Hello!!

Honestly i have no idea what to write about this week.... this week has gone by really fast and it seems like it was yesterday that i wrote you guys.  But we have been keeping busy and getting out to work a lot more this week, we are actually having quite a bit of success in our area now and we have been able to teach quite a bit of lessons this week, and we actually have an investigator!!! he has a baptismal date for the 7th of may, but he is really nervous and does´t think he is going to make it by that day, but we are going to try and help him get ready by that date.  But as far as the work in our area goes... it is going awesome! during the last month there have been some changes in the ward leadership lately and every single one of the new leaders are so awesome!!! there are all willing to give everything to help us with the work, and our new bishop is the most amazing member i have ever met! we saw him out visiting members today! so with all the help we are getting from the ward the work is really starting to pick up! every single lesson we taught this week was with a member present! which has never happened in any of my areas! sometime i just wish i didn´t have to work in the offices! the members are so amazing here! 

But as the offices go we are doing good.  we just found out this week, that the church is going to be updating there financial system from may 10 to may 23 or something like that so we are going to have a ton of complications! so we are trying to get ready for that, and it just so happens that that week, is the week of changes!!! so that is going to be a very FUN week! (sarcasm!) 

Life is going good... not much else to report... although this has definitely been some of the most stressful times of my life, the time here in the offices has been amazing! the elders that i am surrounded by are such great examples and i have learned so much here.  Lately we have been trying to start doing more contacts while we are working in the offices, for example doing contacts when we take taxis to go buy and do stuff, or just talking to the people with whom we work about the gospel, this week we got an email from an owner of one of the houses that the missionaries rent about that he was grateful for a pamphlet the financiers gave him about the restoration and how is going to start the book of Mormon this week, Its just cool to see that even though we aren´t in the street or teaching a lesson, doesn´t  mean we can´t share the gospel. Which is cool cause it is something that we can amply after the mission, just being good examples of disciples of Christ and sharing with those that are willing to listen. 

Anyway thanks for everything and i hope you all have a great week! 

Elder Jensen

Elder peterson toilet papered my computer....

so i got him back....

Office slumber party!!!

[Apr 16, 2016 Letter]

Hola! 

Well this week was pretty normal and everything was going pretty good, me and elder Martinez went to go get our uruguayan ID card, and now are official uruguayans! we got all the flights set up for the the missionaries, and a couple other normal things and then late last night stuff started to happen... So we had stopped by the offices at like 8 30 to finish some stuff and at like 9 15 we start waking home (its like 3 blocks) so all six of us are walking and it starts to rain like crazy just out of the blue! so we run to the house and we go to open the door and the lock is broken... we have 3 copies of the key and it won´t open... so elder cannon climbs up on top of the roof thinking that maybe he can get into the house some how, and cant find anything.  and during the whole process the 6 of us are trying to share 2 umbrellas, just to make it even better.  So we finally just gave up after like 25 minutes and we decided to sleep in the offices! so... we did!  we pulled out jackets, dirty blankets, and the new pillows we bought last week for the new missionaries, but we had to used them in their plastic bags made it a little more annoying but it was still pillows.  and we slept on the offices floors!  then we tried to get to the temple in the morning but due to some recommends being in the house, and missing the clothes we need, only 4 went, and so me and elder cannon had to go drop them off and on the way back we realized that we didn´t have keys to get back in the offices, so we spent another hour (personal study) looking for keys and asking members to find keys.  found keys and then went to pick up the other elders. and we just got back! so today has been a great start to pday! 

Other than that this week really has been pretty normal.  we have another baptism in the ward today, and she is going to be such an amazing member. already has a super strong testimony and is really going to help the ward.  But our ward is doing so good right now! we aren´t helping a lot cause we are offices elderes but we are leaving everyday to go work and trying to help, but the sister missionaries here are doing amazing work! and the members are starting to help with the mission work! it is such an amazing ward! i just wish i could stop being a office elder and just be a normal missionary in this ward, cause we could really have a ton of succes here! we are still hoping to have success, and we are having a little bit, but if we could get out and work more we could really have great success here.  

Thanks for all the love and support and i hope you guys have a great week! 

Elder Jensen

photo of the zone with president and the wankiers

subject

Whats up! 

Well this week, was pretty good, and a lot of good things are going on here in the offices.  These next changes in may are going to be president cooks last changes so we are really trying to perfect them and we are already having meetings with him, the financiers and the assistants to be able to be as ready as possible for the new mission president that is coming here next change.  so a lot of meetings lately and a lot of stuff we are getting ready for.  But some exciting news is that after 3 months of waiting i am going to be an official Uruguayan!!! all of the offices elders have to be registered Uruguayans to be able to drive and so this week i am going to get my Id Card and then the next week i get my licence!!! so i am stoked to get to finally drive our beast of a van! 

As for "the Work", me and elder bio are really working well together, and i am really glad that we are getting a lot great, because it makes life so much better when you get a long with your comp.  he is still a super new missionary, but he knows a lot of stuff already and we have been able to get in rhythm together really fast.  He is really helping me to focus more on getting out in the street and focusing more on our calling as missionaries and not as our assignment as secretaries.  We don´t have any crazy success yet, but i really feel good about the work that we are doing, and we always finish the day feeling good about what we have been able to accomplish.  

Today we are going to elder Bio´s old area to go see a baptism of a convert that he was teaching, so we aren´t going to have much of a pday but i am excited to leave montevideo, considering pretty much all my mission has been inside of montevideo, but thats all that is going on in our life.  Thanks for all the love and support and i hope that you guys have a great week! 

Love elder Jensen

Photos of me and elder Bio for a presentation that we give to the new missionaries. we had a little bit of fun with these!  and the first is supposed to be a gif, but i don´t know if it worked. Enjoy!

Change Week!!

[Apr 2, 2016 letter]

Well this has definitely been one of the craziest weeks of my mission! It was really good, but there was definitly some hard moments but some really good ones.  First we started off the week on a really good note, Gonzolo invited us for dinner because i hit a year and he took the five of us (2 financers and the 3 secretaries) to this amazing restaurant in our area, and it was amazing!!! i ate the best food i have had since i got here! we ate every type of meat that exists, chicken, steak, cow intestines, kidneys, and brain! it was such a good way to get change week started.  oh and if he sent you guys the photo of us there, i would like to have it.  

Then changes started.... and since i have my new comp, i am now the lead secretary which means i had to teach my comp and take care of everything this last week, everything was going smoothly until Wednesday morning when we were in the bus terminal with all the missionaries and one of the brand new missionaries just starts having a crazy amount of pain in his stomach and basically falls to the ground! luckily the mission nurse was there and figured out that he had kidney stones! so we ran him to the hospital and now he is doing totally fine, but man it scared us! but the poor elder! it was his first day, he had just met his trainer and was just about to leave to go to his first area, but no, he spent the first 2 days in the hospital! but he made it to his area alive and healthy again! 

Then all day thursday we had to take all the "dying" missionaries to the airport, and this was hands down one of the hardest days of my mission.  One of the things we have to do as secretaries is what we call "the Veil" and that is when we send the missionaries through the security and say goodbye to them, and only the missionaries, president and hermana cook and us are there, and everytime we give the veil it is super emotional and hard.  But this time was really hard, we had to send off several people that i knew at 2:00 in the afternoon and then later at 6:00 we had to drop off Elder Oliveira (my second comp in the mission) and saying goodbye to him was one of the hardest moments of my mission.  He has been one of my best friends here in the mission and the hard part is that i just don´t know if i am going to see him again in this life. Honestly it was just as bad as leaving salt lake a year ago and honestly it makes me scared to go home! believe it or not after being secretary and seeing what it is like to go home, I kinda don´t want to! Of course i can´t wait to see all of you guys but its really hard for the missionaries to go home and its going to be hard. There was a good moment though, Laura and Freddy (from Parque del Plata, my first area)  came to say goodbye to them, so i got to talk to them again after 6 months of not seeing them, me and elder oliveira just talked with them for like 2 hours before he got on the plane and it was amazing to catch up with them and see the difference the gospel has made in their lives. 

And now we have General conference which the first session was amazing!!!! littterally i loved every single talk! and Come Thou Fount and the end of conference was sooooo good!! i am super excited to watch the rest of it! but ya that has been my week basically... i hope you guys have a great General Conference and another great week! Love all of you guys! 

Elder Jensen

photos of me, Elder Oliveira, Freddy and Laura.

airport and office photos! oh and when i hit one year we bought pizza! 

One year down - one to go

Deanna Jensen Facebook post from Mar 28, 2016:

One year down - one to go. A big thank you to Brittany's cousins Gonzolo and Felicia for taking these missionaries out to celebrate!!! Always happy to see this boy's smile. Congrats Elder Jace Jensen

Un Año y nada mas!!!

[Mar 26, 2016 letter]

Yep its true!! as of yesterday i officially have an entire year as a missionary!! which i honestly can´t belive and i really don´t feel like i have been here for a year but its true!! so to celebrate we bought some pizza and grapefruit soda (which sadly doesn´t exist in the US) then as tradition, I burned a shirt... it wasn´t my shirt but i still burned it! ;)

Well other than hitting my year point this week has been pretty stressful! really good!! but stressful, last night the new secretary was called and he is going to be getting here anytime now, his name is elder Bio and he is from Mexico, the crazy thing is that he is a super new missionary! he only has like 4 1/2 months in the mission, usually the office elders get called between 7 and 10 months, but i have really good things about him and am super excited to meet him today! that and the new assistant was called last night as well and sadly that means that elder oliveira is going home this next week, which is going to be hard, but he has already been here for 2 years, he can go home.  

So basically all this week has been preparing for changes next week and getting the offices ready for a new assistant and a new secretary, we have been verifying all the flights and travel of the missionaries, and tonight we are going to officially start changes! we have to organize all the buses that are going to bring the missionaries to the bus terminal here in Montevideo and then make sure we can get them to their new areas without any problems or missed buses! Sadly we haven´t been able to get out to work much this week, so there hasn´t been any real progress in our area, but the sister missionaries in our ward are flying! they already have another baptism set up for the 9th (it would be the 2nd but there is general conference!).  so due to the 2 baptisms of some really awesome converts the ward is getting really excited about the work, and i really think that that will bring a lot more success and growth in this ward! 

But ya that has been my week, and i am super excited for easter and conference!!! have a great week and hope to hear from you guys soon! 

Love Elder Jensen

Chilling on the bench (Oliveira, peterson, briceño, me, cannon, xavier)

random platform in the middle of the ocean... not sure what elder cannon is doing in this photo...

now chilling on the beach

Foto De La Zona

steps of the hotel/casino

BURGER KING!!!

back at our favorite museum 

Hola, Hola, Hola!

[Mar 19, 2016 letter]

How is it going everybody! 

Well this has been a fun week! We have done almost absolutely nothing exciting, but we are just getting ready for the changes in a week and a half.  but the changes are going to start for us in like 5 days when we find out the actual changes and we can start organizing everything and getting the buses ready and preparing everything for the missionaries that are "dying" and the missionaries that are coming to the mission.  And the investigator that i told you about last week, left to argentina for the next month so we have no idea what is going to happen with her, but luckily she has some good friends in the ward, so i am not super worried that she is going to lose the desires to get baptized, but we aren´t going to be able to anything until she gets back.  But speaking of baptisms, the hermanas in our ward had a baptism, and we have been trying to get ready all day! we went to go start filling up the baptismal font at 1 30, and first it was dirty so we filled it up a little and cleaned it, and then the water wouldn´t drain so we got the bishop to come over and fix it, and while we were waiting for him, we started taking out the water by hand just using buckets, then next thing we know the sister missionaries showed up and we realized we had 40 minutes until the baptism and the baptismal font was completely empty! so we start filling it up.... and there isn´t any hot water!! so we left it filling up with cold water while we started bringing hot water from the kitchen (on the other side of the church) to help fill it up faster and make it a little warmer.... long story short, the new member got baptized in almost cold water about 1 hour after she was supposed to get baptized, but the important thing is that she got baptized!

Then another thing that went wrong this week was on this Friday we were going to take a sister to the airport cause she was going home with medical problems, and we wake up early and go to get the van, actually to get the car of hermana cook, because our van died this week and we literally can not drive it until we get it fixed, so we get in hermanas cooks car and someone had left the lights on all night and the battery was dead.... and the taxis are on stike.... and the buses as well... so we had no mode of transportation what so ever.... oh and it was pouring rain haha! but president came with his car and we showed up to the airport like an hour and a half before the flight took off, and due to some serious miracles we were able to get the hermana on the flight before it took off! so ya that is pretty much how our week has gone.... a lot of things going wrong and the miraculously getting fixed! like i said last week... its a miracle that the offices hasn´t burned down yet! but we keep working! 

Other than that we are doing good here! i hope everything is going great back on the home front and all is well! love you guys and talk to you next week! 

Love Elder Jensen

a photo Hermana Cook took of the offices elders at the conference with elder Bednar

practicing our Uruguayan hand signs for the presentation we do for the new missionaries... we decided that we needed new photos... and we may or may not have gotten bored ;)