Feb 6, 2017 email

[Feb 6, 2017 email]

Hello!!!

Well this week was quite emotional! i had my last multizone conference in Maldonaldo and i got to see old comps and a couple other good friends from the mission, and in the conference they asked me to give my "Last testimony" and then they gave me my flight plans and instructions for going home, and i think for the first time in these weeks i really understood that i am almost done, and it is starting to become real, but it was a great experience to be able to see a couple people one last time.

Like i said i had my last multizone conference but while we were they we talked a lot about church attendance and what we can do to help people get to church and also the importance of working with the members so after the conference we decided that we were going to do everything possible to get people to church so we call and we sent messages and on saturday we tried to stop every investigators house to remind them and we were also fasting and praying (ALOT) and we were feeling really good and that this sunday was going to be amazing! but... things don`t always go the way we plan! we had daniel come to church again but he fell asleep! haha and only a handful of members showed up, but there were a couple less actives that came for the first time in quite some time, and after feeling bad and asking "why didn`t anyone come?" my comp said hey "we had 6 men in church..." I realized after that i had been looking more at the amount of people and not so much as quality, 1 man (daniel) isn`t member but has accepted to be baptized, 1 was a less active that hasn´t come in months and could come back, and 2 are a newphew and uncle that both we active leaders before, but for varias reasons left, so i realized that even though we didn`t have a ton of people in church we had preisthood. which is what we are looking for, so it wasn`t what we asked for but it was what we needed.  

Then today for pday we went shopping here in some local shops and i told myself that i was only going to look today and then buy souveniers later.... i spent about 1000 pesos and bought something in 3 of the 4 shops we entered... my comp made fun of me for being a girl and buying everything that i saw! haha but it was totally worth it! 

Thanks for everything I hope you guys are enjoying feburary and i will see you next week! 

Love Elder Jensen

Old Comp elder bio and elder ramos

We went to go remind an investigator to come to church and they weren`t home so we wrote them a message in the sand.

we went looking for an investigator in the middle of no where.... we never found them... but beautiful photos!! 

another week in castillos...

[Jan 30, 2017 email]

Well we are back in business! This wednesday we went back to montevideo to get my comp checked up and he is doing good! we have been able to get back out and work and we have had some first good days together.  We have been able to find a couple of our old investigators and we found some new ones as well,  and onae of the new investigatores that we found came to church with us and he really enjoyed it.  his name is Daniel. 

But we are really excited for this change, we were finally able to really start working and we put some high goals and my comp has a lot of good ideas on how we can help out investigators. adn we are really going to focus on getting them to church where as in the past we were focusing a little bit more on reading the book of mormon, we are seeing that this is really the problem is that they aren`t going to church.  But we really feel like this is going to be a good change.  

As for the week we don`t have much to say, not much happened, we spent the first half of the week just deep cleaning the house and staying inside, but next week should be more eventful! 

Thanks for everything and see you next week! 

Love you guys!

Elder Jensen

all my mission agendas... all 17 of them.

enjoying cheesecake... 

eating some "milanesas al pan" ...

Highlights from Elder and Sister Wankier

[From Elder Jensen's Dad]

Here are some highlights of Elder Jensen on Elder and Sister Wankier's blog:
http://gordon-renee-in-uruguay.blogspot.com/

Jan 22 2017:
"Elder Ramos had an appendectomy on Saturday and was being transferred to Castillos.  The assistants asked me if I would take him.  Elder Ramos is a great young missionary but after surgery, not in real good shape to go on a four hour bus ride.  So I loaded up the part time missionary and Elder Ramos and headed up the coast.  ..."

"We stopped in Rocha to pick up Elder Ramos’ companion, Elder Jensen, and then off to Castillos.  So Elder Ramos is doing quite well after surgery but he still has a hard time moving, especially stairs.  When he saw the tall, steep stairs that lead to his bedroom in Castillos, his heart sunk.  He tried to go up the stairs but his desire was more than his ability.  They spent the first two nights with their mattresses on the floor downstairs."

Jan 8 2017:

"Our Castillos visit included lunch with Hermana Narda as always.  Milanesas and salad really hit the spot.  What a blessing to have her support.  Elder Jensen and Castillo are working hard.  They had four investigators in Church today.  They participated in the meetings and seemed to enjoy it. "

Stay at Home Vacation

[Jan 23, 2017 email]

Well this was definitly an interesting week to start off! i got a call from Sister eddy telling me that my comp had recently gotten his appendix taken out on monday and was not going to be able to leave the house for 10 days... Fantastic right! haha so we have spent since wednesday in our house and basically the whole week was spent as seen in the photo... but my comp is awesome! he is really dying to get out and work and i think its driving him more nuts than its driving me! but he is fairly new and is from mexico.  

Luckily our "vacation" was interupted by our Open house this week! there is a photo of all the missionaries together on  Elder Wankiers Blog.  We didn`t have to much success but the missionaries came and we were able to invite tons of people to hear the gospel and we now have a couple of referrals for our area.  it was a great spiritual experience and there was one young man who came in towards the end who was really promising but we are going to see what happens, he said he would stop by or give us a call after reading the book of mormon.  

Sunday was fairly normal, but for some reason none of our investigators showed up and we haven`t been able to get a hold of most of them, we know that juan and jorge were working but we are not sure about the rest of them.  

Then luckily this week we are going to montevideo to have my comps check up appointment to see if he can work on wednesday so we are really hoping that it goes well and that we can get out to work finally.  But things are going great here and we are having a great time! Wish us luck! and thanks for all the prayers.  

I love you guys and have a great week! 

Elder Jensen

the Last Change...

[Jan 17, 2017 email]

Well its official, i am starting my last change with my last comp.  my new comp is coming out of being trained and i think he might also be coming from my first area parque del plata as well! his name is elder ramos, i have heard he is from Mexico and that is about everything i know about him!! so I am excited to be working with him! my comp Elder castillo is going to my old zone in maroñas (lucky!!) and he is going to do awesome out there! 

This week has been quite a crazy week! we have been having a lot of good charlas and we have several really good investigatores but only juan could come to church this week, but i am really excited for this last change and am hoping to see a couple baptism here! :)  

I had an awesome intercambio with Elder vicente this week in rocha and man he killed me! haha our first visit was this lady named marcia who is from mozambique! don`t ask me how she got here cause idon`t know but she is super awesome!! the only bad thing is that we had to walk 6 km to get to her house! then luckily someone took us back! but it was totally worth it! super faithful lady and she just understands everything! 

Then last monday we went to brazil, and unfortunatly there was soooo many people that i didn`t even dare take out my camera, but i got a photo of the results :)  a new jersey, mate and Uruguayan swag :) 

that is about it.... oh and my comp had his birthday on sunday and everybody was crying when he told them that he was leaving! so it was a day of very mixed emotions :)  But life is going good and i hope you guys have a great week! 

Love Elder Jensen

Me castillo juan and jorge.  and it was also my comps birthday on sunday, so we bought a pineapple and dulce de leche cake... it was amazing! 

Week of Miracles (Part II)

[Jan 9, 2017 email]

Well we have some great news to start off this week! We had 3 investigators in church!!! Jorge came again and his brother would come but in his new job he is working on sundays so we are going to have to fix that, but jorge came again and is making huge progress! he keeps reading the book of mormon and even though he didn`t accept a baptismal date, he is considering getting baptised! Then we also had a young couple come to church for the first time named Victor and Florencia.  They are super awesome and we found them in my first week here, but they finally were able to make it to church and they loved it! They are going to have to make a lot of changes in their life to be able to be baptised and its going to take some time, but they are both really awesome and we are going to be working with them a lot! 

This week we had the wankiers with us again for church and they gave a presentation for an open church activitie that we are going to have in 2 weeks and the members got really excited! we also had some less actives in church and we had the highest attendance since i have been in castillos,  16!!! whoa!!!! So we are all really excited for some progress and hoping that this can be a continual progress, and not just a one time thing.

Also just a fun little thing that we are doing today, is we are going to brazil!!! okay not really but we are going to the border called Chuy and i will send you guys the photos next week! I hope everything is going good and that you guys enjoy the cold! have a great week and love you all! 

Love Elder Jensen

Happy New Year!!!!

[Jan 2, 2017 email]

well its now 2017!!! its crazy how fast time has flown and that we are already in 2017!! but this new years was kinda boring haha! we just stayed up till 12 to watch the fireworks and there were only about 5 minutes worth of fireworks and then i started up the old jensen habit of having breakfast at midnight and made some crepes! and then went to bed :) 

But we started off the new year great! We had 2 future melchizedek preisthood holders in church for all 3 hours!! Juan (25) and Jorge (20) are brothers that we found this week and they both came to church and after all the members had given their testimonies Jorge got up and gave a legit testimony of how before he didn`t believe in the Churches but always believed in God and now he is starting to change! it was an awesome testimony! they accepted the invitation bautismal as well but juan has got a couple doubts that he wants to get over before he really commits. the great thing is that during preisthood we talked about the temples and all the requirements... so they already know about the law of chastity, word of wisdom, and even tithing! They are showing a lot of progress and we are super excited for this week to see how things go! 

Another exciting thing is that on wednesday night we got a call from a member at 10 telling us that the church was flooding! so we ran over luckily she was exaggerating and there was only a small pipe that had broken and was entering the church but most of it was leaking outside of the church.  (see video)  the fun thing was, is that the water service didn`t show up until 12! it was a fun night :)

but ya that was our week, and we are hoping for another great week! 

Love you guys

Elder Jensen