Dec 2

First week of the new companion!

And what a week it was! Elder Ellis, my new companion, is from Pleasant Grove Utah, and he's a ball of fun. I haven't had this much fun, while seeing this many miracles, with this much snow, since last winter!

What a good life we lead, we missionaries.

So, the big exciting news from this week would be the baptism of Théophile Irie (tay-oh-fill  ee-dee-ay) this Saturday at 4 (2, your time) We're stoked to help yet another child of God come closer to his Father in Heaven. Théophile is a cool story, because he was actually taught almost a year ago by my dear friend Elder Williams, and it just never clicked for him. He was dropped by the missionaries because he wasn't willing to do what he needed to, namely read the Book of Mormon and Pray. 

Fast forward to Elder Christensen and Elder Messinger, we stumbled across dear Théophile again, and he was so surprised to see us come back that he decided to actually read the book this time!

That seems to have made all the difference. He's already sent missionaries to his family, and even though he's moving away to saskatchewan at the end of the month, he's already located the church he'll be attending over there. The Book of Mormon changed this man's life, and it will soon change the lives of his family. :)

Other than that, we've gone through an intense appartment re-model to celebrate the change in companionship. We even took our fridge doors apart and put them back together to open from the other side JUST to be different! A quote from elder Paul B. Pieper when he came to visit us was

'Missionaries are called to break cycles and change lives', and that's what we're trying to do, starting with our own cycles and our own lives! So, we've tried to break or change as many of our old missionary traditions as are humanly possible in this last week, and the fruit of it, as is the usual fruit for trying to follow our priesthood leaders, has been huge MIRACLES as yet another inactive member of the church that we've been unable to contact just decided to come back, all on his own.

Isn't God Great? 

I love all of you, I hope you had a wonderful thanksgiving, and that you have a wonderful week. :)

Love,

 

Elder Christensen

Nov 25

Transfers for reals!

Well, my companion is leaving me. Yet again.

I always pray to stay in my area and to keep my companion. (I'm selfish, I guess), and it's always sad to see one go, but that only opens the way for one more friend eh?

So, my new companion is Elder Ellis, from Pleasant Grove high school (yep, right next to home!). I'm sure we'll soon find all sorts of fun connections and be wonderful friends, but I've only actually seen him once or twice, so for now, he remains a mystery. 

The rest of the week was, well, typical. Filled with miracles, and let downs, joys and sorrows, everything that is part of the daily life of a missionary, but the END was something different. We have a young man in our ward leaving TODAY to go on a mission to France, and we were able to go through the temple with him when he received his endowments, and to be with him as he was set apart. THAT, was cool. It reminded me of my own preparations to serve, and I felt those embers still burning brightly inside me. What a sweet experience.

In other exciting news, we had a baptism in our ward the other week (the sisters investigator), and we'll be having another one here in the next couple weeks! If you're going to pray, pray for Theophile (Tay-oh-fill), our Ivorian investigator, who is preparing for his baptism on the 8th of December. We'll keep you posted. 

I love you all! Have a good week!

Nov 18

Transfer Calls.....

.....are coming up this weekend.

Hah! Did I psych you out?

No?

Hmm.

Well, either way, this week was AMAZING! We had Elder Pieper, of the first quorum of the seventy, come visit our mission and teach us, and it. Was. Incredible. 

I'm not going to even try to cover the Topics he covered, (we were with him for like, 5 hours.....) But! He gave us a lot of direction in the work, and I'm super happy to have the time that I do have left to try and apply it in!

As the expectations of HOW we do missionary work have been changing, and we've been trying to change to accommodate, we've started to see some HUGE miracles come to pass here in the Canada Montreal Mission, and the things Elder Pieper shared with us will only add to those Miracles. One of my favourite miracles is a man named Frank. He's a member of the church that was baptized a few years ago, but has been inactive since, and one day through a crazy series of events, felt the spirit pushing him to come back and join with us again. It's been almost a month now that he's been back, and I love him. Every time there's a ward function, Frank's always coming over to hang out with us, ever confident that the ward and the missionaries will be able to help him, and ready and willing to change and re-accept the gospel in his life. His open heart is one of the most beautiful things I've seen on my mission, and people like him, miracles like him, are the fruits of the members and the missionaries in a ward working together in unity. Every week, he sees the second counsellor in the bishopric and gets some homework and a game plan, and then every week we see him and go through his homework with him and help him start to apply the principles in his life. Once a month, he sees the bishop, and almost every day a member of the ward calls him to see how he's doing. It's SO COOL to see how the love of the members of a ward boosts and encourages him to continue down this road.

So. Love. Do it."for he who loveth not, knoweth not God". Especially as we approach this Holiday of Thanksgiving, lets give thanks to our Father in Heaven for everything He gives to us, but giving some love to His kids.

Are you with me?

Sweet. :)

I love you all! have a good week!

 

Elder Christensen

Nov 11

Saweet! Thanks for the updates! That's all super awesome. :)

I'm going to lump everything together into one e-mail again this week, less Hassle. We've got more zone craziness this week because we have a general authority in the mission, a man named Elder Pieper, who's from the first quorum of the seventy. We had a special meeting with him and President last night with some of the other missionaries from around the mission, and over the next three days he'll be touring around the mission doing conferences with us all. It's awesome. He spent a half an hour lecturing us on the priesthood, and on the role of sisters. He told us that the only real difference is that sisters are not ordained to the priesthood, and therefore do not perform the ordinances of it. But, when a woman accepts a calling, and speaks as an authorized representative of the Lord, she's speaking by the same authority that we are as priesthood holders.

It was REALLY cool to have this Member of the seventy open the Doctrine and Covenants and teach us... and then teach us HOW to teach others. It was all around a sweet experience, and it took place in my old chapel so right afterwards I was able to go say hello to a bunch of my old ward members, less-actives, investigators, and my old companions. Good end to a good week. :)

So, anyways, That's about the neatest thing that happened to us this week, so I guess I'll leave it at that. Have a good week everyone! I love you!

-Elder Christensen