Transfer week!!!!

So this last week was the first week of transfers, and it was a busy week. I loved every moment of it though.

So Monday towards the end of emailing I checked an email from President Pingree, and he asked me to give him a call when I had a couple of minutes. He said he wanted to talk to me about transfers. So I went out of the room from where my companions were. No worries, I was still in sight and sound of them so we are good! But I called President Pingree, and he then on the phone asked me if I would be willing to come and serve as and assistant in the office! This came out of no where!! I was pretty dang nervous, but I accepted the call, and told him I would do my best!! 

   Well Tuesday was transfers, and I just kinda was walking around the parking lot helping missionaries get on there ways. After we loaded up the trailer with the luggage for the departing missionaries. I felt so weird doing this, but we then had the chance to go and take these missionaries around to different trainings and to the temple that day!! We got to go through and go to the temple with them. It was such a blessing! 

After we went to the temple, we went to take them to the mission home for a dinner and a devotional!! And it was such a great devotional! The Testimonies were so powerful and sincere! Many of the missionaries that have gone home this transfer I became close to!! They are all so great! We then went to take the elders back to our apartment for the night. We had to then drop the transfer van of at the mission office and pick up our van. After having to get some other things ready we got back to our apartment at about 10:30.

   Wednesday we went and began to pick up the departing missionaries and took them back to the mission home for breakfast. They ate breakfast, and then we were off to the airport. I had to say goodbye to some of those missionaries that I came close to. It was hard, but I was happy, and thankful for all that they did. After we dropped them off and got them checked in we went back to the mission office to start filing some different reports. 

We were expecting the new missionaries to come in that day around 1:30 pm.  We got back to the airport around 1:15, and we ran in there to get there in time. Well we had a big storm that came through, and caused all of the flights to be delayed. We were waiting at the airport for about 3-4 hours waiting for our missionaries to come in. During this time me and my new companion Elder Hillebrant had the opportunity to eat lunch with President Pingree, Sister Pingree, and their daughter Kate. I twas such a great experience to be with them!  It is going to be hard to see them go. We love them so much! I know President Mortensen will be great also! I am excited for things I will learn from him, but I will for sure miss the Pingrees. 

   Well we finally picked up the new missionaries. We greeted them right as they came off the plane! After talking with them for a little bit got there luggage, and we brought  them back to the mission office for some training. While they were in training we were doing more reports on the computer. Then after we went to the mission home and had a dinner and devotional! All of these missionaries have such a great spirit about them! I know they will do so great! 

   Thursday we had the training meeting for new missionaries and their new companions. We had the chance to take the new missionaries to another room and present some different training for them. Again they have such a strong spirit that they bring with them, and we had a great meeting and training. After that we got them on there way, and we went back to the mission office after lunch to do some more numbers and transfer things. 

But that afternoon we got the chance to go out and meet our ward mission leader. His name is Moroni, and so everytime I see him I call him Captain. He is so cool, and he is all about helping hasten the work! I think we will see some great miracles with him. 

  Friday we had some more things in the office, but then we went and taught one of our investigators named Kyle. He is pretty cool, we are trying to work with him to read the Book of Mormon. That is really what he needs right now. So after we had a good lesson with him, we left and as we drove away, we saw he was in the parking lot reading out of The Book of Mormon. It was great! 

Saturday we did our bed route. We basically went and drove around the mission the whole day delivering mattresses, and other items. We had to go get mattress from some apartments that no longer had 3 missionaries and take them to apartments that then needed an extra bed. We were at the office from 10-11:30ish. Then we began to sing as we drove and drove and drove. and drove. We didn't get home that night until about 9:40 pm. It was a long day, but it was so good! We got that finished and we were happy!

  

They told me that the first and last week of every transfer can be crazy at points, but from now on things will slow down a little bit! We are trying to be out and working at every moment we get. I love this chance. It is also so crazy, because next Monday we will be going to the airport with President and Sister Pingree to get the new mission President and their family. 

Sorry this email was so long, but just wanted to give y'all and update! Things are going well here! I love this new opportunity that I have! I have felt so blessed my whole mission to be out here and to work! I love this gospel so much! I can't wait to get back out and to work hard! This is such a great work we get to be apart of! Please be anxiously engaged in helping hasten the work! I know it will bless your life more than anything else!

Hope y'all have a great week!

Elder Joshua V. Christensen

I will sent more pics next week, I left my cord at the apartment, but if you go the the mission blog there are some good pics on there from our week! (Pictures in the post above are from the mission blog).

Transfers

Hey I found out that I am getting transferred! It was a quick six weeks. I am not sure if I will be be staying in Cypress or where I will go. But from what it seems like they may be putting zone leaders back together in the mission before the new mission president comes in two weeks! There is a chance that I might be going back to the area I started in, so that could be kinda fun. But I will send out my new address once I receive it! So until then please don't send anything! 

Follow up from Elder Christensen on his transfer after his original email:

I don't know the address yet, but I just received a call from president Pingree, and he has asked my to come and serve with him in the office as an assistant. Holy cow!!!!!!!!!! I am so nervous!!! But I am excited for the opportunity!! This is such a big shock!! Once I find out the address, I will let yall know next week! but really in all honesty you can just send mail to the mission office and I will get it! Ahhh any advice!!

This last week was good! I am going to have to keep it pretty short, but we saw some really great miracles this last week. We were able to get in with different members and less active members and were able to go through some of the missionary lessons with them. There is a member named Brother Howery. Right now at the moment he isn't very interested in coming back to the church. But over the past few weeks we have been able to get in and talk a little bit with him!! He is such a nice guy, and I think he is getting to a point where he will be ready to come back. This last week we talked with him and he brought up over and over family! And so by the end of the night we taught a lesson on eternal families!! It seemed to go over pretty well.

I wish I had more time this week to write but these last few days have been so dang crazy for me. Next week I will have a longer email. But I just also wanted to say happy fathers day to all the fathers!! I love one of the mormon messages by the church, and I invite yall to watch it! It is so good!! It is called

Earthly Father, Heavenly Father

I have such a testimony that God is our loving Heavenly Father!! He wants us to be happy while we are down here on the earth!! He has given us our familes to bless our lives! I know that as we read the scriptures, pray, and go to church as a family when we can, that our familes will be strengthened and we will feel a great sense of love for each member of our families!! I know this to be true! I have experienced in my life, and I am seeing first hand how it is blessing other families!! 

I hope yall have a great week!

Elder Christensen

Spiritual Awakenings

Hey Everyone!! Things are going well here!! This past week was a little bit slower, but we saw such a great miracle happen. So on Wednesday We were out working on the other side of our area. We were trying to stop by different less active members as well as investigators we haven't seen in a while! Well we were working till around 2 and decided to go grab a quick lunch. 

So we went in and had lunch, and after we were leaving and someone came up to us and asked us if we spoke Spanish. Well my companion Elder Alvarenga speaks Spanish. So he started talking with him, and the guys name was Gerardo, and long story short he came from California and he is trying to start a new job. Well he needed somewhere to stay for a couple nights until he would start his new job the next week. We gave him the address to our church, and the missionaries phone number in the Spanish ward if he would ever be interested in coming and seeing the building. We told him we would also see if we could find him a place to stay for a couple nights. 

After we left, and we were trying to meet with a couple more people and 30 min later we got a call from Gerardo, and he was at the church and wanted a church tour. So we biked over there and gave him a tour of the church! Elder Alvarenga did all the speaking. He also began to go into the restoration and I was listening very close. I could understand a lot of what they were talking about. By the end of the tour Gerardo committed himself to be baptized one June 21st! At the end he also asked about a priesthood blessing! I was expecting Elder Alvarenga to give it, and then he asked me to do it. I accepted and gave him a blessing in English, but I know the spirit was telling him what  I was saying! I felt that this blessing was truly directed by the spirit, and that he felt the message of what we taught him was true! 

At the end he let out a sigh of relief and told Elder Alvarenga that he felt really really good! We went our separate ways but we kept in close contact with him. Just in that first night he began reading the Book of Mormon and got through 2nd Nephi, and he said he prayed to ask if it was true and said that he knew it was true and once his family comes up from Mexico he wants his whole family to be baptized as well! It was such a blessing to be able to talk with him and to hear that!

  

Also this week I had the chance to go to my final MLC with President Pingree!! And it was such a great meeting! Topic was on spiritual awakenings! We went through Alma chapter 5. And we talked a lot about what a spiritual awakening is and how we experience them. And there was a common pattern that we see happen during a spiritual awakening! 

1. Usually there is some kind of trial or struggle.

2 We begin to read the words of God

3 We have a facilitator that helps us during this time!

4 Act of faith, which is where we begin to read and pray with sincere intent to know its true and to change!

5 And the spirit testifies to us of the truthfulness of that! 

I wish I had more time to go more into detail with all of these, but it was such a great experience to really see how they all play into each other! I would invite all of you to read in the scriptures and look for examples of when this happens. I know that we all go through out points in our lives where we have spiritual awakenings! 

Our life here on earth is about Spiritual awakenings and becoming closer to God and more prepared to meet him! 

Now the trials I am going through right now are preparing me to become more enlightened by the spirit! It makes me have a completely different look at my life and the things I go through! I would just also invite you to look back through your life and ponder about spiritual awakenings in your life! And then think of how they helped you to become a better person and closer to God! 

I know that as you do this that you will feel a greater relationship with Heavenly Father, and you will have your perspective changed to see how we can grow and change! I know this to be true, and I leave that with you in the name of Jesus Christ amen.

I hope all y'all have a wonderful week!

Elder Joshua V. Christensen

Doctrine and Covenants 123:12

From 6/2/14

Hey everyone! Things have been going really well! This week I was able to see a couple of really cool miracles! 

12 For there are many yet on the earth among all sects, parties, and denominations, who are blinded by the subtle craftiness of men, whereby they lie in wait to deceive, and who are only kept from the truth because they know not where to find it.

From Monday night until Tuesday night I was able to go on exchanges with one of the district leaders who has been out just a little longer than I have. And while we were on exchanges we saw some very cool miracles! So that day was great because of how many lessons we were able to teach! They had a lot of set appointments, and we just went from investigator to investigator. Now there was one or two that ended up falling through, but we came up with a good back up plan for what we would do it that happened. Well one of them included going to one of the complexes in there area and trying to meet with one of there investigators while we were there. 

Well we went there and actually ended up talking with someone else they have been trying to teach for a while! Well we started to share the plan of salvation with him, (Eric) and his wife came over and was going to listen. And like 2 min in she stopped us and said " how do you guys know what to teach?" And we explained how we have different lessons we will usually teach, but we go by the spirit. She then asked us to go inside and teach her teenager. So we went in and we began to talk about how God blesses us when we are obedient, and the spirit was there, and they started to asked some very inspired questions. Those questions we used to lead right into the restoration. 

Because me and Elder Nygard have been out about a year we both are very comfortable with teaching the doctrine, and we were able to teach very well with each other. The spirit was so strong and we were able to bare powerful testimonies! It was such a miracle to see how the conversation both ways was directed by the spirit! Well this family was getting ready to move and they wanted the Elders to come back one more time before they move, and they said that they want to find missionaries in Washington to continue to teach them! I know that God has prepared this family for the gospel, and I know they will be blessed as they continue to follow the promptings of the holy ghost. That was just one of the great miracles we have been able to see this week!

We also recently got a referral  this last week, and went over to teach a guy named Alberto. He didn't have a lot of time so we left him with a copy of the Book of Mormon. And some pamphlets that he wanted. And we were then biking around his house a couple days later and we thought we saw him in his garage so we went up and began to talk with the guy! Well it wasn't Alberto, but it turned out to be his brother. So we began to teach him the restoration because he was very interested in learning what we believed. We taught him and he was very receptive! He said he wants us to come back and teach him more, and he also said he is going to read and to pray to ask God if the Book of Mormon is true!!

Had another lesson this week with a kid name Kyshi! He is way cool, we started to talk with him, and he had a couple mins. He said he would talk to us and wanted us to teach something to him. He said he had seen missionaries before, and they had taught him just a little bit. But we asked him if there was anything in particular he wanted to learn about. We we started to say different gospel principles that he could choose from. He said he wanted to learn about life before we were here on earth, and about Jesus Christ, and about life after death. And so we decided to just teach the plan of salvation. 

Again it was a great lesson! We were able to teach him powerfully! He had different questions, and we answered them and we able to help him understand! By the end of the lesson he said, I feel so weird right now! I feel as though I was asleep. But now I feel like after you taught me this that I am beginning to awaken. The spirit truly taught him about the plan of salvation and touched his heart was able to help him see and understand it. We also gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon to read. He seems very interested and  we will get to meet with him again tomorrow hopefully!

It has been a great week, and I have been so blessed to be able to serve this mission and to meet so many different people! I know that Jesus is the Christ and that as we learn about him and his plan that we will draw closer to our Father in Heaven! I know we have a purpose here on the earth, and it is to prepare our selves to return to live with Him someday.  We all have the same goal, and I know as we look for people who are prepared then we will be led to them! Many don't know the truth because they know not where to find them! 

You hold the responsibility to show them where that truth is. Pray for opportunities and you will be given them.  I know as you do yo will be blessed, and you will be able to strengthen your commitment to follow Christ, and strengthen your family relationships. ! I testify of the truthfulness of that and I say that in the name of Jesus Christ amen. 

I hope y'all have a wonderful week! 

Elder Joshua V. Christensen

We are a peculiar people!

from 5/26/2014

Hey everyone! I hope y'all have had a great week! This week has been very similar to last week. We had a lot of appointments that fell through, but it was still a good week! 

We have been trying to start going through different parts of our area and get to meet the members and less active members here. We had a cool miracle happen while doing this. So we decided to go to a certain part of our area and go through the list like I mentioned. So we did that and we came to a name of a guy in our ward. His name is Brother Potter. He is a less active member. So we got into the area of where he lived, and he lives in a gated community in our area. Well we go and knock on his door, and he answered and was surprisingly happy to see us. He said it was the first time in 5 years that he has seen Elders. He said that alot of missionaries must have been scared away by the no soliciting signs, and the no trespassing signs in this community. 

He let us in and we started to talk with him a little bit, and he was so friendly. He gave us water and starting telling us about himself. He was telling us about how he met the missionaries, and how he became a member. He then told us that once he remarried, his wife wanted to go to a different church. So he stopped coming so he could go to church with his wife. I really felt that if we keep coming back to his house that we will be able to help him out. He travels alot for work, but he invited us to stop by at anytime, and he will let us in and give us some water! I just know that as we are looking for opportunities to help others out, and are really including God in all of our plans that he will bless us. I know that we were led to Brother Potter, and that we will continue to see miracles as we do this! 

    This week we also had zone conferences! And we had such a great training by President, and the assistants. So the main point they were getting at was that we need to always be following God in all that we do. We need to follow the spiritual promptings that we receive. They used different examples out of the Book of Mormon and the Bible. For example in the Book of Mormon when King Noah is questioning about what to do with the prophet Abinadi. As Abinadi taught, King Noah had the thought to release him, but his priests were telling him that it was Abinadi at fault. 

There was that point that he could have listened to the spirit, and followed what God would have him do, but he listened to the voice of man. Our mission President went on to say that as missionaries we are weird! And we need to be! He used the example of how missionaries have to have someone stand behind the car to back it up. That is weird! But that is what we have been asked to do! And as we follow it, we will be blessed! Now when he was talking about this he said we are weird because we all have points where we need to heed to what Gods says, and ignore the voice of the natural man. In 2nd peter 2:9 

  

 9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

  

    As members, and as missionaries we need to be peculiar. We need to be examples to those who are not of our faith! We are weird! The world is changing at a rapid rate, but as we hold fast to the truths of the gospel, we are going to be blessed for it! I know and testify that as we do everything we can to help bring people to Christ, and we follow all of Gods commandments with diligence, and follow all of the promptings of the spirit, meaning acting upon them immediately; God will help us and protect us. He will comfort us when we stand in need of comfort! The Gospel truly is the way that our Father in Heaven wants us to be  happy! Even though in the worlds eyes we are weird, in Gods eyes we are preparing ourselves to live with him again! I know that to be true!

    I am sorry that my emails lately have been shorter, we haven't been have as much time to write. But I hope that all of you are doing well. Please always look for chances to share the gospel with others! This is Gods work, and we are blessed to be apart of it.

I hope all y'all have a great week!

Elder Joshua V. Christensen