Tijd Vliegt Op Vleugels Van Bliksem ;)

My dear family and friends,

Wow, time is really just flying by! I can't believe transfer calls are in less than a week again! Also, shout out to my little brother who will be leaving the MTC in about 1 hour to make the long journey to join me in Europe! Only a hop, skip and a country away. :)

Well, this was (as usual) a wonderful week! The weather is finally beautiful and warm again, and we've seen some great success in this area. One example is with Cynthia! She is a 50-something year old woman originally from Surinam. Her sister who lives there and is a member visited a couple of weeks ago, took Cynthia to church with her, gave her a Book of Mormon, and introduced her to us. While at church she was very touched by the testimony of another sister, and when we taught Cynthia the first lesson this week we asked her if she would be baptized as she knew our message was true. Her answer was basically, "Of course I would! I loved what I saw at church this week! I'll pray about this, but of course I will be baptized when I know it's true!" This woman understands what it's all about. :) Oh, and then she surprised us by saying she had prepared lunch for us after our appointment. This lady is awesome. :)

On Tuesday we had interviews with President and Zuster Bunnell. It was good to get to them a bit more personally. They're so different from President and Zuster Robinson! I love and respect both the old and new President and his wife. They will do wonderful things building on the awesome legacy left behind by the Robinsons.

Álso, momentous occasion - our helmets came and we wore them for the first time this morning! So far, only one snide remark from someone. I won't keep a tally or anything, but this is definitely going to change people's perception of us. On the plus side, the helmets we got are super comfy and nice quality! So despite the uncertainty of ordering in German we must have done something right. :)

Well, I'm running out of time as always. However, I love you all! As a closing thought, something I've been thinking about this week - life is hard, but it never has to feel hard. If we just keep the right perspective, an eternal perspective, and have hope in the Atonement of Christ, we will realize that we can overcome anything and it's all given for our good anyway. It's even better when we learn from the Spirit and from the examples of others, both good and bad, so we can spare ourselves so much of the misery that we cause ourselves - then we only have to deal with the trials God sees fit to give us, which we will look back on and just collapse in gratitude that God was willing to give us opportunities to grow in a way He knew, with His help, we could do. Take a moment this week to look at a trial in your life, and think about or even write down all the ways you can think of that this might actually be a blessing, whether now or later. And if you can't think of anything, simply pray. Sometimes we shouldn't pray for the trial to be taken away, but we should pray for strength and help to understand why. And we know God always answers prayers. :)

Love you all!
-Zuster Jensen