Hey It´s Actually Me!!!!

Hey everyone this is elder jensen himself. what is up? So this week wasn´t too bad we did a lot of walking which is hat a missionary does i guess haha. but everything is going great here. i love it here in leiria. it´s a pretty town about the size of STG. So i really like that haha. but everyone and their dog in portugal sm,okes so that part i hate. So i have one big piece of news.
on july first the portugal porto mission will be no more.... it will be combined with the portugal lisbon mission and there will be one portuguese mission. this is kinda sad but it´s good because that means the portuguese people are more able to govern themselves without having a mission president over them to tell them what to do. but the libon mission last year baptized 600 or so people the most out of any european mission and their goal this year is 900 and our goal is 300 so if when we combine~and then we boath reach our goal the portugal mission will have crushed any other european mission at baptisms. but unfortunately president and sister walton will be released and go back to the states. so i won´t be serving in the portugal porto mission anymoer it will be the portugal lisbon mission after july 1.
but the language is coming great i really love it and everyday it gets easier to understand and the people are very patient with me when i can´t understand which is nice of them haha.
so we had this one investigator named socrates and he was doing everything he was supposed to like reading and coming to church and praying but he wouldn´t believe that jodpeph smith was ãn actual prophet. so we went into our last meeting and we read him a scripture that basically said we had taught him everything which we had and said that we were going to have to drop him and he understood but then i asked what his actuall doubt was and he said he liked the book of mormon and he wanted to believe but he didn´t know why but he just couldn´t believe in joseph smith. so i asked right then if he would pray about his doubt and we did and me and tolman felt the spirit so much but we don´t know if he did or not then i bore my testimony about our church and he said that was nice but he still couldn´t believe so we dropped him. it kinda sucked because i felt that we were so close to getting him to be baptized but oh well.
oh and that girl that me and elder miles were with requires a story haha so we were up in coimbra for training and so i went on splits that night with elder miles and AP and we met up with some other elders that we found walking around then we went and had dinner with president and sister walton and they were sitting behind us in this restraunt and they were apeaking a little english so we asked them and it turns out she´s a famous latvian dancer haha so we got a picture with her haha and don´t worry president walton took the photo haha
well thansk all you guys i love you very much and i will try to do this every week and send an email too.
love
elder spencer jensen

Elder Spencer Jensen
Avenida Cidade de Maringá
Torre V, 3ºC
2400-052 Leiria
hey everybody this is my new address. I live in a city down south in my mission called Leiria. It is way pretty and has a castle in the middle of town on a hill. The language is coming well... itºs getting easier everyday to understand what people are saying but it is still kind of a struggle. but i´m working on it. the money has been hard to get used to haha i like the good ole green back. my new comp is elder Tollman from salmon Idaho. hes pretty cool and this is his last transfer. but i really like it here i´ve taught a couple lessons and they were OK. one of them we got a baptismal commitment but he didnºt show up to church.
i am surprised at how much poverty there is over here. most people live in tiny dirty houses. and we donºt usually teach too many Portuguese but mostly Brazilian or African. but that´s OK. there´s a prophesy from i don´t remember but it says that Portugal will turn Europe into a boom for baptisms again. and i came into the mission right as that was happening. so i´m way excited for that.
not much else to say just pray that i will receive the gift of understanding Portuguese please haha and i love and miss you guys.
love
elder spencer jensen
sorry i forgot to say some things. so i just got back from a town on the coast called nazaré which was way pretty. and the waves were huge and we met some elders from the lisboa mission that were out of their mission haha oops. so one more thing my pday is on mandays and i´m 7 hours ahead here so when it´s noon there (utah)it´s seven here. oh and i want to know how many people are in leiria so email it to me.
thanks
love
elder spencer jensen

hey,

i'm alive hahah i made the long voyage to portugal with only a little bumps along the way. on the 1o hour flight to frankfurt the dinnner they gave us made me sick and i threw it up haha but that was the longest plane ride in my life. but im alive.

portugal i sso pretty and it is so green. so far the people are very nice but it is really hard to understand them. but taht will come with time.

president walton and his wife are really nice. they treat us just like family. tomorrow i will be able to find out what area i'm going to and i'll let you guys know. but all the coices there are for me to go area all really good places with lots of potential. president walton told us that we have come at a great time int he mission. the work is exploding and baptisms are becoming more frequent. the members are really involved in the work and that makes a lot of difference. also the temple is starting to have an affect too. a lot of people are starting to become more interersted.

i've kinda talked to a couple of natives and they are really nice. but that is pretty much all of my first day i am really tired so i'm going to go to bed love you all

Phone Call

After threatening Spencer to within an inch of his life-I got him to call me today! He sounded like he was doing great! He said he weighed about 187 and he thinks he looks super weird in old pictures. He tried talking to a guy on the plane-but the guy was kinda rude and wouldn't talk back. He's excited to see Portugal and was telling me about what they said he'd encounter there. Crazy!
He sounded just like Rickl Patrick-so never fear he's under there somewhere!
Marissa

hey everyone,

it's me again :) i only have four more days til i get to Portugal!!! but sadly my companion can't go because of the blood clot in his arm that he had taken out. he has to be on cumadin and the church doctor doesn't want to take the risk of him getting and injury and bleeding to death so he's going to be reassigned somewhere in the USA portuguese speaking.

thank you all for the letters and packages that you've sent me since I've beena th the MTC. i really appreciate them and they make my day better.

i've had so many spiritual experiences since I've been here at the mtc it's unbelievable. i found a scripture that gives a pretty good representation of my MTC experience. its luke 24:36 i believe. it's about when Jesus was resurrected and in disguise and walked with a couple of apostles and what they said is exactly what my experience here has been like.

i'm so glad that i've had this experience to be here and i know my testimony had grown so much becuase of this experience. i love you guys so much and i miss you, but i love being here more and this is what i'm supposed to be doing.

i'm very excited to be leaving for portugal finally. i can't wait to get out there and start teaching the people. i'm sure once i get there i won't understand a thing they say but i knwo the Lord will help me with that. and he already has. my language skills have improved so much and i am able to understand most what people say and able to hold a pretty good converstation with somebody. and i know once i get there it will come even faster than it has here. and Portuguese is such a beautiful language and when i get home i will show you what it kinda sounds like haha since i can't show you guys now you'll have to wait haha.

we ahd a pretty good lesson at the TRC this week. one thing we're supposed to do is keep the investigator involved whichis really hard especially in Portuguese but i think this lesson we did a reallly good job. we taught her the plan of salvation. which is one of my favorite lessons to teach. it has a bunch of good stuff in it about the atonement and celestial kingdom it's awesome.

well before i leave i just want to extend to you guys againt he invitation to go on mormon.org and make those profiles again if you haven't. the church wants the member to find the investigators now. the missionaries should be teaching and the members should be finding. that is the ideal situation because it keeps them in the church and it strengthens the church. so if you know anyone help the missionaries find them and bring them to the gospel. it is the best weay to do missionary work and it helps the church stay stronger and grow.

i love all of you so much and i miss you. thanks for all the love and support. Ate Logo.

love

elder spencer jensen