Elder Jenson Mission Blog: What an eventful week for the triforce...

Man this week flew by! It has been a good week here in the Sutherland Shire!

Monday- P day baby!! After emailing we went to a city called Bankstown and we went to the mall there to look for big mink blankets that are cheap. We couldn't find any there so we wasted a lot of time there haha but I had fun because I like just bumming around the mall and stuff. I had a cold for awhile then it hit me super hard that day. Luckily the drive home from Bankstown was long because of traffic so I just slept in the back seat haha. I took medicine and started to feel better which was good because we had an appointment to meet with a less active member named John Gibson. We taught him about Matthew 11:28-30 and talked about how through Christ our burdens can be made light. Teaching this also just strengthened my testimony in the Atonement and how much Christ really does take our pains and burdens upon himself so that we can be happier. After we finished teaching him we went over to the Bishop's house and had family home evening with his family. They fed us shepherds pie and oh man it was sooo good!!! I loved having the home cooked meals from members! We taught his family and him about prophets and why we need to follow their teachings.

Tuesday- We found on the train and around the beach for people to teach and just talked to heaps of people! We had a lunch appointment with an old couple named the Jordans. We taught them about 1 Nephi 17:3 and it talks about how if we obey the commandments of God he will provide a way for us while we go through trials and just life in general. We found the rest of the day until we went to a less active member's home and talked to her and her son about how church attendance is a blessing and we invited them to strive to come to church every week and to feel the blessings that come from that. Elder Smith said an awesome quote to end the day, "I love being a missionary for this church because it is just so dang true!" I couldn't agree more with that awesome statement!

Wednesday- We came up with a better way to find and talk to people. We came up with a basic survey with 5 questions to ask people. It actually got people to stop and talk to us! One question was what do you know about mormons? People always replied with, they have like 6 wives, or they are bible bashers, or they are a church made of man, and man it was just funny to hear all the crazy comments hahaha. Through this we were able to share what we believe in easier and put an end to Mormon stereotypes so that people knew what we stood for and believed in. This also lead to people bible bashing with us.. hahaha we bashed with these two girls about grace and how you have to have faith and works, but they just though that you can do whatever you want on this earth but as long as you believe in Jesus Christ that all will be forgiven. We then went on to tell them how if you have faith in Christ then that leads to wanting to serve him and keep the commandments which he has given us, hence faith without works is dead. Well they didn't believe that so they just threw bible verses at us and we did the same with them. It was useless and dumb to do haha but by defending what we believe it really testified to me the truthfulness of the message that we share with people. I know it is true without a doubt!! Still shouldn't have bashed with them so we will not do that anymore hahaha well we will try! We then went to an investigators home who is being taught by the sister missionaries and we taught him about the priesthood. We gave him a blessing and it was so powerful because during it I knew that the words Elder Smith were saying were not his but they were the words from the Lord and they were what Chris (the investigator) needed to hear.

Thursday- We visited a 96 year old man from the ward who is almost all they way deaf and blind. He is Hungarian and honestly we couldn't understand a word he said for the whole hour we were there hahahaha but man he is just a sweet old man and he is funny to listen to. He repeated himself a lot and he told us about his muslim neighbor and about how he got hit by a truck while he was driving his scooter a couple months ago, and he didn't stay at the scene because it was raining and he didn't want to get wet so he just went home! hahaha man he was great. Then we got approached by a man named Jeremy who was in the Vietnam war and had a Mormon friend in the army who told him to look into the church before he got killed in war. So we talked to him for a long time about our church and what we do as missionaries. He treated us to dinner at a steak house and spent about 45 dollars on each of us! He was a super nice guy!! We are hoping to see him at church soon.

Friday- We had zone training which was good we learned about how we have to have effort to learn and the Lord will provide the rest as we continue to try. We also were trained on how to invite investigators to pray! Then we went and gave a blessing to a young guy in the ward who just hurt his knee in field hockey and he needed help with knowing whether he should play or not and if he was ok to play that he would be safe. We then went and mowed a less active members lawn and then we were treated to some gnarly chinese food hahaha but we were grateful for a meal.

Saturday- We went to a place called Paul's Burgers and it was delicious! We taught an investigator we met this week and he just wasn't very receptive haha and he didn't really know what was going on. He has been through heaps of missionaries but we think we could be the ones to turn him around hopefully. The only other cool thing that happened on this day was we saw some members at the beach and they bought us fish and chips!

Sunday- We went to church and then we went out and found people to teach. We talked to one girl who didn't believe in anything. She didn't believe in God or anything after this life.. It was so sad to me that people have such a sad outlook on life. We tried to convince her to let us teach her just once so that she could see how powerful our message is but she wasn't interested.

I am grateful to be a missionary and for this Gospel! I love being a member of this church! I know it is true and I invite all to know for themselves the truthfulness of this message! We only know it is true if we give it a true chance and are dilligent in prayer and learning! Love you all heaps!!-Elder Jenson