Early Christmas - Joram and Brittany's Visit

Our son (Joram) and daughter-in-law (Brittany) are in Uruguay for the marriage of her cousin. Brittany's father is from Uruguay and most of his family still lives in Uruguay.  Today they attended church with some other cousins and they live in the same ward that our son (Elder Jensen) is serving in. What a small world.  Below are some of the video's and pictures we got from their visit today:

Peeking into investigator class that Elder Jensen is in

Waiting for the investigator class to end

The greeting!!!

visiting after Sacrament meeting

Hola Mom

Elder Jensen headed back to work

Joram with Elder Jensen and the other Elders at a ward Christmas program. 

ward dinner!!!

[Dec 14, 2015 email]

"hello world! the sun says hello!" 

ya the sun has come, and it got super hot here! it hit like 96 ish and with a ton of humidity! but its not the walking in the heat or anything like that, that bugs me... its that it stays super hot during the night and between the 4 elders we just have 1 fan... so we have started getting in the shower with our pajamas on or just putting them in the freezer, its either that or sweat all night.  but even with the sun we have had a pretty good week and we have found a couple of new investigators but nobody is going to be progressing soon... so we are going to wait and see. but the work is going really well here in colón, me and elder padilla are working together and working hard! i really want to stay here in this ward! 

but like i said last week, we had our ward end of year dinner and it was awesome!! i love this ward here! we ate food, played some games and some of these people were going nuts over these games!! im talking about full grown men and women yelling over a trivia game! it was intense but super fun! then this week we have our mission wide christmas conference tomorrow! , and i am super excited! 

Love you all see you next week! 

Elder Jensen

this is what i´ve resorted to... putting clothes in the freezer....its hot here! 

ward dinner

gift from a recent convert.... i think they are trying to say something...

...not much... except christmas!!!

we this week was a pretty normal week, just a day shorter with the changes last week and we had to help with elder moss moving into our house, but it has been a pretty chill week this week.  then last thursday elder padilla got super sick out of no where! we were just walking in the street and then he suddenly stopped walking and almost passed out! we still don´t know what he got because he got better latter that night  but then the rest of the house now has got the cold... well we had the cold.  it was only like for a day, but ya it was really interesting how fast it came and went! but we are all just looking forward to the christmas activities in our ward and stake there are like 4 activities in the next 2 weeks so we are really looking forward to this! but i don´t have much to say this week, and besides i´ll talk to you all soon!! that and  im out of time :(  but love you all i hope you guys have a great week!!

Love elder Jensen

fotos del bautismo

me, solange, jamie, elder padilla, then our ward mission leader and his wife hno y hna perez.

changes!!! ....psych!!!

so yep we had changes this week, but there really weren´t any changes anywhere... only 2 elders in our zone are changing and i will be staying in colon with elder padilla for the hollidays! hopefully we can keep getting a long but we will have to wait and see!!

But this week was awesome! we had a baptism this saturday and it was super awesome and spiritual!!! so hermano jamie canals and his wife solange (they are an older couple) got baptised and they have such a strong testimony already it is amazing!! but this week before their baptism she told us her whole conversion story from start to begining and it is a super awesome story so i thought i would share it! but she was going to go to florida to go visit her son that lives there and while she was sitting down waiting to board the plane, a lady sat down next to her and they started to talk a little bit, and turns out they were going to be on the same flight, and the flight ended up being cancled due to the weather.  So the airline rented out a hotel and they ended up being put in the same room, so they got to know eachother pretty well and turns out that this other lady was a member of the church, and at some point they started to talk about the church and the member just happed to have a copy of the most recent liahona in her bag so she let Solange borrow the magazine for the flight and now they are best friends and because this member was willing to share a simple magazine, her and her husband were able to get baptized last week.  Honestly the story was a lot longer and better but i had to cut it down, but it is just a cool example of how "by means of small and simple things, great things come to pass". unfortunatly i didn´t bring my camera so i will send photos next week.  

But ya that was about it for the week.... i love you guys and have a great week!!!!

Elder Jensen

Testimony

Note: A member of our ward created a Christmas book with each missionary and their testimony. Here's Elder Jensen's from Nov 23rd:

honestly being out here thousands of miles from my home, family, and friends, trying to learn a language that i didn´t understand after 5 years of high school classes, and teaching the gospel has opened my eyes and stregthened my testimony in ways that i coudln´t have imagined before the mission.  When i look at all the problems that there are in the world and all the broken families, i have to recognize that the family that i have and the unitly between us is a blessing from our Heavanly Father. cause in this world it is nearnly impossible to have a family like we do, and i cannot deny that all the blessing i have been given come from this gospel.  I do not have a perfect testimony and there isn´t a missionary that has one, but that is why the Lord sends 19 year olds. to strength their faith.  and i know that only being here in uruguay i could have grown like i have.  now i can truly say that i know that this is the true church and there is no other way to reach eternal life. i am so greatful for the challenges and stuggles i have had and that i will have in the mission and in life in general, because that is the only way we grow.