Hey All

May 18, 2009

 

Hey all!!!!!

I've had a crazy week so get ready. First of all, we put 4 fechas this week and have some incredible investigators that are progressing. It has been BY FAR the best week here in Allen. We had 12 lessons with a member present—a new record for me. We have one guy in our ward named Victor who is awesome. He has a full beard and looks hippie, but he is really excited to go work with us. He's 22 and we are starting to work with him to get him prepared and excited to go serve a mission. This is someone that I really feel like I've had a big impact on. My 2nd or 3rd Sunday here, I sat by him and just started talking to him and we talked for a long time in between classes. It was fun—he does a lot of really cool things and makes a lot of things and I took a little interest in that. Now we are great buds, and last Wednesday he took off work to come and work with us all day. We had 5 lessons with our investigators and they were great! Its fun to see results of the things you do, and I feel like part of the reason I came to Allen is to be friends with him and help him progress. Its great!

WE have 2 families that we are teaching that have fechas. One of them is especially good—the parents of both have fechas. We have 2 menos activo families that we are teaching, one with 4 unbaptized, and the other with 3 and both are reading and progressing. In the family of 3, they didn't come to church for some reason, but we went to see why and the mom (a member) said hey gonzolo wanted to talk to you guys because he wants to take the charlas and get baptized. Needless to say, Elder Argueta and I were stoked. We are really excited because we are seeing some tangible fruits of our labors.

That brings me to my next point. We were planning and really excited because we had alot at the chapel yesterday.  We were planning Saturday night when the zone leaders called and told us transfers. I'm going to preface this with another story. I hope you're following. We were walking around Saturday and elder Argueta was saying ´I'm leaving. I'm going to comodoro rivadavia.´ I said ´no way. We are working too well together to split up. If you leave, I'm going to train again.´ So then we get the call—elder Argueta—Comodoro rivadavia. Elder Jensen- you're training! We knew it. And we are still in denial. We are really devastated that we have to split up. We don't see eye to eye all the time, but really we have helped each other so much. I read what elder Argueta wrote in my journal and I am really glad I came here to work with him. He is a kid that I've had a big impact on this transfer because he saw a big difference between me and his trainer. He is leaving with a lot of animo and excitement to go and work hard in a new area. He is really really sad to go, but president cook told us that he had to think really hard about us and if he was going to split us. In the end, he decided yes because elder Argueta is going to go and help reconstruct a struggling area. And I'm going to have another kid! My new missionary is coming into a really really strong area. I guess I've learned a little patience here. It really was a battle the first 4.5 weeks, but now we have some really really really good investigators. We are going to have a lot of baptisms next transfer—just the way it should be with my kid.

It did stop raining on Tuesday. My shoes were just caked in mud everyday. It was fun. Our area is pretty poor, so there are a lot of mud streets. I also found a new aide for my stomach—crema de bismuto. I was really bad this week, but I took this medicine and I've been great ever since! I've now added that to my arsenal of things to calm down my stomach.
It is pretty cold here now. We walk around in our sweaters and suit coats now a days. I use my hat a gloves about every morning and night too. But there is a good solution of staying warm—entering houses! Haha.

My companion did get to speak to his family this past Saturday. Finally. It was really good for him—he had a really tough time with it. He is a really good guy and I'm going to miss him. Its been really fun being with him, and we have a ton of really good memories together. I am sad we don't get to be together for the baptisms we're going to see next transfer! But, that's the way the cookie crumbles.

I love you all—take care and have a good week!

Elder Jensen