Work with the Missionaries!

Hey family and friends!
It's been another great week here in Boa Vista!  We've been walking a lot and teaching a lot and now we are just waiting and waiting for the fruits of our labors.  Boa Vista is a fun place to work.  It's actually really tranquil, especially in our area.  We also have a lot more wind than Manaus and a lot less hills.  One thing that is kind of scary sometimes are the random power outages.  They happen all the time!  We had one yesterday during church.  We were in gospel principles and all of a sudden it was dark.  It was funny though because we could hear the primary kids screaming in the other room so we ran over there with a flash light to calm them down.  Luckily the power outages never last too long.

I love our primary kids!  They are so cute and right now we are teaching them the song "A Childs Prayer".  It's funny though because they have to learn it from 2 girls with funny accents.  They are going to sing in sacrament meeting in a couple weeks for "Dia das Crianças" (Children's Day).  Yep, that's a real holiday.  In the states we have Halloween and I guess this is their day to pay tribute to children.  I'm not sure what it will be like yet, we'll have to see!

This week we went to visit a woman named Mosinha in a city far from where we live.  (Well, not far...just a long walk).  Sister Crane and her last companion had been teaching her and she couldn't be baptized because she wasn't married.  They left her with a date to work towards for marriage and a heart shaped box to save up her money.  When we returned this week, she told us they were still planning on getting married and they saved the money so that they could get married by October.  We were so excited!  A lot of couples in Brazil aren't married because it is so expensive for them, but Mosinha wants to be baptized and for the past 2 months she has been working towards marriage on her own without the help of missionaries.  She was our miracle this week!

We also had an investigator at church!  Trust me, that is a miracle!  I'm not sure why, but it's been really hard getting people to church lately.  We walk around all sunday morning picking people up for church and they all have new accuses.  We also invite everyone we see.  A lot of people say, "Oh when your new chapel is ready, I will come".  But this Sunday our investigator named Rafael hussled to make it for sacrament meeting.  It was a really good meeting and the talks were all really inspired.  He told us that he really enjoyed it and he is excited to learn more.  But it is so vital that he continues coming to church!  That's where the members play a huge role.  Fortunately, we had a lot of members talking with him after church and welcoming him.

Our role as members is so important!  And the role and the vision for member missionary work is changing.  It's more than feeding the missionaries and receiving a nice message, it's about working side by side with the missionaries.  We had a Zone Conference this week and our Mission President spoke a lot about how we can improve our work with the members.  Why is that so important?  Because Heavenly Father cannot trust our wards with new members if we don't strengthen what we already have.  Our home ward has been so blessed!  I was so happy to hear that you now have 2 sets of missionaries!  Use them!  Find people for them to teach!  Heavenly Father has blessed the Brighton Ward tremendously to give ya'll 2 sets of missionaries.  You will see miracles as you earnestly try to work with the missionaries.

Remember that we ourselves our testimonies to the world that the church is true.  In Matthew 6:22 it says:

 22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine ^aeye be^bsingle, thy whole body shall be full of ^clight.

If our eyes are single to the glory of God, others will see the light of Christ in our eyes and they will want to know what we know.  I'm so grateful for the gospel in my life.  I'm so grateful to be a missionary.  There is no other place I'd rather be right now.  I walk, and sweat, and eat until it hurts because I love my Savior Jesus Christ.  I have never felt His presence so much in my life as I do right now.  I know the church is true!  The Priesthood is restored and I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God.  I know with a surety that God lives and loves us.  He is aware of every detail of our lives.  I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God.  I'm so grateful for this opportunity to share this good news!  I love you all!  Choose the Right!

Sister Jensen