Week 71 "PRAY FOR PARIS"

November 16, 2015

 This is a picture Jamsion took a few days before the Paris terrorist attacks on Nov. 13, 2015....President Babin let the missionaries write to their families that they were safe. Also President Babin wrote this message:
 "Dear all, we just want to let you know that all the missionaries based in Paris are safe. At the time of the bombings all the missionaries were in their apartement. A message was send to the Zone Leaders to make sure that all missionaries based in Paris will stay in their apartements tomorrow until further notice. No missionaries are allowed to come to Paris tomorrow."
Pt Babin

So the week started off really fun, then got a little more serious, but fortunately we stayed safe throughout!

        On Monday we ran around Paris and up to the top of the Eiffel Tower, we took pictures up at the top, then ran back down.  Monday night we walked around to contact and found a handful of people to talk to, but few people were out, so my comp and I just ended up talking things out.  Tuesday we combined with the Troyes (pronounced Twah) district or district meeting and our district leaders, Elder Merrill and Wilford, taught about unity, and thus tied in playing 'Loups Garous' (similar to mafia) and got pizza together.  I decided not to stuff

myself and only ate eleven pieces.

        Throughout the beginning of the week we did service for two different members, and we had great experiences building trust with both of them.  We received a really nice complement from Brother Crucy,( a member who we removed a pile of dirt for), who told us we were a good example to his kids.  He said they could feel a good spirit around us, which was pretty cool.  Tuesday night we went to a meeting we had set with a random man off the street.  We weren't sure he would come, we had no contact information, but we went anyway, and guess what? We ended up meeting three people in twenty minutes who were willing to meet with us another time and receive lessons.  God works in mysterious ways to help us out!

        Thursday night, we had some more great experiences with the members.

We had fixed two lessons with members Thursday night and I consider it a miracle that both people we went to visit followed through on their promise.  We had two solid lessons, and I feel good about this new investigator we have named J. he's come twice already to church, we've known him for two weeks, so cross your fingers and more importantly pray for these people.  A less active named Q. invited us over and we had a great discussion on church standards, and how to know if they're true or not.  The way to know is to read the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it's true; if it's true...the rest falls into place.

        Friday the thirteenth started out pretty fun, we went contacting in the morning and we gave a Book of Mormon to a high-schooler, then planned for our coming week, then unfortunately our lesson in the night got cancelled, so we ended up coming back to eat dinner.  It's okay...I mean, there wasn't any real danger in being out but I was happy to get home early and eat dinner because...If you know me I love food.  So we make some food, then played "phase 10",  then I wrote a letter and when to bed. 

        I woke up about an hour after going to bed.  Our district leader was on the phone with other missionaries filling us in on the events happening right as we're hearing about them. The various shootings and government action took place within another hour, and by midnight we had all lost any capacity to sleep.  We talked among ourselves for a bit, and after saying a prayer together, we decided to stay up until 2:30am and finally felt tired enough to fall asleep.

        We woke up around 9:30am.... haha, wow!  That felt nice!  We filled in on our agenda for the day and were told that we were not allowed to leave the apartment UNLESS we had lessons.  Fortunately we had five lessons planned for the day, and four of them with members, probably the most busy day I've had planned on my mission teaching-wise, so I felt relieved we could still go teach and didn't have to cancel our lessons. We had a great day with three of the appointments working. We gave a Bengali Book of Mormon to J, and taught another investigator F. about the importance of keeping the sabbath holy.  We had some really solid lessons that day and I thank the heavens that we have investigators that are going strong right now, because I know that when tough times come people tend to take a side either with or against God, and I'm happy we get to strengthen the investigators we have right now in the Lord.

        Don't worry, everyone we are staying safe.  We have restrictions and rules that will help us to stay safe if we follow them and stay smart. I'm glad we have the spirit to guide us and keep us safe from danger. After a national crisis such as this it seems like the population in general seems a lot more somber and serious, but I'm glad we carry the light that come in Christ's teachings, the teachings that tell us to 'fear not, be of good cheer, for he has overcome the world.'

Love you, Stay safe, thanks for praying for paris, and our investigators!

Elder Jones

Sent from my iPad

                        Jamison and the Paris Zone Conference November 6, 2015. 

Week 70 "Top of the Eiffel Tower!"

Top of the world!  Eiffel tower.  Yep, folks, we ran up it.  Well, the first two levels, then there are no more stairs, so you have to take the elevator.  Man I was so tired but I fulfilled a pretty cool classic life goal.

The View from the Top of The Eiffel Tower

   So, what did elder Jones do this week?  Too many things.  I wish I could take you all with me and just cart you around to see what a great adventure every week is.  Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday felt slow, but then our week got rolling and we found some great people, and had the opportunity to visit some members as well! Well the first side of the week felt slow because we had very few people to see, and a lot of spinach in our fridge. To combat the deep fryer Elder Oldham has been eating a lot of spinach, and I have been helping him try to finish the bag.  By Friday most of it was gone but oh man I need a break from spinach. Ok so now we'll talk about that first half of the week again. I regretfully say that even after fifteen months of contacting people I still have some apprehension before going outside to contact, but I forget that when I ask God to lead me to the right place something amazing always happens.  Tuesday we got caught in a rainstorm while contacting, no umbrellas, no raincoats.  Wednesday felt especially tough, as we went to explore a new city, Vaires, with few people interested.  Every cloud does have a silver lining, as we did find a 'Saumonerie' or a shop that only sells salmon, haha! So even though these first two days felt hard I also felt a good vibe of endurance and constance and hope, it wasn't too bad.

        Thursday rolled around and we did some service for Frère Euvrard, the past president of the Milan, Italy mission.  I told him about Willy (my cousin serving in Milan, Italy) and he told me a little about Trento, pretty cool! That afternoon we went contacting around a pond, and we hit a spiritual roll of finding people who we really felt needed to hear the gospel message.  If they didn't accept a return visit in the end, it's okay, we helped them feel more deeply that God loves them.  That's the most important thing.  One lady had a really difficult experience with religion tearing her family apart, and another young student let us teach him on a park bench for half an hour! Both these people benefited from the message we carried. And I'm happy to be here carrying it.

        Our week picked up speed after Thursday, even though everything didn't go as planned.  I will share a few moments. We are teaching K. our investigator who has a problem with the word of wisdom.  The member who taught with us said, Okay K, (he had taught him many, many times in the past)  Now is the time to stop smoking, do you have your cigarettes with you? 'Yes' Okay, Give them to me. 'Okay'.  K., You'll probably go back home and smoke more but if we take away your cigs this you'll be on the road to stopping completely.    Another experience, Elder Merrill and I were on an exchange and we saw a lady with a Bible that's destroyed.  We offered to give her a new Bible and she really wanted that so we told her she could come to church and get it on Sunday!

We bought this Brie Cheese.......  Yep this is normal in this country.

Other events: played Telestrations (telephone with pictures and words) at a member's house last night, then made a huge pile of dirt a little bit smaller at a member's house with the goal of putting all the dirt in his gardens.  God is a God of miracles.  Starting this Saturday we have a goal to find a new investigator every day for forty consecutive days.  Pray for us please, that we'll be able to accomplish that goal. I love you so much!  I'm ponderizing Alma 12:15 this week! and rereading the Book of Mormon, it's so good.

Elder Jones

Week 69 "Bonne Fête Halloween!"

Halloween Party Missionaries Planned

Hey tout le monde (everybody).  So let's relay this week's adventures!

Monday:  we bought a deep fryer and the apartment has never been the same. 

  

Tuesday: I ate at Chipotle! Yes, they have one in France, three tacos, so good.

Wednesday:  We bought sixty donuts for our Halloween party, plus other things.

Thursday: We went to zone conference and I got my new temple recommend.

Friday:  I worked as the host for our multi-ward Halloween party.  I had to call out the kids who cheated in musical chairs. My other assignment was to  make French small talk for two hours.  Haha

Saturday: The Sister Missionaries made us dinner as a goal to give service.  I didn't mind at all, their food tasted sooo good.

  

Sunday:  We started a photo directory for the ward and met really cool people!

GUESS WHERE? Chipotle à la Défense!

That is the summary of the week, now we'll go into some more detail.

  

In only eight days the Missionaries of our ward and Meaux worked together run a Halloween party for our wards.  We had a tight budget but we made the party great.  We had apple bobbing, donuts on strings, and played “Just Dance” projected on a big screen. We decorated by stringing balloons in arcs across the ceiling and then pulling artificial cobwebs across the top; made for really cool decoration.

As mentioned above I got to hold the microphone for two hours and keep the party alive, telling everyone about the activities and acting as a radio broadcaster/host sort of role.  I tell you, I made some pretty funny language errors, such as trying to tell people 'good job' which I translated to 'bien fait' when that actually means 'well great, you really messed up this time'.  Haha, but we had a lot of fun and had a great turn out of seventy people, along with some member's friends and our investigator K. who also came!

Success, yes!!

  While the Halloween activity took lots of preparation we found time to get missionary work done as well!  On Tuesday morning we were headed to pick up our legality cards and we met a lady on the train who was reading out of a little catholic prayer book.  When we asked her what she was reading she explained to us and tried to offer the book to me! I said, no that's okay...but would you like to see what I'm reading?  (As I'm reading in the Book of Mormon) I shared a scripture with her, Mosiah 4:30 and she really started taking interest in the book. By the time we got off we had explained how we use The Bible and the Book of Mormon together, and to her delight we gave her the book for free.  She lived near my previous area, Cergy, so I was happy to give her the number and directions to the church! What a cool miracle! I'm so happy that Heavenly Father helped us meet her and I hope she'll give those missionaries at the opposite side of Paris a call!

    Our mid-week zone conference went well.  President Babin addressed us on making our amis the amis of the ward members.  For those who don't have French mission background knowledge, investigators are called friends of the gospel, or 'amis de l'église' so we're trying to make our friends their friends, and I really liked that concept.  We have quite a few people in the woodwork and I believe greater member involvement would help them a lot.  Our most promising investigator is K. He's been an investigator for a few years and struggles with the

word of wisdom, but I really believe that the atonement can change him!  He's come to church twice since I've got here and he really wants to be baptized. Last week we went to help him clean out his little apartment and we really felt a good spirit there.  Keep him in your prayers!

        Now to tell you some other good experiences of the week.  Elder Oldham and I were out Sunday night looking for some people we had found in the area book.  Unfortunately none of those people were home but hey! We met some really cool people on the way!  The first lady we contacted on our way out to visit this pass by, when she heard we were the Mormons, she gave this bug-eyed look with a face like she was about to laugh.  We said, oh, no, you must have heard all the things that are not true about Mormons.  After putting to rest the rumors she had heard we learned of her recent conversion to Christianity and told her about our message centered on Jesus Christ and testified how that

can help her.  She seemed really looking forward to meet with us, and we're praying she calls us back!  M.A. are her initials if you want to pray for her.  Coming back from our visits that night, having had a few difficult, but solid at the same time contacts we met a woman, who, in the middle of the introduction we were giving, asked, “Wait, are you the mormons?” When we responded “yes”, she said, “Hey! I'm Mormon. I was baptized when I was eleven years old, but then life and divorce and a lot of crazy things happened, and I still want to be part of it.” She felt very grateful to hear that we had a church right in the

vicinity, and we'll be seeing her tomorrow!

The Lord's showing us lots of miracles out here.  I am grateful for the cool things he gives us every day.  Kind of like an easter egg hunt where you find the eggs with money if you just keep looking.  I pondered/memorized a scripture this week that really helped me and I know if we all do that we'll be very blessed. I'm grateful for my comp, elder Oldham, and all the other missionaries who I get to work with here.  Thank you for your prayers, I love you all lots!

Avec amour, Elder Jones

This is Monday's Breakfast. Beef jerky spinach omlette with other food

Week 68 " BEAUTIFUL FALL DAY IN FRANCE"

Elder Jones

Hey family! And everyone!


   Things are going well here in Torcy.  Really well.  So let me give you a run down of what's going on.  Monday night I bought a cake.  We were at a Boulangerie in Paris. There was this cake sitting on the counter.  Impulse buying...I got it and we ate it that night.  Coming from the Boulangerie that won best baguette of 2015 of Paris, we can conclude that we had an ethereal moment eating that cake.  

Tuesday our district meeting activity took an unintended wrong turn.  They wrapped me in food wrap and told me to race Elder Davis, our zone leader in moving marshmallows to a bowl on the opposite side of the room, but we ended up fighting for the bowl and shattering glass. But, we learned how from the activity to take good care of our investigators, as they represented the marshmallows, and the food wrap represents limitations we put on ourselves. Don't put limitations on yourself, live it up on the mission! 
Elder Jones and the 4 other Elders in is Apartment

We had a really cool experience, though; starting on the premise that we had traveled up to Paris that day and all I wanted to do was sleep. But nope, out we went to work.  I was really tired, and I just put up this prayer to heaven, saying, “I'm really tired but I'd still like to work, please help me.”  I have this goal with myself to talk to someone every time I'm in the RER, and I'll tell you I felt heaven's help, as the person who I was guided to sit by had a big bag of something, which enabled me to start up a conversation with him quite easily, and we spoke in English, another plus because Elder Oldham and I had only been speaking French to each other, and I was pretty fed up with that too.  This man who we spoke with was really nice, and though he had his own church, I was so grateful to God because he gave me someone to talk to.

Disneyland Paris

      Tuesday and Wednesday involved a good amount of walking through the neighborhoods of Torcy, St. Thibault, and Lognes looking for people to teach. We found a couple of nice people with whom we set return appointments. That night we went to ward council and the ward mission leader meeting.  Very interesting.....between two meetings I had an interesting feeling to go outside. 

I really didn't want to disturb the meetings, but I thought, 'what if this is an impression, then I've got to do it!' So Elder Oldham and I quickly left and walked outside. I felt unsure of the feeling the first couple moments we were out, but then we saw a lady walking with her son and two pizzas (Domino's is next to the church) and we thought, why not talk to her? We approach her and talk, and turns out she spoke English, YES, and we taught her about the difference between us and the Catholics, the concept of families being together always, and The Book of Mormon. That's why we came outside; I felt happy that I'm improving on following the feelings I have.
We cleaned up K.'s apartment on Thursday.  One of our investigators who had been struggling with the word of wisdom.  Don't know why but I love cleaning, It's becoming very therapeutic for me. We cleaned for a couple hours and after we finished mopping, doing dishes, and organizing clothes the place smelled and looked a little cleaner, but all he could say to us was "merci infiniment" (thanks infinitely).  We told him it was our pleasure, and we were even more pleased to see him at church on Sunday.

Elder Jones, Brother and Sister Oscarson, and Elder Oldham

      Bringing us to the end of this week.  We planned a Halloween party which takes place this weekend.  And we saw Sister Oscarson who is the General Young Women's President in our church.   Yep, she came to speak the night before to the youth, and she came to our ward Sunday.  She spoke in church and Elder Oldham and I took a picture with her.  Score!  We went to a family home evening where one of our investigators attended, and that wrapped up our week.

Thanks for the package, family. We loved the sponge bog fruit snacks and Pez candy

     Well we had a great week and I think I learned a lot of things, but the most important would be to follow the spirit, because it will take you and help you to be a better person. For me following the spirit can be very hard, but always worth it.  Always.  I am rereading the Book of Mormon right now and Mosiah 3 and 4 stuck out to me recently.

 Just the fact that God gives us everything, so we can do our best to give him the little effort we have.

 Love you all and have a great week!
 Avec Amour, Elder Jones
 Ps. we got a deep fryer this pday.  More adventure to follow.

A French Lego Man

Week 67 "Bussy-Saint-Georges" my new address

"Sacre Coeur"
A beautiful monument we visited today in Paris

         
Hello friends and family, I'm in Torcy! It's right next to Disneyland Paris! 

         Last week, before I said farewell to Cergy, we took a little time to visit a less-active. Apparently someone had anonymously written her a kind letter, and she thought it was us! We told her we hadn't written the letter and she didn't believe us; point is, this is a great idea, so try it!

Farewell Dinner in Cergy

         The next day we had many things going, since transfers were the following morning. We started off with a lesson for a new investigator we found.  Right as we left the church, some members who had wanted to take us to lunch gave us fifteen euros and left.  It was one of those make-you-accept-the-money-or-else situations.  I felt so bad for taking it...Elder Harris is going to sneak the money back to them next time we go and visit. That evening we visited the Deleu family and shared dinner with them.  Their dining room looked Heavenly; white walls, white table, fancy glasses and silverware, and a big chandelier hanging.  The food, I'll say, was equally Heavenly: It was something with....wait it was called "Confit au Canard" and you can tell from the name just how good all the food was. Great way to finish off our adventures in Cergy!

This is Elder Kasteler, Gaule, Me, Smith, Congerton, and Oldham on transfer day in Paris.  we went to get crepes together.

       Ensuite, we had transfer day.  All I had to do, in theory, was take the "A" Train from one side of the city to the other, but I ended up waiting for my companion, and saying “Hi” to lots of missionaries, and going to get Paninis with some elders from my MTC group. 
 By the time we arrived in Torcy it was 4pm.  I discovered, the night previous, that Elder Oldham had never been to Torcy either, and we were replacing the previous missionaries by a process commonly known as a 'whitewash'. So, we knew none of the investigators, members, or bus lines.

      Fortunately we had Elder Merrill (the only missionary of four in the area who had stayed) to guide us around, and the old missionaries had left a little paper giving us all the useful information we needed to survive, and we've been clinging to that for the last five days. 

     That night we met the Sister Missionaries in the ward and I found out that Sister Back, who I went to high school with, is in the Torcy ward too. We have a solid group of six missionaries here: Soeur Back and Nolasco, Elder Edmunds and Merrill, and Elder Oldham and me; we're  looking forward to tearing it up, in all the best of ways.

Elder Oldham and Elder 
In our new apartment in Torcy

    The next couple days, Thrsday and Friday, seemed a blur in my head due to a little flu I had acquired over the week. Elder Oldham was kind enough to let me rest up, and he made me some herbal tea too, that was nice.  We did get out to contact as well, and I'd say we taught  five or six people, which is great under most circumstances, especially with how I have felt with sickness.  Elder Oldham and I are also speaking only French to each other, as we are both the same age (11 transfers) and speak French relatively well. This practice really hurts my head sometimes, but you never know when you'll be called to train an only French-speaking companion. It's a good challenge. 

Saturday morning we helped move the Fyeski family in the ward.  We worked very efficiently and they fed us breakfast and lunch. We visited an investigator the missionaries had left, Y. and we really hope that he'll continue with the same momentum he had previously and choose to be baptized. 

Sunday I was introduced at the ward and I got to know more members.  I keep notes on who they were.   We worked from after church till the end of the night, I was so tired. My new companion, Elder Oldham is great and he works really hard. 

 I'm tired but it is great!!

 Shoutout to Emily Watts .....I'm sad I didn't see you on Wednesday, I had to catch up with the other Elders who were trying to catch a train. 

       If you noticed I started to write really fast cause we went to a monument in Paris and I ran out of time.  "Sacre Coeur."  I took cool pictures.  Then got the supposedly ranked no.1 bread in Paris.  It was ok.  It probably would have been better fresh, but Hey! I'm happy.

       We've got a great week ahead.  I love you! 
Elder Jones

Here is my new mailing address in Torcy:

Les Missionnaires
Elder Jamison Jones
My new mailing address is:
6 Avenue Andre Malraux
77600 Bussy-Saint-Georges
France

Week 66 "New Transfer to Torcy France located by Disneyland Paris"

(I am so sorry! I wrote a huge email but then I went to paste it and it disappeared!! I am sad about that, but here is a little summary of the week!)

My District in Cergy....now I'm off to Torcy

Hey, everyone!
        I had a wonderful week.  It started off with a wonderful family home evening at the home of a member family, baptized by one of fellow missionary's father thirty years ago.  We had very French food, tomatoes and eggs, beef and potatoes, and dessert. Amazing!!
        We had our last district meeting.  We discussed general conference and my favorite talk, or one of them, was when Dale G. Renlund discussed the importance of seeing people through God's eyes.
I could definitely work on that.  There are lots of people who act coldly toward us, but I think some Godly love would help them.

I think I've grown

        I loved visiting with the Azika-Eros family this week.  They are so great, and I really felt like our small spiritual thought and playing soccer with the kids made all of us feel a lot happier.  That's what the gospel's about, helping people.

Pontoise, a city in our sector.

I

        Though we saw many miracles and had a lot of good happen this week I have limited time and I am sad that I can't write more.  However we saw great success this week.  We found a new investigator who's Haitian, and she was really kind.  I have got to go now, but remember to focus on individuals, and line upon line as Isaiah says.  Good  week. Love you all!
Love
Elder Jones

I took this photo before boarding the train.

PS. I'm getting transferred to Torcy, France this week. My new companion  is elder Oldham who works hard and is obedient. .  He's in my group but I don't know him super well. Torcy is by Disneyland Paris. Big ward.  Love you so much; don't hesitate to send me a little email throughout the week if you want.  Thank you! Thank you, Mom..... Love you all.  Looking forward to seeing you relatively soon with skype. 

Week 65 "Castles and Conference"

A Castle on the way from Mantes to Rouen

Everyone, hello!

So...how are you all; I hope everyone had the opportunity to watch General Conference that the church put together.  If not go watch (click) CONFERENCE right now. Wow, I was so happy to hear so much advice I couldn't go without. Some of my highlights I would give were President Monson's emphasis on Christ as anchor, Richard Mayne's council to center on Christ, and Elder Holland's plea to love our mothers. In reality I have so much to work on, so much to improve on but that will come through putting Christ as our ultimate and supreme example, and remembering that we can try again as many times as we will turn our will to God and recommit to have trust in him.  Now I don't want to be a hypocrite; as I'm so far from perfect and I will say that I have got to do a lot more focusing on Christ. We have to always remember him and man I'm really hoping to improve on that.  I'm doing that through following the counsel we got during conference to...well a lot of things. Go watch it!

Ward meal between Conference sessions

   This week went by well.  Many of our investigators stopped answering their phones, and weren't home when we passed by.  So what did we do, we visited a lot a lot of members and tried to encourage them to share the gospel with their friends.  After visiting around twenty member families we received three referrals of people who have shown interest in meeting the missionaries. And though many of the referrals given to us don't live in our area it's good that we're getting Gospel to those who need it.  All the missionaries are on the same team, So even though I feel reluctant at first I know and hope these people are in good hands.  Also wanted to bring up the importance of meeting with members, I felt the spirit in a really special way being able to give service and pay visits to members.  A few families in particular really benefited from our visits. A sister whom we visited; we couldn't find another man to go with us, so I called her telling her we could just share a message at the door, she however, insisted that we come and told us that she'd set up a table outside so we could all talk. We shared our spiritual message and I could tell it really brightened her day. And we got a killer microwave cake recipe from the visit, so we were pretty happy. 

Me and Elder Harris between Conference 

   I had some great spiritual experiences this week as well.  I got to go on an exchange with Elder Duncan who had been out for six months.  As I asked him about himself I asked him what the best part of his mission was so far.  After thinking he said hmmmm...well I like being able to completely consecrate myself to Heavenly father, without any other distractions.  Wow that amazed me, I thought he'd say something about the beautiful landscape, or the amazing food, but no, it was the ability he has to completely focus on serving the Lord.  Man this mission's in good hands. 

I made chicken Poppy Seed!!!! Thanks for the recipies mom!

   Well this email is short but know that all is going well here because the Lord takes care of us.  If you need any words of counsel or advice go to Devin G. Durant's talk about 'Ponderizing'. I love you all so much!

Elder Jones

Dad, I found a football field in France!