The temple was awesome. I was told it was the first of the new presentations, not the newer one. It definitely provided some new ways of looking at different parts of the Plan of Salvation, I'd say the main new thing I got from it was simply a re-enforcement of the fact that Satan often will try to appear sincerely concerned for us as a way of trying to shake us. It was especially meaningful since we got in a 2 hour long discussion that night with a Canadian Baptist who was just about as friendly as one could be while implying that the other party is doomed to hell (us). For the record Dad, all those books that the people would pull out when you would stop by on your mission have now been put online. He was using his phone to pull out quotes from books written by apostles that I had never even heard the title of before. I surprised myself by coming up with a good answer to all of them though (thank you Holy Ghost). I just said that as missionaries, we teach the basic doctrine as found in the BoM, the D&C, the Pearl of Great Price, and the bible. Anything else, even if written by an apostle, is their opinion, and not official doctrine, even if true. The real moral of the story though was that even though he was super nice about it, I could tell that the spirit was not guiding the conversation, although I could feel it help us answer his questions at various points.
Xxxx Xx Xxxx is still on track for June 22, we had good lesson with him yesterday evening, the only problem was that he miss-heard the last reading assignment we gave him on Sunday. He read 2 Nephi 12 instead of 2 Nephi 2. Needless to say, he was a bit confused from having been asked to read the Isaiah chapters. He's still doing well though.
Xxx Xxx Xxx, (my first baptism) took sister Chan and Dong, and Elders Cook, Murray, Wang and I out for dinner on Monday. We tried to tell her that we had other stuff planned, so she wouldn't be able to take Wang and I, but she wasn't taking no for an answer, and then Elder Wang slipped up by saying that our other plans were not a lesson, so she knew it was probably something we could re-schedule. Still really tasty food though. She just got called this last Sunday as the second counselor in the Relief Society presidency. She's also coming on the ward trip for pageant from the 17-19th of next month, so you can probably expect her to want to take pictures with you.
We've had 4 baptisms in the last 2 weeks, with another 2 scheduled for this coming Sunday. The work moves on.
I had 粽子 for the first time yesterday. They're the Chinese equivalent of tamales, a lot of white rice with some pork and peanuts steamed in bamboo leaves. Pretty tasty, but they are killing my stomach now, so I don't know if I will have them again any time soon.
I found out they have Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings in Chinese for the books. You can add them to my Christmas wish list as well.
Elder Murray and Sister Chan are going to the temple with president today, he has a tradition of taking the dying missionaries the week before they go home. It's crazy to think about the fact that it was over a year ago now that I was companions with Elder Murray. Soon I'm going to be hitting my year mark of when I went up-state.
Love, your son in service,
Elder Christensen
陳少駒
Monday, July 28, 2014
May 28, 2014
You can always add a trailer hitch onto the back of the RV and pull a car behind you. Regardless, next year I'm finding a way to get from Pageant down to the city, either before or after, probably after, for the sake of having more time.
I miss the "can we panic now" state. It was really fun to watch.
We've been contacting about the same as before, just that right now, the weather makes it a lot more pleasant to contact, so that's always good.
We have one investigator who is doing really well currently who I don't think I've told you about before, his name is Xxx Xxx Xxxx, he has a baptismal date for June 22. Elder Wang and I are feeling really good about him for a few reasons, one of them is that he is really fresh to the USA, practically FoB status (fresh off the boat). He works in Connecticut, but he hasn't missed church since he first started coming. He also said he has always gotten Sunday off before, meaning that he chooses jobs that have Sunday off intentionally, because he wants to have a regular schedule. Also, June 22 happens to be one day off the year mark of Xxx's baptism (June 23rd), which we are hoping is a good sign.
Monday was nuts. We taught a FB lesson to an investigator in Rhode Island until 11:10 PM, Called Xxxx Xxx Xxxx (see above paragraph) for a quick phone lesson, and called another investigator at 11:40 in Tennessee (10:40 his time) and talked with him until 1 in the morning. Then we got up at 6:30 Tuesday morning because we had meetings in the morning. I never thought that my high school training for sleep depravation would come in handy on my mission, but Elder Wang was completely gone by dinner time. My eyes were getting a bit sore, but other than that I felt fine. I was switching back and forth between Chinese and English a lot as well, which I don't normally do, I usually stay mostly in one language or the other, not switching back and forth, but I guess when I get tired it dissolves the barriers between languages for me.
For some reason a lot of people haven't shown up to church the last 2 weeks, not just investigators, members who have been coming weekly for over a year just stopped showing up 2 weeks ago, we're trying to figure out what is going on.
I'm going to be seeing Robert(cousin) 2 weeks from today, that is kind of funny.
Currently I don't need anything, I might go buy some suspenders, apparently they are approved missionary clothes (President asked if it was because I needed to hold my pants up or because I wanted to make a fashion statement, probably both.) If you want to send out muffins or something, I guess you can. I would still encourage you to use the mission office address, but seeing as I'm living in the same apartment as I was from March to Aug. 2013, you can probably find that address somewhere and ship directly to me. I still wouldn't advise it, we don't check the mailbox hardly ever.
Moving out of Delancey was a much longer process than we expected. I had no idea how much crap can accumulate over 21 months of elders living in an apartment. Currently we are living with Elders Leung and Guo (new this cycle), but that will probably change somehow in 2 weeks with transfers, we will see.
Elder Snow of the Seventy is coming to tour the mission, we have a nice long meeting at the temple tomorrow from 8am till 4 in the afternoon. It will be fun, I learned a lot from the last mission tour back in Oct.
We are going to the temple today for P-day. Hopefully I will finally get to see one of the new videos (still have only seen the one).
Oh, Elder Murray is going to his Broadway play today, he flies home 2 weeks from tomorrow. It really is crazy how fast it goes.
I attended my first mission leadership council, normally it is only the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders who attend, but President had all the District Leaders come as well this time. I learned a lot more about planning, and especially about the principle of accountability, particularly from the perspective of a leader.
Love you all,
Your son in service,
Elder Christensen
陳少駒
I miss the "can we panic now" state. It was really fun to watch.
We've been contacting about the same as before, just that right now, the weather makes it a lot more pleasant to contact, so that's always good.
We have one investigator who is doing really well currently who I don't think I've told you about before, his name is Xxx Xxx Xxxx, he has a baptismal date for June 22. Elder Wang and I are feeling really good about him for a few reasons, one of them is that he is really fresh to the USA, practically FoB status (fresh off the boat). He works in Connecticut, but he hasn't missed church since he first started coming. He also said he has always gotten Sunday off before, meaning that he chooses jobs that have Sunday off intentionally, because he wants to have a regular schedule. Also, June 22 happens to be one day off the year mark of Xxx's baptism (June 23rd), which we are hoping is a good sign.
Monday was nuts. We taught a FB lesson to an investigator in Rhode Island until 11:10 PM, Called Xxxx Xxx Xxxx (see above paragraph) for a quick phone lesson, and called another investigator at 11:40 in Tennessee (10:40 his time) and talked with him until 1 in the morning. Then we got up at 6:30 Tuesday morning because we had meetings in the morning. I never thought that my high school training for sleep depravation would come in handy on my mission, but Elder Wang was completely gone by dinner time. My eyes were getting a bit sore, but other than that I felt fine. I was switching back and forth between Chinese and English a lot as well, which I don't normally do, I usually stay mostly in one language or the other, not switching back and forth, but I guess when I get tired it dissolves the barriers between languages for me.
For some reason a lot of people haven't shown up to church the last 2 weeks, not just investigators, members who have been coming weekly for over a year just stopped showing up 2 weeks ago, we're trying to figure out what is going on.
I'm going to be seeing Robert(cousin) 2 weeks from today, that is kind of funny.
Currently I don't need anything, I might go buy some suspenders, apparently they are approved missionary clothes (President asked if it was because I needed to hold my pants up or because I wanted to make a fashion statement, probably both.) If you want to send out muffins or something, I guess you can. I would still encourage you to use the mission office address, but seeing as I'm living in the same apartment as I was from March to Aug. 2013, you can probably find that address somewhere and ship directly to me. I still wouldn't advise it, we don't check the mailbox hardly ever.
Moving out of Delancey was a much longer process than we expected. I had no idea how much crap can accumulate over 21 months of elders living in an apartment. Currently we are living with Elders Leung and Guo (new this cycle), but that will probably change somehow in 2 weeks with transfers, we will see.
Elder Snow of the Seventy is coming to tour the mission, we have a nice long meeting at the temple tomorrow from 8am till 4 in the afternoon. It will be fun, I learned a lot from the last mission tour back in Oct.
We are going to the temple today for P-day. Hopefully I will finally get to see one of the new videos (still have only seen the one).
Oh, Elder Murray is going to his Broadway play today, he flies home 2 weeks from tomorrow. It really is crazy how fast it goes.
I attended my first mission leadership council, normally it is only the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders who attend, but President had all the District Leaders come as well this time. I learned a lot more about planning, and especially about the principle of accountability, particularly from the perspective of a leader.
Love you all,
Your son in service,
Elder Christensen
陳少駒
May 14, 2014
First things first, Mothers Day Skype will be from the Buckner's house at 5:30 NY time, 3:30 Utah time. One thing you might want to look up before the Skype (I can't believe I'm going to be saying this) is when does winter semester registration at BYU start up/when does the semester start exactly, because that will probably play a role in what time I go home. Interestingly, if I go home before Christmas, I will never have Skyped on the day I was actually supposed to.
This last week, I had possibly the most ridiculous night possible without breaking any rules. We needed the WiFi for some lessons later on, but due to it being down at Delancey, we got permission from the APs to...visit the East Broadway Elders for Monday night. One juked lesson with a potential investigator over the phone and 2 lessons with less actives who are out of state because of work (Conn. And New Hampshire) later, we finally got to bed at 12:40 am. Since there was only the one set of beds, Elder Wang took the couch and I claimed Elder Murray's study desk chair for the night. Since they didn't have any late night lessons, they got up at 6:30, so we did as well, and went through the whole day like normal, complete with 3 hours contacting at the tree. Definitely falls in the top 10 most tired days of my mission.
Contacting recently has been a lot more effective, but currently I would say that our most promising person is a 21 year old named Xxx Xxx Xxx. He's really smart, he taught me how to say Einstein in Chinese. He had a really hard time saying Tesla in English, too. His favorite way to mess with me is to use 500 year old Mandarin poetry when he talks (imagine a Chinese version of Shakespeare). He currently is in Tennessee for work, but comes back some time in the first week of June, and hopefully will be able to start at a community college here in the city during the fall. We have a Facebook Lesson with him tonight.
Currently, I'm scheduled to do 4 baptismal interviews on Sunday before Skyping. All of them have been people who have had some serious issues, be it faith or personal life, but if all works out well then on a week from Sunday we should be having 6 or 7 people getting baptized (a couple of them are from the other district in our ward.
Our recent convert from Rhode Island is Xxx Xxxx. He is still coming every week, which is really good. He has to leave early some weeks, but he has only ever missed once, and it was because he was sick. I ordained him as a priest 2 weeks ago (first time I ever did an ordination I think, definitely for the first time in Chinese, I need to review how to say that stuff more often.) He is going to be called as the ward librarian next week, which we don't know for sure how that will work when we just have a large cart we throw all the books on, but it should still be good.
We haven't been able to find a Chinese thesaurus here either, I honestly question if they exist, but definitely try Cameron's teacher.
So the running I was doing with Elder Zander has definitely stopped. The interesting thing is that we really aren't exercising at all currently because we don't get up until we need to in order to get ready for the meetings we have during the mornings a lot of the time, because even sleeping till then we aren't getting the full 8 hours president asked us to get. My weight has dropped a pound or two since Zander left, but it's hard to say if it is fat or muscle.
You can try getting Robin and Wes to do this, some elders do it, but most of them are Spanish program, and they get fed so much they don't really have any control of if they put on weight or not, they just do.
Love you lots, see you on Sunday!
Your son in service,
Elder Christensen
先苦后甜-it translates literally as "first bitter, then sweet"
This last week, I had possibly the most ridiculous night possible without breaking any rules. We needed the WiFi for some lessons later on, but due to it being down at Delancey, we got permission from the APs to...visit the East Broadway Elders for Monday night. One juked lesson with a potential investigator over the phone and 2 lessons with less actives who are out of state because of work (Conn. And New Hampshire) later, we finally got to bed at 12:40 am. Since there was only the one set of beds, Elder Wang took the couch and I claimed Elder Murray's study desk chair for the night. Since they didn't have any late night lessons, they got up at 6:30, so we did as well, and went through the whole day like normal, complete with 3 hours contacting at the tree. Definitely falls in the top 10 most tired days of my mission.
Contacting recently has been a lot more effective, but currently I would say that our most promising person is a 21 year old named Xxx Xxx Xxx. He's really smart, he taught me how to say Einstein in Chinese. He had a really hard time saying Tesla in English, too. His favorite way to mess with me is to use 500 year old Mandarin poetry when he talks (imagine a Chinese version of Shakespeare). He currently is in Tennessee for work, but comes back some time in the first week of June, and hopefully will be able to start at a community college here in the city during the fall. We have a Facebook Lesson with him tonight.
Currently, I'm scheduled to do 4 baptismal interviews on Sunday before Skyping. All of them have been people who have had some serious issues, be it faith or personal life, but if all works out well then on a week from Sunday we should be having 6 or 7 people getting baptized (a couple of them are from the other district in our ward.
Our recent convert from Rhode Island is Xxx Xxxx. He is still coming every week, which is really good. He has to leave early some weeks, but he has only ever missed once, and it was because he was sick. I ordained him as a priest 2 weeks ago (first time I ever did an ordination I think, definitely for the first time in Chinese, I need to review how to say that stuff more often.) He is going to be called as the ward librarian next week, which we don't know for sure how that will work when we just have a large cart we throw all the books on, but it should still be good.
We haven't been able to find a Chinese thesaurus here either, I honestly question if they exist, but definitely try Cameron's teacher.
So the running I was doing with Elder Zander has definitely stopped. The interesting thing is that we really aren't exercising at all currently because we don't get up until we need to in order to get ready for the meetings we have during the mornings a lot of the time, because even sleeping till then we aren't getting the full 8 hours president asked us to get. My weight has dropped a pound or two since Zander left, but it's hard to say if it is fat or muscle.
You can try getting Robin and Wes to do this, some elders do it, but most of them are Spanish program, and they get fed so much they don't really have any control of if they put on weight or not, they just do.
Love you lots, see you on Sunday!
Your son in service,
Elder Christensen
先苦后甜-it translates literally as "first bitter, then sweet"
May 7, 2014
So this week just happened.
Yes Mom, Elder Wang is the first Elder Wang that I was companions with right before I left Chinatown. The one who was called Chinese speaking, not English. He entered the MTC 2 weeks after me, came out a few weeks before I got here, and will probably fly home the same day as Elder Cook and I. Fun fact, Elder Cook still hasn't left Chinatown yet, and he won't be able to leave next transfer either, because he is sending Elder Murray home, so he will need to help the next Zone Leader figure out how to do the Zone Leader gig. This means that the earliest he could go upstate will be the transfer in July, when Sister Mackay and Sister Lee leave. In other words, Elder Cook will serve a full Sister's mission without ever leaving his first ward.
If you post pictures on FB I can see them, I don't know if I will look for them, but I can definitely see them.
We did a service project this last Friday. We went to help prepare for the Revlon Walk for Brest Cancer. It was really fun because most of the time we can't really find service opportunities besides English class, and it had the added benefit of us being able to see the rest of the missionaries serving in Manhattan currently.
Saturday we took a ward trip to the Cloisters, it is this old monastery on 197ish street at the very top of the island that has been converted into a branch of the MET Museum focusing specifically on Medieval European art. Since during the 1500s, all art was religious, it basically was us just getting to look at a million different sculptures, paintings, carvings... of Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and various other religious stuff. We took a tour of the Innwood chapel after that, including the bishop's storehouse in the basement there.
Our pad is being sold as of the end of the month. I'm fine with this since it is really overpriced and not the best anyway, but the bigger issue is that we don't have a new pad to move into yet, so we might become homeless at the end of the month. More news will be coming regarding that hopefully.
Love you lots,
Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen
陳少駒
Yes Mom, Elder Wang is the first Elder Wang that I was companions with right before I left Chinatown. The one who was called Chinese speaking, not English. He entered the MTC 2 weeks after me, came out a few weeks before I got here, and will probably fly home the same day as Elder Cook and I. Fun fact, Elder Cook still hasn't left Chinatown yet, and he won't be able to leave next transfer either, because he is sending Elder Murray home, so he will need to help the next Zone Leader figure out how to do the Zone Leader gig. This means that the earliest he could go upstate will be the transfer in July, when Sister Mackay and Sister Lee leave. In other words, Elder Cook will serve a full Sister's mission without ever leaving his first ward.
If you post pictures on FB I can see them, I don't know if I will look for them, but I can definitely see them.
We did a service project this last Friday. We went to help prepare for the Revlon Walk for Brest Cancer. It was really fun because most of the time we can't really find service opportunities besides English class, and it had the added benefit of us being able to see the rest of the missionaries serving in Manhattan currently.
Saturday we took a ward trip to the Cloisters, it is this old monastery on 197ish street at the very top of the island that has been converted into a branch of the MET Museum focusing specifically on Medieval European art. Since during the 1500s, all art was religious, it basically was us just getting to look at a million different sculptures, paintings, carvings... of Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and various other religious stuff. We took a tour of the Innwood chapel after that, including the bishop's storehouse in the basement there.
Our pad is being sold as of the end of the month. I'm fine with this since it is really overpriced and not the best anyway, but the bigger issue is that we don't have a new pad to move into yet, so we might become homeless at the end of the month. More news will be coming regarding that hopefully.
Love you lots,
Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen
陳少駒
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