Hey Peeps!

So... it was a pretty good week. Who wants to hear about my birthday? It was one for the books. It was pretty uneventful until about 3 pm... we taught an 18 year old kid that we haven't seen in like a month... it's only XXXX's 2nd time seeing the kid... we showed him a mormon message called reclaimed,

and asked him what it made him think about. he talked about kinda how god gives us commandments... and THEN... Elder Mayer.... made the greenie mistake... he started talking about the law of Chastity.... I mean he took it, and ran the lesson off of a cliff!

It was so bad... the kid is 18 years old and has a girlfriend.... holy cow. it was bad. When we got back into the car, Elder Mayer reclined his seat, curled up into a ball, and screamed "WHAT DID I JUST DO!!!!".... But legit..... just imagine.... slaughter....

So not much else really happened... I had been praying and asked God to help us set a baptismal date with someone... by 845... we still hadn't had a very productive day.... we had an appt set up with some people we had knocked into the day earlier, we had taught the daughter and wanted to return to teach the family. It ended up being only the mom... she is from El Salvador, her name is GGGG, and she is probably the most prepared lady for baptism that I have ever met my whole life. One of the very first things that she said to us was, "I know that you guys were sent here as instruments in the Lord's hands because He knows I need some help." We taught a short version of the Restoration, and as I was thinking about when to extend as a baptismal date, I felt like we should extend the 20th of June. When I extended the date, she got a really thoughtful look on her face, and said the 20th is her birthday, and said that if she knew that our message was true by that day, she would be baptized. That was a pretty cool experience.

Except for that SHE DIDN'T COME TO FREAKING CHURCH ON SUNDAY!!!! NO ONE IS COMING AND IT IS FRUSTRATING ME!!!! That is my rant for the day.

So for our pday, it was pretty good, some members got permission to take us hiking outside of the mission, at a place called silverton falls, there will be pics coming next week. This is the only one we took on the ipad, but I feel like it's a pretty accurate representation of Mayer's and my take on life... oh and I got my last haircut last monday. And then the other pic we just found in someone's garden.... and no one was home... so we took some pictures and bounced:)

And next week is transfers... my hope and prayer is that I stay here in Beaverton for another transfer, with Mayer, and that we get to trio train a greenie! So keep that in your prayers!

OH, and it was cemented into my mind today... the woman I marry HAS to like outdoorsy things and hiking. #amust!

Hey guys!
So.. this week was pretty bomb. Super bomb actually. Numbers wise, it
was the best week of my mission. We taught 35 lessons and found 18 new
investigators. Most days we didn't have time to take a full lunch!
Freaking the only problem is that NO ONE WILL COME TO CHURCH!!! 


That
is the current frustration... Beaverton is a blessed area, there are
hispanic people all over the place, but thus far we've only had 1
person to come to church...
anyways... story time... so my companion and I were talking about how
much we hate cats.... and I don't remember how the subject came up...
but we were talking about what we'd do if we were going to propose to
a girl who had a cat... (edited/deleted for content...not exactly missionary focused...:) so... those are
the spiritually uplifting things that my companion and I discuss....
other than that.. nothing is really new. I'm excited to go home but I
really am gonna end on a high note, I've loved the last couple of
months!
also.... this pic is a pretty good representation of how our morning
went this morning...


we both woke up and weren't really... well...
yeah. By 930 halfway through comp study mayer was sitting in his chair
screaming "JORGENSEN!!!! I CAN'T DO THIS!!! WE NEED TO LEAVE!!! I NEED
TO PDAY!!!!!" and of course I Had to make some smart comments such as
"elder Mayer... I think we should take some extra hours of study
today. Let's study until 12 and then nap for the rest of the day...


:)
I love you guys! talk to you soon!

  May 10th update

 

Hey guys!

So there's really not much else to update you on other than what happened yesterday... just a few conversations between Elder Mayer and I that I thought would make you smile:) So the other night, we had a late night, and didn't finish planning and whatnot until about 11... And Mayer was SUPER tired,

he was struggling to make it through the prayer... so me... being me.... I decided to say something along the lines of "bro, I'm feeling an all nighter. let's just stay up and talk"... to which he just looked at me like I was the scum of the earth and very bluntly said "go to "somewhere that is hot and eternal'  (edited for content...:).

Also, yesterday, during lunch, we got kinda bored. Aunt Heather sent me a slingshot for christmas... we live on the 3rd floor and there is a cat that hangs out kind of at the bottom of the stairs, but aways a bit. So we started shooting advils at it from our balcony.... we got kinda close but no cigar. So we decided to move in closer for the kill, and took some close range shots (we ended up hitting him and haven't seen it chilling there since:).... and that just made us feel so happy that we talked about how maybe we are gonna take the slingshot with us during the day and just do driveby shootings... for example when we see random people. or when someone who we are trying to teach runs inside and shuts the blinds to avoid talking to us:) And, of course, we wouldn't be able to resist shooting the occasional cat:) we decided that some nights we might go cat hunting... so anyways as we were driving around last night I totally could have run over one cat and then we saw like 3 others... so we decided it was a sign to go cat hunting later in the night:) and as Elder Mayer was saying a prayer before we went into a lesson, he said, "please bless that we can....." and then paused for a long time, so I said under my breath "go cat hunting.".... to which he finished by saying, "Father, you know our plans, please help us make them happen!".... we were laughing pretty hard after that!

not much else is new... just working too hard and sleeping to little... last week was the first Sunday in this area that I haven't fallen asleep at some point during church...

. If I sit down for an extended period of time with nothing to do, I fall asleep:) Aight guys that's all, love ya!

This will be framed in my house one day.  'Nuff said.

so, to start off with.... we had a couple of really cool experiences this week... I already wrote Pres about them so I'm just gonna copy and paste...

Miracle. This week's miracle was pretty personal to me, a very big answer to prayers. When I was with Elder Bair, we met a LOT of really cool people who had already been through some rough patches in their lives (aka drugs, youth going to prison, alcoholism... ect.) And, although it's great that they have made it out of that phase of their lives, because they've made it through that, they don't see the need to come to know Christ anymore, He has already saved them and they are fine the way they are, because what they are is a result of what Christ did for them so they don't need to change anymore. So in my prayers lately I have been asking God to be able to find and teach someone who is in the middle of a crisis or hard time, and wants help out. This week we got a call from on of our investigators, TLTL . He called the mission office a couple of weeks ago asking for us to stop by, we ended up teaching him outside of a taco time, but that was the last we heard from him because we never knew where he lived. This week we got a call from him, he said he would be home, he told us where he lived, and he asked us to stop by. We did. During the middle of the lesson (the restoration), he told us that he was struggling with an addiction to pornography, he has had it for 5 years, and he wants to kick it. So in our second lesson with him we taught him about the enabling power of the Atonement.

How God can strengthen us to bear up our burdens and act and change our circumstances. And as we were teaching him, I was watching the gears fit into place in his mind as he applied and understood what was taught. He has a baptismal date for May 30th, we've fasted and are praying that it goes through.

Studies. During sweet hour of prayer yesterday, some scriptures kind of clicked into place in my mind. Elder Mayer and I had an experience this week where we were stopped and talked to by a " another religious person" he asked us some questions, and when we answered, asked us where our answers came from, and when we told him the Bible and The Book of Mormon, he told us "uhh... I'm not so sure about the Bible. I know it pretty well. You could pretty much read to my from anywhere inside it and I'd be able to tell you where you are reading... and I've never read anything about that." As Elder Mayer and I were discussing it, scriptures from the Bible came to our minds that referenced what we were talking about. So I was bugged by how stubborn and prideful that guy was. I was just kind of thinking about it during sweet hour of prayer, and I remembered all of the times that the bible says something along the lines of "seek, and ye shall find." The Book of Mormon teaches us that "God grants unto men according to their desires, whether it be unto salvation or destruction" (Alma 29:4) Which just reiterates that what we are looking for, we will find. Hence is it is important that we are always trying to do God's will, which we discern through prayer, and the scriptures we are commanded to 'pray always, that we may come off conqueror.'... So obviously that other religious person was missing key points of doctrine, because he wasn't looking for them.

So that miracle was super cool... I've been getting kind of frustrated because we've found a lot of cool people but no one is sticking it through. One of our baptismal dates fell through, the other one is being postpned.... But TLTL is super cool so our fingers are crossed on that one.

Anything else?  As far as Eric goes... their family is still in Beaverton, Eric might actually start coming to play morning sports with us. And we are about to go frisbee golfing with him. Do you still have Jose's number? that's for sure a family I want to spend time with when we come back for vacation!

I love you guys! Wes nice job vaulting bro, I'm still waiting on those pics!Enviado desde mi iPad

Hey guys!

So the craziest thing that happened this week was that I interpreted a dream of a recent convert/less active. The story goes a little something like this. When she got baptized 8 months ago, she said she had a dream wherein she saw the missionaries walking around in her complex, and she knew that they were messengers from God. So she listened to everything they said and got baptized. Well, a little over a month ago, she had another dream, where she saw Elder Bair and Tuten, (Tuten was here before I was with bair,) in a room, but then she saw some other doors representing other churches, and chose the catholic church, and then she said the doors of our church closed on her. So there's not much we could do there.

This week, when we saw her, however, the dream had changed; This time she told us that in her dream she had seen a Book of Mormon and a Bible placed on a table, had felt like she could only choose one, and so she chose the Bible and later when she tried to come to our church, the doors were closed and everything was dark. All of the sudden my mouth opened and the next think I was doing, I was asking her why she had chosen the Bible, and explained to her that a testimony of our Church, or even just of Christ, can't be adequately sustained just with the BIble. Both the Book of Mormon and the Bible are needed.

Maybe even more miraculously, she understood what I was saying! Usually she is very hard to teach but she understood that perfectly! So that was just a cool little experience I guess.

What else is new? Not much really... except for FREAK guys I've only got 12 weeks left. That smacked me in the face this weekend, getting calls and finding out that Bair was leaving... It was hard to see him go and even harder for me to realize that I only have one more transfer call. As much as I have complained and as hard as some of my areas have been, I have loved my mission, and part of me doesn't want it to end. Coop also went home today... that was freaking weird, let me just say. I was not a fan of that.

We get to see Elder Holland this week! He is coming to speak to the Mission on Saturday! He's gonna freaking singe everybody's eyebrows off!

The area is going good. We set 2 baptismal dates last week. One of them is with a 15 year old kid named VVVVV He is super legit. We found him a few weeks ago, and it reminds me almost exactly of what happened when we taught Eric. We started teaching just Eric, and then slowly integrated his family. Tonight we are going to go play soccer with VVVV and his dad. I'm pumped. There is another cool young couple named LLLL and SSSS and they both recognize and feel the Spirit very well, they wanna know more! The other investigator with a baptismal date is QQQQ, she is 19 and our problem with her is that her mom doesn't want her talking to us... but we're working on it!

Wes way to go man on not letting that deacon be a punk!

.

anyways.. all of those plans sound good. Elder Bair's family wants to come to Oregon too... maybe, if you wanted, you could email them and tell them some of our plans and then maybe we could hang out at the coast or something together!

I love you guys! the pics are of bair and I, and the 2 spanish zones playing soccer last week... Talk to you guys later!

Familia!!

Alright well do I have some stories to tell this week!! Should I start off with the spiritual one or the funny one... I'm gonna go with spiritual because if I go funny first the spiritual one might get shafted....

So we did 2 exchanges this week. One was tuesday to wednesday, and the other was wednesday to thursday, back to back. On Tuesday I left and went to Hillsboro with a new missionary, and then on Wednesday I was here in Beaverton with an Elder from Portland. His name is Elder Gregory, he got to Portland (which is a pretty slow, hard area) when I got to Tigard, he was trained by Elder Goff, and came out right after Soriano. he is a farmer hick kid from somewhere in Utah...

and anyways since we've served around each other we've become pretty close. When I was his district leader, calling people every night, he was always very open and willing to ask for help. There have even been a couple of times this transfer when he's been having a rough time and has called me because he said that's what he felt like he should do after he prayed. Anyways, those are all unnecessary details, but the point is we know each other pretty well and we did this exchange because he called and asked if we could.

So anyways it was around 4 on Wednesday (this exchange had started at 2 after district meeting), and we were just leaving the library, we had been doing some online teaching on FB. As we were leaving, a man stopped us and asked us for money, explaining his story which I don't remember a lot of, but their house was getting fumigated that night and they needed a place to stay. Anyways, I've been asked by people quite a few times for money, and he seemed pretty legit. But, when he asked, deep down I really just didn't want to give him any. Elder Gregory pulled out his wallet and gave the man $7. As we were walking away, I felt ashamed for being so selfish. I remembered what President Eyring had said in Conference about helping others,

and silently said a prayer asking Heavenly Father that driving away from the library I would be able to see him again to give him some money. As we exited the parking lot my prayer was answered, I pulled over, got my wallet, and went to give him $3, but a 5 came out with it, so I gave him 8. Elder Gregory told me that the same thing had happened to him, he had only meant to give him $2, but the 5 came out. I felt better afterwards. Now here is the cool part. For dinner that night, a lady had signed up to feed us, and she didn't have any males in the house, so she just gave us $20 for the two of us. Curiously, she had 2 friends over, each of whom decided they each wanted to give us $5.... so we were up to $30. Elder Gregory had never had Sushi before, and here they do Sushi restaurants that just have like little samplers on a conveyor belt, and different colored plates are different prices. So we walk into the place, sit down, and start eating a few plates. There was no one else inside. About halfway through our time there, the cashier came and told us that someone had put $10 towards our bill. That was all we spent, so we got a free dinner. And the whole time I knew why this was all happening... it was because of the man we had helped. So although nothing huge, I feel like that was just a soft little reminder that God is watching over me.

Ok story time.  (edited for content :)  for details, please ask Elder Jorgensen in person anytime after July14 ;)

mom as to your questions about being a zone leader on sundays... there are 3 sets of spanish missionaries attached to our group, so the 3 of us cover the stake. we are an appendage of the Beaverton ward, but are in charge of the group. so no,thankfully no other meetings... the extra meetings are 2 district meetings every week instead of just 1, and MLC (mission leadership council) every month.

anyways... I love you guys! Have a good week! 

Ferzulis also got baptized!!

 

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