A Little Sad

HI!!

Well as you know, or as you dont know.. I had changes. I left my home in San Marcos. Its feels weird, and I miss all the people so so sosososos much!!!! Tuesday I spent the day packing and saying goodbye, and crying my eyes out. I have neve been that sad to leave people. They are so so special there. 

On Tuesday we said goodbye to the zone and took a picture (included). Later we were eating lunch with our cook and I didnt want to tell her  I was leaving cause I knew she would cry, but it came time to go, and I told her. She just stopped and started crying on the spot. I couldnt handle it. Then it was time to take a picture (included) Then I said goodbye and her husbands eyes were all red and he started crying, oh man it was a toughie!!! I love them. Uriel and Margoth de Leon. The most wonderful people on earth. I love them so much. I spent the rest of the day crying and just being all sad. I didnt like it very much, and I actually still feel sad.

Wednesday morning we left the house at 5:00 in the morning and made the trek down to Reu. I was so so tired and just wiped out and crying on the way down and just sad. You cant even imagine how I felt. We finally got to the change meeting and I had to take a picture with our chofer that always takes us when we travel. Paco. He is so funny, and nice. He always bought me stuff cause I was the one that always paid him. He tried buying me juice and fruit like four times. The meeting started and it was a little different because it was the first change meeting of Pres. Ruiz. But it was good. All the changes went by, and they always put the zone leaders at the very end, so I had to wait.... (I already had an idea of where I was going to go but I was still nervous). It turns out I am in................ Estaca Las Palmas..... which happens to be the stake where the mission office is. Im 3 minutes away from the office in a tuc tuc. Its awesome. My companions name is Elder Quiroz from Chile. He is the coolest person on the planet. (Picture included) Elder Quiroz has 18 months in the mission, and we were in the same zone when I was in San Luis. He works so hard and is so focused. Im so stoked about it. We have already had really good experiences. He is also a chef... But he hasnt cooked anything yet. bummer.

It hasnt rained here since Tuesday, so everyone says that I brought the curse hahahaa. Its so SO HOT!!! Im kinda not used to it cause San Marcos is coldie. The zone is a very good zone. We are 22. 10 Sisters and 12 Elders. Its fun to be with sisters in the same zone. There is just a different spirit and a different way to work. Every companionship in the zone is training except three. CRAZY!!! This is also the first time in my mission that we are 4 living together. The other Elders in our house and ward are Elder Murillo from Hondurus and Elder Luna from Mexico. Its really fun.

The ward is excited Im here (who isnt right?) hahaha jokes. But it is a really good ward. Its actually the very first ward or Reu, so there are a lot of returned missionaries and such. This is a great place and a great companion to finish up strong. I love life.

Guess what?? This is the work of God. He guides and directs it. I am a representative of the only true church on this earth, and I love it. God lives and loves us, Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and He lives. I know it without a doubt. The Book of Mormon is the word of God. We were teaching a man about the BoM the other day, and he thought it was a book to help us understand the Bible better, what he didnt realize is that its a book to help us get closer to God. Its a book from Him. Written by prophets here in America. I love it.

I love you so so much, Im happy, healthy, and hot. But who cares about the hot right? I have work to do!! Have a GREAT week!!!!

Elder Jensen

A couple cute pics of Chase's niece's first birthday...can't wait until he meets her 

Wedding Season

Well hi there. It´s a beautiful day here in San Marcitos. Nice and sunny, not too hot, a little breezy, just waiting for some rain in the afternoon.... it almost always rains in the afternoon!!!!!

What a great week I had this past week!! I´m so happy to be a missionary and I love my life! As always, I don´t remember what happened in the beginning of the week... it was just so far away and I never remember... But I sure do remember Thursday, Saturday and Sunday... and Friday I think. hahaha

For the most part everything is just going super tranquilo here... aka chill. We have been getting Milton ready for his baptism on the 27th and he is super stoked. We had a good lesson with him and his 2 brothers (1 receint convert (adolfo, member him?) and 1 theat just coming back) and his mom. We talked about the Atonement and they loved it. Then the mom expressed to us how proud she was the have her 3 sons going to church and they are more united as a family and she was just so proud. That´s makes it all worth it. I love helping people, and I love the gospel. I know for a fact that everything I teach and preach is the truth. I know the God loves us and wants us to be happy, and the only way to really be happy is through being obedient to the commandments. This is a marvellous work and wonder... I realize it time and time again.

On Thursday we had interviews with Presidente Ruiz. They were awesome. All the missionaries from Tierra Fria showed us (except our zone) at 8 in the morning. Our zone showed up at 2 in the afternoon cause we live closer and Pres does the interviews according to who lives the farthest to closest. But me and Elder Salas had to open the stake center, clean up a bit and get everything ready before Pres came. So we got there at 7:15ish and did all the stuff, then realized there wasn´t water in the building. We spent much of the morning looking for a big plastic tub to fill up to be able to use, but then it just dawned on me to call the maintenence guy... all we had to do was open the water valve.. hahaha problem solved....

Interviews lasted all day long... as Zonies we interview the missionaries with the assistants about their studies nad planning and dats, then we hand them off to the senior couple in the mission, the wife about english for the latinos and the elder about training (he just talks to trainers) then we pass the off to Pres for worthiness... long day. We lafte the church at about 7 at night. The good news its that it was pouring rain and we didn´t get wet!!!

President Ruiz is an amazing person, he is so excited to be here, kinda nervous, but excited. I can´t help but love him with my whole heart. Hna Ruiz is very serious and a little scared of Guatemala (she´s a city girl!) I love her too though. She gave us some muffins yesterday.. she loves us..

Oh and yesterday we had a super busy day. We had church, which was GREAT! Then after church we had a meeting with the stake presidency and President Ruiz. It was awesome. The Stake is going to make a mission plan to reactivate 10 families for each ward. With the goal to get each father of the home advanced in the priesthood and the final goal is the temple. What a great idea!!! With the help of the stake and the wards and the Lord, everything will just go excellently well. I’m so excited, and Pres Ruiz was just stoked to be alive. This is the work of God. He guides and directs it, and there is nothing that can stop it. I’m pretty lucky to be apart of the 65,000 missionaries in the world. And there is nothing cooler than speaking Spanish and being in Guatemala, and having experiences and meeting people that wouldn’t have ever happened if I wouldn’t have come here. I love it.

Fun story time... So there is this really old couple in the ward that showed up to church about a year and a half ago, and they got baptized... just the other day a sister in the ward called us and asked us what we do if someone is baptized and not married, we told her to talk to the bishop... It turns out that this couple got baptized without getting married. I guess the missionaries just figured since they were so old, they had to be married... but no. So quickly the ward planned a wedding for them, and almost the whole ward showed up. It was just the funniest thing on the entire planet!!!! I took a million pictures, but here are just a few. They were just so cute and old and embarrassed to be in front of everyone. Oh man everyone was just having a great time. I loved it!

Here in Guatemala there are 2 words for a white guy, the most common, "canche" but here in tierra fria they say "mesho" The old guy calls me "mi meshito" my little whitey... hahaa it makes me laugh so hard... (they are kinda crazy... but now they are married).

That’s about it with my week, I don’t remember much else. Just know that I love you so much, I miss you, God loves us and wants us to be happy... be happy this week!!! Wake up every single day and tell yourself that it is the best day of your life... it´s what I did in high school a lot and it works (I try to do it here, but I always forget with so many things on my mind hehe)

I know Christ lives; He suffered our pains, temptations, sicknesses, troubles, and sins so that He could know how to help us with our problems, so that He knows how we feel in each moment. Alma 7, read it, study it, and love it like I do. It’s my favorite. Read it in Spanish, it’s even better... (the scriptures are different in English I feel like haha) But yeah... I hope you have an excellent week.

With mountains of love from Guatemala,

Elder Jensen

Three More Months!

Hey... What´s Oakley´s email address?? I´ve been wanting to write her my whole mission btu I think she changed it... when I started the mission it was ojensen1@bornsoon.org... but now what is it?

Holy smokes another week has come and gone... and it was a good one!!!!!!!!!!!! I´m such a blessed little missionary. Well actually I´m big cause everyone is short... but who cares. The only day I even remember is Saturday... cause there was a baptism!!!!! Adolfo got baptized!!! Oh man it was a great baptism service, and we didn´t have to worry about anything, cause the members are incredible and they love us. In other areas we had to clean and fill the font, get the agenda ready, plan the messages, conduct the baptismal service, worry if there would be a snack or no, clean up afterwards and then go home tired and hungry... but not here in Maya. The only thing we did in that list was clean and fill the font (cause we have keys and no onbe else haha) and we cleaned a little after.. but the members here are excellent. Adolfo´s brother (the tall one in the picture) will be baptized the 27th of this month, and his mom and other brother are already members. I was just so stoked all day long and so was Adolfo. He was so happy and ready and his mom was just so proud of her three kids being in church rather than being in other places, am i right?!?! It was just so great to be able to help someone receive forgiveness of their sins and receive blessings. Not only Adolfo was super happy and blessed, but so is the whole ward. Yesterday we had ward council and everyone wanted the bishop to give Adolfo a calling in their organization. haha it was awesome and everyone was just happy to be alive. Adolfo is amazing. 

Other than that... I can´t remember hahaha OOOOHHHHH

The other day we were contacting and knocking on doors and here in our area live a bunch of rich people, so we picked a HUGE orange house, and a lady opened the door and told us to come on in. So we did right, we found out she is from Mexico and she talks A TON!!! she is super super nice and she is going to invite us to eat tacos one day... my companion is dying for some tacos.´and me too..... We also found out that her husband plays the "marimba" for Los Internacionales Conejos... look it up. haha He talks really loud and also talks A TON!!!!! But they are really great people... and rich. I´m more used to being in nice houses and sitting on couches than sitting on logs with smoke in my face during lessons... I miss the poor life. It´s fun. With much love I have included a picture of me (Elder Jensen) holding up one of my shirts.. You can´t really tell, but they are basically see through. Good thing I always have my backpacky on or a sweater.. I think they can last 3 more months. It´ll be nice in the hot weather when I go back to the coast the 24th aka there are changes and I´m 75% sure I´m outta here....... I´ve only been here since January.

This week we have interviews with President Ruiz, and I´m stoked. Today we cleaned our house real good and even mopped. A clean house makes me happier.

I´m so happy. The church is true. I know it, I know it, I know it. Guatemala really is the promised land. I love it with my whole corazon. Testifico que Jesucristo vive y nos ama. Yo lo se. He sentido Su amor mucho en mi mision. Anhelo el día que lo puedo conocer y agradecer por la expìacion que efectuó para nosotros. Yo se que el Libro de Mormon realmente es otro testamento de Jesucristo. Se lo leemos, nos acercaremos mas a nuestro Padre Celestial. Seamos obedientes, Él quiere bendecirnos. Los amo con todo mi corazon. 

(look how amazing Spanish is. I love it!!!!!)

I love you all so much! I hope you have an excellent week full of thought about me! hahahahaha I love you, miss you, and pray for you. CTR o HLJ

Elder Jensen

One Happy Missionary

Helloooooo!!!! I´m doing so good. I´m stoked to be a missionary. The members have finally woken up and we are finally seeing miracles and finding people through their references.. actually one of them is getting baptized this Saturday. His name is Adolfo, he´s 23, and he has read almost all of Gospel Principles and is reading the Book of Mormon. Oh man I´m so stoked. His brother Milton will be baptized the 27th! How great is that??

On Tuesday we went to Retalhuleu. It was hot! But I got to meet THE Johnny F. Ruiz. aka My new mission president, aka Presidente Ruiz and of course his wonderful wife was there too. They are so great. But they were so nervous. (Understandably right). We had a very good leadership meeting and got to know them a little bit. Pres. Ruiz made a slideshow showing pictures from when he was baptized, then with the missionary that baptized him 35 years later and the mission president back then. It was really cool and helped us to see the vision of everything. We never know how many apples come from one seed!!! Hna. Ruiz is  very serious and quiet, I don´t know if it´s because she was nervous or no, but I made her laugh hahahaha. They are incredible people. The truth, I kept looking at the teble where Pres. and Hna. Maravilla always sit and I just kept thinking it was so weird to see two different people there. I´m not used to it. 20 months of seeing and listening and learning from Pres. Maravilla and now Pres Ruiz is different. It was weird. But as Pres. Maravilla said, "the old king is dead, the new king lives." and that´s the way it is. I´m so blessed to be able to have 2 mission presidents, and learn from the both of them. I love them both so much, and I´m so blessed to be a missionary of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Guatemala. I love it.

Wednesday we did divisions. I went to a ward just up the road called Federacion with Elder Cardona. I did some baptism interviews of a family that will be baptized soon. They were so excellent. They were telling me about all the changes that had seen in their lives and about how happy they were. That´s why I´m a missionary. I just kept thinking of Mosiah 2:41. I shared it with them and told them they had been chosen since the beginning to be able to know the true gospel. The mom started to cry, and I was just so happy. Such a great experience.

Thursday was a good day too.... We visited Milton and that´s when we were able to put his baptismal date. He is a good kid. 15 years old, but really really smart.

Friday we went to Malacatan for a multi-zone conference. Just like always we rented a big bus for the 42 missionaries here in "tierra fria" and went to the heat. So hot. It was a good conference for everyone to get to know Pres. and Hna. Ruiz. It was basically the same thing as Tuesday, but it was still good. Everyone is really excited.

Saturday there was a stake activity for the youngins in missionary prep class. Elder Salas and I taught a little bit about what it is to be a missionary and then we went out and contacted people in the park for a while. It was really fun. I love teaching.

Sunday was also a good day. There were 4 babys blessed, so the church was full for the 2nd week in a row. It made me happy, and our bishop was just stoked to be alive. It was a really good meeting and we had a lot of investegators there. I didn´t have to speak or teach anything so I was just enjoying the day hahaha. After church we always go visit with our bishop and his councelors, but yesterday we went with bishop and young mens president. We went to visit Milton abnd Adolfo and it was perfect cause they got to know their mom and got to know them better. It was a really good visit, and we visited less actives too. I love this ward. The people are incredible. 

I love Guatemala, the people are incredible. I know I always say it, but it´s truer than true. I love being a missionary for the only true church on the face of the earth. I love it. I only have 3 little months left, but there is so much work to do. I can´t wait to see you, but I can wait 3 months haha. Just know that I love you to the moon and back. I know that Christ lives, and directs His church today. He loves us so much. 

I love you so much. I hope you have an excellent week. Haz lo justo.

ps no photos today, I completely forgot to take some this week. oops!!

Nutella and a New Presidente

Hi mom.... oh and everyone else. hahaha

 

Hows it swimming in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America. Wull... here I am in San Marcos, San Marcos, Guatemala, Central America. We are far huh?? hahaha

 

Well this week was a good'n.

 

On Tuesday we went to Reu for the last meeting with President Maravilla with all the zone leaders. Lucky me huh?? Well Hna. Maravilla shared a little message, then President Maravilla just sat at his table and said, "does anyone have a question for me." (ps he does this all the time and its so fun). But anyway a lot of people asked him questions and he told us stories, he told us about his childhood, and when he got baptized and all kinds of stuff. I loved it!!!I love that man. I´m so blessed that I was able to know him, learn from him, and be better because of him. I sent some pictures of the goodbye, we took pictures two weeks ago when we had conference of the zone, and the other is with them on tuesday. I was just about to cry, man it was a toughie. I hate goodbyes!!!!! haha plus Hna. Maravilla is amazing too. I will miss them. But as Pres said, The old king is dead, the new king lives... so that´s the way it is. I´m excited to know Pres. Ruiz tomorrow, (we are going to Reu, AGAIN. Then Friday we have multi-zone conferences)... Then in two weeks we have interviews with him. I´m stoked. Life is good. 

This week we also did divisions. I was with Elder Gazo, he´s here in the same ward, but it was fun to have a little change for a day. We had a good day. Elder Gazo talks a ton, I loved it ahhaha I´m not used to it cause Elder Salas is a mime... well not exactly but......

Oh I forgot to tell you, on our way back from Reu we got permission to go to the distribution center in the temple and then to Wal Mart in Xela. That was a blessing. I bought NUTELLA!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh man I love it. I bought just a little jar for like 57 quetzales.... kinda expensive, but if we don´t spend money before we die it will just stay here, am I right?? plus it was only like $6 or something. Well worth it. But it´s about halfway gone. But that will hold me over for about another week then I will just have to be strong for 4 months more. 

Yesterday was ward conference. It was incredible. The church was jam packed and the temple president came with his wife. It was so so so so good!!! I love the temple and I love this place. It´s so special.

I almost forgot the coolest part of this week - Last Sunday a guy came to church with his friend, his name is Adolfo. He went to church and loved it. Then when we taught him he told us he was going to get baptized and he searched out the church on his own. On Sunday we gave him a Gospel Principles book, and by Wednesday he had read 14 chapters. So we gave him a Book of Mormon, taught about baptism and the restoration. Then Saturday him and his family invited us to eat lunch and we watch the restoration movie. Then we challenged him to get baptized the 13th of July. He said yes. Oh man I´m so stoked. He went to church yesterday and was telling everyone that he is going to get baptized and everything!!! Everyone was super happy for us and just happy. He told us he didn´t just want to be another member, he wants to be an excellent member. Can you say prepared?? I can. Prepared. His little brother Milton also said he would get baptized, but hasn´t been to church yet. But we are working on that. please pray for Adolfo and Milton. They rule.

I cant really remember what else happened this week, all I know is that I love my life. I love speaking Spanish. I love Guatemalans, with my entire heart and soul. They are an amazing incredible people.

Dad, Mom, Kelsey, Corey, Brooke, Elder Jensen, and Oakley - I know without a doubt that the church is true. It´s so important that we are obedient, that we go to church, that we read our scriptures and pray. God loves each and everyone of us. We are His children and He wants us to be happy. Families are forever. Never forget that I love you and I hope you have the best week of your life. 

Ps yesterday Elder Salas overflowed the toilet and a ton of water was spilling out at 11:30 at night. It was hilarious I had to snap some pictures. the floor is still wet, but not the lake like last night. JAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJAJA

Elder Jensen