Zack at Christmas

welli dont know Bp meds and all that they do other than they lower heart rate and BP haha! i just got mad at him because i said im 20!!!!!! i dont need BP he said there is a kid that is 16 on BP meds, if its in your medical history tehn you need to be cautious! it was a interesting argument but eventually i gave in becasue i dont know what im doing. now that you mention it my pulse has been in the mid 50's for about a week which is pretty low i think, they said its fine though. yea that miracle was awesome! i was so excited! well im SO VERY GRATEFUL FOR THE GIFTS I LOVE THEM!!!!!! i love that tie especially! please tell all the members in the ward thank youf or thier gifts and cards i really appriciate it and thank gma and gpa on both sides! i love them and miss them. make sure those thank you's get out! i dont have enough stamps to individually write them. thank you so much family for the gifts and tahnk the bay family and everyone else! i really loved christmas and ithelped my comp to since he didnt get much so i was able to share with him and make thigns good for him! he is a great guy! i love you all! im glad you have had great christmas gatherings to start with! im glad that lal is well! where does kevin live? why is he taking my chinchi? glad the cat is nice because i would have been spending lots of time tryig to make it nice when i got home haha! alex and liam are studs that pic they sent of them are awesome and theya re going to be women magnets as alex already is, he has already been proposed to huh? he is a smart kid, avengers are way cooler than marriage haha! the gifts are amazing and i really wanted those snack foods! thanks for the CD as well i was getting sick of our selection of 3 cd's hahas! im glad to add a 4th one! :) well i love you all muchly! i will send a christmas card to fam! Dawn is great! she is very nice, she was also out of town this week so we will be making contact with her later this week or begining of next week! we need the referral because we are out of people to teach and thats sad. so thank you again for the referral :) she is nice and has lots of potential i think she is asking lots of questions and accepted a BOM of Resto Pamphlet. if there is anyone else you know in lodi we would love to visit them because i like teaching and meeting new people and we are out of people to meet, just hoping for another miracle! there are a lot in lodi! im also trying to see some of the cool things in Cali like the mercer caverns and the moanig caverns and sadly big trees state park is closed for the winter, i guess a couple inchews of snow is rights for closing a state park down.... sissys. they are BIG TREES if anything its cooler int eh snow or what california calls snow, so we just hung out with the san andreas elders for a while, its an hour and a half one way freeway drive to get up there so those elders dont get lots of visits so we decided to grace them with out presence haha! well love you all so much and im glad you are all happy! im happy as well! keep up the great work and keep being amazing! not tons toreport on from last pday i guess! we had our transfers im staying another 6 weeks asi though, i will prolly die here because i spent 8 months in my last area and when i cam to lodi thats all i had left so im just assuming that im staying haha! uuhh... we had some emergency meeting for all leadership and we had to train on some stuff in front of all the leaders of the mission which was semi scary but lots of fun i cracked jokes in a demonstration with president and that was im sure pretty fun! we were pretty busy helping the zone out today so not tons of proselyting got done. we had a great convo with a member thats coming back and he said the reason i left and i want you over is because i know the church is true. he said knowing the churchwas true put a lot of stress on him knowing his salvation but thats because he doesnt understand the atonement and now he knows that we were not set up to fail but to succeed. so we are teaching repentance and atonement to him because he is scared to make a mistake but we all make mistakes so he assumes we are all doomed, which is no the case :) we ended our work before xmas eve by coming together as a zone and carolling which was really fun! we were able to knock on doors and not have them slamme din our face or bad thigns yelled at us, they were happy to have us sing, which i think is because they didnt hear me singing above everyone else ;) lots of fun though! my comp and i are very different and somtimes talk things out about how we should run things, im showing him we dont need to be rule nazi or nobody will like us, we need to help them trust us and love us so that they will follow the rules because they want to make things easy on us and they like us, so its fun trying to do that. either way we enjoy our time reguardless its silly to let slight differences get in the way of getting along which some companionships are doing so we been working with that as well! well all is well here and i love you! sorry for all the spelling errors i was trying to see how fast i could type this page and i think i did well! love ya! see you in a couple hourse BYE!!

Jeremy to Skype 12 noon MST!

You guys have got to slow down hahaha I think since I've left the family has over doubled in size... I will definitely shoot a few more out to all of them. Won't be there by xmas but I'll do my best. This week has been nuts.. I don't have a whole ton of time to email today but we will shoot for 11am our time, we couldn't do the 4pm unfortunately.... Kind of a bummer.... You and Darlene are becoming Grandparents (not in the old way, just the fact that all of a sudden all must gather to you)... This is really weird haha Having to do special family gatherings to summon the family from the four corners of Utah. We have a baptism the 26th for two boys that'll be awesome. I really appreciate the support that all of you have given me. I'll definitely get a few personal letters out today. The Hats are for Alex and Liam and I have a thing coming for Kayla. I love the work and I'm loving this area. We easily have the greatest investigators in the world and our ward is the greatest. I do love all of you and my bad for not being on top of staying in contact with everyone. I can't wait to see all of you, until then, love ya and do good! Elder J. Larsen p.s. What on earth is Krockenbush? what is Hale Theater? have we become a cultured family and stopped eating raw meat and thirsting continually for the blood of our enemies? oh sorry that's the Lamanites.... Is it bad that all of my jokes come from the book of mormon now? I'm pretty sure Missionaries are the most sacrilege of all people, even up at MLC with our mission president some stuff gets away from us haha You are the greatest family, thank you so much for all you do. Love ya!

Miracle baptism in Lodi!

well this was another week of miracles! we had our temple conference which was really quite amazing! we were able to learn so much. i actually paid attention to what was going on and learned a ton and the vid has got an actor who played deacon in the movie saints and soldiers. (hope i can say that.) anyway i learned a lot from the conference. our zone is still laeding the mission and we are going to break our high water mark (which is most baptized ina month) we are very excited. transfers happened and im staying with my comp. i will be skyping home around 4 to 430 liberal time i mean california time ;) you thought i would warm up to the place :) with the investigator in the hospital that we were told was going to pass away, p-lewis told us to keep a clsoe eye on her in case there is an opening where she can be baptized because if there is then we should not deny her the blessings of it. well we did so and yesterday she came out of the coma is conceious and is going to be baptized today. it is a miracle its so crazy. my comp and i went into the home and did the interview and its was really a good experience. they live in horrible circumstances with no power and on oxygen tank running on low battery power. we are trying to get things worked out but its really a miracle she si alive. she is walking and talking. so we were blessed with that miracle. we got ahold of dawn who is the referral you gave to me. she is so very very nice and accepted a book of mormon and a restoration pamphlet, she has many good questions and has accepted us back. she is an animal cop. thank you! by the way ever since my ER trip in north sac. my BP has been pretty high and so now my last visit with the doc he has put me on atenolol for my BP and its feels funky. i said there is no way i can be on that im ONLY 20!!! he said we have a patient thats 16 on BP meds and so its not unheard of but im uneasy about. we have a baptism set up for jan and one more for this month we are very excited! hopefully your referral will have a baptism date by the end of this week. i do miss kimi! no cat is really the same, how is chinchi doing? as far as my ghetto stories go we have part of stockton in our area and we go there a bit and while down there, there was a armed robbery inprogress with a hostage and they shut down a bunch of streets and had FBI and SWAT on scene and it was pretty cool, one officer said "another day in stockton" haha! thats a sad statement haha! i agree the service is a great idea iw ish all the missionaries did it and i wish that all the missionaries who do service use it as an effective missionary tool for reactivation and other purposes. i need to know the name of bro snuffers books adnw hat they are about by the way :) well all is well here. im happy and semi healthy! i love the work and im sad time is passing by so quickly! hope all works out well when we skype so jeremy and i can see eachother, i was just going to call him but my comp is pretty pharasy on rules haha! we balance eachother out nice from overbaring obedience and being normal obedient haha! i hope all is well with the fam and the pets and the friends! well love you muchly!

Jeremys BUSY with teaching!!

So you're still rockin the heavy metal haha I've done some good in the world today! August Burns Red is going to be one of the few heavy metal songs that I can listen to when I return. I still haven't figured out what we are going to do for Christmas Skype, life has been pretty hectic so we haven't figured something out. Sunday was probably one of the coolest days of the mission so far. This last week actually has been one of the best. Moony and I were called up to Newberg for a meeting with the head of proselyting in the church, Bro. Heater and then President Packers grandson Bro. Packer. They had Moony and I then the Sister Trainer Leader from our zone and her companion. It was intense... The next day we had another meeting with them with 40 other missionaries in the mission. Definitely cool to be apart of that stuff. Then we have been meeting with this Gal, Rose-Cole, she is from Lebanon but lived in England and Jerusalem most of her life. She said she was going to decided if she needs to be baptized after she sees a baptism next week. She believes that the BofM is true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet but she has a hard time understanding the uniqueness of the church. She is 83 but is all there and is one of the nicest, learned, and upbeat old ladies I've ever met. She has stories for days! She has a bomb that should have killed her and her family as a plant table in her house..... just crazy haha So then We've been working with another family, Janelle and her 2 kids Manny and Johaana. Sweetest lady in the world. She really is looking for truth and is on her way to baptism. We had a baptism also on Saturday for Doss Mckinney, I'll get pictures asap. Then that Sunday Rose, Janelle and a friend, the Frasers (greatest family ever), and two of the Iversons all came to church along with James and Lyndsay Marck. We had a ton of people there. The speaker spoke about how it feels to investigate the church and basically had the talk directed solely on them. It was insane to see how God made it possible for all of them to be there that day and then have a talk like that. We had a talk with the Fraser's that night and Amy got a whole lot closer to baptism and her family will definitely follow. Rose is close and the Iversons are on date, Janelle is right on her way. So please keep these people in your prayers all day. They need the guidance and help! Also if you could return all the gifts that you got me asap.. I really hope you haven't sent it out, totally my bad on doing a double take. If you could send me a package for the Iverson's kids and Janelle's kids and Fraser's kids that would be awesome. Iverson's have an 11 boy, 9 boy, 5 daughter, and 3 boy- Janelle has a 9 boy, and a 1 girl- Fraser's have a 10 girl, 8 boy, and 4 girl. Just presents for them would be much better then anything for me. I'm sorry if you've already done a ton of work and gotten the stuff and ordered stuff. If its not possible just let me know. I love ya'll and hope all is well. I love all of you so much and hope all is well. Tell Katie she is insane! I'm so proud of her and all that she is accomplishing. I wish I could be there to see the change happening but I feel like she has changed just as much as I have. Same with the cat if its actually nice now hahaha We'll definitely have to do a temple run when we meet up! (not the game) Also we're getting FB soon so I'll let ya know when I can add ya hahahahaha Crazy world we live in.... Well I love ya so much again and hope you have a great weekend and enjoy watching the Hobbit probably 4 times (thats my guess on how many times you get it in. Elder Larsen Sr.

Snow in Oregon brings an investigator!

This week has been a crazy one! Weather here has been nuts. We actually got snow! However, snow in Oregon is very dangerous... they don't have anyone that goes and lays salt, or shovels the roads. Also, the snow just turns to ice as soon as it hits the ground, then you get snow on top of it. Soooo after a trip to Keizer (about 45min north of Salem) we were driving back and the roads and people on the roads were crazy. So we decided to go and park it for and go find a hill to help people push their cars up and help anyone else in trouble. Funnest 3 hours, I'm tellin ya, it was so crazy. People here have a real tough time with snow and ice.... We were wearing thin suit pants and a light jacket and I think God just kept us warm cause it was 15 degrees outside and we were toasty. Cool thing came of it though. We met this guy named Ryan Green. He helped us push a car up then invited us to his house to relax for a bit. We stayed out another hour then walked over. He let us in, introduced us to his wife Pearl, and hit it off. He gave us pie, offered us Beer/Wine (we then taught him about modern prophets and the WOW), then gave us sprite, and we talked for probably an hour. He said we could come back whenever, we said a prayer with him and we were off. He thought we were some of the coolest people for doin that though, it was great to see that God had us in the right spot. Also I have a job working for his construction company if I move back here. In about 5 years he'll be the Manager of the entire company. Right now he's an area manager but his boss is retiring and giving him the spot. Just a cool guy and family. Also this week it was announced that we will be using Facebook..... I'm pumped but scared at the same time.... I know its potential either way so its great. All the ZL's are going to have to monitor it also so its more parenting but it'll be worth it if we can use it correctly. I look forward to new pictures! Also will you treat me to a fancy french restaurant when we meet again???? I'm trying to get the Packages out this coming week so hopefully you'll get them on time. I want you all to know how much I love all of you. I look forward to seein ya soon and I'll let you know when I know whats going on with Skype and such. Love ya! Elder Larsen Sr

Zack has some amazing experiences!!

well sounds like great snow im missing out on. we got snow here for the first time in 12 years! im going to big trees later today where there will be more snow! ill take pics for proof :) sounds like a lot of parties going on in the larsen home. i remember when i got stuck with the accent in a bad storm at megans house that was funny! i remember her parents saying i could stay the night if i needed and i said i dont think my father would approve haha! maybe thats why they like me because i didnt jump on that option like most teen boys my age would haha! you think dean would send me pepper spray? i got my 21st birthday next handgun? thats crazy the seahawks are top!!!! how are the 49ers? well we had a baptism yesterday! we are hoping for another one to go down this saturday! we have 2 lined up! our zone baptized 3 of the 6 that happened in the whole mission. we still have another 16 with baptism dates so thats exciting! we found a new inv who we knocked on her door in the cold and she answered and all i really said is we are missionaries and we share a message about christ and how he loves you and cares about you. this message will bless your life and we share because we care about you. (i dont really start contacts that way) she said "YOU care about me?" nobody has said that in a while thats not common. and she invited us back on tuesday. i contacted that referral the sabys had and we are invited back as well this week so we will see what happens!! sadly the person we contacted at the hospital with that amazing experience passed away before her baptism, her kids still wanna be but we dont know who the guardian is yet. im trying to get permission to do her temple work if they adults dont join the church. that was a great experience and i feel that if her relatives dont do the work its still my job to make sure she has that opportunity she wanted for baptism. she was going to be baptized in 2 weeks. so ashley is concerned about a place in utah? what place in utah is sketchy unless its in SLC? or south provo? anyway i think a sad instance is when i discovered i no longer had those thanksgiving cookies because i ate them all :( they were most delicious! since when did we have a jetta? i will make you aware of when im skyping home as soon as i does :) next pday is on tuesday i believe just so you know. treck huh? before i get home? to bad :( treck was always pretty fun i played cards and got the whole tent to bet haha :) well i miss good snow, i always make fun of those who talk about snow here. californians got 4 inches and said THATS A TON OF SNOW! i just laughed and said yea you should call it a snow day in your schools weather is to bad haha! when is katies play? im learning a lot about leading, how important enthusiasm and optimism is. my comp is lacking in that right now and kinda blows up on people but he is working on it and trying to get better. in the mean time im trying to make sure everyone is happy and that they know we love them and want their success just as much if not more than our own success. we did a great training on teaching effectively and hopefully we will see good things come from it! they like us enough im just trying to keep everything steady with the missionaries. i does love the work though! its a busy time this month and we need to take full advantage of the blessing the lord is wanting to bless us with! well love ya very much!! have a great week! keep the spiritual high going! and tell mrs beck she was a good teacher and she wasn't paid enough to deal with me haha!

Jeremy and 3 awesome experiences

So I only have a short time to email today unfortunately.. I was up at MLC Sunday Monday so I wasn't able to email yesterday. It was a crazy crazy time. I'll talk to my Pres about getting released the 28th, just not right now. I've got a lot to work on and I really don't even want to mess with talking about that stuff haha I have had 3 life changing moments this last week. I've heard and felt God's hand much more then ever before. Starting Tuesday I got a call that one of the Elders was in the Hospital about half an hour away. So We went out there and got there at 1030pm (really late) We found the Elders talked with them for a bit. Then a few people started to talk to us and it got spiritual pretty fast. A family went to the ER in the middle of the conversation and we asked them if we could come back and pray with them and they said of course. So they took their room and we continued to talk with one of the ladies. She was trying to find God, and the only church that had ever reached out to her was the local branch. So we said a prayer with her, taught her about our church a bit and set up an appointment to meet up. We went to the back and talked with that other family. Exact same thing happened. The spirit was so involved, you could feel God there. I wish I could explain it better but it was awesome. I had gone through some of the same stuff as the family was going through. They recently had a son go to jail and such and we were able to provide quite a bit of hope fro the family. It was really cool to be a part of Gods miracle. Later that week we were driving into Turner and I got an impression to go and see a family who just lost their Daughter to cancer. I fought it a bit then thought "doubt your doubts" so we decided to go. We headed over and right as we got there Kim's sister (Kim is the gal who died) and Kim's daughter Morgan walked out of the house. We told them that we were their on impression of the spirit and prayed with them. Morgan is trying to go out on a mission and we ended up talking about it. She asked me about going out on a mission and how I was able to do it right after my mom passed away. She wanted to know how to deal with it emotionally, physically, and spiritually and I was probably one of the few people around who knew how to empathize with the situation and God sent me to her. It has just been evidence to me of just how involved God is in each of our lives. He really cares about the little details of our lives. It was amazing to be a tool in his hands. The last story comes from yesterday. Elder Monteirth, a Spanish ZL, (I love that kid, he's such a boss) were in a situation that was funky. We left to do a few things then we were heading back to the mission home to pick up the other Elders. On our way back we saw the Presidents car go past but we continued on to the home anyway. We got there and everyone had gone. So Monty and I prayed about what to do and we felt like we needed to go back to the office (even though the logical thing was to stay cause we didn't have a phone to figure out what was going on). We headed over and on the way saw the presidents car again so we got cold feet and turned around. We received an impression to go to the office again but didn't follow it. We got there and the president had dropped them off...... It was humbling haha I learned a valuable lesson for sure.. I love ya'll though, I hope you had a great week and I really appreciate the pictures!! Tell errybody I love them! Also for Christmas, I would really like some Kevin Durant 5's (shoes) if you could get me some of those in size 12 that would be so awesome! if I could get them in black or gray with the thunder blue or orange colors that would be awesome. I love ya padre Elder Larsen Sr.

An investigator knocks on Zacks Door!

well i do love the pics! is jake only a Sr. in highschool? i thought he was older. anyway the Zl job is very busy and lots to deal with. we did a lodi zone tour driving all the way to san andreas to meet with elders about turning in info so we can be prepared when we meet with the stake president, mission president, and high councilman over missionary work every week! its crazy! i dont like authority they scare me so i have to be on my best always. we dont get all the info all the time so we had to talk to all 24 missionaries about it so we dont look dumb in those meetings haha. our zone is doing amazing! our zone has 23 investigators who agreed to be baptized and 3 of them are ones we are teaching! the spanish branch in our zone baptized a family of 5 unexpectedly they just showed up and said i want to be baptized its amazing how that works! my comp and i were doing our weekly planning which i hate because im planning for 3 HOURS!!!!! i cant concentrate that long on one thing you know that haha! usually i wonder off with my WWII hat on and eat cookies or something haha. we got a knock on the door and i answered fearing it was jahova whitness but it was just a girl who needed help moving in and was referred to us. the san andreas elders packed her up once we contacted them and when they came down to our complex we unpacked them and she spoke of being in a very bad situation and not having any friends to help because of her bad situation. she was so grateful for our help we moved a ton of stuff haha! we bore testimony of how the gospel can help her in this situation and how god is aware and cares for her. she started crying and was grateful and so we sent the sister missionaries over, since they cover our apt complex (weird) and she let them in and is taking the missionary discussions. its so amazing how the lord prepares people i never thought we could get an investigator knocking on OUR door, usually its the other way around haha! we got 4 investigators to church this Sunday and one of them was bawling in testimony meeting and loved it, he is getting baptized dec 21! he is awesome and doesnt know anything about bible or book of mormon or anything so we are having to teach a lot haha! he is a really good guy, a lil racist but who aint. he really desires to be a good person and i think thats so great i can really see the spirit working in him and making changes and i love seeing that! honestly i love seeing that more than baptisms! just seeing someone make a change of the better is so satisfying and increases my testimony in how the gospel truly blesses families and individuals. i may not have a testimony in everything but i do have it in that for certain! i love the work! THANKS FOR THE REFERRAL! we will go see her and help her out! we cover that street, infact thats close to the ghetto haha! i like going down to tokay st. i dunno when im skyping home but when it gets closer i shall inform you! when are you moving? what is the address? and love you all!!! oh sorry again for spending money on the home card :( im running low on glucosamine 1000 mg and calcium magnesium 1500 mg i belive it may be the other way around oh well i dunno i just need it haha! i am hoping the best for my jaw but its really hurting me bad and locking up somethin fierce and so thats no bueno! :( tell kevin (and ill spell it wrong) tiena un gato incendido in dus pantelones defuago. LOVE YOU! mission is great!