Guatemala Retalhuleu Mission -Elder Jensen: A Return to the Beginning

Dear Family,

My companion and I have had some interesting times as we travel throughout the mission. We had the chance to go back to San Marcos and San Pedro to work on Tuesday and on our way up we came up on a very strange scene. It was one of the big buses but it´s wheel axels were super, super misaligned. I mean super misaligned! It looked like the bus was going to fly off the side of the road but it was going straight! It was hysterical but we also hoped that the bus had no passengers because that was not fit to be on the road. We just wondered how hard it would be to park that bus all crooked like that.

We started the week with some really successful trainings for the leaders of the mission. The Spirit helped both of us out to give powerful messages and inspiration and I am amazed at how comfortable I am now talking publicly. That is a huge blessing. But I was definitely more calm when it was all over. On Thursday we got to go up to the mountains again and I worked for my first time there! Wow the air is thin there! The Elder that I was with decided to take me up a massive hill in the area and I was just amazed at how much my body is not used to working in the high altitudes. Let´s just say I had to yell a lot ´slow down!¨ It is amazing at how different the culture is up there. I also lost the feeling in my fingers various times.

On the way back we stopped in Xela to buy some bikes for one of the big areas in the mission.

The Quetzaltenango Temple at night

Something that Elder Merrill and I have figured out is that a great way to pass the time on these long drives is to listen to a ton of talks and devotionals which has been fun and made the trips feel a lot quicker. I am starting to love the teaching style of Elder Holland, Elder Bednar, Elder McConkie and many others.

I had 2 big highlights of the week. Number 1 was that we got to work in our area on Friday and Saturday. Well on Saturday I got to be with Elder Walton (my old comp!) and we were working super hard the whole day to find new people that could attend church the next day since they had been struggling in the area. Well we worked super hard and talked to a lot of people and at about 8:30 at night we knocked the door of someone that Elder Walton had met one time at the gym. Well he was super excited to come and know the church on Sunday and he ended up attending. Then at about 8:45 we knocked another door of someone that turned out to be the brother of a member of the church. He had listened to missionaries a long time ago and he also came to church the next day (2 miracles since church starts at 8am). It felt so awesome to bring people to church again and get to work in my assigned area! The Lord blessed us a ton in those few hours since we never get to be in our area.

The other number 1 highlight of the week was that on Sunday we went and worked in Calahuaché, my first area!! It was a blast and I got to show the missionaries some of the people I used to teach that had come to church in the past and it was fun to actually teach some of them once again and see a new excitement to come to church in them. It was so fun and the best part and one of the sweetest parts of my mission is that I got to see the B. Family again. This was the family that my companion and I found back when I was here and they ended up all being baptized in the church and now many of them have callings. The oldest son is now the branch mission leader and he is waiting his mission call! Right when they saw me they yelled ¨Elder Jensen¨ I was happy they recognized me so fast and they just kept saying how grateful they were for all that we did to teach them and I felt so happy to see that all our work in Calahuaché really had a big effect. I love this family so much and I am just carried away in joy to think of the amazing souls that I have met here in Guatemala! I love this work!