It is interesting to see what people will say just to get away from you...

So my zone is good. All of the guys in it are great guys/girls they have mainly been out here for a while so they know what they are doing. It is good to learn from their mistakes so I can do good faster :-) haha. This week has been sweet. It has been a mission week you know? Like it is seriously just a regular week you would expect in a mission. Except we don't have anyone to teach, so we are just going out and talking to everyone we can. It is crazy, literally everyone, it makes things cool and interesting to see what people will say just to get away from you haha. We saw this guy walk down this street and he saw us so he turned around and started running the other way. But I wanted to talk to him, so naturally I started to run after him, we had a nice little jog together haha.

A deer jumped over our car this week. That was a trip haha.

So while we were out finding people this week we started talking to this Baptist preacher. And I started with, like getting to know him, and then I was like can we share a brief message about Jesus Christ. Then we proceeded on. And we started talking about prophets and Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. After a while he was like. Wait a second, I thought you were sharing a message about Jesus Christ...........and that took me back a second...

Too often we get focused on everything else except what is literally on our name tags. Christ is the whole part of what we are. Through Him is the only way we can make it to heaven. Because of what he did, we are able to be clean.

So when you look back on what we have, all of our teachings, all of the way our church is set up. Look at how Christ is in it first. Always remember him.

I felt like an idiot.

I learned a lot this week about who we really are as latter-day-saints. He also brought up the point. Why are we called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints? Why not just the Church of Jesus Christ? And we had to think and really we are in the last days. This is the end of times. It could end in like a 1000 years or in like ten, but it is still close, so we have to be the best we can, but evil is doing the best it can too.

Stay strong, sorry this week kinda nothing happened, Elder Christensen

 

 

 

(I got a call this week from a CJ who is a ward missionary in the ward Keegan is serving in. He told me some nice things about Elder Christensen and they said they got a car due to his companion’s hurt hip or knee)

-Keegan’s Mom

This was just a spiritual week and it was cool...

Hola from Texas,

No, I haven't had an interview with the president yet, haha he doesn't come this far into outer darkness, jk, but yah, he hasn't had an encounter with anyone in our zone for a while. I guess we are the rebels of the group or something. I think I forgot what he looked like I’m not going to lie haha.

Nope we can’t ride bikes anymore because Elder Ashton hurt his hip!!!! So we are now a walking / get a ride area. Yah, he has to use a crutch everywhere, it is pretty cool. People look at us and feel sorry for us now and are like what can we do to help you. Everyone in our ward thinks I beat him up though, haha it’s awesome. Really he just crashed his bike and cried...

So this week was also awesome because we got to go see Angelo State play! Curtis our big black sheriff investigator took us to it and it was seriously the coolest thing I have ever seen. There were so many people there and it was the best game I have ever seen and we were talking to Curtis after and he was like you know, y’all are just guys, like you are people, but better than people you know. And we were like okay where is he going with this. And he was like you know I might look into getting baptized. So we are people, but we're not people, everyone remember that, we are not just people, we are literal examples of Jesus Christ. People can see it and they want it.

So this week was awesome. We got a lot of stuff done. WENDY GOT BAPTISED Yesterday. Haha she is so cool.

So this week we had a feeling like we had to have her baptized on Sunday, so we prayed and the Lord thought so too. So we taught her everything and she has been clean for like a month and half now and we were going over the baptismal questions with her and she was like, "I want Christensen to baptize me" and we were like okay. So I got to baptize Wendy Michelle Harris...... it was a feeling that you can’t describe. As she came up from being submerged you could just see her glow. She was smiling and crying and so was I. I cried like a little girl. Then we gave her the gift of the Holy Ghost and that was even cooler, you could feel it go into her. I’m not even joking it was the coolest feeling I’ve ever felt. Then after the baptism I started thinking about the baptismal prayer.

Wendy Michelle Harris, Having been commissioned of Jesus Christ.......then I stopped and I thought how cool that sentence really was. I’ve been given the gift to work in Christ’s name on this earth. He has given me permission, I have the authority. It is the most empowering feeling in the entire world. The same power that Christ had is on the earth today......think about it.

My challenge this week is for y’all to gain a strong testimony of Joseph Smith and all the prophets but especially him. Pray about it and read the Book of Mormon. Like it says in the Bible, ye shall know a prophet by his fruits. So gain that testimony of him and you will never waver. I know that this is true I’ve seen too much, I’ve studied too much, I’ve felt so much that there is no doubt in my mind. Other religions are good they are even great but, they are missing. the authority, the priesthood authority. I love y’all.

This was just a spiritual week and it was cool.

Elder Christensen

 

 

I wish I was more threatening...

I’m in the zone this week everyone. I don’t know what it means but I’m in it.

Yah, my bike can be fixed luckily and the guy at the bike shop is this dude from Australia and he loves the missionaries so he is fixing me up nice and easy. It is pretty cool this week we have got a lot of walking in again… and no further bike wrecks, but I borrow Elder Palomos bike for a little bit and it is ten years old and it has been in the mission for ten years the back brakes don’t work and it doesn’t shift gears, but it is a blessing sent from heaven no joke.

Am I eating healthy? Yes, but the amount of food I am consuming makes that mean nothing. I’ve been to five BBQs this week and eaten and eaten and eaten. No joke the food that I am consuming is starting to outweigh all of the bike riding I’m doing. Brisket is just so good and everyone always has extra. And since I’m bigger then both my companions they assume I can eat a lot more. And boy were they right, holy crap I never stop, it’s like a train, I am the food tank of San Angelo. I’m disgusting; I can feel my arteries clogging one by one. But yet it is beautiful.

So this week in San Ang was cool. San Angelo State was number 2 on ESPN top ten because the football player hurdled another player on the other team so people were going crazy at this week’s game. But really people care about the Dallas Cowboys more than anything. When we were out knocking the other night, we got yelled at thirty times because the game was on and they were playing the Red Skins.

And then the cowboys lost. No joke, I have never seen more grown men crying....it was almost poetic in a way.

We would relate the loss to them having hard times and how they can resort to prayer to help them and we got a lot of success out of that. So that was nice.

Nothing really crazy happened this week I’m sorry everyone.

But we did get David to come out of his house. Which he hasn’t left his home in over fifteen years, so yah, we got him to walk over to the church when no one was there and we had a lesson and he cried and we cried and we all lived happily ever after :)

Wendy didn’t come to church. I yelled at her and she laughed and said it was cute.... I wish I was more threatening...

A few tips from what I’ve learned, stay in school, brush your teeth and don’t do drugs.

I was thinking of a spiritual thought for this week and it wasn’t coming. But this week people have been giving me a lot of anti-doctrine and saying I need to study this religion before I get so involved in it. So I put it to the test, every piece of anti-Mormon doctrine there is an answer for and I am making it a point to find out those answers. There are literally no loose ends if you search for it, so if you have a question, I challenge you to study it.

This is Christ’s Church, Joseph Smith was a true prophet who restored the church for these latter-days. Men are not perfect. But God is. So don’t take man’s word for it. Take God’s word. Pray pray pray. It is awesome, He will give you answers. If any of you lack wisdom, let him as of God. Boom that is true. I love all of you, sorry I don’t have anything to say.

Stay strong. Elder Christensen

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Life without love, is death...

Transfer calls are in! And there are too many people in the Lubbock Texas Mission, so they are sending me to Jamaica!!!!!!!!!!

Na, I'm just joshin ya, I'm staying here haha. So are both of my comps for another six weeks at least, it is the opposite of madness!!!!!!!!!!!

It’s still way hot here, like upper 90s to 110 every day, so I don't need a coat for a while, but I may need one apparently some areas get cold. I am excited to be cold I have forgotten what it feels like, it is sad.

So this week started off the slowest week of my life. Then it took a sudden turn for the best week ever, no joke. People were haten' at the beginning and bringing us down, then on Thursday night we were riding our bikes by the football stadium and there was a game going on and everyone was there. Everyone... and there was this girl in college all painted up and dancing around. Then she saw us. This is a direct quote from her mouth. "Hey look, it’s the missionaries, cool" then gave us all high fives. Let me break this beautiful sentence down for y'all out there. 1) "Hey", she said hello to us first, with a smile 2) she called us "the missionaries", not satan worshippers, polygamists, or Mormons, 3) "cool", that was so cool she was happy to see us. It goes to show how much one little happy hello can do for a person. I will never take that for granted again.

Then the next day I was riding my bike down the road and all of the sudden my whole peddle thing fell off and I go flying into the middle of the street almost dying it was awesome, biggest rush of the mission haha. But now we are without bikes. So we are now given the gift of our own two feet and we get to walk/run to every appointment... God bless Texas. But because of this gift we got to eat at three different BBQs yesterday. We didn't teach very much, because everyone was plastered, but we didn't want to be rude, so we had to eat haha. I didn't know what true BBQ was... I'm blessed haha.

Then Saturday we got transfer calls and it was like Christmas waiting for the phone to ring, haha no joke, it seriously was crazy everyone was jumping around and stuff.

Then yesterday was the best, we had three investigators at church and all of them cried! Good tears.

So we are teaching this girl named Wendy, she is 41 and seriously the coolest sweetest person on the planet and is trying to turn her life around from her past. I have a testimony that talks in church are seriously inspired so listen to them. Every one. I promise you won’t be let down.

K, so this week we were having a lesson at Wendy’s house and a little background (her best friend is a stripper and she leaves her daughter at Wendy's all the time, but she is seriously so nice and so cool, and so is her daughter and they are all taking the lessons with Wendy so that’s cool) but Wendy lives in these way bad apartments with a ton of bad people and a meth lab upstairs. So we were teaching a lesson and the person knocks on the door and we open it and the person just drops to the floor and everyone starts screaming hahahahaha, it was so funny it was like I was in a movie. The person was just way screwed up. Anyway. Wendy is the best, she is being the example to all of her friends and making new friends and I love her and she is getting baptized next week. I wish everyone we talked to was like Wendy haha.

Also Wendy's friend's daughter loves me and she is one years old, so when Wendy had to take her to church, I had to hold her so she wouldn't cry or fuss. Made my week haha I'm so pumped to be a dad.

The ward loves us now and it is so cool! They even gave me a nickname because the other day I was sick and passed out on the floor when a member came in and I was wearing my Superman robe. And he said, I didn’t know Superman got sick! Then I got to church on Sunday and they introduced me as Elder Superman over the pulpit so everyone calls me Elder Superman... I'm jumping with joy. This has been a good week.

So my message to you this week is... life without love, is death....take it in.

Love always, stay strong.

Love, Elder Christensen

 

I wish I were like one of those Buddhist monks...

Brycen(Lee) and Jesse(Saltzgiver) are companions that is weird hahahaha. I know both of them really well. Elder Lemmon and I are in the same district and we hang out all the time (he went to Woods Cross too) that's awesome.

Yes mom, I'm taking my medicine haha, but I am still way tired from working always and never stopping. No joke, we come home for a quick pit stop for a half hour for lunch and dinner, then we are off. I love it.....

This week has been a good week for teaching not going to lie. Working hard pays off. And I figured it out, when there are people who want to bash with you and want to shake your faith, all you do is bear your testimony. A testimony is yours, no one else’s. It’s tangible. It might be little, but like it says in Alma 32 that a small seed of faith can grow. And even that small seed can move mountains. It’s pretty cool.

We are teaching this guy this week and he is this sixty year old guy and everyone around him is running his life for him. He hasn't made a decision for himself in years. And when we came over he's like, I'm am sick of people telling me what to do, I hate it. And we just calmly said, this is your choice, we are here for you every step of the way, but this is your decision and the spirit came in the room and he started crying and now he greets us with a smile:)

Also we're teaching a few other characters that I will tell you more about at a later date, but it has been sweet.

I saw a road runner this week and an armadillo. It blew my mind because I saw it get hit by a car and it exploded and the skin and blood got all on the side of our car, it was crazy awesome haha.

I've had a lot of time to think since I've been here. I never realized how little I really thought about things before my mission, I just kinda did it. I would just do haha and it’s good to think, about everything. Seriously everything. Why not? I know I'm just an eighteen year old kid, but sometimes I wish I were like one of those Buddhist monks that are like a 150 and live in the hill. That would be cool.

They said that it should start to cool off down here which is good, but it also stinks because we won't look as sweaty when we walk up to the door and people won't want to invite us in so we can get out of the heat which is our main way of talking to people.

I smell bad.

Oh ya you know Eldorado? Where that FLDS compound is, where that like Warren Jeffs guy was? That is in my area so we went by the compound on p-day and it was seriously so creepy. You can't get that close because there is this huge gate and these cameras that follow you where ever you move, it is so scary, it’s like a scary movie! And when your there it’s just a bad feeling haha, so ya the church is true I promise that.

I want anyone who is struggling with anything to receive a priesthood blessing. That is my challenge. I've seen so many out here work miracles and literally cast evil spirits out. I testify that it will bring you that peace and comfort you are looking for. I love you all, be safe and I will keep you in my prayers.

Much love, Elder Christensen