SISTER JENSEN: Snow Days

Me faking happiness about the snow.

Dear Family,

Winter just came out of NOWHERE. We just woke up one day and the ground was covered with snow. We went out and worked the first day of the snow, but then a couple of days later it snowed again. One of the sisters that we live with called the office to ask if it was okay to drive, and everybody told her no. So we kind of had to stay inside that day. Fortunately, it was planning day, so we still got to get a lot of work done despite being home. But we were pretty bored after we finished planning. We have a couple of portable DVD players in our apartments so we were able to watch The Testaments, which was really good. But we have been able to brave the weather the rest of this week, careful to drive very slow through all the snow and ice.

The other sisters decorated, they are the best!

Our improvised Christmas tree

Nothing too big and exciting happened this week, so this update might be a little sparse. We continue to meet with J. a couple times a week. It is so fun to watch her learn and grow in the gospel. She tells us that she wants to learn so much more about the gospel so that she can teach and testify to everyone. I know that she will be an instrument in the Lord's hand to bring many, many people to the gospel. Her daughter, D., has started coming to our lessons with J.. She mostly just looks at her phone, but we have the suspicion that she is listening. I showed her my scriptures and personal progress ribbons and I thought she thought is was totally dorky. But then the next day J. told me that D. said she wants scriptures just like mine if she is baptized. Just pray that she will want to listen and feel the Spirit as we teach her! I am super excited because we are planning on bringing J. to the family history center this week so she can get some names to bring to the temple. I love how much joy missionary work brings!

This week, I have seen the Lord's hand in leading us to people to teach. A couple of weeks ago, we had several of the missionaries tract in our area. The assistants were tracting in one of our neighborhoods and found these two guys, and one of them had already read in the Book of Mormon up to Helaman. We tried for a couple of weeks to meet with them, but it didn't work out until this past Monday. We went and found out that the one reading the Book of Mormon, B., is actually a member that lives with this cute couple that has two little boys. So we read the scriptures with the B. while the family was eating dinner, so hopefully they were able to hear and listen as well. We will continue to visit B. and hopefully will be able to teach the family.

Then we got a referral on our snow day! A brother in our ward called us and told us that his neighbor wanted to take the lessons. We called him the next day and set up an appointment to go and visit him. His name is R., we call him Brother R. He is 76 and lives alone. He went to the church when he was younger but never joined. It was funny because he was very good at keeping us on track, which isn't usual among the older people. He just told us that he wanted us to talk about Christ, and we were like "Great!". We taught him the restoration, but it might of been a bit much for him to take in at one time. He did tell us after we prayed that it was very nice. We set a time for us to visit him every week.

Then, yesterday in one of our missionary correlations, one of the ward leaders told us to go visit this guy named J. He briefly mentioned that he has a girlfriend. We visited him last night and she is now our newest investigator! Her name is C. and she is SO SWEET. She was like, "Do you have classes at church? I would totally come to them" and "So how does it work when you teach people if I want to learn more about it? Do I have to go to the church? Can you can a certain time every week?" We were like, "Yes, of course we can come and teach you in your home!" So we set up a time to come and teach her on Thursday. It was funny because she was telling us how she eats oreos with a fork and puts reeses on her smores and I was like, "Me too!!" (Forgive me for saying like so many times) The Lord prepares you in weird ways to connect with those you teach haha. She suggested eating peanut M&M's with popcorn, so that is a new one I will have to try.

I love being a missionary during Christmas! I do get hit with bouts of homesickness every once in a while, it is hard not to. Christmas time has always been my favorite time to be with family and loved ones. But I know that this is a sacred time that I have to bless other families with beauty and love of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I love being a missionary, even though it is the hardest thing I have ever done, I know that it is Heavenly Father shaping me into who He needs me to be. I love and miss all of you and am so thankful for everything you do for me!

Love,

Sister Jensen