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!

Zack and an interesting blessing!

wow sounds fuN! sorry i didnt get to you on monday we h ad our Pday today on thanksgiving! anyway i love yall and miss ya and i hope you have a great thanksgiving! anyway i got the package thank you very much i was able to be very useful with those cookies! we had to deal with an emergence transfer this week and a couple apostate elders lost in the hills which i dont blame them, there is less up there than there is in wilton. you can google maps san andreas or murphys california and see what they have to deal with. well we had a really spiritual week this week! we got called into the hospital for the 4th time to do a blessing but this one was different. we came in and it was a girl named carol and she was not on the hospital records when we called and so we were freaked out because we had a voicemail of her on the phone and we thought its one of those ghost stories or she is in a coma and nobody knows her name and we will have to come and bless her back to life or something. turns out no such luck. we found her but when we walked into the room it was hallowed for sure there was such a strong spirit. the first thing she said is me and my son need to join your church... we dont have anything and dont want anything from the church other than my sons safety. i have seen the church in action and i know that they are the closest to christ. my son is really my grandson but i have full custody of him and his mom is a drug addict going to jail again. i cant ahve him in this situation. im going to die soon. (she has cancer and COPD) she said i wont live probably more than 2 months but please make sure my son is taken care of and that he is safe and can grow up to be a good boy. its was so crazy i was speachless i didnt even know what to say. i couldnt say anything other than what seemed to me missionary cliches about how christ will help her and we will too. it was crazy and a very real experience in the very importance of my calling as a missionary. people are truly relying on me to help them. the only thing she asked of the church was to take care of her son and give her a ride to church. she was so sincier. i went down to the jaw doc because my jaw has been straight up killing me even with the meds and splint and everything he said we may have to go to joint injections for pain andi dont want that :( so im trying another way but hopefully it works anything but those injections haha! i think my jaw has seen better days. tell jason im thinking of nursing school as well i was thinking about med-evac rescue for the civilian military but i think ill settle for firefighter nurse :) :) what can i say great minds think alike only ill be a nurse and a firefighter :) well i have noticed something about lodi, its pretty much utah only its not mormon churches on every corner its 7th day adventest THE RIVAL! we went down one street and counted 4 on the same small street. there is at least two opposing churches on every street and our most common reply is i am comfortable with my church family. our reply is we are teaching about gods church family haha :) but thats only when im really upset and not feeling charitable. i have come to a new saying i like to follow. "come what may and love it" - joseph B worthlin he is a great speaker and i like that because there are a ton of empty doors here. we as a zone are doing amazing this month we have baptized more tahn any other zone and our work is higher than the other zones. same story for december with 21 investigators committed to be baptized we have 3 that are committed to it and we are excited! its not really a measure of mission success but it is a big motivator. well a big shock we got a call from president and he told my comp that his gpa had passed away and that will be interesting to deal with im trying to be there for him without really being overbearing on him. in those situations there is a lot of wrong things you can say and not a lot of right ones. i will jsut be kind to him as best i can. well thats pretty much the week! when is the house selling? i love the cookies and the lettetrs i love yall muchly and hope you have the best thanksgiving evaaarrr!!!!!!!!! I LOVE MASH! well love you all and bye bye!!

New missionaries in Jeremys Zone!

Hola! Well today was transfers. For the most part our zone has really been buffed up. I've been drained these last few weeks but I look forward to this new transfer with some new faces. I think things will really go well and life is going to be good. As for the Q's you asked I think that I'm getting released the 17th of September, but don't quote me on that. I haven't even talked to him about it being negotiable or not, I dunno. Its not something I've been dwelling on a whole lot. Do you need me to ask soon? Also for the Christmas thing.... I could definitely use a new White Shirt size 15 34/35 (slim fit fosho) (Enro is preferred) If you could send Elder Moon something like a pillow case thats homemade that would be really cool. Dymatize Elite Protein Chocolate is nice (No Casein). Something home made is always cool. Smart wool stuff is appreciated to, its cold haha If its a tie get a copper or a burnt orange paisley, those are sick. Whats up with Katie going to New York??? Errybody needs to slow down and not grow up haha I feel like a little Peter Pan would be good for all you right now. Tell Gordo I love the guy and miss him. Turkey's are funny, I love seein them fight out here, its awesome haha. Did Jason get the sauces I sent him? Also they all settled in? Did Kevin get my letter? They were all in that huge box I sent. Speaking of Massage therapist I need a small Asian woman to dance on my back haha What are the plans for thanksgiving this week? We are playin ball early early, then eating and kickin it all day, its gonna be nice. We are going over to the Farr's for dessert just cause Bro. Farr sounds like Sean Connery. You can just feel the spirit from that family to. Its easy to tell the families that really live the gospel. Thanksgiving dinner is going to be interesting. Its going to be with a great family and also 3 atheists and a physics professor. I'm getting pumped haha This last Sunday we had the Fraser's come to church, this time with all their kids! So sick, I love this family, they're going to make the greatest members of the church. They came to a baptism on Saturday, church Sunday, then we had a lesson that night. Amy has really been noticing that her life has gotten harder since she has started to investigate the church and we started to talk about how Satan is trying to get her from doing the right thing. We had another family over that helped a lot in relating to her. I was able to cause I saw it first hand right before I came out on a mission and I muffed up big time. The saying that before and after every spiritual success is a spiritual darkness is so true. The spirit was crazy strong and they will be dunked soon. I've learned so much out here about God and how he works its just crazy. This has been the greatest experience of my life. I was hurtin pretty bad when I thought about how this was my last Fall here. Keep praying for them and our other Investigators, Doss, Rose-Cole, James and Lyndsay Marck, and Noah & Kye Iverson. I love ya'll and hope you have a great week! Elder Larsen Sr.