Monday, September 30, 2013

Elder Christensen: Letter 09/30/13 Loving the land of Lincoln :)


Well family, this week has been crazy. Being back in Springfield really has been a blast to the past. I went to my old apartment to meet the new Elders, and to get a map from them because my comp and I both don't have a GPS. Ha! Ha! But that's ok I've gone this far on my mission without one. A little longer won't kill me! The Meserveys drove us up in a 2013 XJL Jaguar. That was such a nice ride! I loved every minute of it.  They took us to Panera (its like Kneaders) and that really hit the spot. :)  They also got me a new suit today! When they picked me up at transfer meeting, they noticed all the other missionaries making fun of my baggy clothes. Ha! Ha! So they were like "oh we will take care of that!!" and they did. lol Very nice people. I love the Meserveys! :)

We had a meeting in St. Louis on Wednesday and its the longest meeting ever! We simply talked about our zones and how they're doing and any struggling Elders or Sisters and talk about how we can help them. It takes 6 hours to do all this and we get trainings from the AP's (Assisstants to the President) and some other ZL's (Zone Leaders). It's the longest day of your life! lol.

I love my new companion. Elder Sutherland has been out 23 months, so I will be his last companion, so we will be going out with a bang hopefully! ha!ha! This area hasn't had a lot going on since I was here a year ago. They have had a few baptisms but not what they deserve. The Ward is great. I also got to see a few from the 2nd ward but not Amanda or Grandma Hurley yet. Hope we will meet up again. 

We had tons of teaching appointments this week and most of them were home so it was a great week. :) Got 2 new investigators as well. I'm very glad we are working hard in this area, cuz ZL's in the past haven't, so its good for this area! Your mission would be so boring if all you did was the meetings and exchanges and checked up on people all time, so I'm very happy we do missionary work haha!! My favorite lesson of the week was when we found Josh. He is 16 years old and loves techno and computers and his mom is a less active member and we talked with him and he was super open with us it was great! We taught the restoration and he told us about his struggles with losing his sister about a year ago, and it felt so good to look him in the eyes and promise him that he will see her again.  I could see the joy in his eyes after hearing this and I'm so thankful we have the knowledge we do of the plan of salvation. I can't imagine how hard this life would be without it! I love you all and hope your doing well!

Love Elder Christensen


Monday, September 23, 2013

Elder Christensen: Letter 9/23/13 Sprigfield, IL Round 2


I heard on Sunday that my Utes are still spanking the Cougars. I've got some more good news for you :) This week I did my final exchanges with Rantoul and Urbana, and got them stoked for the next transfer. It was real cool cuz I told Elder Locklear he will be a District Leader before he knows it, and he is taking my place now! Ha! Ha! As for me, I'll be going back to Springfield, IL as a Zone leader.:) Well if I could've picked any place to go. I got it! Ha! Ha! I'm so excited to see all my old converts and how they're doing and kick some youth in the butt to get them out on missions. This area truly wont be the same with out B.Robb... I'm gonna have to make it for my zone though, this will be an epic transfer! Ha! Ha! I'm really gonna miss biking everywhere. I loved it and it was really helping me get in shape, but I will go where they want me to go. I'm also gong to miss serving with Elder Dominguez. He was awesome! I had him sign my journal and it was all in Spanish, so I had him translate it to me, and I wrote it in English. ha ha From what I was told, he will miss serving with me as well. This transfer went by so fast, it blows my mind!

Well I'm going to be ruffing it in a $200,000 guest home for a while, so feel for me family. Also we will be driving a 2012 Subaru legacy. Life is hard!  Hopefully they get the zip line fixed before it gets too cold. I want another ride!  What I find really funny is I'm going back to Springfield almost at the exact same time I did last year and I got a 6-week shaft at the same time! lol Maybe I'll spend both of my Christmasses in Springfield?

I hope all of you are doing well and are ready for fall!

Love Elder Christensen

Monday, September 16, 2013

Elder Christensen: Letter 9/16/13 Holy Jamba


 


Well family, this week we went bus contacting because an Elder left some bus tokens in the area. So we got on the red 2, and I gave out 3 Bom's, 4 restoration pamphlets, and taught 7 other lessons and 10 Mormon.org cards. I miss the buses! That is definitely my best contacting approach! I wish we could do that more often. We would be teaching like 20 people instead of 2 and 8 Less Actives! lol So Chris the former investigator that we handed off to the Zl's will be getting baptized this week so that's great! I'm glad we called him and gave him a baptism tour and helped get him on track! I will be doing the baptism interview this Wednesday, so it will be official after then. :)

We also had Mission Conference this week and got to hear from Elder Godoy. He was so cool! He is a seventy from Brazil and taught us a lot about missionaries, and different types, and how to improve no matter where you're at. I really liked it.  I learned that I'm a very good missionary when it comes to technique and inviting, but I'm not as good in the attributes area. At the beginning of my mission till about 8 months, I would've said the opposite! Ha! Ha! I just need to find my balance. :)

I was on exchanges this week with Elder Anderson, and we where contacting on campus and we talked to this one girl for almost 30 minutes and she was like thank you so much, and I asked her where she was going she was like, "Jamba Juice." I was like, "shut up, no way!" I've looked my whole mission for a Jamba Juice, and haven't found one. So we went with her and sure enough there it was in the union building. I almost cried at this beautiful sight! I got a power white gummy and was very pleased!! That was the best way to end the day! I needed that tender mercy for sure. It's been a harder week. We found no new investigators and most of our appointments fell through, which really sucks when you have to bike 5 miles to knock a door .... But it puts hair on your chest! Ha! Ha! I don't mind biking everywhere though. I'm in my own world whenever we bike, but I don't feel too effective as a missionary when I'm in that mode.  I love you all hope your ready for fall then winter. I'm stoked! I hope I'm not biking in the snow, but if I do it will be legendary! I'll probably fly off a snowbank/ jump in to a car! Ha! Ha !

Love Elder Christensen  

Monday, September 9, 2013

Elder Christensen: Letter 9/9/13 Casting Demons





Well family, I had another great week. I'm loving this area! We got a baptism. William Day, he was baptised this Saturday by Elder England in Urbana. Then we contacted a former investigator,  Chris Tepedino, and he was like, "I want to be baptised." So we got that in the works now! We decided to give it to the Zl's (zone leaders) because he wants to go to the singles ward, and they cover that, but at least we got to spark that fire in him. He should be baptised sometime in October.:)  This area has tons of Less Active work and we do a lot of that. I'm starting the 5x5x5 program here so that will help big time!
 
My companion and I are 2 peas in a pod. I love it! We get along great, we are unified in our teaching and we have tons of fun. I'm learning a lot of Spanish from him as well so in lessons I have a general idea of what they are saying now. It's pretty cool! This week was a way hot week and biking wasn't the funnest, so we would do like jumps and tricks to make it less miserable and i went all out! Ha! Ha! I almost took out a mailbox after catching some air off an old cement ramp! Ha! Ha! It was funny. The best trick was I was able to balance the bike on a rail road track for like 25 feet! Sorry grandpa Redman, I know that doesn't make you happy that I wasn't following the railroad safety you've taught for years... I couldn't resist tho and got some good pics. I'll try to get them on the blog.
 
We are working with a part member family right now. She is our closest to baptism, and that's still a ways to go ha ha! We are doing all we can tho!  As a district we are doing amazing tho. I love this district! The sisters are super crazy and funny which makes p-day interesting and they remind me of my crazy funny friends and all our adventures.:) I miss them so much! Nine months isn't too much longer tho, so keep strong my friends I'll do the best I can! 
 
One crazy story is this week on exchanges, Elder Teixeira and I were tracting and this old black man comes stumbling out of his house and yells "Elders come here!" So we did and he was wasted of his rocker and then a younger black woman came out and said, "come cast the Demons out of this house!" And I was, "what the heck are these people on?" She was like, "look at me the demons made me this way!!" So we went in and said a prayer and cast the demons out...  but the saddest part was seeing 3 little kids in the living room huddled in the corner seeing their mom and grandpa get drunk til they drop. I wanted to take a kid with me so bad! Some peoples kids.... you could feel the presence of evil in that home, but after the prayer I felt some peace. Then when we left, one little black kid like 4 years old came and hugged my leg and said, "thank you Jesus." I wanted to laugh,  but then after I thought about it, the kid probably really thought I was Jesus.... so gave him a Book of Mormon and then we had to run to the baptism. Crazy, funny, and sad experience for ya! The Urbana Elders will be teaching them this week. Love you all!

Love Elder Christensen

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Elder Christensen: Letter 9/3/13 Memory Lane


Well family, this week a lot of our appointments fell through, but we did get some new investigators for the other areas around us, so that's good.  This week I also got to give my 1st Baptism interview. That was awesome! Very spiritually uplifting for me, and the investigator. He will be baptised this Saturday, so that will be awesome. Hope we can get some of our investigators there for that. 
 
We had a miracle happen this week. We had like 2 hours left and had nothing planned, and I told my comp lets go ride our bike on campus. He looked at me and said, "Elder, are you trunky?" "Do you know how many girls are on campus on Saturday nights?" I said, "no, no, that's not why I want to go there. The Spirit is telling me we need to be at the Union building" (which is right in the middle of all the party buildings...). So my comp said okkkk, but I could tell he still thought I wanted to go for the girls. lol Some people's kids...  When we got to the Union building, Daniel Lee was there and just got out of this discussion for his business class, and was like "Elders can we meet?"  I was like HECK YES! That's what I'm talking about! We taught the gospel of Jesus Christ and went over the baptism questions he said he doesn't feel ready yet, but he has felt the Spirit when we meet, so we are making progress with him. Hope we can help him the rest of the way before he has to go home!
 
All in all its been a good week. Very hot and humid, so biking everywhere has been a blast, and the cherry on top it that our AC unit broke, so we got that fixed. Ha Ha Glad fall is almost here!!  We had Zone p-day yesterday in Springfield. That was a blast to the past! It's been almost 1 year since I 1st went to Springfield. So many great memories are there and going to the mansion to play football, capture the flag, and ultimate Frisbee was great.  Can't believe that it was a year ago when I met B.Robb and he showed me how Springfield was going to be the best area of my mission. I'm very sore and hope I'll have enough in me to bike the rest of this week! Ha Ha! Our team won in every event. Go Champaign! 
 
I love you all hope you doing well!!

Love Elder Christensen