Tuesday, July 5, 2016

The Lord ALWAYS answers our prayers.

July 5, 2016

Hello Everyone!
This week has been another busy, hot week here in Burbank. Elder Martin and I are starting to get real tan thanks to these bikes.

Diana got baptized this Saturday! She was interviewed by our Zone Leaders on Thursday and was so excited the whole time. She is usually really shy and quiet but she kept expressing to us how excited she was and how happy she felt. She even told us that she wants us to come and teach her daughter so she can get baptized as well. Diana is just another perfect example of how prayers are answered. She has had some really tough times recently and had been praying to Heavenly Father for guidance. Well a few weeks later the missionaries were doing their laundry at the same laundromat she goes to and they told her they felt they needed to talk with her. She instantly knew that this was the answer to her prayers. The Lord ALWAYS answers our prayers. We just need to have faith and recognize the answer when it comes. Everyone in the Burbank 3rd ward is so friendly so I know Diana will have no problem joining the new family she just received. Elder Agamata came back and baptized her. He is the one who found her and began to teach her. The program was awesome and lots of ward members came and supported. She was really moved by one of the Stake Presidency members talk on baptism and afterwards asked him to confirm her on Sunday! Such a cool experience. Oh and a funny story about the baptism...the water heater broke so it was ice cold hahahaha! They got out as fast as possible!

We taught Mannet ( the woman who pulled over to talk to us) this week as well. Holy Cow she is SO prepared!! We got to know her a little better before the lesson and she told us how she had been to many churches, but she left all of them because she didn't think they were right. So we jumped right into the restoration and talked about the Priesthood and how it's permission from God to baptize etc...and she opened up her Book of Mormon ( which was all marked up and had notes) and started reading a scripture to us from 3rd Nephi that explained the priesthood perfectly. I was pretty mind blown that she knew the Book of Mormon so well so I asked her what she thought about it and she gave the most sincere answer I have ever heard. She said " The Book of Mormon makes the bible even sweeter. It's so detailed and I just understand everything Christ did for me even clearer. I love it. I love this book." Said in an Armenian accent haha. She was still struggling with the English though so we gave her an Armenian Book of Mormon and she was so happy! I've never had an investigator who was more excited to receive a Book of Mormon. She committed to baptism and has been praying for an answer about Joseph Smith being a Prophet so please pray that she will receive an answer!

We got in touch with a former investigator named Byron this week! He backed out of his baptism a few days before it was supposed to happen so we went to find out why. Well turns out that his family all loves the missionaries and after he called off his baptism the missionaries just stopped going by. So they asked us to please come back and visit tomorrow! It was a super cool experience to find them and see how interested they still were in the Gospel!

Funny story of the week: We were tracting in a park and I was looking around for people to talk to. Anyway, I turned to the left and everyone was staring at us cause it was the 4th of July and we were just walking around in white shirts and ties...so I turn back around and run right into a pole hahaha. I bruised my nose super bad! Everyone kept staring at us the rest of the time we were there hahaha.

Another funny story...I threw a one year mark party for Elder Olivas hahaha. It was so funny! We had a Ceremony and everything. I conducted the ceremony.

Well I love you all so much! I hope you have a wonderful week!

Elder Jensen

One year celebration ceremony for Elder Olivas.