Week 99 "FIVE AMIS @ CHURCH"

May 30, 2016

Our week began with a fun night at the Decaux family's house.  Two of our Amis came and they had a fun time, and we taught the Plan of Salvation.  Our friend who serves as a Catholic priest almost came,but then had a last-minute problem so he didn't make it.  I drew a big explanation of the Plan of Salvation on our mini whiteboard, and everybody thought it was well-drawn, that made me happy.

       We taught S, one of our new investigators and things are progressing really well with him.  The story of how we found him is nothing too special. However I did feel the spirit very strong when we met him; walking up the road to visit a family we teach, I felt a strong impression to talk to this man.  Since then, S has loved reading the Book of Mormon, and this week we invited him to church and he accepted the invite whole-heartedly.  Some people act very lazy about coming to church, S was different, he insisted that we give him a reminder call the day of and you could just feel his sincerity.  It's a cool feeling when people are sincere and keep their promises.
        The next story is called the "Kebob from Heaven." Thursday night all the way into Friday morning was full of cancelled appointments and lots of walking and taking the bus.  Taking the bus makes me really tired for some reason!  But anyway Friday morning we go out contacting before lunch.  About one hour has passed and we're just about turning around to head home to eat...and then we contact this man who is interested.  We talk a little about the Book of Mormon, and then he pauses and says, "Have you guys eaten lunch yet?" Um, no..."Well do you want to go eat a Kebab with me?"  Well, ...yeah! Sure! So we got Kebabs bought for us at the end of a long, hard couple of days.  Had we not met this man we still would have eaten lunch, but the experience was a sign to me of God's love.  Keep going to the end and God will send blessings!
 

Storm Coming into Blois 

    
  That's not all, folks.  The best experience of the week I'd have to say, was church. Elder Smith was not feeling well at all, but we put on our rain jackets and went out.  We met up with "A" right at the beginning of our walk (1 person at church) and had fun talking all the way to the chapel.  We attended the first class, then went to pick up S, our progressing Ami from before, who brought his son as well (3 people at church).  The Sacrament Meeting started and I got a tap on the shoulder, "Elder, there's someone in the hall." An old investigator showed up kind of unexpectedly.  (4 people) And halfway through the opening song another Ami who we had invited sat down.
That made for five people we're teaching (or have taught) at church! The coolest thing was that as these Amis came in, a few church members quickly changed spots so they could sit by our Amis and explain the meeting and help them feel welcome. Well what a cool thing that we have members who care about our Amis, there's nothing better than good solid members who help you!

STORM IN BLOIS

        I am grateful to serve in such a beautiful country.  There is so much old tradition here, It all feels so cool to walk down the same streets your 700 year old ancestors might have walked down, with their pitchforks, armor and mandolins. And I feel grateful to be here doing what matters most.  Even though most people don't listen fully to what we say, the majority are very nice.  The Restored Gospel takes time and effort to understand, but not everyone will put forth those two simple things.  Fortunately we teach a handful of people who are willing to take the time and put in the effort to learn about this awesome gospel for themselves!  And I hope that A, A(2), S, L, and G will continue to work toward knowing through the Spirit this is true. The great thing is that we can all gain a testimony the Gospel of Jesus Christ through praying and putting forth that time and effort ourselves.  This works, I've tried it. And with that I know that this Gospel is true.  We will all have the occasional doubt, but just hold on.  God will not leave you comfortless.  He loves you.  He gave us Joseph Smith as a prophet, and all those prophets after, to restore His Church.  He gave us Christ to set a perfect example. And heck yeah it's hard to to what we're supposed to but just stick with Him (God) and he'll 'place you on his shoulders and carry you home'.
Elder Jamison Jones

Week 98 "Another Great Week in Blois"

May 23, 2016

Statue of Liberty in Blois

Allergy season has hit, I went through fifteen little tissue packs infour days!  I decided, after the second day, to do something about it since my nose was running like a leaky faucet eighteen hours of the day.  I tried that treatment where you put a towel over your head and breathe in a lot of steam with salt, and that actually helped a lot. Elder Smith and I are both plowing through these last weeks with sickness, although mine is really nothing at all, and we are doing really well all together.

        Yesterday we taught our amis in a unique way, by skype! I hadn't ever done this before, but it was cool.  Our amis from Albania speak just a little french and no english so we contacted the Baltic South mission this week and they taught this family about The Restoration.  I
realized what it's like to hear missionaries teach in a language you don't understand.  I just kept thinking how on earth did two guys from America learn how to speak Albanian so well? Gift of tongues, my friends.  And as a missionary, you don't realize how cool it is to
hear someone speak a foreign language until you're on the outside looking in, as we were in this scenario.  Real cool!
        Oh and we had the funniest Family Home Evening this week.  Funny meaning just insane.  So we just met a muslim man from africa last week and decided to invite him, another african lady, and her two kids.  Sound normal? Well that's where the normal ends. Everyone gets there, and we find out that the african lady is the ex-wife of another ami who was going to be baptized, thus his two kids as well, and the muslim man was a friend of the ex-wife's husband, and wouldn't stop telling us how she wasn't a good person, right in front of everyone. Uhmmm, so cue the missionaries to tell everyone we're all just going to sit down and have a nice night together, so we prayed to start the evening, praying that everyone would get along, and things got better from there. We taught about The Book of Mormon and everyone seemed on par with the subject, phew. Good turn-around for a potentially
disastrous night.

        We taught quite a few new amis this week.  Two of our amis who were going strong stopped meeting us because of work issues, and it seems like we have an all-new list of people to teach after only a month and a half.  Well that's how it is sometimes, but hey, we've got A who is progressing toward baptism.  We talked to his mom and she completely saying to us that it's his choice now and I have no problem with him joining the church.  Thank you!  A has helped us move a member of the
church this week, so he's doing well, we could say. Just hope that he will stay on track for the 17th of June.
        Just want to let you know how much I love this experience of the mission in it's entirety.  I realized this week, since my anxiety about going home was high, that the best way to prepare for the future is to enjoy the now.  That way you've trained yourself to enjoy the present day, so when that day comes that you've been looking forward to finally comes, you will have trained to enjoy it in it's present state, instead of constantly feeling anxious about what's to come. The time I refer to is the end of my mission, but I believe this same practice applies to all situations: Prepare to enjoy the future by enjoying the present!
Enjoy the present, have a good week. If you're not having a good weektalk to Heavenly Father. He will help you!
Elder Jones

Week 97 "President Uchtdorf in Versailles"

May 16, 2016

Right now I'm on a bus going through the Chambord Castle Forest on the way to Cheverrny...another Castle.  It's really nice, there are beautiful bright green trees, about fifty feet high in all directions with the occasional path with a French family riding their bikes (today's Pentecost, a national holiday), nothing like spring in the

French Countryside!

Chambord Panorama

  You may think that my week is all just castles and horse-drawn carriages.  Well... that's the truth; we walk around the base of the Blois Castle every day, and every half hour a two team horse-drawn carriage drives past our apartment.  Ha, but in all seriousness, this week was full of stood-up appointments.  We probably got cancelled on 4 out of five times.  Here's what happened: we'd meet someone on the street or call them, and this person would say, 'oh yeah, tomorrow is good for me, I'll just meet you in the center of town, at the park.'

Chambord Gardens

The BEST PATISSERIE! It's called Paris-Los Angeles.  Cake,
Strawberries, Strawberry whip cream and pistachio whip cream. 

So we fix a time, get there, and wait for fifteen or twenty minutes and nothing. : (    Then multiply that by ten.  I need to figure out an action plan for when that happens, because it's happening too much.

                    In the Car going to see President Uchtdorf.  That's our Ami "A" on the left.

Well we actually got the chance to see someone really cool speak! Thursday night we drove up to Versailles with our Ami A and the Liebard family to hear President Dieter F Uchtdorf! The thing that impressed me most about hearing Pres. Uchtdorf was his simple, genuine character. He really felt like just another normal person, but with God's power helping him speak. 

As he began his address, he paused overtaken with emotion and said, 'it feels like I'm coming home.'  His roots being European, Uchtdorf feels a lot of love for the French people, and the saints of Europe.  He emphasized the importance of acting worthily to be able to enter the temple, keeping the commandments, and trusting the Lord.  All great points of counsel. I feel really happy that A our Ami, only seventeen years old, got to see President Uchtdorf.  What a great experience for someone just starting to learn about the church! I had a great week. 

New Paris Temple in Versailles under construction

So I just wanted to share a really great miracle that happened to us this week. Well two of them:

First one happened yesterday.  We are teaching a family from Eastern-Europe of seven people.  They mentioned they had financial problems and were struggling to feed the little girl because she could only eat one thing, plain yogurt.  We had some in our fridge but I kept forgetting to bring it to them, and then we finally brought it to them a few days ago and we were able to teach the kids about the tree of life. On the way there we met a man who I felt really impressed to talk to, and we gave him the Book of Mormon and he accepted to meet up this next week!

   I mentioned that this week we had had a lot of cancelled appointments; and this week the thought came to my mind, 'you haven't fasted this month yet.'  We usually did at the beginning of the month but weren't able to, and so we decided to fast on Friday.  Friday was full of more changed & cancelled appointments, so it was pretty hard. Then we finally got to the end of the day, pretty tired, and we were coming back home around 8:30pm.  The phone rings and someone is calling from a random number.  I answer, and a lady says,  'Hi it's P. I met you three weeks ago, remember me? You gave me your card and I promised to call you back.  I forgot until tonight, when I just happened to be emptying out my purse and the card fell out.  I said to myself, Oh no, I forgot to call those missionaries back!' So we were pretty happy our fast was answered in such a wonderful way. God answers prayers! And loves us!

I love you all

Love Elder Jones

Week 96 "Happy Mother's Day"

May 9, 2016

It was fun talking to Jamison on Mother's Day. He looked so happy! He was excited to tell us that he will be with Elder Smith for this last month and a half of his mission. We were able to meet Elder Smith over the Skype call. We are grateful that they work so well together and that Jamison can finish with Elder Smith. Today they went to Chambord Castle for Pday. In his letter, I have included some of the photos. 
Mimi


Letter from Jamison May 9, 2016

Fun things we did this week.
Family Home Evening with our Ami A and the Liebard Family. A is only seventeen but he seems pretty intelligent and open to everything we've taught so far.  Since his schedule is completely open right now we've invited him to every event we can think of.  There's been a lot of A this week, but I don't mind, it's great.

Chambord Castle on Pday

        I saw, another Ami a couple of times as well.  We had a pretty funny lesson.  We were discussing some of his difficulties with money and looking for a job; many people like him come to France and have
problems legalizing.  As we're talking in the tiny one-room apartment he motions over to his new TV, saying, 'Isn't it great? It only cost €100.' Then we had a talk about how in life you can only control your attitude and effort, and part of effort included using money wisely, If you have no money left to eat then you shouldn't have bought a TV. Well people have got to make their own decisions and even though our Ami made a dumb choice it's another one of those experiences he's bound to learn from.  Live and learn.

Inside Chambord Castle

        We're probably opening up an Arabic-speaking branch in the next couple weeks, haha.  I say that because we have found seven people over the last six weeks from the middle east/north Africa and they love meeting us.  I don't know if they'll progress all the way to baptism, but they really enjoy learning about the Book of Mormon, and I'll take any chance I can get to teach people about that book.

Chambord Outside of Castle

Friday we hosted a Finding Day in Blois.  Talking to people during their vacation time (Ascension) in a tourist filled city proved a lot more difficult than I thought.  Well, most the people we met were on vacation from other parts of France and I don't know what made people say no so much other than that.  We did, however bring six members of the branch to help us contact and we enjoyed working with them.  

Chambord and croissants

I got to contact people with the Branch President, and even though he's confined to a wheelchair we still got him out on the streets talking to people, super fun.  I wish I had a picture but I forgot to take one.  Oh well just imagine Elder Jones strolling along the French Riviera with a cool guy in a wheelchair talking to atheist French tourists.  What a fun time!

Modern Art Inside Chambord 

        We painted a celing all Saturday morning, pretty tiring but I haven't painted in a long time, so it was fun. 

 We spent the afternoon
finishing preparations for the Missionary-run activity, "An Evening With The Mormons', which involved games, food and an inspirational thought.  We designed an invitation for the activity, which we handed out during the finding day.  Handing out invitations on the road wasn't so effective, but a church member Carlos brought his friend, and A came as well, so the 'Evening with the Mormons was definitely successful.

Let's close out with the best part of the week, the end of the
Saturday activity.  We thought a good way to close things out would be by watching The Restoration.  I've seen the movie countless times but I thought, you know I could learn something new by watching it again, never know. I've also been pondering a lot of the truth of the restoration. There are so many churches and the question that's come up in my mind has been, is this church that I belong to the only real,
true church? So the movie plays through the story of Joseph Smith, how he had a question and asked God for the answer, kind of the same thing I had always remembered seeing each time.  I was thinking to myself, hoping that I could learn or feel something by watching this time that would strengthen my testimony of these things.  Then I had a really unique experience; Joseph smith, in the video prints the Book of
Mormon, gives it to his Dad, and he reads Moroni 10:4 - 5.  When he said by the power of the holy ghost you can know the truth of all things, it just hit me really hard, just the feeling that all the little impressions I have felt over my life lead back to the book of mormon, and I just had this spiritual moment of realization, that these things I believe are the truth.  The Book of Mormon is from God. Joseph Smith is a prophet.  He listened to God, following His instructions to re-establish His real church.  And all this, this feeling the Holy Ghost, acting on those feelings, and seeing and experiencing the results is real! It really is!  That's what I'll leave with you, may God bless you all.
Have a great day!
Elder Jones

Week 95 "Visiting Tours, Bourges, and Blois"

May 2, 2016

This week we traveled to four different cities. Here are some of the many adventures!
        Tours: Working far from Paris means that President and Sister Babin came out to Tours to interview us, and observe our district meeting. Taking the train south of Blois we arrived in Tours a few hours early, just enough time to do some contacting, see some sights, and grab lunch at a little Chinese restaurant. Later that afternoon I met a Sister missionary from my Grandparents ward (Jones side), and that was a great coincidence. I loved interviews with President Babin. I have had some questions for quite a while that he helped me resolve....... he and his wife are just great!

TOURS

 Bourges: We also call it Bourgeous, 
(Bourges + Gorgeous = Bourgeous). A beautiful city with lots of cobblestone and really French people.  We came to help the Elders there to find some new investigators, and we found a few people despite some really hard rejection from others.  The thing I like most about Bourges is the Chorizo Bread, it's an indispensable item at each of our district meals.  I had always wanted to come here because my previous elder Smith companion (Devyn Smith) and my trainer Elder Johnson had served here and really loved it.  I didn't get to spend that much time there but I enjoyed the finding day all the same.

Bourges

        That night we received an emergency assignment from the Sisters to create a big publicity on a four-by-eight foot board advertising genealogy through the FamilySearch.org website.  So Elder Pro and I went to work and four hours later we had created an awesome design for this board, we finished at 10:00pm and got home around 10:15....just dead tired.  We had to cram on the board because the Sisters needed to set it up the following morning for their finding day in Orleans.  7:30am, after sleeping two nights on a leaky air mattress we packed up and took the train to Orleans for our second finding day in a row.

Here's a picture of some church members in Orleans working at the
apple crate stand.

        It was pretty funny how the day played out.  First we got to the church, finalized this giant Board for FamilySearch, then drove out to the public market where we planned to set up the advertisement for FamilySearch.  Two downsides: one, it started to rain and with no tent we had to set up our stand under a bridge; two, nobody had considered what we would put the stand on. From the looks of things we were about to be four confused Mormons under a bridge with a giant display on the concrete ground - kind of pitiful to imagine -  But I wouldn't let it happen.  We walked through the market thinking of how to get a table, and eventually we were able to bargain with a lady selling apples to use her empty crates to set up the stand: haha, innovation!  So you
will see the attached picture of our big display board sitting on stacks of apple crates - and the best part is that people actually stopped to look at it and the members did most of the talking to people!
        That was just the beginning of our Orleans adventures.  The afternoon began and we split off with a group of youth to contact people in the center of town.  At first the two teenagers I was with, were really reluctant, but as we got going, they got pumped and started talking to people too.  We met a really cool girl who seemed down on her luck, so
we introduced the Book of Mormon, and though she seemed suspicious at first we clarified some false rumors she had heard about it and she accepted to read the Book!   It was cool seeing the teenagers I worked with really enjoy talking to people and see how happy missionary work makes you and other people.  I will say it stressed all of us out to contact down the main street with hordes of people; things got better as we got onto more quiet roads.  All in all we had a blast in Orleans!

Beautiful Hidden Passage-Way in Blois 

        We made it back to Blois by the end of the week, just enough time to weekly plan, teach a lesson, and contact on the street. Let me talk a little about the fun event we had at the other end of the week. The Decaux (pronounced DayCo) family invited us to a multi-family dessert/game night and encouraged us to invite as many amis as possible; out of the five we invited three came, and we taught them all about the Book of Mormon and the Plan of salvation.  Then I showed
them how to play telestrations and everyone there laughed really hard.

Elder Jones kicking a dandelion to Elder Smith 

        You've seen the highlights of our week, I'm just going to share a part of the week that was more of a struggle to victory.  Over the past while I've had a great struggle with learning to follow and deal with spiritual feelings.  Whether it's from Heaven above or my own thoughts has made me feel some anxiety, and I've prayed for a lot of help.  I've also sought help from my parents, my companion and other
trusted leaders.  I'll tell you that for a conflict that seemed large, the response to my call for help seemed bigger and made my problems feel very small.  I say this so you all know that if you have a difficulty, ASK FOR HELP.  Satan wants you to think you can do it alone. That's a lie.  Our Father in Heaven is willing to help you through all of your challenges, every one!  I think the main things I've learned through all of this are: One, you cannot force the spirit. Two, Be Thou Humble, and the Lord thy God will lead thee.
I love you all!
Have A Great Week!!!
Elder Jamison Jones