The End of the 3rd Reign of the Judges (Also known as the one where Elder Jensen leaves inner Houston and heads for the COUNTRY!)

Buenos felices dias amigos y familias!

Que honda? Como estan? Espero que cada uno esten SUPERbien. 

I hope this letter finds you happy, healthy, and having the time of your life! This week was awesome! Elder Rasband from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came to visit our building to talk to all the leaders in this area and all the missionaries crammed into the Family History Center to listen to what he was saying! We had a lot of success finding new Less-Actives that we didn't even know existed and by our count now have 30 active members and 50 known Less-Active members. From the land of endless rain and one-step-more than endless humility I, Elder Jensen write my final epistle from the inner city of Houston. Yes, the news has come and I'm trading my polished shoes and straight-fit church pants for a pair of denim jeans and a pair of cowboy boots! After spending 6 months in the inner-city, I am now moving all of my earthly possessions about 20 miles south. I have been assigned to work in the outskirts of the Greater Houston area, as well as the cities of Richmond and Sugarland. 

I am super duper grateful for all the trials and difficulties that have come in the first 6 months of my mission. To be honest, this area has been super difficult. We had been stuck in this no-baptisms rut for almost 3 transfers but I gained such a testimony about how being a missionary is more than baptizing, it's helping others around us. Being a missionary is serving others and making life better for the people around us. I hope that you've all taken the time to look around and find someone in need and help them. Though I am super duper sad to leave Downtown Houston, I won't ever forget what I've learned.

I know that sometimes we have tough times in our lives, that's pretty much a guarantee of mortality, but the important part is that we keeping looking forward full of faith. Everything will work out as long as we trust in God and believe that his plan is better than our plan and his ways are higher than our ways. Just keep moving forward and everything will work out in the end :)

(Elder Palacios wanted to see if he could fit into my suitcase so he could come with me)

Love you all!

Elder Jensen

The Systematic Logistics of Spanish Ward Parties

Hello friends and family!

I hope you are all doing so very well and that everything is going your way. Texas has gone from 45 degrees back up to 80- so from the land of short-sleeved shirts and the only place where y'all is a politically correct term to use, hello from Houston!

So the last six weeks have been pretty tough, we haven't had anyone coming to church or haven't really felt like anything was going our way and I have to admit, it was a pretty bummer last few weeks. But this week we finally had two investigators show up to church! It was a miracle and although it's not a ton, it was a huge success for us. Then on Saturday my week was made when we had our ward party, and it was the best thing in the world. So, a fun fact: our ward does not go light when it comes to parties. I'm talking Wii's in the back for the kids, hired DJ's, lip syncing competitions and missionary-served food. The best part? 80's themed so the whole night was just a Spanish jumbled mess of awesome. 

So why is Elder Jensen sharing random numbers from people that came to church and how awesome a little ward party that had was? Well to prove that life has ups and downs. In this area, I have learned so much but the greatest lesson of all is that we're all going to have ups and downs in life. Because life is a roller coaster, but you know what? It's our roller coaster and I learned that no matter what, we have a choice in how we respond to hardships and trials. In the words of my Mission President..."you just have to fake it till ya' make it". I know that's true and that when we have hard times, you just have to make the best of life and keep moving forward and maybe even team up with the young single adults in your ward and play keep-away with a fellow companion's water bottle. 

Love y'all,

Elder Jensen

Around the World in 7 Days

Ha'cha utz a wech familia y amigos?

Not even 0% sure if that's how you spell that, but if you say it to a Guatemalan it means "Hi what's up?!". I hope that you all are happy and healthy and enjoying life because that's how life should be! So this week was definitely a week. First off, we had the opportunity to meet a lot of new people, our President has asked us to have a focus on finding new investigators and we did just that! Political unrest in Guatemala has sent a lot of new immigrants our way who don't even speak Spanish! In Guatemala they learn Spanish in school but at home (at least in the city of Toto) they speak a dialect called Quiche. It's a really awesome dialect that literally makes zero sense..a word that's spelled "ri re xibija'lija'xbiab" could really sound like "re re fish". Granted that's just an example, but it's been really neat to get to learn it! We have a investigator who's husband speaks Spanish but she doesn't speak any Spanish at all so we've been learning how to start the conversation in Quiche so the husband doesn't have to translate as much. It was funny because right when I started to get a hang of Spanish, we got a Quiche shaped wrench thrown in our lives to humble us :) 

In other exciting news, our area has done something that has never been done before! In Houston, a big focus for the City of Houston and the Church has been to teach English to recently arrived immigrants. So they just decided to partner together and so for the last 3 years the Church has been implementing the Daily Dose program to teach the parents of students who just recently arrived in the junior high school around Texas. Fast-forward three years and the English as a Second Language coordinator for a local high school in our area hunts us down on the street (ends up following us for 10 something minutes) and asks us to start an English Class in their school. 5 days, a couple calls with President, and meetings with various school leaders and we are now in charge of an high school class where we go in and teach recently arrived refugee kids how to talk in English. It has been such a humbling experience to get to know these kids (who are really only 3-4 years younger than I) and hear their stories about coming to the U.S. from Burkina Faso, Rwanda, Columbia, Guatemala, Uganda, and the DRC. 

A lot of them lost family members, friends, and left behind all they had to come the America. Their stories humble me a lot, I've realized in the last few days truly how blessed I am. It changes how you think about things. A few days ago we found a group of Romanians that are living in one of the mega apartment complexes that we work a lot in and we started teaching all of them! The translation rate is about 50% but the mother of them all, also speaks Italian which is more like a 75% translations rate. It's been such a special experiences because although they have nothing in their fridge, no food on the table, and we don't even speak their language, they are still the most loving people in the entire world. Every time we finish lessons all the kids come and give us the biggest hugs and it's the most special feeling in the entire world. 

It's also changed how I look at the world, I mean I have been blessed with so much. With a family, food on the table, and everything I could ever need, yet sometimes I find myself complaining about little insignificant things that mean nothing. It was neat because we had the opportunity to host President Russell M. Nelson (who for those that don't know, he is one the twelve apostles in the LDS Church and it's a super big deal when they come to visit) in our ward's chapel. All three Houston missions came and he spoke to all of us for about 3 hours. I got to direct traffic and his security guard ran over my cone so that's my claim to fame :) 

He taught us a lot of lessons but the most profound was our purpose. He told us, and the mayor of Houston, that the reason Missionaries are where they are is to make life better for the people in their area. It doesn't matter if it's through teaching them about God and Jesus Christ, or if it's just serving and helping other people, we are literally where we are to help others and that's the best job in the entire world :) When times get tough, just lose yourself in helping other people, and keep moving forward! 

Les amo mucho :)

Elder Jensen