caving and waterfallin

Man so we went caving this morning with Brett Baker and we don't have heaps of time to email so I will just hit ya with the same format as my past few weekly emails.

- We had a solid lesson with Jack about the life of Christ and we were able to really connect with him. Later in the week we went to his footy game as well to support him and he killed it! He was stoked that we came too so it was a good way to build his trust.

- There was a big 50th anniversary of the building and dedication of one of the chapels here in Canberra. It was a big celebration with heaps of food and lots of members came around for it! It was a big feed and celebration on Saturday and then Sunday there was a big stake sacrament meeting which was sick!! 

- We got to meet with David Dwyer and have a good catch up with him and share a lesson

- We had a lesson with a potential we found on the bus one day named Jimmy. He is from China and is super cool and interested in how the Atonement can change his life.

- We had a good week working with all the less actives that we have been seeing. They are all making some progress and we have a good connection with all of them. 

-We had two sick Pdays in a row! Last week we went to a sweet Waterfall and today we went and did some caving with Brett Baker which was one of the coolest experiences ever! At one point in the cave we just turned off our head lamps and sat in complete darkness and sang some hymns. It was a really powerful experience and one I will never forget! 

I am just loving the work down here and every week is just so good! I love my comps and everything is going good :) sorry for the shortness of this email haha I will do better next week! 

I think I have sent this scripture before but I love it so much and I just read it again this week because this is where I am in the Book of Mormon. It is in 3 Nephi 9:14 and it is the words of Christ. He says,

"Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will come unto me ye shall have eternal life. Behold, mine arm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive; and blessed are those who come unto me."

I know that the Savior is always there for us. His arms are always extended towards us. Love you guys have a good week! 

Elder Jenson

no pics this week

Well I don't have heaps of time to email this week due to skype, so it will just be a short quick one haha. The week was really good! My family knows most the deets from skype so there isn't much to tell! Here are a few quick moments of the week.

- Got dropped by Alex (our investigator) We found out she is gay so she isn't too keen on the church's stance on gays..

- We did some service at Vinnies and also down at brother Amosa's house.

- We made some good contacts with our LA's this week and had some of them at church

- Had a good sport night at the chapel and had a lot of non members come to it.

- Did a lot of finding at the Unis.. a lot! With all the evil in the world going on the best thing we can do is not be overcome by it but to be the best we can and let the light of Christ shine through is to overcome the evil around us. God is great and He loves us. He is there and He always will be. Be the light that shines in the dark! Have a good week and stay safe! Love you all! 

- Had interviews with Pres and Sis Back which was our final ones before they go home on July 1st! 

Nothing too crazy this week haha just the basics and I am way too lazy to look back on my week and write everything out haha sorry bout it! 

Romans 12:21

"Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good."

With all the evil in the world going on the best thing we can do is not be overcome by it but to be the best we can and let the light of Christ shine through is to overcome the evil around us. God is great and He loves us. He is there and He always will be. Be the light that shines in the dark! Have a good week and stay safe! Love you all! 

Elder Jenson 

p.s. forgot my camera in the car so no pics this week... sorry :) 

found my 2$ coin.

This week has been good for us! We have been having some fun as a companionship and we are seeing some good success here! I will give a few highlights of the week again to save us all some time haha :) 

- We had a solid lesson with a less active ysa! I got prompted to suggest that we go visit him and I was pretty doubtful in the prompting but I followed it anyways and it turns out he was home and the lesson was so good with him! We never catch him home so it was pretty cool haha

- I lost a 2 dollar coin at the mall on pday so I prayed that I would find it and boom my eyes were taken right to it haha so God really does care about us even with little silly things like that haha.

- We did some volunteer work at a place called Vinnies, it is basically a D.I. haha. We just were in the back sorting through clothes and we always put on the girl clothes and it gives all the old ladies a good laugh! 

- Had a good catch up/lesson with Ezra. He is preparing to go on his mission to Cebu Philippines! 

- We had a lesson with Alex about the Plan of Salvation and she had some concerns about the fall of Adam and Eve, so we had a good discussion on that and we were really able to gauge where she was at as we had that lesson so we feel like we know what our next steps will be with the lessons we teach and what not. We are hoping to set a baptismal date with her soon! 

- We got to have a good lesson with Jack about the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I think it was pretty eye opening for him as we discussed what Christ actually went through. We set a new baptismal date with him for the 3rd of June. 

- Went to one of the less active boys footy game this weekend and it really helped us gain his trust. He came to church the next day for the full 3 hours too which was solid! He also mentioned how he has a friend who is keen to learn and get baptized so we will keep you updated on that haha! 

Other than all that the week has been pretty good! We are seeing good progress with the people that we are working with and we are enjoying ourselves while we do it haha. I am loving my mission, my area, my comps, and just everything! Life is going good! 

My spiritual thought for the week comes from Alma 61:9. So Pahoran just got rebuked by Moroni via letter about being a lousy leader and what not. The only bad thing is that Moroni doesn't know the full story of what is going on in the land where Pahoran is. Instead of getting offended and telling Moroni off and telling him how he should get to know the facts before he blows up on him. He says this,

"And now, in your epistle you have censured me, but it mattereth not; I am not angry, but do rejoice in the greatness of your heart. I, Pahoran, do not seek for power, save only to retain my judgment-seat that I may preserve the rights and the liberty of my people. My soul standeth fast in that liberty in the which God hath made us free."

We choose to be offended... so the biggest thing I learn from this is that we must be quick to forgive, and forget. Forgive others and move on from it. Do not look back. The quicker we can get good at doing these things the better off we will be! Remember the Savior Himself as he was hanging on the cross told Heavenly Father to, "forgive them for they know not what they do" This is a Christlike attribute that isn't easy to obtain, but boy does it make life easier! Love you all have a good week!

Elder Jenson

new shoes dumpster shoes.

So the new transfer just started today and I am on my final 12 weeks of my mission!! Pretty surreal and I am ready to finish strong. I am still in Canberra with Elder Hunt, but we got a trio this transfer and our new comp is Elder John from Guyana! This is his final transfer so we get to kill him off. Pres said he put him with us so that we can help him finish strong! So I will jot down a few highlights of the week for yous :)

- Got a new investigator named Shrijit who is over here from India for Uni. He is super interested and wants to have the peace that Christ can offer in his life. 

- We went to the dawn service for Anzac day here and we had to wake up at 4 in the morning for that so that was fun hahaha but Brett Baker made us some good waffles for breakfast afterwards at his house. Brett is a good guy he always takes the missionaries to stuff and takes care of them.

- Had a good turn out to institute this week and we had a good game of volleyball afterwards with everyone. Makes it easy to connect with people through sports haha. 

- Had a good break through with the Sekona family which was good! We had a powerful lesson about reading the Book of Mormon more and living its teachings.

- We had a good lesson with Alex and she is progressing really well! He committed her to read the Book of Mormon every day and to pray about it every day as well for a week! 

- Had a good lesson with Nigel (less active rugby player) and he has been reading his Book of Mormon ever day since we last saw him so we were stoked for that!! He is such a good guy.

- We had a good dinner with the Barber family and got to meet their two sons who are in the youth. One of them got his mission call to Perth this past week too so it is good to help him prepare to go out. We made a solid connection with the family though and they invited us over again in a couple of weeks at church the next day hahaha. 

- We haven't been able to meet with Jack or Tinnai for a little, but they are still in our teaching pool. We are hoping to get to see them this week. 

Everything is going really good here though! It is looking like this is where Elder Hunt and I will spend the rest of our time on our missions which is sweet!! We really want to finish here together. My little thought for the week is about Christ's love for us,

1 John 4:19

 "We love him, because he first loved us."

The more I learn of the Atonement of Jesus Christ the more I learn of His infinite love for all of us. He truly is the light and life of the world. He gave His life for all of us. I am grateful for my Savior's love. The more I serve the people here the more I feel His love for me and for everyone I meet. He is real and He lives. 

Elder Jenson

Rugby

You will get the title to my email a little later...

Tuesday- We had Pday and we went and played golf as a flat! It was just a little pitch and put course but it was good fun! After that Elder Hunt and I went to MCM/dinner at the Clarks house which went really good! 

Wednesday- We met with Alex and discussed some more questions she had. She was thinking about dropping us and not taking the lessons but we basically just told her to please give us a chance haha and we invited her to church to see what it is like. Then we went and met with the Sekona family who has heaps of YSA in their family and it was a really spiritual lesson with them! After that we tried to go and visit a few more people but no one was home sadly haha. One of the YSA took us to dinner before institute which was sweet haha. Then we went to institute and we played volleyball afterwards with everyone because heaps of people showed up! 

Thursday- We played some basketball in the morning with some of the less active YSA boys which was a good time for us to connect. Then we went and visited Komiti and had a good lesson with him and his younger cousin. After that we went and met with Taylor Rossel and had a good lesson with him and his parents. He always arm wrestles new missionaries and so he challenged us and I thought I was gonna win but..... yeah moving on hahaha. We had MCM at Bretts house with the other missionaries and we got to update him on all the LA's we are working with. Then we went and did some of our weekly planning

Friday- DTM in the morning went really well, we learned about asking inspired questions. Then we went and did finding for the rest of the afternoon and we got shut down so much it was insane hahaha it was rejection after rejection for us! We had a good laugh at it though. Now comes the best part of the week!!! President Back gave the whole zone permission to go to a professional rugby game!! We went and watched the Canberra Raiders vs. Manly Sea Eagles! It was a sick game!! Holy cow I can't even tell you how much fun it was and how good the game was! It went into overtime and everything! We got some of the YSA boys to come too and we one of the Ward mission leaders and another member come along to be our chaperones haha! Far out it was the coolest experience ever! We all lost our voices by the end haha. 

Saturday- Had a quick service in the morning and then we bussed down to the bottom of our area to go and see someone but they weren't home so we ended up tracting instead. We got told we weren't real Christians by some born again guy and so that was crack up haha. Then we came back up to the north side and did our weekly planning and had dinner! 

Sunday- Alex came to church which was so good! The Gospel principles lesson was on the apostasy and restoration which was perfect! She said she really enjoyed church so that was good! The rest of church went good for the day. Then we went to go and see Ephrim and he invited us to stay for dinner so we did and it was solid. We had a good lesson with him and his family. 

My spiritual thought for the week comes from Alma 38:9

"And now, my son, I have told you this that ye may learn wisdom, that ye may learn of me that there is no other way or means whereby man can be saved, only in and through Christ. Behold, he is the life and the light of the world. Behold, he is the word of truth and righteousness."

There is no other way that we can get to Heaven. No matter how hard we try and no matter how good we are, we will always fall short. Luckily for us Christ has already paid the debt in full. Through Him we are able to find new life, light and strength. The first principle of the Gospel is Faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement for a reason, it is the only way that we can find true happiness and be saved from our sins. I know this is true with all my heart! 

-Elder Jenson