Sunday, November 5, 2017

Meridian Temple Open House-Week 1

Dear Family,

I am so grateful for the many miracles I have been blessed to witness over this past week. This open house is truly a choice experience that puts many in our path who are being prepared. 

Since I wrote last we have taught our investigator that recently got married. The big miracle here is that her new husband also came to the lesson and that really helped. We talked about where she is at with everything that we have taught her. We focused our lesson on asking and receiving answers from God, so we read with her from Joseph Smith history. I love reading this because investigators can usually relate to Joseph's search for truth amidst chaos. And the Spirit always fills the room when we read the account of Joseph seeing the Father and the Son. We talked with her about what it means to be a member of the church. Her friend that was with us during the lesson also talked about the possibility of them going to the temple and being sealed for eternity. This brought tears to her eyes.  Her husband also told us how everything seems to be going better with them since she started meeting with us, and how he feels they really do need to come to church. They are just really sweet, humble people and I love them. 

Saturday was the beginning of the general open house and it was packed. My favorite person that I talked to all day was fifty year old man. He came up to me and another sister and asked if we were the ones answering questions. He then asked us about how exactly we do baptisms for the dead. Once that made sense to him, we also explained how we also do sealings for our ancestors so that those have passed on can also be with their families forever. He didn't want missionaries to come and teach him, but he did ask for a Book of Mormon. 

We were on our normal schedule on Sunday, and we had a huge miracle! A couple of weeks ago we ate with a family that has a foreign exchange student, I think she is a junior or senior.  She has been coming to church with them for the past couple of weeks, and this last Sunday there was no teacher in their Sunday school class. The other youth in her class, being the amazing missionaries that they are, asked her if she had any questions. She did have tons of questions and after talking about them, they asked her if she wanted to meet with us and she said yes. We talked to her after church and set up a time next week to teach her the first lesson. She even asked if we could make it a group discussion by inviting the other kids in her class, which we readily agreed to. The Lord is always preparing people, and it is amazing to see them brought to you. 

We have been at the temple all day Monday and Tuesday, and I am pretty wiped out. But again, so many miracles. I will start with my favorite. Earlier this year, I had the chance to go to a Christian school and help give a presentation about the church to a comparative religions class. It was a really awesome experience, especially because of the teacher. He was really open-minded, he even came to our ward to see what a church service was like. He also told us that he was just sticking to sources put out by the church which really amazed me. Well, I was in the reception tent, when a group of teenagers came through. They really looked like a seminary class. Once I start talking to them, I find out that none of them are members and that they are all in this comparative religions class at Christian school. They asked me a ton of questions, then their teacher came out from the tour and he remembered me. He took his class out of school because he just didn't want them to miss this experience. They hadn't done the unit on the LDS church yet because this was different class. It was just such a tender mercy because I was only scheduled to be in that tent in an hour, and tours go through so quickly that it is easy to miss people. God really is orchestrating this whole thing for people to meet who they need to. I also ran into a man from Bellefontaine, Ohio. I had a couple from Okinawa come through my video room that are now stationed at Mountain Home Air Force Base. I ran into some parents of a family that we lived with in Okinawa. I also was in the video room that a YSA ward that I served in when I was in Meridian came through, and I got to see some people I was close within that ward. It is humbling, all that the Lord has blessed me with. 

Love,
Sister Jensen   


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