Flat Christmas

This was probably the most memorable Christmas of my entire life! This will be one I'll never forget and it was the best mission Christmas I've had so far. Christmas Eve was a crazy day. We had several lessons on Christmas Eve and Christmas day because the Nigerian community gets work off, and they are super down to have us come by! On Christmas Eve we got a flat tire, fixed it, got another one, fixed it and got to our appointment late, and then got another one!

At this point we had to cancel our lesson because there was no way we'd make it, and we were going to play Santa Claus and bring some Nigerian members some gifts donated by the ward members. We had to have the other elders drop us off at the Lowe building, with flat bikes. We stored the gifts at Darlene's house so the kids wouldn't be able to find them, and grabbed them on Christmas Eve and dropped them off at about 9:00 pm when they were all asleep so they wouldn't see that it was us. Then we had to book it home to try and make it home on time with flat bikes, we just stuffed them on the bus and tried to get home -- super cool Christmas Eve.

I don't think I'd ever imagine myself in the middle of the Southside of Chicago, with flat bikes and listening to the few Christmas jams I have on my phone waiting to get home. I literally have never been happier. It was an awesome night! Elder Heffner and I got home and went to sleep, woke up early on Christmas morning to go on a morning jog to the other elder’s apartment to borrow some tubes and patches to get through the day. Luckily the weather was awesome those two days! Christmas Eve was actually crazy! Lots of people were out and about and there were sirens like all night. There must have been lots of wild stuff going on! Either way it was the best Christmas Eve of all time!

On Christmas day we fixed our bikes and rode to the bishop’s house for a breakfast and then to the church for district council. All the elders got together and went to the Lowe building and sang to a few recent converts and they loved it even though we sounded awful haha!

That evening Elder Heffner and I went to a recent convert’s house named Virgie, and she made us a Christmas feast! She made Greens, dressing, (I guess that's what African American people call stuffing) ham, Sweet potato pie, red velvet cake, and she insisted we eat all of it. We were stuffed full after and then had to jet to another appointment like 6 miles away. We rode there super-fast and it was awesome. But when we walked in, the Nigerian family we were visiting who is in our ward, put a massive ice chest full of rice on the table and said that all of the elders were not leaving until we had finished it. Elder Heffner and I were already stuffed and could not contribute more than a couple spoonfuls of rice, and the other elders there on their own haha.

When we were all about to burst and had no hope left, we realized we had probably only eaten 1/8 of the rice given to us, we ran out to the car, grabbed a big garbage bag and hid it on our laps. We put probably 3 pounds of rice into this garbage bag and stuffed it in my massive bag pack when nobody was looking haha! AND THEY STILL GAVE US A MASSIVE PLATTER TO GO! Good thing I'm in a bike area or else I would literally be huge. The portion sizes are unreal haha. It was pretty good though.

That night we started an exchange with a district leader Elder Noble and I went to south shore with him which is a super sick place and they do a lot of contacting right by this African store so we hit that place up and got some new Nigerian people to teach which was sick! It was a super good day with lots of good finding.

The next day it was good to be back with Elder Heffner in our area, and it turns out while on the exchange they had gotten two more flat tires so I think we were having some major bad luck. One investigator in our teaching pool said we could come by and he offered us some food! So naturally we said yes even though we had just eaten lunch and biked and drank tons of water. He made white rice and chicken with pepper stew. This pepper stew officially broke the record for the hottest thing I have eaten in my time here, and in my entire life. It was so hot we were sweating, coughing, snotting up and we're even crying if we shut our mouth haha. We were breathing heavy this stuff was HOT! But we were able to put it all down and teach the lesson with red faces.

The funniest part was when we hopped on the elevator after; we went down one floor before Elder Heffner grabbed my arm and pulled me off, and the proceeded to throw up everywhere on floor 19. One of our formers we were teaching saw us and let us use his bathroom to clean up and stuff, but poor Elder Heffner is still trying to adjust to the spice haha! Good times.

On Saturday night one of my old companions Elder Dodson came to visit the mission and took us out to grab some Giordano’s pizza which was legendary! His mom was a little paranoid to be on the south side at night, but I had no fears in the world as we were right by the church in Hyde Park, the nicest part of our ward boundaries. It is actually in the sister’s area because it's so nice! Then the people next to us proceeded to start screaming at each other and beating each other up until the manager screamed at them and chased them out, and called the police. It was pretty sad that my past comps family had to feel endangered, but at least they got to experience the south side! And it was great pizza!

That's about it for our week, we got another flat on Sunday on the way to church but we're able to make it. Got soaked on the bike and I've been loving every minute of it!

Hope everyone has an absolutely amazing week!

Elder Jensen

PICS:

Virgie feast 

Hood hotel  

Edibo family presents and tree

Being Santa on Christmas Eve 

Christmas morning jog

Infinite Jolloff Rice 

We Finna Have a Black Christmas

I really don't get the weather in this place and I don't think I ever will haha. This week started out way cold, like 10-20 degrees but now all sudden were in the 40-50s again which I'm OK with because it feels great to bike in! We had some polar biking days this week which was pretty cool! (Literally)

This week was awesome! I love being with Elder Heffner, he loves to bike in whatever weather and it's been making us get around so much faster than with the slow bus. We put on a lot of miles this week and my legs could be huge soon!!! Also we fixed my brakes this week so now I have less of a chance of not running into traffic!!

This week we had our Christmas zone conference which was super awesome and spirit led. There is nothing better than seeing the energy to get missionaries going even though the cold and dark is coming. To prepare for zone conference I went on an exchange with the other zone leader Elder Shupe to the west side, a glorious land where 13 people got shot two nights ago (and that was in the nice part?! Pray for Chicago and the cursed land of Illinois, they killed a prophet so it’s their fault) but it was pretty legendary we got to have a great time. 

The family we baptized last week the Rotimi's moved from out of our area to the other Elder’s area, and we helped them get everything done. They were super happy to get out of the Lowe building with 22 floors and elevators always breaking down and bug infested (yup that's my prime proselyting place the good ol Lowe building). They still live in the ward which is way good and in a much better home and area.

It's been pretty incredible to see several of the families we've baptized in that slummy building have been able to move out and get a much nicer place in a much better neighborhood with way better schools and closer to the church. The Lord's blessings are real! It's going to be cool because I'll go on an exchange there this next week and go do a lesson in their new place.

That's pretty much all that happened this week, excited for Christmas and blessed to be here with the best of people! Everyone stay blessed these holidays and have a Merry Christmas!

-Elder Jensen

Covenants Made, Elder Jensen Stayed

I'm so pumped that I get to stay here another transfer. For so many reasons!

First off, Elder Heffner is the man! He is actually like the next level super human generation of missionary. And this man likes to bike like me so we've been on the bikes every day this week! Polar biking!!!!!!!!! It's super awesome! He's from Susanville California and has only been out for 6 weeks so I'm kinda like his second trainer, but in all reality he is training me and is going to make this place his own.

This week has been kinda stressful because we were preparing for the baptisms this week, but everything went well and I know prayers from family and friends helped everything go smoothly!! Crazy tender mercies! One of the coolest things is our mission president was able to come to the Lowe building on Wednesday and interview the Rotimi Family for baptism! They passed with flying colors and it turns out that David and Yetunde did a hotel business back in Nigeria and that's what president does! So that was pretty sick and it was cool to take president around in Englewood and in the Lowe building.

Our District leader Elder Noble was able to come and interview Gabriel, Ronke, and Joseph as well which was awesome because it's always legendary to have 4 missionaries at once in the Lowe building.

I was able to interview the people in the DL's area and their names are Bola and Estonia and they are also super awesome! We had a super great Nigerian baptism! 7 people in the Hyde Park Ward Got baptized and 8 people in the Chicago stake! Our zone crushed the goal we set for December and are still looking good for the next few weeks! It's going to be a white Christmas for Chicago!!!! (Except kinda a black Christmas because we don't really have a lot of white people we're teaching)

Anyway, we no longer really have anyone we're teaching solidly so it's time to hit the find grind again and find some more people!!! We're pumped to get this place booming again and are trying to find some more Nigerian families!

Hope everyone has an amazing week! Invite as many people as possible to church next week cause it's going to be legendary!!

Elder Jensen 

1. Abiola family (Recent converts from like 3 months ago)

2. Ronke baptism

3. Gabriel baptism

4. Rotimi family baptism

5. Bola and Estonia 

Oluwadara

This was a super awesome last week of the transfer, and a super awesome transfer! We had some crazy news that we totally weren't expecting when we got our calls!

I was praying that I would get to stay, but when we saw that we'd be getting a transfer call I thought I'd be toast. It turns out Elder Levanger is the one who will be leaving and going to the Naperville zone, and I'll be staying and follow training a missionary who is already in our district named Elder Heffner!

I've gone on exchanges with him before and he's a straight homie! Only has to shift one area over to the left and gets to stay in the same ward! Didn't see that one coming, but Elder Heffner is a stud and I'm super excited! That means I'm going to have been here from 7 1/2 months of my mission by the time I leave, and I'm looking forward to it!!!

Those we are teaching and who are preparing for baptism are doing extremely well. Our friend Renke has had all the lessons taught and her interview finished! She's ready to go and we're super pumped. Gabriel loves the church and agreed to live the law of tithing so we just have one more thing to teach him and the interview before Saturday. He is loving it!

The Rotimi family was crazy shook that they couldn't drink coffee but agreed because it was counsel from one of the Lord's prophets to bless us. I'm so amazed by their faith! A lot of the Nigerians here only drink coffee because they need energy to work late at night, so we teach them that it's bad and then give them some mio energy and hot chocolate to be a substitute haha. But their belief in God gives them the strength to sacrifice anything! They are LEGENDARY!!

We had an experience this week where the mission president called us and said he'd like to keep one car in Hyde Park district and he was thinking of giving it to us but we only go to one concentrated area so we told him it would be better to give it to the other missionaries and we could just keep taking the bus.

Then our entire day proceeded to get destroyed by the bus system and we lost like 3 hours because of interesting things that were happening on the bus haha. This one lady tripped on the bus and then tried to sue the bus driver and we all had to wait on the next bus and now I really want to fix my bike ASAP even though it's probably going to snow this week haha. Then this lady proceeded to get off the bus, walking around like she's fine and yelled asking if anyone has a cigarette. Then she started screaming at us because we're "from the church of God in Christ" and we "gave her a card forcing her to trip" *face-palm*

Luckily the next bus came and we got to our destination an hour late haha. Gotta love the bus adventures. As we were walking away Elder Levanger saw a church called the church of God in christ and said "well that church is probably going to have a bus law suit on their hands anytime soon." so if anything ever goes wrong in the work or if you ever make anyone mad on accident, I've learned the valuable lesson is just to tell them you're Jehovah witnesses. (Unless they're just mad at the True doctrine then just tell them the truth and stand strong haha)

There is one Nigerian woman in the ward who keeps telling us every Sunday that she wants to have us come over so "she can host us." We went over this week and she made us a feast and then taught us one of her favorite African songs called "Oluwadara" or in English "God is good." It was super legendary and she was not fond of the idea of letting us leave until we had this song burned into our brains. Next level Nigerian hymns!

I think the last thing this week is we had MLC so that was mega hype! I got to go on a double exchange with my ZL comp Elder Shupe, which was pretty fun, but it was a fire time and we learned a lot of good stuff!

Please pray for Gabriel, Renke, and the Rotimi family this week! It's going to be a big weekend for them with their baptism coming up and we're excited to see them make covenants with God! Everyone have an awesome week!

Elder Jensen 

Pictured: 

Us with our girl Virgie Smith (recent convert) 

Twinning backpack squad ft. William Robinson (another recent convert) 

A house that got shot up 

Coffee replacement 

The elders and Omolara 

Our Chicago mural jump attempt 

Thanksgiving Exchange

This week was another phenomenal one! We saw many miracles and had many legendary experiences!

We had 2 exchanges to do this week because the end of the transfer is coming up soon and will be next week! First I had an exchange with this super awesome missionary in my district, Elder Noble, and we were able to have an awesome lesson with one of our progressing investigators, Gabriel, and we were able to get a recent convert named Martins that we baptized like 2 months to come.

We knocked on the door to Gabriel's home and heard his roommates yell "who is it?" and Martins yelled loudly something in Yoruba and then said "OPEN THE DOOR" in his booming voice and they let us in instantly. He literally just walked into some of the people’s houses who he didn't even know, sat down, and even started eating some of their food haha! And they love him now and are homies. Martins is a beast! Ever since then Gabriel has been even more excited to be baptized. He loves coming to church and is progressing rapidly!

We also tried to teach this one lady on this day who it turns out just wanted to hang out and walk around the Southside stopping at all the Walgreens and Dunkin Donuts for fun. She literally called us over 50X that day so we ended up blocking her number because missionaries aren't very good at "hanging out" anyways haha

This week we also had our Thanksgiving and we just happened to be doing exchanges with the assistants that day, so I went back to the Naperville zone and oh boy do those members love to feed their missionaries there. We had four Thanksgiving meals that day. I was a little sad I wasn't able to spend the holiday on the Southside but it was still a really good time and the missionary I went with named Elder Jimenez knows one of my cousins so that's pretty sick!

It was so weird to be back in the suburbs and knock on white people's doors for the first time in about 6 months. I think I like the city haha! It's a lot more exciting and fast paced! But it was still a super fun exchange and I had a great time. Elder Levanger stayed here with another missionary in training and they had a bike tire get shredded with no way to patch so they walked like 4 miles to get home on Thanksgiving, but still got a Thanksgiving dinner so they had a great time too!

This week we had our 5 people who are progressing well for December come to church. The Rotimi's came even though the father David stayed up all night working. He still made it a priority to get him and his family to church! They are an absolutely incredible family and it has been so much fun to teach them!

We were able to have an incredible lesson with one person were teaching who is also progressing well named Ronke, we taught her the commandments and she already believed in all of them except for the Word of Wisdom so it was pretty easy. She committed to give up coffee with incredible faith that the lord would give her energy during her night shifts. She works from about 5:30 am - 10 pm every day except for Saturdays and Sundays which she pretty much spends all her time preparing for her next week. She still makes time to meet with us and is excited to be an involved member of the church! She is incredible and has some exceedingly great faith! We had 3 members at that lesson, which happened out of nowhere, one of them being Darlene who has a legendary testimony and wants to help fellowship! It seems everything has been working out pretty well for them!

We'll I've been here about 6 months. This could be my last full week here. Transfers is next Tuesday the 10th, and the baptism is Saturday the 14th. We have 5 people (Gabriel, Ronke, and the Rotimi family) who should be getting baptized. I'm a little stressed out of my mind to leave everything in the hands of my young companion (even though he's a stud) just in case I leave, and I pray that I stay just so everything can go smoothly for the baptism! It's been an absolutely legendary time here and I hope to have a little more of it!

Stay blessed this fine week!!

Elder Jensen