Week 39

Hello Everyone!

It's been another great week in the mission. I can't believe that tomorrow I hit my 11 month mark! Crazy huh? President does interviews with us every 3 months and I saw him last week and he told me that I can take some time to start applying for college! I wanted to cry. He said that my future is important and he would rather have me take some time here to apply instead of worrying about it and then sitting around for a semester. 

There were 3 baptisms yesterday, one english and 2 spanish, so we had a bilingual service. All of the speakers were english so guess who got to stand up at the pulpit with them and translate the whole service into spanish. That was great fun. One of them forgot that I was up there and went on for like 5 mins and then turned to me and said oh sorry and I had to try and remember everything she said. I could see my companion laughing at me as she went on and on. She also read a scripture from Isaiah, and as I read it I found out that Isaiah is hard to read in Spanish. The other speaker wouldn't let me finish the translation before he would move on, so he kept interrupting me. He also had a weird african accent so at times I didn't even understand what he said. Afterward, english members told me I did a good job and I said haha you don't speak any spanish do you? But later our spanish group leader asked me to translate a fireside so I guess I did ok. 

There is this "golden investigator" that the elders found that we have all been tag-teaming with. She really is great and is getting baptized next week. She came to church yesterday with her 3 daughters, a 13 year old, 6 yr old, and a 5 yr old. It's a good thing p-day is on a monday because sunday's are EXHAUSTING. This was my 2nd hour of church: I went to class with the 13 year old daughter and at the beginning there were a bunch of rowdy hispanic boys who came in looking for their class so I went and showed them to their class. As I was in the hallway I see the Elders freaking out and they said the elder who was supposed to do the 2 baptisms we had  yesterday couldn't come anymore so they asked the grandpa to do it but they got mad (because apearently they don't have a good relationship with their grandfather) and said that they would rather not get baptized. As I was helping them figure that out I saw the 5 and 6 year old of the golden investigator running through the halls. I tried to bring them back to primary but they wouldn't go but finally went into the 10 year old class, I don't know why. Then a few members asked me to do some random things for them and when I get back the 2 girls are running in the halls again. They said that they missed their mommy and wanted to give her a kiss. So I lead them to the gospel principles so they could see her for a sec. The older one was all set and went back to the 10 yr old class but the younger one kept running back out of the class saying she wanted her mom (it didn't help that the mom had crackers). To allow the mom to have a spiritual experience I put my hand on the door so she couldn't open it. She wasn't very happy and kept trying to hit it off. After a few failed attempts she finally just laid on the floor. There were some members laughing at me and I started to chat with them when popped up and opened the door before I could stop her. She said haha I got you! She came back with a handful of crackers and glared at me as she came right up to me and kicked me in the shins before she walked away. And that is how my 2nd hour ended. 

I need to go but I love you all and hope your 2nd hour of church yesterday was better than mine. haha

Con Amor,

Hna Jacobsen

Week 38

Hi everyone!

Sorry it's been a while since I've sent a group letter, I've been taking up time to send individual letters to people. things are going great here in boston. It is finally cooling off here, so I don't come home too sticky and stinky anymore haha. i love being in the city. We meet crazies every day, it's fun. 1/8 of our church attendance yesterday were non members, it was awesome. I have less than a min left on my computer but I love you and hope you are all doing good. WRITE ME! 

So the computer kicked me off last week before I could hit send. Something I've noticed around here is that people are just not happy. They get bothered by the smallest things. I feel bad for the bus drivers, they always get yelled at. I always think they just need the gospel. It makes me sad when I see how dark the world is and how confused the people are. Their lives can be so much happier if they just open up their hearts to receive the gospel. 

Today we are going to the free mason lodge to take a tour. It will be very interesting because they get all their stuff from the temple of soloman, the same place all of our temple stuff comes from, so there are a lot of similarities. And Joseph Smith was a free mason so I want to see what that was all about.

I don't know why but I have been so exhausted lately. It's probably because I'm getting over a little bit of a cold, and because I am so old in the mission. In a few weeks I will be the sister who's been out the longest. Crazy huh? I cant believe I've been out almost a year! It will be really weird.

Our little spanish group is increasing so much. We have 5 baptismal dates coming up! One girl we are teaching has a date in october. She is funny, she gets distracted really easily and will get up in the middle of the lesson and make us lunch or something. haha or start mopping the floor. She is 26 and she stays at home all day every day taking care of her 94 year old grandmother who has Alzheimer's. It was really funny one time when we were teaching, the grandma was sleeping on the couch and in the middle of my testimony she sat straight up and yelled HELP ME! poor thing had a bad dream but she went right back to sleep.  

A couple weeks ago we got to go to a red sox game! It was awesome even though we lost. 

Week 33

Hey everyone! 

I have an interesting experience to share with you. So yesterday we were walking down the street in Dorchester and there was this lady set up on the sidewalk selling Obama t-shirts. She stopped us and asked what church we were from, when we told her she said oh that's the one Mitt Romney is from. I should have known right there that it was going to end badly. She asked us what we believed and then was asking really weird questions like if we believe in the devil and what role does he play and why do we baptize at 8 and if children are innocent until 8 then why do they need to get baptized. We were trying to explain it to her but she just wasn't getting it and would interrupt to ask another random question. So I pulled out my book of mormon to read from the chapter in moroni that talks about baptizing babies but she wouldn't let me. She went and grabbed her bible and said where in here does it mention the book of mormon? I told her of the verses that talk about there being another record but she wasn't convinced, she said but it doesn't say "the book of mormon" and I was like well no. Then she said so do you believe that the catholic church is all wrong? And we said no they have some of the truth but it is mixed in with man's own opinions. She was like so truth mixed with lies is lies right? I could only say yes. She then turned to my least favorite verse in the bible, only because so many people misinterpret it, the one in revelations that says if you add to this book you will be cursed with the plagues. I tried to tell her that it was only referring to the book of revelations and not the whole bible and that the book of mormon was written before all of that anyway, but she wouldn't have it. She then started yelling at us tell us how evil we were and that we were speading the devil's lies and our whole church is evil and we will answer to God for leading other people towards damnation and that she will see us burning in hell, to which I responded "well, you have a nice day." It made me very sad how confused the Satan can make people and the anger he can put in their hearts. Later I noticed that I didn't really feel the spirit there guiding my words like I normally do, but I realized that there was nothing  that we could have said, even with the spirit, that would have appealed to this lady. She just isn't ready, but I hope that one day she is. 

On a good note, Steven was confirmed yesterday! Yay it was really good, I am so happy for them, his mom is now active and we might start teaching his older siblings. 

Well I love you all. Dont forget to write me!

Love,

Hna Jacobsen

Week 32

Hey everyone!

Yesterday was a crazy day. We had a baptism of an 11 year old investigator named Steven, he is so awesome. His mom was a less active but now she has come back and we are working on getting her a calling. It was the craziest baptism I have ever had, everything that could go wrong did. I hadn't had a baptism in this area yet so I wasn't completely sure of the logistics in this building, and no one told me that it takes like 3 hours for the font to fill with hot water, so we had to fill it with cold water. Poor guy, at least he only had to go under once. The printer wasn't working so we couldn't print the programs. The bishop told me that he would call the relief society president to ask people to bring food for after but the day before, he called me and said that they couldn't do it because of fast sunday (which didn't stop them in my last area). So we planned a little gathering at a member's house and she said that she would take care of it all, and then when we got to church she asked if I called everyone to see if they were bringing something. I know that I didn't misunderstand her because a native speaking elder also said that she told us she would take care of it. I had to give a talk at the baptism and in the middle of it a little girl got her fingers smashed in the door, so there were cries of bloody murder. There were other children who were restless throughout. But we did it, he got baptized, his mom was happy and gave the closing prayer. I will have to send pics next week. Well I have to get going but I love you. Thanks for your prayers, they give me strength every day!

Love,

Hna Jacobsen

Week 31 - I Belong to Jesus (Pictures!)