March news from the Zuster :)

Dear family and friends,
Wow, this week seemed forever long, but in a good way! March always does that to me somehow. Anyway, let me tell you about it!
Last p-day we got together with some missionaries in nearby cities and visited Camp Westerbork, which is a concentration camp nearby. It was only a transport camp so it was small and there's not much left to see, but it was still nice to be there and to consider the history and humanity of that time.
On Tuesday we had Zone Training, which is always awesome! Also, that night we had an appointment with a less-active named Gladys who is super busy, so that was a small miracle in and of itself. She is extremely sweet and will soon get a new work schedule, so she is hopeful that she will be able to to church more! Also, the branch presidency recently extended to her a calling as relief society teacher. Even though she can hardly come to church, Gladys is so excited about the calling and was telling us about how she will work with the relief society presidency to coordinate being able to teach on the weeks she can come. Her faith and optimism is inspiring to me! :)
Nothing super exciting happened on Wednesday or Thursday, but we had some appointments fall through so we spent several hours outside, which was just wonderful, since those days happened to be typical spring days. Which, for those of you who aren't familiar with Portland/Dutch weather (they're basically the same), that means lots of rain and not too warm. Also, it's super windy here in Nederland. So that was fun. Especially since the wind is always against you, I don't know how that works, but it always is. However, after the end of all that we had a wonderful dinner with a wonderful family, so that was great! Although I got a bad cold after that super rainy day, so that's even more fun. :)
Saturday was awesome! First we took my bike in for an emergency tune-up since my brakes we basically nonexistant for a couple of days, and the bike guy is so nice! He just took a look at my bike, adjusted a bunch of things, even oiled by chain and then said I didn't owe him anything! I love nice people. :) My brakes work even better now than they did when I bought the bike. Zr. Dobler and I plan to bring him cookies next week to say thank you. :)
Later that day the district leaders came to work with us, and we had an awesome 2 1/2 hour lesson with a less active family in the branch! The mom's name is Vanessa, and while she still has a ways to go she shared many of her concerns with us and was very open. She has a son named Joey who's 17, and while he's hardly been to church in his life he's very spiritually in tune! We hope to help him back to church and possibly even on a mission in the next few years.
On Sunday, after one hour less of sleep because of daylight savings, I had the wonderful opportunity of giving a talk in church, my first in Dutch. :) The rest of the day was fairly uneventful and I'm running out of time, I guess that wraps up my week! However, to leave a parting thought with you...
There's a quote that somebody put on the desk where I studied in Maastricht that I really love. It's from President Gordon B. Hinckley: "I speak of the need for a little more effort, a little more self-discipline, a little more consecrated effort in the direction of excellence in our lives. This is the great day of decision for each of us. For many it is the time of beginning something that will go on for as long as you live. I plead with you: don’t be a scrub! Rise to the high ground of spiritual, mental, and physical excellence. You can do it. You may not be a genius. You may be lacking in some skills. But so many of us can do better than we are now doing. We are members of this great Church whose influence is now felt over the world. We are people with a present and with a future. Don’t muff your opportunities. Be excellent."
This is a very busy time of year and many of us are just holding out for that next summer, that next weekend, that next p-day as the case may be... ;) But remember that you are living now, and that this day can be wonderful it we work to make it so. You will never regret becoming a better person! Do something today to be better, learn something new, and take a little step closer to Christ. I know there is only happiness that awaits on that path. :)

-Zuster Jensen

Miracles and Inspiration

Dearest family and friends,
This week was filled with unusual and interesting events! Let me tell you about them. :)
As I wrote about last week, Tuesday was my 6th months mark and we had a wonderful miracle to go along with it! So, there's this young adult named Lindsay who came to church a while ago (before I came to Assen) with a less-active member. Then, she happened to be there when the zusters came for a lesson with said less-active member. She was very sweet and interested in learning more, but the only contact the zusters had with her was through this less-active who actually deleted her contact info because he has issues with depression and relationships. So, no way to contact Lindsay. Then, the first day I was in Assen (so about 2 1/2 weeks ago) we were biking and someone called out to my companion. Who should it be but Lindsay! We didn't have very much time but we gave her our number and she said she would call. Well, we didn't hear from her. But then, this Tuesday we were going to visit a different less-active and weren't even thinking about Lindsay at the moment. But when we arrived and stepped off our bikes, who would happen to be sitting outside reading in the sunshine in front of the house next door but Lindsay?! She told us she actually lived there, had happened to be outside for only the last few minutes, and that she was actually planning on calling us that morning but the day had gotten busy and she had forgotten. She said "God works in mysterious ways," asked if we wanted her telephone number, and asked if she could meet with us sometime this week! Miracles, people. We had a lesson with her on Thursday! I was on exchanges, but I heard the lesson went very well, mostly just answering lots of her questions. She wants to come to church again, she loves everything she hears about the temple and what we do there, and she even brought the zusters banana coconut muffins. This girl is amazing. :)
Another miracle, smaller but still sweet: On Wednesday my bike got a flat tire again, near the train station. Here in Nederland there are bike shops in every train station, so we stopped in to see if we could get a small portable bike pump to get us home where we could repair the bike. The guy working the shop was super nice, and when we explained what we wanted he went behind the counter and pulled one out of drawer, said it had been sitting there awhile and that we could have it for free! Due to his kindness and awesome Dutch tire patches (seriously, they're so much better than American ones) my bike is now repaired (again). :)
Funny storry:On Thursday we went on exchanges so we had to ride the train in the morning, and we were doing companionship study during the ride so we began with a prayer. However, the train conductor happened to come along during the middle to check our cards. It was super awkward because he thought we'd fallen asleep and it's always awkward to stop in the middle of a prayer, but we had a good laugh about it afterwards. Missionary probs. :)
Wow, this is getting long but it was a great week! This week also included a service project (helping the clean up a school building) and a Zuster's Conference! We slept over in the mission home Friday to Saterday and then had a wonderful day of inspiration. It was great. Since I must go I'll end with a quote somebody read at the conference: "Ships are safe in the harbor, but that's not what ships are made for." I love this! I can definitely relate. Since coming on my mission my comfort zone and what I thought was possible of myself have definitely been stretched, and sometimes I miss the safe harbor of home. However, I have grown so much and I would never give up the experiences I've had since I "set sail." Enjoy the peace and comfort of home, but wherever you are in life don't forget to embark on your own journey, whether physical, spiritual, mental, or otherwise, over and over again so that you can write your own story and see just where your adventure has taken you, because that's what you were made for. :)

-Zuster Jensen

Time is Fickle, but the Mission is Good

My dear family and friends,
I can't believe that I've been out 6 months already! As of tomorrow I will have exactly 1 year left in my mission. Home and college seem like a faraway dream, and yet the time has still flown by fast. As I stand 1/3 of the way through my mission there are things I can see I want to improve on and achieve and change, but I wouldn't change my experiences so far for anything. I've already learned so much in every way, and I'm excited for the year ahead of me! :)
My first full week in Assen was interesting, with several appointments falling through but also several tender mercies. Assen has quite a variety of people to help. We teach several investigators, including a man whom we just taught the Restoration to this week and it was positively received. We also teach a part-member family, a couple of recent converts, and less-active members. Everyone is so different and has different challenges, from mental illness to physical illness to lack of commitment to language barriers. However it is wonderful to see the Spirit blessing each one with the things they need as they work to come closer to Christ. I was particularly impressed by Bernadette; she is a 44 year old woman who was baptized about 5 years ago, but she suffers from some sort of mental illness where her mentality is still quite childlike. We visit her twice a week and recently she asked to missionaries to teach her the lessons again because she couldn't remember or understand a lot of it. We have been doing that, and this week she bore her testimony in Relief Society. It was very simple and not the most focused, but it was so sweet to hear to expressing the truths she could. She is so sweet and loving to everyone, and although I wish she didn't have to deal with this mental illness it is a wonderful example to me of what it truly means to be childlike and humble in the gospel.
Something funny for the week, I got a flat tire on Friday the 13th while we were in a neighborhood far from our home and didn't have tire patches with us. That was unfortunate. But, luckily it wasn't raining at the time! So the walk back wasn't too bad, and we got it fixed that night. :)
Something wonderful: I heard from the Maastricht zusters last night that Diana has a baptismal date for April 25!! Diana is a woman in Maastricht who has been investigating the church for about a year. She has been through some very hard things in her life and has her own set of challenges now, but I really grew to love her during my time in Maastricht and I am so excited that she is finally taking this step. I know what a blessing it will be to her and I can't wait for her to see that in her life. Also, I heard that Dudley is continuing to make progress with stopping smoking and drinking and is still on track for his baptismal date in April! Happy news from my first city. :)
Well, that's about all I have for this week, but I would like to take a couple sentences to exress just how grateful I am for Christ and His church. I know Heavenly Father has not just a plan but a vision for me, and that He knows my potential and has provided the Atonement so that I can reach that potential. He has done this out of love for me and I know He has done it for each and every person on earth. We can't fully comprehend this great love and see can't see every particular of the plan, but we can "press forward with a steadfastness inChrist, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men" (2 Nephi 31:20). Take a moment this week to consider God's plan for you, and how you can work to let Christ's Atonement work in you so you can reach that plan and help others along the way! :)

-Zuster Jensen

Farewell Maastricht... Hello Assen!

My dear family and friends,
What a week! It was pretty crazy saying goodbye to people in Maastricht (or not saying goodbye, since there was no time), but sometimes I guess we're needed in different places. I will be forever grateful for the time I spent in Maastricht and the people I have met there- it really is a beautiful and blessed city.
However, new adventures await! Which began with the adventure of transfers... oh man. Getting three suitcases and a bike to the Maastricht station, out at Rotterdam, saying goodbye to my companions, traveling with said bike and suitcases to Utrecht with some other missionaries, stopping out, meeting my new companion, then again on to Assen and then from that station to the new apartment... when you can't take a bike on the bus and the train doors only stay open for about two minutes for you to get your stuff on or off... fun times! Haha, I am reminded why we are told to pack light. ;)
Despite that craziness, I think I will like it in Assen! As prophesied in my last email, Zuster Dobler really is great. :) She came the transfer after me, so we're both relatively new but she has already been in Assen 2 transfers and has learned a lot. She is very sweet and fun to be around, and we think quite similarly so that's fun!
The rest of the week has basically been a blur of new faces and new places, but it's great! Of course every place has it's own set of challenges and opportunites, and Assen just has a different feel than Maastricht. The change will be good I think, we learn different things from different challenges. I'm very optimistic though, Assen has great investigators who are progressing well and I am excited to work with them. It's also a pretty little city! Defintely differnt than the rolling hills of Zuid-Limburg (the province Maastricht is in), it's super flat and therefore quite windy. But the weather has been beautiful the last couple of days and there are these little wildflowers that grow everywhere - they look like mini tulips, they're so fun and a cheerful portent of spring!
I don't have much more to report right now, but I hope to be able to tell you more about the people and everything else here next week. As a thought for this week, I have found a quote here that I really love: "You have the power to increase the sum total of the world's happiness." Just like those wildflowers, they are so litle - and so are we. But they bring so much happiness to me and so can we bring such happiness to others! We may not feel like we are making a difference, but we definitely are. Do something this week to brighten someone else's week, and cherish the smile on their face! :)

-Zuster Jensen

P.S. Huge shout-out to my brother Garrett, who just got his mission call to the France, Lyon mission, speaking Chinese! Haha it's so perfect for him and I'm so proud of him. Missions for the win! Which is awesome, because in the end everybody wins when the gospel is spread over the entire world. Yay! :D 

(p.p.s. this is Garrett and here's my mission blog ;)

Transfer day!

Me, Zuster Dobler, Bernadette, and wildflowers :)

This town ain't big enough for the three of us!

My dear friends and family,
Well, the day has finally come for another missionary to leave Maastricht. Transfer calls were last night, and after 3 wonderful transfers I will be leaving my beautiful first city! I will be going all the way north to Assen, to work with Zuster Dobler. I've never met her but I'm sure she's great, and I know almost nothing about Assen but I'm sure it's great too!
I am truly sad to be leaving Maastricht, and especially Zuster Manning. We've become really good friends between the MTC and two transfers in the land, but I know we couldn't stay together the whole mission and there are things she and I both need to do in different places. She will be staying in Maastricht with Zuster Whittington.
Our investigators are doing well, while there are still challenges we've seen progress this week in getting some to church, progress with stopping smoking and drinking, and progress in finding and resolving concerns. I am very optimistic for the future of Maastricht and know I am leaving it in good hands!
In other news for this week, Thursday was Zone Conference, a.k.a. 6 hours of straight inspiration. I took lots of notes but a personal theme which I really got out of it was having trust in Heavenly Father's plan for us. Like Nephi, we need to pray to know God's will for us (to have a vision), to know what our "Promised Land" is. Then we make goals to get there- in other words, we keep the commandments. Even when we don't see the entire future, when we have faith and we're doing what we're supposed to be doing we will know that God is leading us, and we can have peace because we know that His plan will always be the best one.
There was a surprise with Zone Conference as well - we got to watch Meet the Mormons! I don't know how many of you have seen it, but it was very well done and very inspirational. I know I'm more motivated than ever to make the most of my mission and of the rest of my life as well. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it! :)
There were other great things this week, but unfortunately I'm running out of time so just know life is good here in the Netherlands. As a parting thought for you all:
This transfer I have especially turned to prayer more than ever, and this week in our ward's conference a speaker said something that struck me - the number we need to call to reach heaven is 525, or 5 fingers on each hand turned to each other as we assume a reverent posture for prayer. It really is like a celestial 911 (or 112 for the Netherlands). When we need help, the first thing to do is "call 525" and talk with Heavenly Father. I know that this will always bring help as well as peace, happiness, and even unexpected blessings. Don't forget to pray!

-Zuster Jensen :)