talk to many people this week... there are a lot of them and you never know what they may be going through or if if it was difficult for them to decide to come out to church and need a friend!

Love you all. The church is true. God will bless us and guide us to the people in Dover who need the gospel! its a blessing just to be here on a mission. some days i just feel overwhelmed with gratitude to be in England doing this. 

Elder Jensen

Add caption

This was on elder webbs first day in England! Waiting for the train to Dover, we ran into the wards HIgh priest group leader and he took a pic to post on the wards Facebook page and this is the pic.

Our friend Brian who accepted a baptismal date but has since said he's not interested... bummer. RIP Brian

Shoutout to Dad's mission! 

Week 86-January 16, 2017

Week 86-January 16, 2017

Dear familia,

here is the news from Dover: Ill start with my companion. His name is Elder Matthew Webb, and he's from kaesville, utah. He is a tennis player, science olympiad, and a photographer. Most importantly though his testimony is very strong- he loves the Saviour very much and its easy to see that that is why he is here on his mission. He is a very funny guy and has a great sense of humor and is willing to work his hardest and be obedient so I am excited to serve with him.

We have had a great time so far doing street contacting, tracting, and visiting the members of the ward. We have a vision for our area this transfer and our goal is to help the members find people to teach. All my mission I have struggled to know how to help members do missionary work, I think I just completely relied on my own efforts to find people. But ever since I heard I was coming here, i felt a strong prompting that this was the what the Lord wanted us to do here. since we both are new to the area we have nobody to teach at the moment except for a few people we have found this past week. None of them are solid yet but I have faith that we will have success here as we work with the ward, work our hardest with all the rest of our time, and trust the Lord to do the work. 

About the area: we have a nice flat. its more like a vacation house to be honest. I love it! upstairs and downstairs. we drive a car, same kind i used to drive in Basildon except with out turbo. The area is the most southern part of the mission and is along the coast. The people here are mostly english, with a lot of eastern europeans as well. as we drove by the coast one day, we saw france across the ocean. Thats how close we are! check the map- its crazy. its tempting to pop over for a croissant and a quick peep of the eiffel tower. but seriously.. the area is BEAUTIFUL. dad would love it- theres tons of grass. I feel like a knight sometimes cause there are huge hills and valleys and a huge castle right next to us. its called the dover castle. ill send pics another week. 

the ward: a nice smallish english ward. not many foreigners- its quite a shock coming from Lea Valley! but its got some great members who have already shown us a lot of support. 

anyways, change is always good and I am learning to love the Saviour even more. I have found myself praying a lot more often and thinking of Him more frequently while serving here. I think I have been humbled coming from a very large teaching pool and busy schedule teaching a lot in london to dover where we are starting from scratch. i know we wont be able to have success unless we rely on Him and I am excited for what I will learn and the miracles we will see here. funny how that tends to happen, just when you think everything is under control and you know what you are doing. President Stevens is an inspired leader and I am grateful to him for this assignment. 

anyways, i keep getting emails from return missionaries from this mission and past companions who are home and friends whwo are home now  and they all say how much they miss their missions. I am determined not to waste a minute.

 This church is true and Jesus Christ is able to change people's lives and make bad men good, and good men better. I  know He lives and He has paid the price of our sins. And boy am I glad that He is able to turn our weaknesses into strengths because Ive got more than a few of those I still need his help with. I love you all!

Love,

Elder Jensen

good luck at school kids! and ash! and lydia, i testify that the scriptures are true. Only the weak need vegetables. 

Snow..??

Me and Elder Webb.. The Elders Jebb! 

Tried to take a selfie with someone we were trying to set an appointment with but they dodged the camera...

Week 85-January 9, 2017

Week 85-January 9, 2017

Dear J-squad:

It sounds like winter break 2016-17 for the jsquad was legendary from all those pictures and all your stories. I hope Grandma and Grandpa Schramm are doing well! 

SO its moves week so im gunna be really brief. This past week was pretty great- we got to see a teach quite a bit and met a huge new family. They are from portugal and sao tome (a portugese speaking island off the coast of africa). me and another elder had met the mother and daughter on the tube on exchange the week previous and set an appointment and this past monday when we went to visit, her brother and her nephew and their families were all home as well, so we taught the whole gang! then we went and taught her brother and his family seperately later in the week and they accepted to be baptised in february. he had gone to the church in portugal and loved it and could feel the difference between our church and others. he also loved the emphasis on family, being a family man himself. it was exciting. we taught the original mom again as well but didnt have a portugese speaking member with us so it was a bit rough. 

angela and her boys came to church and...... i went back to where they were sitting when the testimony portion began and i asked cass and agapi if they wanted to bear their testimonies. cass didnt but agapi said ok so i went up with him and he did an awesome job. ill send the video seperately cause elder metcalf recorded it. 

quick miracle as well: a couple weeks ago we met a guy on a tube whose family members were members. i may have mentioned this last week. his mother in particular is a recent convert herself and moved here a couple months ago. she didnt know how to get to a church close to her and doesnt speak english and had been praying for a way to go to church when we met her son. we went over and visited and this sunday we travelled with her to the church and she was extremely happy to be at church. as she sat there in sacrament meeting i saw her crying. she said in tears later that it wasnt an accident we met her son. she was so happy to have found the church and it was a touching experience to see how God answers prayers. 

Sherree fasted and loved it!

Lydia: MLC went great and so did Zone meeting! we had a training about having faith that there are  people are ready for the gospel and asked sherree and another recent convert in the zone to send us a video of them sharing their experience meeting the missionaries and it was powerful when we watched the videos in zone meeting. ill attach sherree's vid! 

so the big news......

I am leaving Lea Valley ward and going to Dover, close to the coast where i will be training a new missionary. im super pumped for this new assignment. im looking forward to the challenge and excited to be with a brand new missionary... any predictions where he will be from? my guess is canada.

Love you guys. The church is true and God is real! 

yours truly

Elder Jensen

6) Rosa- the woman from the Dominican Republic we helped find the church

1) elder mthombeni! reunion of London North ZL's

yesterday

2) a guy named LLoyd we tuaght

3, 4, 5) the London North Zone

7, 8,9) saying goodbye to Angela's family yesterday

Week 84-January 2, 2017

Week 84-January 2, 2017

Not much to report this week seeing as i saw you all just a few days
ago!... life is still good and elder Metcalf and I are really excited
for this upcoming week because a lot of our investigators have been
away and busy this past week or two. We also have MLC and one of the
area authorities will be visiting for it and then we have ZOne meeting
as well so we will be having lots of chances to learn from our leaders
this week.

It was so good to see you all on Christmas. You have no idea how
nervous I got even this time before skyping you all. I love you guys
and it is just difficult for me to see you all and know I will be with
you again soon! I can't believe how much each of the kids have grown.
Good luck to you all in school this semester! And Lydia let me know
when you find out about byu!!!

The work is good... we are teaching a few people who speak mostly
Spanish so My little Spanish has been getting stretched to the limits
lately. Angela showed me a FB message  from mom and I just about wet
my trousers. Hahahahaha it was so funny to see her messaging mom! The
boys are recovering from their operation.

We have had some problems in the zone with obedience and overall
diligence and we are working hard to help them get their feet back
underneath them now that holidays are over. I think it took a toll on
a lot of missionaries.

Thank you so much for the Christmas gifts! I loved them. I have worn
the byu sweatshirt almost every night and already finished the
toffee-ettes and the cereal. You are the best fam ever.

Fun fact: one of the guys me and Elder Burgess taught (Jeffrey) was
still meeting with the missionaries in America during his university
semester and then in Colchester this past month and doing well but his
mother visited from Ghana and she is a staunch catholic and was very
angry to hear he had been meeting with missionaries and reading the
Book of Mormon. He told the missionaries he wouldn't be able to meet
anymore and I'm not sure what will happen but elder Burgess and I will
do our best to keep encouraging him and keep in touch.

Sam told me his parents are going on a mission soon! Holy cow!

Love you all, have a great week back at school! Remember to be a light
to all around you! It's more important what God thinks of you then
what your friends and peers think of you.

Love,
Elder Jensen

Christmas Skype/Week 83-December 26, 2016

Christmas Skype!!

Skyped  at 9:00am Christmas Day! Everyone together again=)

Week 83-December 26, 2016

Polish Christmas Day

Sherree teaching us the plan of salvation over Skype. We had to dress up as investigators... a.k.a. Santa Claus

Balling out some homies on the courts in Turnpike Lane- we couldn't resist and we ended up starting to teach one of them! Elder Metcalf has a shot and we made a pretty unstoppable team...

Week 82-December 19, 2016

Week 82-December 19, 2016 

sorry I have no time this week but I will talk to you guys at 5 pm
London time this sunday! Cass and Agapi didn't get baptised...
Angela's family strongly objected so it's been postponed.. please pray
for them!

Love y'all tons

Elder Jensen

P.s. Have a great Christmas Eve :)

Mom, "Really? No time???"

Taylor responds:

 

The trouble is we had a bunch of lessons today and all the time vanished... 

I can try to write some while we take a bus to our next lesson and send it n our way home.

Angela's mom and sisters and brothers got really angry that she was going to let her sons be baptised before she did herself so we prayed and fasted and she felt that god wanted her to wait and not compromise all of her family relationships. Here's the miracle- during the whole process of this happenening, Angela has gained a very strong conviction that this is really the true church of Jesus Christ and is determined to have the whole family baptised as soon as possible. She's got a lot of faith... 

We had a Christmas zone conference this past week and we had the responsibility of planning all the fun activities. It was good and everyone had fun. I got your package and can't wait to open it Sunday! 

I've been having a really sore throat and lost my voice this past weekend but hopefully it'll be gone by Sunday

Sherree got confirmed and all is well with her

Not much else to say I think..  I just can't believe how fast the weeks are flying by. I'll see you in a week though! 

Love,

Elder Jensen