COMPANION: ELDER COLLETT
So I live in a house now. It is not an apartment. It is a house. We do not live with a member and we do not share it with other missionaries. It has a family room with an enormous fireplace, lots of closets, three bedrooms, 1 and 1/2 bathrooms, a kitchen with dining area attached, a laundry room, and a garage. We live in a charming neighborhood, have a front and back yard, and all the appliances (including our own washer and dryer, oven, refrigerator, stove, beds, recliners, etc.). We also have a full-time car, drove off the lot last month. It is a 2014 Ford Fusion and has 1800 miles on it as of this morning. It makes driving the 0.5 miles to the church building pretty nice. Our companionship has a cell-phone, we each have our personal iPads and we use Facebook to proselyte as well. It is a 21st century missionary life, and I am a little in awe of the RIDICULOUS amount of blessings. I'll probably never be this rich again!
My address is 701 Glendale St. Starke, FL, 32091, if you care to send a letter to my palatial abode.
Starke is a TINY little town filled to BURSTING with southern hospitality. People give us a lot of jams. I have a bit of a sweet tooth. The other day I caught myself eating the jam straight from the jar. Sigh. Anyway, it is wonderful, and there is a train that runs right through the middle of town! It is very loud but makes me feel like I am living in the Old West.
My new companion is named Elder Collett and is from Hemet California!!! He is easily the most relaxed person I have ever met. Even talking to him makes my blood pressure slow down. We are excited to work hard here in Starke, Lawtey, and whatever that other city we are in charge of is called (geographically, our area is huge...)
So MIRACLES! I have a tendency to occasionally be inconvenienced by various weaknesses. One day this week, my body decided it had had quite enough of my jam-guzzling ways, and my left leg went on strike. That must be where my french blood is. Anyway, it was a pretty uncomfortable experience. I was not a fan. By the time studies were over (which I completed lying on the floor), it was pretty clear that the 5 hours of walking/contacting/finding/
10 hours, two service projects, three new investigators, 2 full lessons taught, half a dozen potential investigators found, three referrals received and contacted, and one woman who would a couple days later accept a baptism date met, I collapsed back on the floor where I had spent the morning studying.
We see a lot of miracles in our lives and sometimes it's hard to point and say, "Yes, that, that right there, THAT was a miracle. God did that. It would not have happened otherwise." It was not hard this week. I could not walk. It took me over an hour to take a shower and brush my teeth. And yet the work was not inhibited. It went forth boldly, nobly, and independent of my petty weakness. So believe in miracles. I see them. They happen.
You know, miracles are pretty great. Success is pretty great. I am working on being satisfied. It seems like I can never be still for more than a second without asking, "What's next?" In pondering this trait of mine, be it weakness or potential or vice, I had a phrase begin to repeat itself in my mind. The phrase is this:
This can be the worst day of the rest of your life.
How WONDERFUL is that?? Today can be the low point of the remainder of your eternal existence! Every single moment after this one can be an improvement. Everything can always be better. How happy are you now? Tomorrow can be happier. How satisfied are you today? Tomorrow can be sweeter. There is no reason whatsoever that anything ever has to get worse. Today can be the worst day of the rest of your life. Jesus Christ is at your side. Heavenly Father reigns supreme. With them, all things are good things. With them, there is nowhere but up to go.
I cannot believe I have been here a week already. I cannot believe how many blessings I have received. The work is good and seems an awful lot like play. My companion is a blessing and support. And my God hears my prayers. He loves me. He asks me to begin or to cease, and then he waits for me to follow, and I may progress as quickly or as slowly as I choose to heed His call. I hope it is quickly. I hope to grow. I love being a missionary. I try His work to do.
~Elder Jorgensen
10 hours, two service projects, three new investigators, 2 full lessons taught, half a dozen potential investigators found, three referrals received and contacted, and one woman who would a couple days later accept a baptism date met, I collapsed back on the floor where I had spent the morning studying.
We see a lot of miracles in our lives and sometimes it's hard to point and say, "Yes, that, that right there, THAT was a miracle. God did that. It would not have happened otherwise." It was not hard this week. I could not walk. It took me over an hour to take a shower and brush my teeth. And yet the work was not inhibited. It went forth boldly, nobly, and independent of my petty weakness. So believe in miracles. I see them. They happen.
You know, miracles are pretty great. Success is pretty great. I am working on being satisfied. It seems like I can never be still for more than a second without asking, "What's next?" In pondering this trait of mine, be it weakness or potential or vice, I had a phrase begin to repeat itself in my mind. The phrase is this:
This can be the worst day of the rest of your life.
How WONDERFUL is that?? Today can be the low point of the remainder of your eternal existence! Every single moment after this one can be an improvement. Everything can always be better. How happy are you now? Tomorrow can be happier. How satisfied are you today? Tomorrow can be sweeter. There is no reason whatsoever that anything ever has to get worse. Today can be the worst day of the rest of your life. Jesus Christ is at your side. Heavenly Father reigns supreme. With them, all things are good things. With them, there is nowhere but up to go.
I cannot believe I have been here a week already. I cannot believe how many blessings I have received. The work is good and seems an awful lot like play. My companion is a blessing and support. And my God hears my prayers. He loves me. He asks me to begin or to cease, and then he waits for me to follow, and I may progress as quickly or as slowly as I choose to heed His call. I hope it is quickly. I hope to grow. I love being a missionary. I try His work to do.
~Elder Jorgensen
Letters Home
Excerpts To Kent:
Hehehe yes Starke is a little bit different than I am used to but I am certain I will come to feel very much at home here. I am sorry people have been sick! It sounds like it hasn't slowed down the construction project though. What a fantastic creation, turning that space into an adventure, a castle, a hideaway, a study room, a whatever you want it to be! I have talked to cassidy a few times actually! She is a lot of fun to talk to.
It's been hard for me recently to not be worried about the numbers and the results. I was sort of told I was being sent here to produce, and I feel frustrated when we do not. I will keep the thought of Abinadi in my mind and share with my companion the message of, "You never know".
Being an iPad missionary basically means we use our iPads as we work. We have mormon messages and the life of christ videos downloaded on there, along with scriptures, general conferences (I am reading through all of them starting in April 1971) and we have an "Area Book" application that has replaced all of our paper planners and record keeping. It is an amazing tool! We also use it to proselyte using facebook for an hour every day. I have a few pages that I maintain and am trying to learn how to use all of the little tools on there more effectively.
I have more than enough of everything, thank you so much for asking. There was a bit of a miscommunication about shopping in the hectic schedule of transfers so I have been eating a lot of rice and beans the last couple weeks but I am about to go shopping and buy a ton of fruit! Yum. Wow THAT is a competitive game! I cannot wait to get whooped by both of you! I love you. There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many fun times ahead! I'm excited for them, and excited to hear about your adventures every week. They make my life that much easier and sweeter.
Excerpts To Mom:
Hi there.
YES! Hehehe you MISS ME! Good. I like to be missed. Being missed is fun. It makes me feel important. You read the Illiad! It is GORY. Sorry about that. But YES! The Illiad is widely considered to be one of the most powerful and incredible pieces of ancient literature of all time. And yet it is put to SHAME beside the Book of Mormon. The feeling you are left with is night and day difference. The power and wisdom contained in the pages is of breathtaking contrast. I love secular literature for its own contribution to my soul, but I love it more because it sharpens and heightens my appreciation and hunger for the Truth, and it's confirmation that the Book of Mormon is the very word of God.
Elder Hurd was my companion in the MTC. He was in some of the pictures I emailed home while I was there. He is the very skinny blonde one. Elder Tuft was my companion in Gainesville. He has short brown hair and a perpetual 5 'o clock shadow. I think there are pictures on my facebook page. I mentioned this last week, but I have a facebook and we can be friends but you cannot use it to communicate with me. So no commenting, messaging, liking, etc. or I will be all sorts of busted. But there are pictures and posts and whatnot on there and you can check them out! My new companion is the oldest of 10 kids, is a white/yellow, more relaxed and chill than anyone I have ever met, doesn't watch PG-13 movies, enjoys music, is introverted but willing to talk to people, and is just a nice guy! The transition has been MUCH easier than I anticipated. I have been in some pretty intense pain but that has just given the opportunity for miracles!
Much of my distress has come from my inability to keep the diet. I am trying! You are an inspiration and I will try harder. I read something in a general conference talk that helped. "He who seeks the Lord has already found Him." We get what we look for. The joy is in the journey. As you struggle with Pride in a search for humility, you would not believe it if you were told that you are already living humbly. But your striving to be proves that it is so! How wonderful. How hopeful.
I just finished Jacob. The second to last first is very sad. I'm not sure how I feel about that. But I can agree that everything is slipping by like a dream. I work hard. I want to work harder. I try and strive to do more. I am changing back into the person I believe I was meant to be. I am growing by sloughing off all that I have carried around with me for so long.
I love you. I hope your trip was fantabulous.
****
You're pretty great. I say my mom this or my mom that or the way my mom does it or my mama once said like a billion times a day. I enjoy it. Other people might get tired of it, but I enjoy it. I just have a pretty cool family! I have a pretty cool life. I am living it up here in Starke, in case that was not adequately communicated in my other letters. These last five days since transfers have probably been the easiest in the last 8 months! So whatever it is you are saying in your prayers, keep saying it! It is working.
I get pretty sad sometimes when I think about all the terrible people I have been or things I have said or thought or done or felt. I like to hope that it is because there is so much light and growth in my life that I am gaining an appreciation for exactly what I really was living before. It makes me happy to grow and have light! But it makes me so sad to contemplate the enormous waste and destruction. Sometimes I feel I don't deserve to be doing what I'm doing and have what I have. Actually it's a daily thought. But I pray and I feel better. I remember that I am better. I remember that I worked hard to get here, and how prideful and silly and faithless and wrong it is to reject the Savior's sacrifice by wishing or inflicting punishment upon myself. it's a weird feeling. I've felt a lot of guilt when I've done things wrong, but that's not what I feel because I don't do anything wrong! I just feel embarrassed, and ashamed, and sad. But I try to pray and feel better. You are having a similar struggle it sounds like, which is why I share this one. My companion is ready to go, so I will just say I love you, ask you to pray for me, ask you to share what works as you go. I say a prayer and write down my feelings and thoughts so I can read them the next time the struggle pops up. I have a pretty big stack of positive spiritual impressions by now that I am alright! That things are going to be alright. That it's enough to just live today, without the weight of tomorrows and yesterdays. "A single day--It's all any of us have--so let's live it and LIVE IT WELL!!!!!!"
One more happy thought. I was walking down the street yesterday and realized I could do anything I wanted. ANYTHING I wanted AT ALL. I was so truly free it startled me. It was like flying! Because all I wanted was to be a missionary. All I wanted was to do the Lord's will and serve His children. Every one of my desires was righteous and so I could do ANYTHING I wanted, and I knew that 1) It was good and 2) The Lord would make it possible. In the whole universe, there was not a modicum of matter freer than I was in that instant. My heart was so light. My spirit was so still. The smile was so genuine. My eyes were so bright. I was free. I AM free. With faith I hope that I will always love to be.
I love you, Mother Dearest. I am craving avocado with homegrown tomato slice with salt and pepper on toasted rice bread like NOBODY'S business. WOW. Eat some for me. Did you get all my letters last week? There were lots. Remember that I have dreams. Remember! I remember. I am so happy to have dreams. I love that you and Dad and Cassidy and Kathryn and Courtney are one dream that I have every night, and awake every morning to find has come true.