Coventry Ward

 Missionaries for Coventry ward and President and Sister Rasmussen.

Seven are confirmed members of the church.

So Busy!

Dear Family & Friends, Well it's been the most insane week of my mission I think! I've never had a week go by so fast before! It's been way good though. I'll give you a rundown of the week... Monday: P-day! I never quite understood what missionaries meant when they said they have no time to write letters. Haha, I get it now though! P-day is one of our busiest days! We had to end it an hour early this week too so we could go to a Dinner appointment. We did GQ-ing in city centre after our Dinner appointment. Tuesday: We had to be at the mission office at 9:10 for an interview with President Rasmussen. It was a companionship interview. He basically just asked us if we wake up on time, if we're in the flat on time, if we go to bed on time, if we follow the missionary schedule and if we are exactly obedient. Then he showed us the key indicators for the mission. That was way cool to see. Then, we had an interview as a companionsihp with the AP's. They talked to us about accountability and asked us questions like, Do you have daily contact with your investigators? Do you invite them to be baptised on a date by the second lesson at the latest? Questions like that. They are way nice though. After that, we got supplies from the office and took them to our car and then went to the chapel to prepare for leadership council. President gave some amazing training!! He talked to us about living the things that we teach and how we can't teach any of the lessons with power if we are not being exactly obedient. It was so powerful. After the meeting, we ate some homemade food from Sis. Rasmussen. It was great. After the meeting we went straight to Leicester and began our exchange with the Westcotes sisters. I stayed in Coventry with Sister Gilmour. She is so great. She's 34 years old, I think, (that was slightly intimidating!) but she's a sweetheart. She's from Ireland and has a great sense of humour. We had some lessons that night. We met with our investigator, Agus, he's from indonesia and the nicest guy ever! He ended up bringing a friend with him and we taught them the Gospel of Jesus Christ and set them on a baptismal date for next month. Wednesday: We spent the morning doing some finding in city centre and also taught Kindness, Bubble, and Carol. Kindness is doing GREAT. He still isn't on a date but he is reading in the Book of Mormon every day and is really taking it in. Bubble, is our cute chinese investigator and she is AMAZING. She absoultely loves meeting with us. She told us during the lesson that she loved church and she wants to come every week. Also, she said she called her mom and told her about meeting us and her mom was so happy for her! (Which is a giant miracle, most chinese parents don't want them to meet with us or get baptised but her mom is a Christian and counted it as a miracle that Bubble met us!!) So we invited Bubble to be baptised on March 1st and she said yes! After our exchange, we had a dinner appointment and ward coordination. Thursday: District Meeting! I love district meeting. Our District Leader, Elder Packer is fantastic too. He actually reminds me SO much of Jake! He's a big guy but has the most tender heart. He gets really excited and pumped in district meetings and is always trying different things. This week we all sat in a circle and just asked each other questions about what we need help with. We realized that we all needed help with involving the ward more in fellowshipping our investigators so we wrote down the names of all the investigators in the district and good members to fellowship on a whiteboard and then matched them up. It was really helpful. The rest of the day we literally just did finding in citry centre! It was a bit rough as it was just raining all day but we found some cool people so it was worth it. Later we had a dinner appointment with our investigator, Sarah and a member, Tish. I don't remember if I've said much about Sarah yet, so here's her story as a recap. She had a dream about Joseph Smith saying that she needed to find out who he was. So she asked her co-worker (sister Taroni, in our ward) if she knew anything about Joseph Smith and she said heck ya! So we've been teaching her ever since. She's a really slow progresser but she's making some major changes recently. Just this last week she broke up with her partner of 7 years. That was a miracle. She's reading the Book of Morman and she comes to church every Sunday. She's amazing. Her and I have a really special relationship too. She actually reminds me a lot of Lori Park. She's 39 years old I think and has 3 boys but I just really love her and look up to her. Please pray for her this week! Friday: Weekly planning then exchanges with the sisters in Nuneaton. I went to their area with Sis Gardner. She's a young missionary but she is so amazing. We did lots of finding and had a couple lessons and dinner appointments.Lots of fun! ...sorry running out of email time! ahh typing quick... Saturday! Exchanged back! We had an activity later at the church called Chinese hotpot! SO FUN. Tons of our investigators came and we ate traditional chinese food at the chapel with members of the ward. it was a huge success. Sunday: Church! Bubble, Carol, and Sarah came! AND, Sarah brought a friend!!! They loved it and her friend said we would see her the next week! So exciting. Good things happening in Coventry. I love being a missionary! It's the best! I gotta go!!! Haha sorry this is so scrambled. Hope you all have a fantastic week! LOVE YOU!! Sister Jensen <3

In his Service

Dear Family & Friends Well I think I am starting to get the missionary chronic fatigue syndrome. I just feel SO tired all the time! It's okay though because I only feel tired when I sit down. Haha. I have a strong testimony that Heavenly Father strengthens those who are in his service. Well this week was hectic but fantastic! We had our first exchange on Tuesday with the Glenfield sisters. I got to stay in Coventry with Sister Egbert (who is from my MTC group) so that was fun! We stopped by some former investigators, taught some lessons and did some finding. We had two awesome miracles! One of the formers we stopped by didn't live there any more but the girl who answered the door was interested and invited us back for the next day! Also while we were GQ-ing in town, we met a girl, Carol who was also interested. Sister Muller and I taught her the next day and set her for a baptismal date on the 22nd of February. She is from China and is just super sweet. She told us that she's always believed in God and that she has received answers to prayers. She came to church on Sunday and loved it! We found out later that she is also best friends with one of the Chinese investigators, Kathy that the elders are teaching! So cool. The rest of the week was full of flogged appointments and lots and lots of finding! It can be discouraging at times because we get a lot of potentials but most of them don't show up to appointments and they won't answer our phone calls or respond to texts. But when you find that one person who is ready, it makes all of the hours of finding in the rain with frozen toes worth it! The highlight of my week was on Saturday. We had the privilege of going to see Roy be baptised back in Lichfield! It was such a special experience. We got there at 10:40 am Saturday morning and the baptism was to start at 11:00. We practiced the musical number with the Lichfield Sisters. Roy was in his whites and was looking very nervous! Almost more nervous than Roy was his wife Pat, who had been waiting for this day for nearly 40 years. Two of his non-member children were also there at the baptism and the chapel was more packed then it usually was on a Sunday! It was amazing to see my family in Lichfield. The Dracocardos family is moving to Meridian, Idaho! You will have to look them up on facebook and get in touch with them. I think they are only living there for a few months though. Well, the baptism began a bit late but it was a wonderful service. We sang, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. Then Roy was baptised! He was SO nervous but it went perfectly, one and done! We all went back into the chapel and waited for Roy to come back inside. When he came back, he was wearing a brand new suit. I had never seen him in a suit before and he just looked absolutely amazing. I couldn't hold back the tears as I saw this man who had changed so much in the last 6 months. It was such a testimony to me that it is NEVER too late to change! Even at 82 years old, you can decided to turn your life around and follow Jesus Christ. I am grateful as well for the example of his dear wife, Pat, who never once gave up on him and has been praying for him for 40 years. She is an incredible woman whom I admire. Through faith and prayers, all things are possible! After the baptism, we gathered in the cultural hall for lunch. I got to talk with one of Roy's daughters and she told me how surprised she was when her dad announced his decision to be baptised. She said that growing up he was very Anti and wanted nothing to do with the church. But she said that looking at him now, he just seems to be more even-killed and at peace with everything. What a wonderful thing to witness! I am grateful that Heavenly Father blessed me with this experience. I know that as we come unto Christ, he brings peace and happiness into our lives. Happiness that we haven't before experienced. What a wonderful gospel we proclaim! It is so pure and simple and perfect! Go share it with someone. :) Love you all!!! Sister Jensen

Roy's baptism

Roy's Baptism!

All is Well

Dear Family & Friends, Well, there isn't much to say that I haven't already told you! So this is just an email to inform you all that all is well in rainy-old England! It's been raining for basically the last week with lots of wind! Hopefully there will be an end to it soon! We are SO looking forward to the new year with hopefully some baptisms on the way! This weekend we did some service for the ward. We were asked to help with a wedding and I can now say that I have carved a pig! They had a hog roast and I was assigned to cut the meat off and serve it to the guests. Haha. Dad you would have had a good laugh. On Sunday after church we all went downtown and helped out with feeding the homeless. We had these big crates of food and the people would just come by with sacks and we would fill them. It was really humbling to see. There were a few other missionaries there and some members of a different church. It was really cool joining forces with people not of our faith and feeling their love. Reaching out to others is what Christianity is all about. Well, sorry this is a really short email this week but I hope that you all have a wonderful start of 2014! I love you all so much!! Love, Sister Jensen

Best Days ever!

Dear Family & Friends So, what to say about this week. It was (can you guess what I'm going to say?) GREAT! Monday: So we were going to go to Costco, but we found out only one set of missionaries could go.. :( So we just chilled at home for the afternoon. Some of the other Elders were allowed to go to Costco though and they brought us some ice cream! That made things better. :D I had a driving lesson that night. It was terrifying and I almost started crying! It was really dark and we drove on the motorway (which is basically the highway) and it was raining and the driving instructor kept telling me I was going too fast and that I needed to pretend I was driving for the first time. Poor Sister Moser was dying in the backseat. Missionaries are definitely protected! Tuesday: Probably one of the best days EVER. We were just so so happy the whole day... here's why: So last week we decided to tract this street, and before we knocked on any doors, I could just FEEL that someone amazing was there. And there was! His name is Chris. He is 18. He invited us back to talk with him on Tuesday (this day). I was a bit nervous because first of all, he's English and they "can't be bothered" and second, he said when we knocked his door "I'll have a lot of questions for you." So I was thinking, "Man, he's gonna' just want to bash and be silly with everything..." But, as you probably can already tell, that was not the case. He is SO amazing and so spiritually sensitive! He started to get emotional when we shared the first vision with him. He said he really wanted to come to church with us! So yeah, after that I was just so so happy for the rest of the day. I was honestly thinking the rest of the day "Was that real? Did someone hire him to mess with us? Is Ashton Kutcher going to pop out from the bushes and say you've been punked?" Haha. Luckily he never did! Wednesday: ZONE MEETING! It was fun. Nice to see all the missionaries in our zone, as always. The rest of our day was a bit weird because our ward meeting and our lesson were cancelled, so we talked to some people in town (We will be helping a Chinese guy with his English!), and we visited some members. By the end of the night we were both completely drenched. It's pretty normal though for England.... Now some sad news... Chris texted us and asked for some advice, because he told his parents about our visit and they weren't too happy. They said he has too much going on in his life with school already and doesn't need anything else to fill up more of his time. So they told him he couldn't come to church... We told him if his parents would like to meet us and ask us questions or whatever, we would totally be happy to do that, but his mom said no... we will still see him this next Tuesday, so hopefully we can come up with some sort of solution. Thursday: We met Kindness and tried SO HARD to figure out why he won't come to church or commit to be baptized. We're still a bit confused, but we did help him understand how important it is to find out for ourselves if the Book of Mormon is true. He said he will read and pray about it. Then he took us out for lunch to African Village so we could try some Nigerian food. It was surprisingly delicious! I had some jerk chicken with this jollof rice stuff! Friday: We had exchanges, so I stayed in Coventry with Sister Dorado. she's from Bolivia but has lived in London since she was ten. We did a lot of finding and we were supposed to teach a lesson to this other guy, Chris. But he flogged the appointment and we got a text from him later saying he didn't want to do this anymore and sorry. So that was a bummer. We went into town and did a bit of finding and then had a lesson with this guy Pedro. It was AWFUL. He didn't care about what we had to say and was a horrible listener. He just kept interrupting us and preaching to us. At the end of the lesson we invited him to read the book of mormon and it almost broke my heart when he literally pushed it away and said that he's "filcked" through it before, knows what it's about and has no desire to read it. Well we left feeling a bit disheartened but oh well! Saturday: We played football with some ward members, LA's and investigators. It was the best turn-up we've had so far! There were about 9 Chinese people there and Kindness came too. After, we were supposed to have a lesson, but it flogged so we did some tracting. Then we exchanged back! We then had a lesson with Sarah, and we brought along one of my favorite ladies from the ward, Tish. They just chatted for AGES! Which we wanted. We are really trying to give Sarah some more connections in the ward. And they both seem to get on very well! :D Then we had dinner with Tish, which is my favorite because she is such a good cook. Then we went to the chapel to teach Abdul who is a recent convert, and it was CRAZY there because they had a youth convention for seminary. When we showed up they had just started the dance (So tempting to join them! JK JK) so it was hard to find a quiet room. Oh man, but Abdul is AMAZING! I just love his testimony. While we were waiting for him to arrive, tons of youth were piling in and I got to see some from Nottingham and Lichfield! It was the highlight of my evening getting hugs from loads of the Young Women that I love. Sunday: So, for the past couple weeks there have been LOADS of Chinese people going to church! I counted them this time and there were 12! We usually only have about 3 or 4 investigators at church, so it's insane! I love it. One of the Chinese kids, Joe who just got baptised got confirmed during the meeting. In his blessing it said how it was no coincidence that he had met the missionaries and that if he stayed faithful, the Lord would use him in establishing the church in china when the doors will be opened! It was SO cool especially with all the chinese people there. Heavenly Father really does work in mysterious ways and he is definitely preparing China already for the gospel to roll forth! It is amazing to me to be able to look from the sidelines and see his miracles. I love this work so much and I testify that serving others is what will bring you the greatest happiness! Love you all SO much! Sister Jensen

Dinner with Kindness

 Nigerian food at the African Village!