HE IS FOR SURE READY TO BE BAPTIZED ON THE 7TH!

Heia!

 Well things here are going well!  It has been a pretty hectic week.  I have been learning a lot and having great experiences!  Unfortunately I don't have a lot of time to write today so I will be trying to get the high lights!

We met with S a couple more times this week and he is doing great.  He also came to church on Sunday.  He is for sure ready to be baptized on the 7th!  So that is pretty exciting.  Other than that we had a super amazing week.  Unfortunately I don't have my new companion, he didn't get his visa so he is still in the states.  So right now I am continuing to serve with Elder A.  It will continue to be like this until Elder N gets his visa.  So ya.  Zone leader has been pretty good, we have been prepping for the conference tomorrow.  Elder Kearon will be here tomorrow and we have the conference all day.  Anyways I have a ton of missionaries that are waiting so I will try and catch up next week!

Jeg elsker deg!

Din sønn,

Eldste Jones

HE HAS A BAPTISMAL DATE FOR SEPTEMBER 7

Dang!  I am super jealous about the trip, it sounds super nice!  I am excited for the next trip I can come on with everyone!

As far as the new assignment, it starts on Wednesday!  I will be Zone leader with elder L but serving in a Companionship with my new companion Elder N who will be coming into the land on Tuesday.  So I will also be training him as well as serving as district leader.  So yeah lots of different stuff going on with this next little bit.  

This week has been way busy!  I went to Oslo and Mo i Rana!  So lots of travel.  I think that I spent like 2000 Kroner this week in travel, excluding my actual plane tickets... so ya it has been a crazy week.

Oslo was amazing, we had two meetings for training.  We had a training for trainers and then Mission leadership training.  Both were amazing, I really loved it and getting to hear more from president.

The things here in Trondheim have really picked up.  We actually got a baptismal date!  We taught him once last week and then once this week. .\  Both of our teaches with him were simple, but between them he read and prayed and found out that the Book of Mormon is true!  He has a baptismal date for September 7th.

Other than we went to Mo i Rana for a baptism.  That was way fun, we baptized the man in a Fjord, it was pretty cool.  Then Elder L and I took a 7 hour train ride back to Trondheim, that was absolutely a blast.  Except for the part where we were accused of planning to hijack the train!

This girl was sitting there and heard us talking in English and couldn't understand what we were talking about.  So she thought we were planning to hijack the train, so to make a long story short we were escorted to the front to face our accuser and had to sort everything out.  it was really awkward and embarrassing.  After that elder L and I decided to start speaking Norwegian just to be safe.

It was a good week filled with good experiences, lots of stuff that is now starting to happening in the work.  I think that Trondheim and the North zone is about to explode!

But that is about it for the last week.

Jeg elsker deg!

Eldste Jones

I just love those moments when we know that we are doing what the Lord wants us to!

Heia!

Yes mom, I got the hint!  Unfortunately I haven't really had a chance to take any pictures quite yet.  It has been a very busy little bit of time.  I will try and take a couple today with Elder A and send them to you a little later.  We all just went and got haircuts so we should be looking pretty good!  I also managed to hit 205 today!  So things are still going well in that department!

Other than that I guess I can answer your questions.  Our apartment here is by far the nicest apartment in Norway that I have been to.  We actually live with the Zone Leaders who work here in Trondheim as well.  We have two floors, a bedroom downstairs and then a giant loft area/bedroom upstairs (that is where elder A and I sleep) and then a huge kitchen and then 2 rooms for studies.  So needless to say our place is huge!  It is way nice though because we have these nice curtains that block out all the light (Not that that is really needed anymore since it is getting to be dark again. We are losing 6 minutes of light a day here). So that is all great!

We are two of the 8 missionaries here in Trondheim.  So there is a huge missionary force here in Trondheim.  Unfortunately when Elder A and myself arrived we had absolutely nothing going on.  So these past two weeks have been rough.  We have been trying to find everyone we can with not much avail.  So we will continue to work and try and find those that are ready for us.  Luckily for us the sisters are really killing it here.  They are all having great success and are really making stuff happen.  So that makes my job pretty easy as district leader when everyone else is already amazing! 

We had a pretty cool experience though over the past week.  Last sunday on the way to Church we met this woman named M on the way to church.  She was from mexico and was actually on the way to church herself!  We talked to her and found out that she had spoken to missionaries before and wanted to speak again so we got her number and said we would call here later in the week.  So on Wednesday we did that.  We got an appointment but we didn't have a member to be with us which was something we needed because we cannot teach a single woman.  So we invited the sisters along, who actually were struggling after their hard week the week before.  They were able to be there and take part.  About 5 minutes into the teach elder A felt the impression to go check a man who was sitting out in the hall.  We went out and he was standing there waiting for us, he wanted us to give him a blessing.  We asked to sisters to continue teaching and we went to give this man a blessing.  As we finished we were sitting there and we felt the impression to just let the sisters have the investigator.  That was a little hard because we didn't really have anyone but we went ahead and let them have her and we just left and started working again. 

About an hour later we saw M on the Street.  She said that she had to say thank you to us for introducing us to those girls.  She told us that 'They explained everything so clearly, like no one has ever done before!'  So it was an amazing testimony to us that we had been really guided by the spirit to choose the sisters as our companions for the teach and then have the courage to do what was necessary for those we serve!

I just love those moments when we know that we are doing what the Lord wants us to! 

I know this work is true and that we are being guided by the Lord every second of the day if we just listen to the small things!

Jeg elsker deg så mye moren min!

Din sønn,

Eldste Jones

I am back to a good size ward, we have about 80 in sacrament meeting!

Heia,

Well,  first full week here in trondheim!  Things have been pretty crazy.  I am super glad to hear that things are going well there. It sounds like things are so busy there.  I hope that things are going well with Mimi and everything else!

To answer your questions... yes I got the package.  I am right between the two sizes of pants so right now they all fit... 

The address is Olav tryggvassons gata 30,  7011 Trondheim

Traveling here was pretty good.  I just hopped on a flight and then came on down.  We had a small lay-over in Bodø.  

Things have been a lot different here.  I am back to a good size ward, we have about 80 in sacrament meeting!   We probably have about 150 to 200 on paper.  So that is pretty good.  It is definitely a change from being in Narvik. 

We didn't come into any investigators here so the last week has been just trying to find people again just like we did in Narvik.  So we hope to pick up some people in the next week.  it was kind of a hard week though just because we didn't really find anyone.

The district is doing good though, we have 6 sisters here.  They are all doing great, super young though.  We also have Elder L as my Zone Leader with Elder E as well. I was able to do a my first district meeting last tuesday and that actually went pretty well. 

My Sunday was pretty ridiculous.  We had a member from France that came in and attended our sacrament meeting.  He spoke some pretty horrible english.  He wanted me to translate for him though... so I ended up doing that in Sunday school.  As we went into sacrament meeting I sat next to him.  Being that it was fast sunday he decided that he wanted to bear his testimony.  He turns to me and asks if I will translate to Norwegian for me.  I said sure.  We go up and starts in on telling this really convoluded story about being in paris and traveling and about he almost got hit by a train.  Essentially it was the most broken english I have heard and I was entrusted to translate it to coherrent norwegian.  Needless to say I think I failed.  I think I might have completely destroyed all confidence that the members had in my Norwegian skills... luckily I had to the chance to change that with my own testimony a little later.

Things are crazy but I am really enjoying all the stuff that it going on here.  I love being a district leader and taking care of other people and helping them be better!  It really is awesome!

Jeg elsker deg!

Eldste Jones

TRANSFERRED TO TRONDHEIM

Heia!

Well I just got here to Trondheim!  I am now serving with Elder A.  He is a stud, I can already tell.  He has been here in the mission for 9 weeks so I will actually be finishing his training for the next three weeks as well.  

My district is here in Trondheim, we have the zone leaders and then 6 sisters.  So there are a lot of us.  I am pretty excited to be serving here, especially with Elder L again (he is the zone leader up here).  So things will be pretty awesome I am way excited!

That is all I have time for today though, I have to go eat food and then buy some for the week!

Jeg elsker deg!

Eldste Jones

Simply put, it was because we listened to the spirit. Got to love being a missionary huh?

Heia!

Well, I am happy to hear that things are going well for you all!  I am very sorry to hear that Aunt Sandy passed away.  I will keep everyone in my prayers.  

Tell all the girls I say hello!  Also thanks for the money for the suit, it really looks nice, I like it alot!

Things here are going well. First things first, I just found out that I will be leaving narvik next week... President just called and said that he will be calling me as district leader next week.  I am not sure where I am heading but I think it will be next Monday that I leave.  So it is a good thing that package should get here soon then huh!?

The last week has been full of different stuff.  We have still been working hard and we having been seeing some major blessings from the Lord. We had a couple cool experiences on the street this week.  

We were walking on the street and we felt like we needed to take a turn that we normally do not take.  But we took the right turn anyway.  Then as we proceeded on that route we decided that we needed to go left instead of right.... so we did that to.  Finally we came to another crosspoint and felt like we needed to take another left.  This put us going back the way that we normally would be walking.  Not but 5 seconds later we fall in step with this man from Britain and end up having this wonderful conversation with this man.  Something that never would have happened if we had not been in tune with the spirit.  As we continued on that route we ended up meeting another person that we had a great conversation with and invited to church.  And simply put, it was because we listened to the spirit. Got to love being a missionary huh?

We had a couple other small little experiences like that throughout the week, but nothing that makes quite so good a story.  

On Friday we had to wake up early to catch a bus to Tromsø.  The bus left at 5:20a.m.  and got to Tromsø at 9:30.  So that was quite a bus ride.  Then we had zone leader training there and worked with the Tromsø elders for a little before we drove back with the Zone leaders to Narvik in the Tromsø car.  (The Tromsø car was being returned to the south of Norway which meant that select missionaries had to make long car rides to get it down there,  the North zone leaders had a 15 hour leg of the drive)  That car ride was a blast, it was super fun to get to see Elder L again (now my zone leader here in the north, instead of my district leader in Bergen).  The zone leaders stayed here the night and then left Saturday morning.  So needless to say, Friday was shot by travel.  

Church was interesting this week.  The bottom floor of the Red cross building that we use to meet in is being used right now as a fishing shop, so we had the upstairs.  That consists of 2 rooms the size of my bedroom at home.  We had about 10 people there though, so that was nice.  We watched talks from conference as our sacrament talks though, so that was an experience.

One of the people in Church on Sunday was my district leaders father! My district leader is Elder H, and is from Stavanger here in Norway, and is currently serving in Bodø.  His father was on vacation and came to our church for sunday!  So that was kind of funny when I called him that night to give him numbers and told him that I spoken to his father that day...

Other than that it has been a good week.  We worked really hard again and really tried to make some stuff happen.  But I have been learning a ton up here and am really coming to love it!

Jeg elsker deg så mye og jeg ønsker deg en fantastisk uke!

Din sønn,

Eldste Jones

It is amazing to see the Lord bless you as you try your hardest. That is what we have seen here.

Heia!

Wow!  Things are so crazy how much they change.  I can't believe that it is time for another missionary to go out!  Thanks for those pictures as well!  You have to tell taylor to shave that beard of his though!  Everyone was looking way good otherwise!  

That is cool to hear that the Elders did a role play with you, it is always a little hard to be an investigator for those.  I think that is helps when you choose someone you know and pretend to be them as you go through the lesson, especially try and figure out what they are thinking and what not.  Who know maybe you will realize something that could actually help that person and then share it with them!

Anyways, this week was probably my best week in Narvik.  Elder M and I committed ourselves to working harder than we ever have before and we saw some improvement.  We found 3 new investigators and had 6 lessons.  That was the best we have had since we got here.  But it was amazing to see the progress we have made as a companionship and the progress we have made here in the area.

We have taught M a couple more times, and it went well.  We focused a lot on his concerns with the Plan of Salvation.  We actually were able to explain it in a way for him that made sense.  At the end of the lesson he said, "This makes more sense than my doctrine!"  So that was some icing on the cake!  But a couple other concerns came up as far as proxy ordinances.  So we now have a great way to bring in Baptism in this life and why it is so important.  So we will hopefully teach baptism tonight!  We are very positive, and feel like we have seen some serious growth in him!  He knows that the Book of Mormon is true!

We also got a chance to meet with S.  I don't know if I ever told you guys about him.  Essentially we taught him 2 times and then he got super busy with school. We met with him because he wanted to attend a YSA conference but wanted to understand our religion first.  But anyways we got to meet with him one last time before he left to go back to china.  He really enjoyed to conference and felt like he grew as a result of it.  Unfortunately he still has no desire to change religions.  But the cool part is that he gave us gifts!  He gave me a Chinese screen model.  Essential it is just a small decorative piece.  It has the terracotta warriors on it and is super cool.  I will try and send a picture home soon.

Other than that we have had summer vacation plaguing us.  Most of or other investigators either left on vacation or remain on vacation.  Including half of the ward!

In church on sunday there was only like 3 members.  The branch president left for vacation with his family to Finland.  His daughter leaves on her mission to Finland next month, so they were going to sweden first to go the temple. So next week I think we literally have just the missionaries and one other couple.  But we shall see.   

Other than that we have just been working hard and getting stuff done!  It is amazing to see the Lord bless you has you try your hardest.  That is what we have seen here.  

I vært fall, jeg elsker deg så hoyt!  

Din sønn,

Eldste Jones