Week 64 "THE BEACH"

La Havre with the Elders

Now elder Jones.... What kind of title is that?  'well it's a pretty good one, considering we went to the beach at La Havre this week.

   I have the great responsibility to give a training every week to a district of hard-working, solid missionaries.  Any one of them could easily be telling me what to do, but I guess this is what God wants me doing right now.  Anyways, I gave a training with the subject as, 'How we can grow closer to Christ' We set a goal to grow that relationship by praying more often throughout the day, and I will say that I saw the fruits of doing so.  That night we went to Le Havre on an exchange, and I was looking forward to it because it's, of course, on the coast.  However, I was feeling apprehensive toward contacting there because I knew the work was going a little slower.  Surprise surprise we had a whole afternoon and evening of contacting ahead of us, so I just 'girded up my loins' (haha) as the scriptures say and went out.  This is where the praying a lot came in handy.  Contacting all night is definitely something that requires good physical and moral stamina, and the prayers we offered during the day definitely helped us hold that.  I will also say that passing by the beach and touching the water also helped - I had always wanted to do that.

Elder Jones at the Beach

Unfortunately the dramatic cloudscape wasn't just for show, and we got poured on right after we took pictures. But hey it was okay; by the end of the night, we had taught quite a few lessons!  Just goes to show you that everything impossible with prayer and actually going out and acting on your prayers really works.  Pretty cool huh?  So pray and your long days will go by much better.

La Havre

     The following day we got lost in an isolated beach town.  Took a train that left at the exact same time as our train to Mantes, where we take a bus to Cergy.  So we saw the beach again!  We did not get home until evening, but good thing we finally got home because we had an appointment at the bishop's house!  We shared a good spiritual thought and they fed us Raclette in return.  Raclette is a self-serve cheese melting, meat-cooking grill, which when added to baked potatoes, makes an amazing dinner. Before we arrived at the bishops we were talking to people on the street and a man abruptly approached us to tell us we need only faith, and no works to be saved.  He was in a bible bashing mood, so we chose to just tell him we had to go, rather than argue.  Good decision.  Past that....the bishop of our ward, Frere Leger, is so cool! He's full of fire and good will.  He really wants us to be natural about sharing the gospel, and work a lot

through members. Will do, bishop.

     Rouen visited us in Cergy on Thursday.  We had another long afternoon of contacting, but not without cool miracles to accompany it.  For example, as we walked around one of the wealthiest neighborhoods of our sector talking to people, a lady walked down the road toward us, she definitely displayed the quality of a golden investigator in a financial sense more than anything else.  So, we stop her, and she seems really curious in our beliefs; in the end we explain the entire restoration of our church to her, and she really understood our beliefs.  Though she admitted to being dedicated to her current church, I felt really happy to meet someone who was so open to hear about our beliefs.  At the end of our conversation, she said, "I don't believe in coincidence.  I decided to take a walk because I'm waiting to pick my kids up from school, and look at that, I met you two!" We invited her to pray and left it at that.  wow!

Pontoise at night!

     The crowning event of the week was the baptism of Rotimi, an investigator that elder Harris had taught before coming here. Battling family and friend opposition, he stuck through and after a series of miraculous events he was baptized last Saturday.  The baptism was great, I got to see Elder Gunn my last companion since the baptism took place in his chapel.  I got to play piano for the service, and by the time everything was over we were looking to return home very late.  We hopped on the RER, and as we are sitting there, pretty tired, as it's 8:45 pm, a lady sitting across from us mentions our church's name while on her phone.  As soon as she hangs up we ask her how she knows the church and she tells us about some friends in her homeland who are members. She unexpectedly hopped off at La Defense and all we had time to do was give her our card.  Okay, no problem; moments later a younger couple starts staring at our badges, and then the wife asks us if we're working for a religion. "Kind of..." and that started things off.  She was catholic and her husband doesn't believe in anything, but they both felt interested in learning more about our religion and we exchanged numbers quickly before they too jumped off the train. Woo!  Well, 'jamais deux sans trois' as the French say (never two without three.) A half-minute later a black man right behind where the couple sat said, "so that guy didn't believe in God, eh? How is that possible?"  That started our third conversation. I think we were supposed to be on that train.  Even though he wasn't interested to learn more, I felt pretty blown away at all the people who just talked to us on the train.  God will put people in our path as missionaries, honestly; I could recount two or three other instances from this week where we ran into people we had contacted before, and these people are becoming more our friends than just some person we talk to on the road.

     Well in preparation for General Conference I would just tell you all that first, General Conference, for everyone who doesn't know, is a time when we receive God's direction and guidance through someone called a Prophet.  It's not his advice, it's God's direction to each of us.  Just pray that you'll be guided and humble enough to receive the answers to any questions you have.  If you prepare for conference with questions it's sure you'll receive answers.  I did this last conference and I got some great responses.  So go ahead and that'll

help you out a lot!

Love you and have a great week!

Elder Jones

Week 63 "Happiness!"

 

The Curious swans in Auvers

Things continue to go so well here in France.  The work is really progressing, and I feel really really grateful to be preaching the gospel and teaching people in a place and at a time when the gospel is needed so badly. France, like any other place in the world, is hard to serve a mission in. I feel like there are people who wish they were in a different mission because certain things would be easier, but then they forget that every mission has it's individual blessings and drawbacks.  So even though the physical circumstances may be different, every mission can be hard, and every mission can be rewarding. I'm so grateful to serve in a place where people come from all over.  You may think this is crazy but so far I've met people from twenty African countries, ten Asian countries, and a handful of others from the Americas, Australia, and Europe. I feel so blessed to be serving here.

Elder Harris at The Axe Majeur

   This week started on Monday night at the Louima's house.  The Louimas make Haitian food, and after sharing our spiritual thought and eating enough that we thought we'd explode, Sister Louima filled a giant bag with leftovers!  We contacted home and met two men who moved from near the same region I went to in northern India!  Though they acted kindly toward us they didn't show interest in learning more, but hey I learned something cool from them; that is, Urdu, the mother tongue of northern Pakistan, is extremely similar to Hindi, the mother tongue of India, but only when spoken.  When written out they look completely different - urdu looks like arabic, hindi looks like, well, Hindi; later that week I saw someone texting in Tibetan on his phone, and that looked like Hindi.  My mind is exploding with all these languages.  Luckily most these people speak English or French!

   Auvers-Sur-Oise. Tuesday.  Vincent Van Gogh painted in this town, and we had the privilege to work there for a few hours.  Small town but beautiful still. Contacting went well because people had a more laid back attitude, they didn't seem as rushed.  We also enjoyed the beauty of the land and water, we contacted from this city to the other side of the bridge, and found some swans who though we had food, we didn't but they came close enough for a close up picture!  That evening we met T. who came from Brazil, and he came up to us to ask who we were.  We introduced ourselves, and the church, and we had a good conversation about repentance.  We hope he will meet us so he can learn how to change his life through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Elder Jones in front of the Pompidou

        Elder Wilson and Elder Bigelow came to help us out on Wednesday, and wow they really did a good job.  Elder wilson and I couldn't believe we were serving together for a day, it was very very very great.  We got to teach J our investigator together, then we contacted on the road, and Elder wilson is very bold with talking to everyone, and he inspired me to do a better job of speaking with everyone on the street, regardless. We went home to eat dinner, and made a lot of food. To our absolute delight/horror we came to the member's house and the first thing me and Elder Harris saw was a set dinner table. Oh no, we did not plan on eating dinner here, we were scared that we wouldn't be able to eat all the food because we had just made a big plate of leftovers from our Monday night member visit.  I don't know how, but we managed to finish all the food, and share a nice spiritual thought with the members to top it all off. So elder Jones is definitely not starving here in Cergy.  He is actually eating very well, too well you could say, haha.

This is what we eat most the time: steak hachée and potatoes!

        Zone conference happened Thursday!  I would send you my pages and pages of notes but that would be a little boring no matter how good the conference was. The main subjects discussed were repentance and focusing on Christ, which is a mission-wide goal right now.  As part of that goal we are focusing studies on the New Testament, Book of Mormon, and Preach My gospel.  Right after Elder Chen and I went to Mantes, charged with the good lessons we had learned at zone conference.  We felt a lot of peace contacting people and inviting them to hear about the gospel! We met a lot of really interesting people, including an undercover cop who told us to stay alert and watch out for groups of rambunctious teenagers. At the end of the night we had taught a handful of people, and we agreed that the Spirit had been strong that night, thanks to our focus on Christ.

        At the back end of this week we visited an investigator, Z, and his family.  They made us really good food, and three members of the family would like to be baptized.  The only issue is they need to come to church, but they haven't yet.  So we'll keep hoping they come.  On Sunday we had Stake Conference and very thankfully our recent convert S and her son came, and through our coordination efforts, they went to a family home evening with the Jean-Jaques Family in our ward!  We finished off last night with E.  Another investigator who we actually got to teach at a member's house, woootwoot.  So sunday went well.

We made banana bread! Sister martin, an older lady in the ward, taught us how

        The spiritual thought for this week comes from Nephi, whom, while in the wilderness with his family, followed the guidance of the Liahona. By following it's guidance he and his family were  led in the most fertile parts of the wilderness.  To any outsider, teaching the Gospel in France may seem an impossibility, much like anyone who stayed in Jerusalem felt assured Nephi and his family would perish in the wilderness.  But the Lord does works miracles, and every day he leads us to people who need the gospel.

Just this saturday we walked out of our apartment and we ran into the lady whom we had helped load a large piece of furniture onto the bus. Even the man who repaired our apartment this week was willing to take a Book of Mormon after our invitation.  The Lord's work is so cool! I Love you sooooo much!  Thank you for all your letters and prayers!

Till next week, Elder, Jamison Jones

Week 62 "I Love Cergy!"

A really cool cathedral we

saw during one of our train correspondances, Evreux

Bonjour tout le monde. Alors, cette semaine s'est passe tres bien.  Ohps, started to write in french.

This week overall went very well.  In brief, I Love Cergy and I couldn't be happier to be here.  I will be brief in my email because my email is kind of the same every week (everything is amazing)  BUT wait I have to be careful and not take any of this for granted.  As Gerard Causse told us in General Conference, we have to be happy with what we have and never take the wonders of life for granted.  And honestly there are soo many good things happening here in Cergy, and in our district.  Our area is the northwest suburb of Paris, and we have some extremely beautiful places to work.  Oh man, this week's activities took us around our area and beyond, into Rouen, Mantes, Paris, and beautiful cities in between.  (Man, Elder Jones are you just on vacation?)  Yeah, I should probably work harder.  Events of the week included the baptism of a kid in the ward, visiting some very promising investigators, and surprising (but of course expected on a mission) miracles.  On tuesday morning we headed off to Rouen for our district meeting.

On our way to a District meeting with Elder Wilson (my High School Buddy )
 and Elder Bigelow (my former companion from St. Quentin)

We are trying to get everyone in the mission more focused on Christ, who is the center of our teaching, so the training I gave was based on how we can look to christ and live through prayer and studies.  That night we stayed in Rouen to do an exchange.  With one hour left in our night we decided to knock some doors about halfway between our lesson and home.  It was an on-the-fly spiritual decision.  We just started knocking on doors and trying different approaches to everyone.  About the tenth house down we rang one of those doorbells where the person can talk to you from the house, and we told the lady we were sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with people, and how it's blessed our families.  She said, one second, let me open the gate up.....( ! )  :D  She talked to us for a good half hour, we shared the Restoration with her, and we ended with offering her a book of mormon and asking her if we could come back, which she refused. But hey! She opened her door to us wooohooo!

The metro line one comes out of a tunnel for thirty

seconds to give you this brief view of the eiffel tower

Our recent convert :) S. is continuing really well.  We are focusing a lot on the temple with her, and she can't wait to go there. Her son P. is interested in being baptized and we may teach him soon. Stay tuned.  S saw us late Wednesday night after spending a day in some fields harvesting fruit and vegetables, haha, so cool!  She gave us some corn, which we cooked up and ate later during the week.  I think it's such a cool thing we get to be a part of as missionaries, helping people progress after baptism and beyond.  What a glorious, beautiful blessing the temple is, and yeah, I'm just looking forward to helping S and her son get there someday!

   

a blurry  picture of elder Harris, elder Duncan, and Me 

in the Park in Rouen

Le Havre Elders came to Cergy and we tore it up here!  Me and Elder Shaver from Vancouver experienced a cool night.  After teaching our muslim investigator R. and another investigator J. we planned on an easy night, heading to a members house to share a spiritual message and then coming home.  However an unexpected cancellation of our appointment caused us to change our plans.  Already halfway to our destination, we had a decision to make; either do some work in the city we were in, or go home right then and eat dinner. Elder Shaver and I decided to make it a matter of prayer, and following our prayer we decided to contact some people in Satrouville.  After a semi-successful session of contacting we headed back home.  Still a little perplexed why I had felt to stay in Satrouville to contact, I sat on the train and all of the sudden a man looks over at me, gets up from his seat, and really enthusiastically introduces himself.  He turns out to be the best friend of a member of our ward, and he started asking us lots of questions.  We got off the train with him, walked with him all the way to his apartment with a beautiful view of Paris, and then we talked to him for a half hour, teaching him the restoration!  Wow, prayer can change a lot.  Because we stopped and prayed our whole night changed!

The view from our apartment at night

   This week a kid in the ward got baptized.  The service was really well done, and elder Harris and I cleaned out the font.  Even better than the service, one of our investigators came to the service! She and her son liked it, and they're also considering baptism, they aren't absolutely sure yet because they haven't read the Book of Mormon and prayed about it which is essential. Another investigator Z. and his family would like to get baptized and first he and his wife have to get married, which he's ok with! (phew).  There's so much good happening here and the most important thing is to stay humble and happy.  Sometimes I scare myself into thinking that I'm becoming prideful and letting my priorities slip, but then I just have to remember not to freak myself out, stay calm, and continue to share the gospel with whoever gets put in our path.  Man it's so difficult but so worth it.  Continue strong everyone.  If you want a supercharged study of the scriptures study out of the New Testament and Book of Mormon.  That's what we're doing.  It's amazing!

 A pack of 30 Ramens we bought at a Chinese Supermarket.

Week 61 "New Companion"

Elder Jones and Elder Harris on the High Speed Train back from Paris

Hello, I'm doing SO GOOD!
     So you know how when things are going good, you think to yourself, now things can't really go this good for that long, can they? I'm feeling that way right now, with Sent from my iPad I'll start off with the news about elder Harris.  I am so grateful the Lord has put him here to serve with me.  I have a companion who really understands me.  We talked for a bit about some of our individual struggles in following the spirit, and we realized we've gone through much the same struggle, and that comforted me.  Elder Harris was so happy to come to Cergy.  He was just 'WOW'-ing at every aspect of the work I showed him; our investigators, the chapel, the apartment, the ward members, etc.  His attitude reminded me of how grateful, and how hard-working we should be here. Elder Harris is about 5'8", he wants to follow his father into a sportscasting career, he speaks French well, and he (already) takes responsibility to call our investigators and get things done.  Could I ask for more?
     
We had the privilege to go to ward council this Thursday and present the progress of the work to our ward leaders.  Once again I felt amazed to see that quite a few of our investigators were progressing, and that made me happy.  What made me even more happy, I recognized my progress since my arrival in Cergy.  During the first ward council meeting here I struggled to note everything that the bishop wanted us to do, and I felt stressed and scattered with all the new-ness. However, this meeting elder harris and I had prepared our papers that report our amis' progress on the iPad, and we were able update the ward about all that was going on promptly and with confidence.  I felt that I have grown my capacity to cope with stress here, and I felt very happy to see a progression toward better self-stress management. Woohoo! God helps us!
     
So now for an update on the investigators.  R our Muslim investigator gave us an interesting ultimatum.  Well not an ultimatum, but a statement that really got me thinking.  She said, "I'm not investigating your church at all for sake the purpose of joining it, I just love learning about your way of living and I find so many assimilations to my own beliefs.  The thing that bothers me is the belief that Jesus is the Son of God; but hey, convince me of that and I'd be baptized tonight."  since then I've been studying up on the divinity of Christ, and I hope to be able to explain that clearer to her next lesson.  She is very interested in our belief, but we're stuck until we help her see the true role of Jesus Christ, which is very possible.

Homemade Mexican Cuisine 

     
I'd also like to talk about a couple miracles this week, miracles to rival that Hail Mary 50 yarder touchdown that BYU made against Nebraska.  T is a teenager who texted us last week wondering when we could meet with him; when asked what he would like to discuss, he said "I'd like to know how it works becoming a new convert and all, I'd also like to know what the process is to going on a mission, since I'm 17.  I'm in a pretty intensive study program but I want to finish my study program before I go...but yeah, we'll talk about it in the lesson."  We met him on Wednesday and we confirmed he was a real person, who really wanted to get baptized! We could scarcely believe our eyeballs or ears. He is just a normal French kid, studying law. That is so So SO COOL! And all you listen up, the best part is he was a member referral.  Stay tuned for info on T.  Things should get good!
    
 Ready for round two of miracles?  This time it's Brother Z. He's an investigator who has been away for a while.  We called him up and he invited us over, I knew he wanted to get baptized a while back and Elder Harris and I headed over to verify that Sunday afternoon.  Yes, he is also real.  And his wife and kids!  The husband and wife accepted the invitation to baptism and we're signed up to teach them next week too. What on earth?  How is all this crazy amazing stuff happening here.  Though I don't know why God decided to pour down the blessings now all I can do is hang in there and try to help these people get baptized.
  
Another fun part of the week.  Elder Harris and I went contacting in the park in the rain, and just my sister Abby would like to know that.  I am so.......perplexed, but happy, very happy here, and yes, following promptings from the spirit brings us that happiness.  I feel like I could say what Alma said in the Book of Mormon:

1 And now, these are the words of Ammon to his brethren, which say thus: My brothers and my brethren, behold I say unto you, how great reason have we to rejoice; for could we have supposed when we started from the land of Zarahemla that God would have granted unto us such great blessings?
2 And now, I ask, what great blessings has he bestowed upon us? Can ye tell?
3...[they] were in darkness, yea, even in the darkest abyss, but
behold, how many of them are brought to behold the marvelous light of
God!..
    
 I think I should also talk about the end of the time I spent with elder Gunn.  Even though we had our differences, and we still didn't agree on certain rules till the end, I am grateful for the time I spent with him.  I learned so much about carrying myself confidently, and just believing you can achieve whatever you put effort toward, because that was the example he showed me. I have  a lot of respect for him, and I love him a lot.  He'll see some really cool things the rest of his mission.  Honestly I have never been so talked to while knocking on doors as with him.
     
God brings to pass the work of salvation, even in France everyone.  I had the opportunity to run into a couple Americans on the train, and they asked, "has anyone joined your church since you've got here?"  OH YES.  Thank you for your prayers, you are helping to bring salvation to these people.  Thanks so much.  Thank you Elder Hirst and Hogan for your sacrifices and yeah, you guys are great.  I love you all, Elder Jones