1,2,....3? AND I LOVE MY FAMILY!!!!!

January 02, 2018

1,2,....3? AND I LOVE MY FAMILY!!!!!

Merry Christmas from Elders Taggart, Jensen, and Figgins!

Hello Everyone!

This week was a fantastic one! So, Tuesday, we got together with YSA (that happened a lot this week) and we helped Brother Blackmon put some drywall up in one of his closets. Man, we mostly just talked with Elder Nelson that day while we did that because he was about to go home, and we just wanted him to have a bit of fun before he left. We kind of got that wish when Brother Blackmon took us to get some lunch afterwards.

After that, I had a lot of fun with #LightTheWorld, which was basically all about getting people to smile. I will put some highlights down below. Then we did some night contacting, and a surprising amount of people answered their door. I like it when that happens. We got a potential investigator out of it, and we met up with a less active, which is always nice.

Wednesday, there was no District Meeting, so we got out and did some morning contacting, and we found another potential investigator, though it will be hard to contact her again because the apartment people are now on the lookout for us so they can kick us out. We now have to be ninja missionaries to get in there.

We also had a good lesson with on that day. We started teaching her the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and we mostly focused on the Faith aspect of it. She said some thing really cool, which was, "Acting on faith is a way that we show our love for God." That is so true! My take on that this, If God tells us to do something, and we show that we are willing to act on those things that he asks us to do, we are in fact showing that we love him. Also, a personal highlight of that lesson was that we actually got to pet her dog Butter without him barking madly or trying to bite us, which is nice. Then we went over to see Robert Hall, and the lesson was a usual one. We read about Abinidi with him, and he was impressed with his courage. After that was just trying to find people to teach, but not much happened with that.

Thursday, we were with YSA and went to Feed My Starving Children again, and I actually got a table job this time! I scooped the soy and rice into a bag, and that was fun, because it is super fast paced there, since you are trying to fill as many bags as possible.After that, we went out on Exchanges with Elder Miner and Elder Hanks, and we had a good exchange with them. The first part stunk, mostly because during that time, all of our appointments that we had set up for later cancelled on us, and that is no fun. But that meant that we got to go to dinner with a super funny member, and I got to meet Elder Miner's 9 year-old investigator. He is a cool kid. But, after dinner, I did not get to teach in the lesson, but I did some finding with Elder Hanks, but it was mostly just walking around in the cold. Oh, and during dinner, we got a super cool phone call from Todd, who is the son of Joan, and he basically pledged to help us out in any way that we can in teaching his mother. He is a recent convert, and he absolutely loves the church, and he loves being the scout leader in his ward in Colorado.

Friday was absolutely fantastic because we got to go to a special Christmas Zone Conference. It was a super spiritual and fun experience. There was a ton of good Christmas messages and songs during the first half, and then a most excellent dinner and a talent show afterwards. Then, we turn around and see President Griffin and two office Senior Elders were dressed as the three wise men, and they passed out gifts for everyone. That was super cool! I did not open my gift immediately. Instead, a bunch of us Elders got together to open them together with Elder Nelson, who would be returning home the next morning. He was super happy at that. The gift that I opened there though, was absolutely awesome! I opened the box, and found a KNIGHT'S HELMET INSIDE! NOW THAT IS FANTASTIC!!!!! I may have worn it around for part of the night, just because I could.

Saturday morning, we went over to YSA's apartment to help Elder Nelson and Elder Taggart clean up their apartment before the assistants came by to get Elder Nelson. Then they came, and he was gone. And Elder Taggart was our newest companion. That is correct, I am now in a trio for the rest of the transfer, and man is it fun! The first thing that we did was go out and help Ray clean up his house a bit. That was a lot of fun, and now you can almost see the top of his kitchen table. Then we quickly changed and went over to teach Joan again. This time, we went over Repentance with her, and we brought up the Word of Wisdom with her, and how she has to stop drinking coffee in order to be baptized, and she said that she would quit that day. Woohoo Joan! We still have to check and see how that is going with her, but I think she is doing good.

After that, we went back to the apartment and did Weekly Planning. During that, we felt like texting one of our investigators, Neri, and seeing how she was doing. It has been a really long time since we have met with her. But, when we asked how she was dong, she invited us over that night! Heck yeah! So we went in and taught her the Plan of Salvation, and she absolutely loved it! Now we just have to get regular meetings going.

Sunday was great, because it snowed! Oh it is so nice to see snow, even if is now in the negatives for temperature. Let me just say though, Elder Taggart is a scary driver when it comes to snow, but it was fun! Church was awesome, because they had a special Christmas program, and there were so many people there! It was great to see. Comp Study that day was good. We all got into a deep doctrinal discussion, and we were all setting our hands on fire as well. Good stuff.

We did some finding in our neighborhood after that, and actually found a potential investigator again! I love it when we find people who are interested. Then we went to talk to Keyshawn, who is a YSA investigator. That was the weirdest lesson I have ever been in, because we sat in his freezing car for an hour, and just talked, but also had a lesson woven into the conversation.

Monday was Christmas! That was a fantastic day. We did some gift wrapping that morning for our #LightTheWorld that evening, and then we went out and shoveled some snow from around the church. Then we got to call our families. Oh, that was awesome! I love my family so much, and I miss them a ton. But I was so glad to be able to talk to them, and be able to actually hear there voices. After that call, and the dinner, we went out caroling, passing out wrapped movie and Books of Mormon to people. That was a ton of fun! Well, that is about it for my week. I hope that y'all are doing most excellent, and that you stay warm where ever you are!

Elder Jensen