"You can't eat rice for 3 meals a day." -Elder Abney

Howdy everybody! I hope you're doing well. If you're not doing well...

1) Take a deep breath.
2) Smile slightly.
3) Get out a piece of paper and write down all the things you have to do in order to feel better, whether it be physical, emotional, spiritual, etc.
4) Rank them in order of importance.
5) Do the most important one first.
6) Once it's done, reward yourself with something delicious, like tiramisu.
7) Continue down the list in like manner until your life is figured out.
8) Thank me later ;)

We had a good week! It really flew by just like the week before, and the week before that, and the week before that, and so on and so forth. Mission life is crazy. Did you know that?

There's something I forgot to mention that happened to us last week or the week before: we were to our way to the museum in centre ville and Elder Abney and I, like the obnoxious Americans we are, were speaking to each other in English. A woman standing a couple feet away leans over and says with a sly smile, "Vous êtes en France, parlez français." ("You're in France, speak French.") Before either of us could get a word out, Elder Alvarenga stepped directly between us and the woman and proved to her (very politely) that he was a native French speaker. He finds lots of opportunities to do that! Turns out she had been visited for a while by sister missionaries a long time ago, and she was fairly nice.

This week was Zone Conference! Lyon and Ecully Zones got together, it was really fun :) We had a great conference about hope. President asked for a show of hands on how many équipes were teaching amis who are ready for baptism, but don't want to get baptized. Too many hands went up, as they've been doing in other zone conferences. We discussed how we can help our amis see that the commandments and commitment to Christ and new responsibilities are nothing compared to the joy that is set before them. The restored Gospel of Jesus Christ brings sooooo many blessings, and too many of our amis haven't internalized that. This foundation of faith and hope starts with our example as missionaries (read: guides), so we discussed what a hopeful, repentant missionary looks like. Now we just have to go out and be that missionary :)

Other things we did this week: Pass out flyers and set up/take down for a blood drive they held here at the chapel. It was kinda fun and we got free food :)

We went to a single sœur's house and got sooooo full on couscous. I thought Elder Alvarenga might throw up, but he's a tough cookie.

On Saurday I had an exchange with Elder Graff whom I met at Camp Helaman back in 2014! Small world :) We did some passes up in the hills of Northeastern Grenoble and it rained all day and we walked up a huge hill and got soaked and then a very kind Muslim/Jewish/Christian man offered us a ride down. More blessings for him :)

Something else from Zone Conference that I loved was a quote from Elder Battezzato, currently Lyon zone leader: "There is no way that a loving Dad sent us far away from home without a way to come back." It's so true! I love the simplicity of the Gospel. Either Christ lived or He didn't. He did! Either He was the Son of God, or He wasn't. He was! Either He atoned for our sins, or He didn't. He did! God loves you. He always has and always will. He answers prayers, even when we think He doesn't. I've had times in my life when I was discouraged and had doubts, but I've already had too much evidence of the truthfulness of the Gospel to deny it. Count your blessings :)

Love you mucho!

Ciiaaaoooo

江长老

Pics 2

My comp is abusive

Elder Graff ft. The Great Apostasy

Paris Temple President on his last Sunday!

Lion and snake and sunshine

Photos

Fr. Bertola and Brigliadori ft. Cane sword and revolver

Us celebrating Pi Day with a couple tartelettes

nuff said

language study

possibly the most random thing I've ever found in a missionary apartment

Um green I guess? Subject lines are hard

Sorry all I'm a little out of time! Busy doing important things you know...

To start things off, here's a conversation between two bros I overheard in the tram:

"Qu'est-ce que tu fais là?"
"Je prends le tram, et toi?"
"Moi, pareil."

That translates to:

"Hey, what are you doing here?"
"Taking the tram, you?"
"Same."

It was kinda funny.

Elder Jensen hipster quote of the day: Before I discovered Chinese New Year, St. Patrick's Day was my favorite holiday 🍀 I made sure to wear green on Friday, I hope you did too!

Besides that, we had a pretty good week. We saw Gregory, he's ben really busy with work as normal but he's doing well. Just trying to get him ready for the Paris temple! Him as well as all the other recent converts and less-actives and everyone else. The ward had a little activity after church where they made letters for every member in the ward (particularly focused on less-actives) with an invitation to the Paris temple, to make sure as many people as possible will be able to participate. It's coming up so fast! This Sunday was also the Giraud-Carriers last Sunday in Grenoble! They're going to be the temple president couple in Paris and they start service at the end of this week. Sad to see them go, they're amazing. Happy though, since it means a great work has bien progressed in this great land!

On Thursday we went with a bishopric member to bring the sacrament to that older Italian member who just had knee surgery, he's walking and stuff now so he's recovering well. He showed us his cane sword and revolver and we exchanged ties with him :)

This week I was reading in Jesus the Christ, a great (albeit heavy) book all about His life and teachings. I read about the Parable of the Talents, found in Matthew 25:14-30. In it, the author explains how it's a human tendency to point out faults in others that we ourselves actually possess (see verse 24). That's something I'd never thought about before, but I've noticed is actually true! I've noticed that when I have un-Christlike thoughts towards people or am tempted to criticize, it's a great opportunity to turn inward and look for that flaw in myself. More often than I'd like, I find it! Then I'm more prepared to be patient, long-suffering, full of love, etc. as well as just fix that flaw in myself.

Isn't Christ just the wisest person ever? (p.s. the answer is yes ;)

Love you all! Have a great week!

And don't forget to be charitable, you'll feel lots better :)

Elder Jensen
江长老

My name is Elder John Rogers

No, I don't sleep in until 11 am or do nothing all day. If you remember from The Best Two Years, Elder Rogers almost had less months than Elder Calhoun had years. I take that to mean that Elder Rogers had 3 months left, or about two transfers. I also am in my 15th transfer, it's super weird.

Today was pretty chill, we went to the mall and then played volleyball in a park downtown. Nothing much to report, volleyball was just super fun :) it's been craaaazy warm lately, même pas besoin d'a sweater on certain days.

Last week was fun! We tried to go drop off a surprise letter to our recent convert who lives out in a teeny town outside Grenoble. We took a bus there and tried to find his house by walking up a long hill forever, but it turns out he lived way down at the bottom where we started and we just didn't see it. Finally we found his mailbox but still never found the front door. That should tell you a little something about French architecture 😒

On Saturday the Sœurs had a baptism! It was really nice :) the woman that got baptized was actually a friend of a couple from Mulhouse who have a son serving in our mission. I've met him once or twice, kind of fun to meet his parents :)

We met a less-active from Tahiti (question mark, he's white and French but lived on Raiatea for a while/grew up there? I'm still not sure) and hopefully he'll be coming back to church soon :)

In other news, CHINESE PEOPLE ARE THE FREAKING BEST 🇨🇳

Our friend Richard we met at the Chinese shop back in January and we've been playing cards with him for a few weeks now. We've also done a chapel tour and the first three lessons with him, he's really thoughtful and asks such good questions. Honestly that's my experience with Chinese amis, they ask ridiculously good, insightful questions. He's really humble and funny and I just want him to get baptized so he can have the best life possible. Yes he's happy already, but the Gospel offers potential growth and joy beyond your wildest dreams, and who wouldn't want that? He also says our Chinese is really good which is totally a lie but he's just super nice.

Here's an interesting thought, taken from D&C 101:7-8:


"They were slow to hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God; therefore, the Lord their God is slow to hearken unto their prayers, to answer them in the day of their trouble.

In the day of their peace they esteemed lightly my counsel; but, in the day of their trouble, of necessity they feel after me."

Verse 8 was cited by a member during the priesthood lesson on Sunday, and I liked verse 7 as well when I read it tout à l'heure. How many times do we (read: I) think, "I really need to get up and get working" and then don't? It happens to me more than it should. I'm partially stealing from the train of thought of another missionary whose letter I read today, but indecision is itself a decision! There is no lukewarmity to God! We all know how to tell between right and wrong, but how quick are we to act on that knowledge? There's a reason little kids at church run around with rings that say "Choose the Right" on them. It's because it's sooooo important, and it's so important to do it as quickly as possible. Sorry if I'm rambling a little bit, but I hope you pulled something out of this that you can apply to your life :)

Love y'all!

江长老

Christian Graff

Do you remember Christian Graff from Camp Helaman? He's from Kelso, Washington and he now lives in our apartment in Grenoble! He's in his 6th transfer. We were both at Camp Helaman in Oregon in 2014, small world huh?

Pics

It was really wet so I taped plastic bags around my feet.

Our adventure in Herbeys

Windows painted on the side of a building

Milestones

Hello world,

Today is March 6th. My mission call came two years ago today! I remember riding my homemade skateboard down to the mail room at BYUH and my heart skipping a beat when I found it stuffed into my mailbox. As exciting as that was, the next day was even crazier when I actually opened my call...

But I can't get too reminiscent now, I still have some time ahead of me! This week has been pretty good, including one of the craziest "coincidences" of my mission. More on that later.

On Tuesday we did some things... I don't remember honestly. Maybe that was the day we passed one of our amis randomly to check up on him working on Word of Wisdom and getting him to church, he didn't end up coming but we still have hope! Also we went to a tea shop to talk to the Chinese woman inside, she was so cool! When she found out we were learning Chinese, she immediately went into teacher mode and starting writing vocab on sticky notes and teaching us good grammar and stuff, it was awesome. She even took a Book of Mormon! :D

Okay here's the crazy experience of the week:

Wednesday we were invited to go to lunch with a less-active member we've been working on, he took us to this nice Italian restaurant and the food was super good (I got chicken with olive oil and lemon juice, pretty simple but so yummy). That afternoon we had decided to business contact an American/Canadian/English store we accidentally found one time, but we couldn't remember where it was. We wandered around in the rain forever combing the streets of downtown Grenoble, but finally had to give up. Back at the church we looked on Google maps and found it, deciding that we'd go at 10h the next morning. Now here's the weird part...

The next morning around 9h, we got a text from the same less active we'd eaten with the day before. He asked if we would come to a particular address at 10h, the exact same address as the store we'd already planned to go to at 10h! We told him yes of course, but didn't explain the "coincidence" (read: miracle) until we met him in person. He wanted us to come to the store so he could buy us some classic American/Canadian goodies, but the fact that we had planned to come to that exact store on that exact day at that exact time, having never told him that we were planning on it? Man, it was crazy. When we explained it to him, he mentioned that he's noticed God's hand in his life like that a lot lately. Super cool experience :) and that, my dear friends, is how we ended up with cans of maple syrup flavored baked beans in the apartment.

On Friday we taught our old ami, the almost 80 year old one. The lesson was kind of intense as usual, but still good. That night we had a ward party! I was never certain what the point of the party was, but it ended up being a good way to meet some new friends! Our awesome Chinese ami brought a friend whom we hope to start teaching this week and we met another cool guy from La Réunion. There was the option to wear costumes for the party as well for some reason, so naturally 鏖长老 and I donned our 帅est kung fu shirts and hats. The members loved it, people were taking pictures of us all night 😎🇨🇳🍜

Saturday was fun too, we weekly planned and had game night with one member and one ami (no one else showed up, too bad so sad. More chips for us).

Something fun about serving in France is that you can't always tell that someone's not native just by looking at them. For example: there were a ton of visitors at church on Sunday, so I went up to an older dude after sacrament meeting and (in French) asked his name. He replied with a very American name in a very American accent. Confused, I asked (in English this time) where he was from. San Diego. Turns out he had served a mission in France like 40 years ago and comes back to Grenoble for a week every year to go skiing. I didn't realize, but everyone in the ward knows him and he knows them. Still speaks amazing French, it was a funny happenstance :)

Remember all: God's in charge! There are no coincidences; everything happens for a reason! If you look for that reason, you'll find it. James 1:5 and Matthew 7:7 :)

Je vous aime!

江长老

Pics

Hi Kenny

After Italian food

MLK Jr. sighting

Ohhhh yeeeaaahhhh

Maple syrup beans and root beer

Ward party making me trunky