May 11, 2014
We had our 2nd "skype call" with Gabe and we were SO excited to see his smiling face! He skyped us from his bishop's house in Augsburg. He is doing GREAT and looks so happy!
Sunday, May 18, 2014
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Fast Muttertag!
May 5, 2014
"What up Family!
So we had Mission Tour this last week, and it is just like Zone Training or a Zone Konferenz but a member of the Seventy carries it out. We were spoiled a few weeks earlier with Elder Evans so it felt just like a normal meeting ha. I got to talk to Elder Herzog at Mission Tour and he updated me on good ol' Pforzheim. It's kind of sad "G" and Sister "E" have lost a lot of interest.
On Tuesday we got a referral from the Church headquarters, first referral I've got on my mission! It was exciting. It was this man that was on mormon.org and wanted a visit. Well he lives all the way north of our area and we have one of the biggest areas of the mission. So on Wednesday we made the journey to this man. Our train was leaving at 5 in the morning, so we got everything ready the night before...but our alarm never went off! We left at 9 in the morning and it took 3 hours to get there from train and bus. It was a beautiful ride though and we saw random old palaces nestled in the hills and in between little valleys and fields of yellow flowers. We made it there and found his house in this little dorf (village) and he wasn't home! We wrote him a note and were about to leave and I said let's klingle it one more time - and his mom pops her head our the window. She seemed really nice but was hard to understand. Anyways we are going to go by again later this week. Please pray for him.
When we got back we went to help this member move stuff from his keller and we met a man riding his bike and started talking to him. We ended up getting his information and are going to try and stop by. Later that evening we had Sportabend and the six Elders came and stayed at our place because the next day we were all heading to Munich. (Mission Tour)
After Mission Tour we had a HUGE finding day in Munich. It was fun, afterwards we carried out an Aus tausch and we all stayed in Augsburg. We went and ate at this Irish Pub because one of the Elders hit his year mark.
Saturday we were invited to this grill party from this non member with the Sister missionaries. A little bit of a different experience but it was fun.
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Mission Impossible meets Europe
April 28, 2014
"Familie,
So I'm emailing late this week because we just got done helping a member move out and paint her apartment. This week went by pretty fast as always! Gosh before you know it a new week begins, it's crazy how fast time really goes. This coming week we have Mission Tour, it happens once a year and it will be in Munich. The Stuttgart zone comes to it in Munich as well. I don't have a whole lot of time, sorry.
On Tuesday we were about 10 minutes out of the city by Straßebahn (street rail type coasters) and we had 20 minutes until the train we needed to catch left. Elder Sponseller and I just took off running! We were kind of lost for a minute, but we were sprinting down and through these little narrow cobble-stoned streets surrounded by old buildings and rivers and streams (just how you would picture it). It was a beautiful day and there were a lot of people out and about so we were trying to dodge them as we were running. Long story short we ended up catching our train some how and we were so red faced and sweating. Then come to find out our train had a 10 minute delay so we got to hang out for a bit while everyone was staring at us. So that was fun, I was laughing the whole time and just enjoying it.
We taught a couple people this week and we've been going by a lot of people from this list of names, but almost every one of them we have stopped by have moved.
Anyways I hope you guys have a great week. Work will get going here, I know it! Augsburg has all that it needs, now just to get it rollin.
Love Elder Jensen"
Special Witnesses
April 21, 2014
"Hi Family,
Today is a holiday in Germany, and we all know that a holiday literally means all of Deutschland shuts down, haha, so I am emailing from the church right now and I don't have a lot of time. This week we were able to have one lesson in Höchstadt which is where all our 'brothers' live. We taught about 4 of them, and one of them is a member. It takes about an hour to get there.
We met with a couple members this week and we met with the Achters family to give a family mission plan. This was my first time meeting with a real family on my mission. They have 4 kids and they are all so strong in the church and do mission work! We also shared a little spiritual Easter message with them by doing the easter eggs with the scriptures, it was fun.
The highlight of this week was our special meeting on Tuesday in Munich. We got to hear Elder Evans from the Seventy and it was just our Zone. The Munich zone has a lot of privileges, and I'm being honest when I say I've never been in a more spiritual meeting in my whole life. I took so many notes and he is truly a special witness of our Savior. It would be impossible to share everything that he shared with us, but he talked to us a lot about the Book of Mormon - which he didn't plan on doing. He talked about how important it is that we have all of our investigators read the Book of Mormon from start to finish. So true! He went into a lot of detail and it was just so spiritual. Again it would be impossible for me to share all that I heard and learned during this meeting! Another thing he talked about was conversion. Now there are some amazing conversion stories where they can remember the exact day, time or event where they were converted and found out the truth for themselves! There are other times when it happens through a period of events and you can't recall a significant event or date that converted you but it just happened. He compared Alma the younger where it was a specific event, and Nephi where it just happened - he believed his dad from the get go and it was built upon from himself and his own faith.
NOW this really got me thinking and I decided to think of my conversion story...I'll be honest, before the mission I had a testimony of this gospel, and I never doubted that what I did know wasn't true...But it wasn't until my mission that I experienced my conversion story. I have a challenge to ALL of you, please write down your own conversion story, because we all have one if we claim to know this church is true. And if it is hard to recall that special witness that we are all promised we will have, I suggest you strive to receive one. I love you all and just know that I KNOW that my Savior lives and he is looking to help us. I am so very thankful for him, everyday of my life!
Elder Jensen"
Happy Easter!!
Friday, May 2, 2014
Frohe Ostern! (Happy Easter)
April 14, 2014
"Hey family!
Wow Augsburg. It's really big! I had a tausch here last Tuesday and Wednesday with another new missionary that is a neighboring Elder. We were both here in Augsburg, needless to say we did get lost a few times, haha. Augsburg is beautiful though and the surrounding areas of Bayern are just rolling green hills with fields of yellow flowers. Very pretty! On a clear day rumor is you can see the Alps, I've yet to see them though. We live in Altstadt which is near the inner city, there is still the old city walls around some of the city. Lots of way old churches here too.
I had my first Sunday here in Augsburg. It was fast and testimony meeting, it was good and the ward is huge! We only have thirty percent activity which is sad, and there is KIDS! Man it's so weird.
Sportabend on Wednesday was fun, we usually just play volleyball and it's not competitive at all. We had two lessons this week...I know that the work here will pick up, we have a lot of great ideas and I'm excited for us to put them into play. Our area is so spread out and the city is really big which makes it difficult with traveling. It can take about 3 hours to get to the end of our area, and sometimes a good 2 hours to get to a lesson one way, then 2 hours back.
We had interviews with President on Sunday here in Augsburg too. Sister Miles and he came to church on Sunday and we were going to throw them a bbq afterwards because our church owns a little grill. So the night before Elder Sponseller and I went and got all this meat and grill stuff and got it all ready, we were so excited! Then when we got to church on Sunday we found out we had a dinner appointment and lesson with a member family that afternoon. They were so excited to have us and had been planning on it so we ended up showing President and Sister Miles where all the meat was and where the grill was so they could cook and eat while we traveled with this member an hour or so to eat with his family. We had a good time and the family was nice, meanwhile the Sister missionaries in our area had their own personal bbq with President and Sister Miles.
Thanks for all that you all do and I hope you have an amazing Easter weekend. I've really been able to have such good spiritual studies and "ah ha" moments this week. I have such a strong testimony when it comes to teaching by the spirit - you know when you are teaching by the spirit when you yourself are shocked at the words that are coming out of your mouth and you learn something from what you say. This is the Lord's work and I'm just honored that I have the opportunity to be a part of it. I love you all and pray for you all.
LG,
Elder Jensen"
Gabe and his companion Elder Sponseller
Gabe's church building
Lunch with the Sisters
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