Week 86 "Oh la, ca change"

February 29, 2016

Sunrise from the Versailles/Assistant's apartment

If I were to summarize in three sentences:
I did an exchange with the Assistants, went to their beautiful area -Le Vesinet,  and we found new people to teach.
Elder Trotter and I worked out in the morning!
I made Bearnaise myself, it wasn't that good.

Sunrise from the Versailles apartment (a different view )

If you've got more time read on.
Surprise last Monday morning, the assistants called and said they would be doing an exchange the following day, so I packed up my bag and took the RER to Versailles.  I felt sort of intimidated at first to work with the assistants, but then realized that they're normal missionaries like everyone else, they just work hard and obediently. I saw through them a good example of how to work harder.  I happened to go to their sector on a 'consecration day', which was completely devoted to finding new people to teach.  'Oh man this is going to be a long exchange (it lasted 48 hours on top of that, big exhale phooo sound)'. Even though I felt tired from all the talking to people everywhere we went, we met some promising people who want to see us again. Our efforts were met with some success.  Then again not everyone we talked to accepted to see us again, it felt most rewarding to work hard and not let as many people slip through the cracks as we sometimes do.  Overall we taught about ten lessons in that period, wow, so cool!

RER on Sunday

So I don't know what changed our how exactly it happened but something clicked and we're out working out every morning.  We went to the park to work out Friday, went running Saturday, rested Sunday, and went running again Monday.  Wow it feels good that both of us are hitting the pavement working out!  I think Elder Trotter has felt better since we started exercising.  This all started right after our exchange with the assistants.  In addition, right after we got back from the exchange I got some huge package from home, and Elder Trotter got one too! We took a moment to bask in glory of our packages then we made some soup from one of the mixes.  We proceeded then to teach Y, who we hadn't seen in a few weeks but he wants to be baptized, so we will work with him for the next two months so that happens.  Also, we saw J at night and watched "The Restoration" together.  Because English is his second language, we decided to do more audio-visual lessons, and his understanding really increased.

Me and ElderRivas contacting a lady! There were three people on this exchange,
part of the time we were with a Paris zone leader, so this is me and
elder Rivas contacting a lady.

    Remember how I went to the assistant's area for their whole entire day of finding, well I got another one when came back to Torcy!  We went contacting all day with a district meeting in the middle.  We had a cool miracle, I went through a progress sheet calling people...it was super old. These people had given the missionaries their number two years ago, but nobody had left comments on them, so one of the
people out of the fifteen or so I called answered and said, "This really isn't a good time I just lost someone in my family" (Um actually the perfect time!). I told her how we believe that people don't go away forever, their spirit is still there, just somewhere else, and she said.  "You know, that sounds interesting, not this week but next week will you call me back?"  WOO Yeah!"No, I didn't say "Woo yeah" on the phone, but that's how I felt.  Coming home from all the contacting we did today we met some interesting people.  First, I ended up talking to a man at the bus stop, I think this guy represented my sister Abby, because I ask him how he finds happiness,and he says, "By being present."  I almost laughed because Abby tells me that all the time, and he reminded me of the need to enjoy the moment we're in, whether our circumstance is good or bad. After that we met a guy who had major back problems and I was like, Oh I should talk to him; he was really nice and we left him with a prayer.  Then we met Sebastian and his dog 'ferocious'. Last contact of the night, one of those hey let's talk to one more person experiences.  I had a lot of those this week, and I felt very filled by taking more and more of those chances.   I took a lot of risks!  It was great!

My French Study, My Dictionary, and the Cookbook 'comme un chef'

  What else did I realize this week?
I like living in Torcy because the kitchen in the assistants'
apartment is tiny and I felt like Buddy the Elf. I realize that old French cities like Le Vesinet are SO BEAUTIFUL.
I think that if you have enough faith you can do anything, but work your way up, because it's impossible to have no faith then have a lot at once. I realized that even though I should follow the recipe for Béarnaise sauce I should use common sense as well, adding half a lemon and it was way too strong haha! I know that in order for anything to happen in the work we have to leave the 'flow' of normal grind of life and follow the spirit, THAT'S SO important. I realize that no matter how much you want a circumstance to change, you have to wait on God and trust things will improve.  Elder Trotter is more obedient and I don't know how that changed but it did.

The recipe for Béarnaise Sauce

My attempt at making Béarnaise Sauce

Following Directions

I love you all! I think that the scriptures and things that have been helping me through this time have been personal revelation and prayer.  Asking the Lord what I can change and not worrying about other people but just changing myself.  And honestly that's the best thing.  And to cap off the week, just to tell you all and Abby.  We went running this
morning it was freezing, I was thinking about a lot concerns I have then the town city bell for 7:00am went off (with such a distinctive European sound) and I just basked in the present moment, running in the fields in France on my mission.  So exhilarating and beautiful!!!
I lived in the present, I was present! - There you go abby!
Love
Elder Jones

Week 85 " Week Thirteen Together"

Elder Jones and Elder Trotter standing in front of "La Defense" the shopping district. 

                   Jamison bought a new suit and it was finally ready today.

Hey, wow, what a relief it is to write an email in English.  All I can say is I'm thanking the Lord for every week I have left with Elder Trotter. I struggle to realize the 'why's of my situation, but I feel like the Lord is teaching me a lot, kind of like you know something good is happening but you can't exactly explain what.  So that's how I feel.

Photography by Elder Jones

      So, do you all want to hear about a cool experience? Tuesday morning we went contacting, and I felt like I fell back into the France of fifty years ago.  We found ourselves on a path isolated from the urban jungle, and surrounded with nature, real French people and old buildings.  I thought, maybe this is what France looked like fifty years ago when my Grandpas who served here.  I loved the contacting and nature walk.  We found a chocolate factory at the end! see picture

The chocolate factory, the building is actually suspended over the
river.  The factory was built by the Menier family who produced
chocolate and the building was later bought by Nestle.  Today it's the
business hq for nestle.

        And yes, we did do some missionary work as well.  Coming back from church, waiting at the platform for our train home, I had a cool experience.  I looked about twenty feet down the tracks and a man stood there on his phone.  I had this feeling to talk to him and hard as it is to follow those feelings I....(almost, but wait for it) did it. The train came and not yet having approached him I hopped on the same car as him, and finally after two minutes of battling in my head I dove in and introduced myself and invited him to church.  The phrase 'you have the courage and capacity' kept coming to my head and I know that God gave me the strength to talk to that man, I only had to choose to go for it and talk to him.  How does the story end?  Well he says, 'You know I can't come to church right now, but yeah, another time I would want to come to church. Where's it at?.. Oh, by Domino's pizza, OH yeah I know where that is. Thanks for the invite, that was really nice.'  And then I get off the train.  Woah you know that you just did the right thing when you feel so good after having the guts to do something like that.  So I did my mini celebration dance in my head and then right after,I felt like I should contact two more people on the road but I didn't.  Agh.  For one thing, I've gotta be content with the effort I gave, and remember that I can improve as well.

Man playing 'Champs-Elysées' on accordion with another guy
half-annoyed but listening and enjoying simultaneously.  A timeless picture. 

       Thursday we visited K. At first he didn't answer his door so we worked in the area for a few hours, then we felt like we should try his door again, so we got off the bus, walked through the park, into the puny elevator, and up to his room.  K answered, and I kind of freaked out because his room was all dark and he wore a big black robe. 'K, I said what are you wearing?'  It's a traditional robe for..(I don't remember what)

In the end we taught a lesson about having faith in Jesus Christ, and I felt really good about the feeling we followed to come back and teach K the second time, that made all the difference. You could literally see how he felt more light and happy after the lesson finished.  Wow, Cool!

   We made Brioche (fluffy butter sugar bread) can you believe it?!

      In writing these emails I feel blown away by how many things God is doing for us.  It's like he's running this huge chain-reaction, rube-goldberg machine and we're the little kids to whom he says, 'okay now press that green button' and something amazing happens.  God is the master planner, the big architect up in the sky, and our job is to follow the feelings we have and obey him, and man, we see the coolest miracles.  

                    This is carrot soup that I made.  It's not very impressive looking but
                    mmmmm it tasted good.  Made it from a cookbook elder trotter had.

      We found quite a few potential investigators this week.  Helping our neighbors move, impromptu contacting sessions, and teaching friends of our current amis were all sources of contribution.  It blows me away to see how many cool things we saw this week when I look back.  I honestly forget during the week, all the little miracles we keep seeing thanks to YOUR prayers, our prayers, and our constant effort. 

Teaching the "E" family

This week wansn't the week I've worked physically hardest on my mission, but I'm always working hard to follow the spirit and I did a good job of that, and that makes me happy. Thank You, Thank You, Thank You for your prayers! I know my efforts are not in vain and that God and all of you are helping me every single day.  Love you all!  The scripture for the week I have on my wall is Psalms 55:16-17,22, "As for me, I will call upon God; and the Lord shall save me...... Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud; and he shall hear my voice. ....Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee; he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved." 

Bisous

Elder Jamison Jones

Week 84 "Staying in Torcy"

Hello!
Thought the best way to start this would be with listing these things: 
I'm grateful for the fact that i'm healthy 
and have high metabolism
I'm grateful I get to speak a beautiful language on my mission
I'm grateful for good food, all around me
I'm grateful that I'm coming to love the people
I'm grateful to take e train every day, it's so cool
I'm grateful it didn't rain today
I'm grateful that I can email all of you
I'm grateful for the opportunity God's giving me to work with Elder Trotter for another transfer.
The week has gone well like all the other ones.  
Lots of trials and even more blessings.  It's like the more we decide to work the more blessings the Lord throws us, and then some.  I really saw the coolest miracles this week, and I went through some difficult moments as well.
        The rain took a break Thursday morning so we felt like we should go contacting.  I persuaded my comp to go (yes!) and oh wow...so I felt great because It's been a while since I got a long period of contacting.  The sun was out, and we walked around the ponds in a nearby village.  We saw a man after venturing off the path to look at some storks. He was taking his lunch break; I'm a little tentative to approach French people relaxing, because approaching him talking about religion didn't seem to me like it would be a good idea.
        Even though I felt like that, I had an even stronger feeling in me that was tired of debating whether or not to talk to people.  After debating for a moment I said, "Ok I'll just go for it". So we walk up to him, introduce ourselves talk about prayer.  I felt surprised at the spiritual feeling we felt while talking to him.  Sometimes French people have a turned off-attitude toward God, but this man loved what we were talking about. Right toward the end we mentioned we would like to talk again to share the 'restored gospel' and he said, "Hmm, I've never heard of the restored gospel before, sounds interesting." Guys this guy was interested!  Few people on the street publicly voice that, but he wants us to talk to his family another day.  OOOHHHH so cool! Probably my favorite French person I've met on the road.
Saturday Elder Trotter and I found out we will stay together for a third transfer! We both felt pretty surprised because, we both expected one of us to leave.  And we have worked really hard on keeping a positive relationship, which is really hard to do.  I thought the Mission President would give us a break but nope, I think the Lord needs me to learn some things.  I'll say that honestly these last two transfers have surprised me.  Though I've felt I'm in a difficult circumstance the Lord sustains me in a way that goes past my personal understanding.  The Lord tells us where to go and what to do, and things work out if we follow that guidance. When I do what the Lord tells me to I feel amazing.  Conversely, if I try to do things my way, it's almost like I leave the eye of a hurricane and things get bad real fast. So the glue to keep this next transfer together is for me to trust in the Lord.  It's the only thing that's going to work.
        We taught the E. family on Sunday. Trusting not the consecutive order of lessons, but the voice in my head, we taught 'how to recognize the spirit'. The lesson went shaky at first but ended strong.  We shared with them what the 'Holy Spirit' should feel like from Galatians 5:22
 -  "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith," Immediately following our reading of the passage, Mr Eng commented
that it's basically 'relief' that summarizes all of those words.  Then his mother and wife shared their feelings on the passage and some amazing personal experiences.  Now they're more ready to pray and ask God about what we teach; they know how they should feel to know if our
teachings are really from God.
        Things are hard right now but they are SO good too.  I'm looking most forward to putting more trust in God this transfer than ever before. I have no clue how to work this out with elder Trotter with my own intellect, but the Lord knows him and me perfectly so he can guide us.
Man, just looking forward to the next six weeks.  The Lord will guide me.
Love, love, lots of love to you all.  Happy Valentines day!
Elder Jones

Week 83 "Still Plowing"

P-DAY SELFIE

February 8, 2016

Still Plowing.

Either this week felt tough or I'm weak and being strengthened or both...we had some tough times, and cool experiences too.The first thing I remember about this week was the exchanges we did.I felt happy to get out and do some contacting up in Lagny, a city a half hour out.  We passed by a less active who lives there, and we found out that he actually doesn't live where we've been passing by,so it'll be nice to improve our efficiency and work in other areas... On Wednesday night we met with our ami K, who, surprisingly, texted us to set up the lesson.  We asked what he wanted to talk about, he said, 'baptism'. OKAY a bit peculiar, we'll just have to go in calmly, and explain how baptism works and how to prepare.  We wrote up a lesson plan, and I'm happy to say that our lesson plan worked mostly, and K agreed to pray for the first time.  Keep in mind he has been taught since August but never prayed before, so maybe this will be the real beginning of things going in one ear and down into his heart, instead of in one ear and out the other.

Watching the Muskrats who came right next to us

 The second miracle experience, started with, once again....nothing at all planned.  Knowing my comp and me don't see contacting all day as fun, I scramble together a plan late at night, calling anyone I can think of in the phone; then the spirit tells me to call someone else. I call her, she answers, she accepts to take a church tour the next morning.  The sister missionaries come to help us teach her (we have such good, hard working sister missionaries here) and this lady is nearly golden.  She loved the church and promised to come this sunday! That's miraculous because she goes to Sacré Coeur for church normally, the most beautiful church in Paris, she must have felt something in our humble rented-out building....the SPIRIT.

Third, the E family is still going strong.  The lesson we had with them, on our part I felt was not top-notch, but I felt happy to see them still. I've seen the Lord's hand every day this week.  I know if we pray to him and ask him for guidance on where to go and what to do, he will tell us.  He knows my circumstance, he knows that I feel inadequate sometimes.  He knows that I'm trying, more importantly that I'm doing what he asks...though I don't always do it perfectly.

Old Volkswagon bug

                If ANY OF YOU are out there feeling like your circumstance is difficult I understand.  If ANY OF YOU feel like you are trying your best but your circumstance limits you, I get that.  If you feel tired and sick of it all, yep, I feel that too.  The hard truth is you need those experiences, I need these moments of difficulty.  I don't know why but reaching eternity doesn't sound easy.  I hope that any of you who are feeling pain turn to God, because things always get better

 his help.  I love this mission.  I'm looking forward to transfers next week. God be with you all.

Elder Jamison Jones

P.S. Jamison wanted to tell people reading the blog that he would love it if you would write to him with any questions you may have about his experience as a missionary or  what mission life is like. He would love to help answer any questions you may have.  He made the comment today  "One of the biggest lessons I'm learning right now is you have to choose every day of your mission to change, to be obedient, to do the Lord's work.  Some people probably think that the mission's like a machine that transforms you into an attractive, well spoken, spiritual person; I see the mission more like a marathon, where, if you want to finish, and finish well you have to keep fighting, keep going, constantly choose to do what you know you should to finish."

jamisonj@myldsmail.net 

Week 82 "A God of Miracles"

Stain Glass window of Church in Vaires

February 1, 2016

The weeks keep ticking off like seconds.  During the week it seems like forever though...haha weird how time flies.  So we saw great success this week.  Man, I feel tired but I refuse to give up!  Our week started with some great Korean food with the elders in our apartment, my mouth almost fell off drinking the Kimchi soup -- so spicy!

 

Church in Vaires

We journeyed to Vaires the day following.  Vaires is a cool little town where we did some contacting.  We found one guy named something like 'Reddy' and he seemed pretty nice and we exchanged numbers.  Hopefully we'll be able to see him again. We saw K, our ami and had a family home evening with a couple the Pletain's.  He (K) studies the scriptures and told us he feels like when he reads everything zones out and he feels peace. We committed him to read and study every day, he said, "I'll try" Haha kind of weak commitment but I think his desire will slowly start to increase.

 

Tuesday night teaching and enchiladas at the Pletain's house.  Our ami
is the guy on the left next to me

Wednesday we worked on a project, compiling information on members for future missionaries to come to our area.  I like to call it 'TorcyBook'. Our goal is to put together twenty member information cards before our transfer finishes.  This project will help especially if a 'whitewash' happens, and the new missionaries don't know any members.  So we're putting down a lot of helpful info and I'm hoping the missionaries following will use it.

We visited with an ami 'A' who insisted we meet him in Paris.  In a short little lesson we shared how the Book of Mormon testifies of Christ.  Following our lesson we had District Meeting and interviews in Paris (which is why we agreed to see our ami, otherwise we're not supposed to leave our proselyting area). I enjoyed my interviews and I have some good goals for the next couple months, and other goals which will help me keep my spiritual momentum post-mission: two of those goals are to be more happy around my companion and to not carry others problems on my shoulders - in a stressed sort of way. We saw the Fieschi family at night and I had a strong feeling that I'm really learning to love the people of France...especially them!  They have a really strong desire to do missionary work and help us...I love that!

 

                                 Frere Londono making CHURROS. The best columbian family out there.

We finally toured the church with C, a referral who took a very long time to contact...three months.  But we finally met him, an open guy, very curious, hope he comes back to church again.  I felt so much peace this day as I was fasting for our amis, wow I realized how peaceful fasting makes me feel, even If I feel so angry in moments I'm able to control that anger and turn it into productivity.  Me and my comp got along really well and did a large portion of our planning, so great!   We helped a family move in the day following, and the move went well.  We moved an entire forest up a few flights of stairs...so much wood furniture.

The bus for Disneyland Paris right next to our area

So then our ami D ran into some problems for baptism.  As a nine year old he has to have permission from his parents to be baptized, and his mom no longer wants it.  We don't communicate with the parents too well which really kills me.  We just want to talk to his mom about baptism, and reaching her is pretty complicated.  And D is the SMARTEST nine year old I've ever met. He asks really thought-provoking questions during our lessons, and he's had some powerful spiritual moments that seem to me like a testimony that he needs to be baptized.  We'll pray more for him and his parents, because I can imagine how hard it would be and how much could happen between now and when he's eighteen. Let's all pray for him ok?!

 

So you know this game, you have to guess what scripure character you
are by asking yes or no questions.  Elder trotter was Shadrac

From problems to prime teaching opportunities, Sunday flew by fast.  Run to catch train, prelude at church, J came! go back, eat couscous, teach E FAMILY WITH A GREAT MEMBER!!!!! eat vietnamese food, teach a new investigator and gets intense with the restoration, FHE with cake, came home, plan, get in bed and pass out. But I have to tell you how cool it is that we're teaching the E family! Coming from a Buddhist background they progress slowly but surely, one of them agreed to pray and ask if the message we preach is true! That's big.  So now I've got to go. But everyone have a great day and keep going toward eternal life.  God gives us a lot to do, and yeah it's eternal life but just one step at a time.  God knows us and he knows each child of his, that some of us (like me) aren't very good multi-taskers so he just gives us one thing at a time.  And the more we seek his guidance in prayer, the more he guides us closely.  I know He guides me out here.  I know he will guide anyone who asks.  I know God will stretch us because he loves us.  Wow I fell so stretched here, so challenged. But I feel good too.  I feel good!

Que Dieu Vous Benisse! Bisous.  Elder Jones

This is the guy that helped me at Defursac. I bought a new suit

Trying on some shoes during Pday