June 16, 2014

Dear Family and Friends!
Well, I was looking forward to some baby pictures, but I guess I can
wait! I hope everything goes well with the delivery and that he comes
SOON! To answer all your questions mom:
Yes I got your email! Yes, we are still teaching in Spanish, mostly me
right now. But Elder Blake is learning to pray and bear his testimony
in Spanish! We've been trying to get more member support so I'm not
teaching alone. Yes I'm the senior companion. The weather is good,
about 80s everyday and a tiny dust storm today! We aren't outside too
much though. I think I still have two extra packages of pages for my
journal, so I'm good for now.

Well this was quite the week! After teaching 25 lessons we now have
Steve and Julie on date for July 19th! They don't know each other at
all, but they both picked the same day! We are excited for them both.
Steve is awesome and still getting over his fear of coming to church
with people he doesn't know. But he will work through it! Leander is
still planning on being baptized this Saturday the 21 so we'll be
praying all goes well with that! The Lord truly has been hastening his
work here in Flagstaff. We had members at almost half our lessons and
we have been running all over the place all week. I don't know what
we're doing differently, but it just seems everything is falling into
place.
One thing I have gained a stronger testimony of as well is the power
of two or more witnesses. I don't particularly like teaching by
myself, but we found ourselves in several situations this week where I
was teaching the whole lesson. I realized I can only do so much.
Really, what I do, and what we do, is very minimal. We are messengers,
but the Spirit is the teacher of truth. We can't convince anyone that
Joseph Smith saw God and Jesus Christ. We can only bear our personal
testimonies and allow the Spirit to back us up with an additional
witness. There's hasn't been a single time on my whole mission that I
or my companion have recited Joseph Smith's experience in the sacred
grove and the Holy Ghost hasn't born witness to me again that it is
true. And when you have a companion who testifies as well, it's even
better. Elder Blake really is taking it like a champ though. He's been
setting goals each week to learn Spanish and participate more.
Well, unfortunately I caught some bug this weekend. Don't know if it's
stomach flu or what but I guess success comes at a cost! Hopefully
it's gone by tomorrow for our Zone conference in Sedona!
I love each of you and appreciate your prayers!
Until next week,

Elder Collin Christensen

June 9, 2014

Buenos tardes Familia y amigos!

Well, my new companion is Elder Blake! He's from SLC, UT and has been
out about 17 months. He is a nice guy, pretty quiet, and he plays the
piano like a mad man! Oh yea, and he is an English missionary. I don't
know what President Taylor was thinking making me the only Spanish
speaking missionary proselyting in Flagstaff. Being in a hybrid
companionship is definitely testing and humbling me. Teaching alone
isn't too fun, so Elder Blake is actually learning Spanish with me! We
had a super successful week though, we found 4 new investigators and
had a lot of member participation!
Elder Muñoz ended up in Peoria, in the Agua Fria ward where I was
trained! He has my old bed! Haha
Sorry this is a short email, we are having a big activity today! I
love you all!

Elder Collin Christensen

June 3, 2014

Dear Family and Friends!
Well, we just received transfer news, and Elder Muñoz is leaving tomorrow. :( we are both pretty bummed about it. We have learned so
much from each other and have loved the last 6 weeks working here. I am a bit uneasy and quite honestly nervous to take over this area.
While our English ward is small, our Spanish area is enormous and a little overwhelming. I didn't really realize it until this last weekend when we stayed out in Williams and Ash Fork. I know that The
Lord doesn't expect me to know it all or be able to do everything perfectly, so I am grateful for His help which I will most definitely need! I feel I have learned two huge things from Elder Muñoz. The first being love. We can't do the Lord's work unless we do it in the Lord's way, and the Lord's way is love! Elder Muñoz is an awesome example of loving the people and showing it.  The Second thing I have learned from being with him is how to effectively and confidently make decisions. I am still learning it, but ever since I got here, he turned most the reins over to me and really let me guide our decisions. I believe he was inspired to do that so I could learn to trust not only the Spirit, but also my own ability to make decisions. Anyways, I love this guy and will miss him!

This last week we've stayed busy. Recently we have been struggling with how to get the members to work with us. They are excited and willing to participate, and they trust us, but most of them just don't have a clue how to do missionary work. It's understandable too, of course people want to share the gospel, but the "method" of sharing is isn't quite so easy. Well, I can tell all you members reading this,
the "method" is the missionary manual Preach My Gospel. As Elder Ballard said this last April's Conference, this is a manual for missionary work, and so it's a manual for all of us! His Apostolic
challenge to us to study it as members of the church is not merely a suggestion! So I will back up his challenge with mine - study it! If you truly want to share the gospel, you will heed this call from a prophet of God. I promise that if you do, the Spirit will enlighten
you and give you an idea, a "method", in which The Lord would have YOU participate in His work. And the COOLEST part of this last week has been watching members apply the principles taught in Preach My Gospel. They invite! We had several lessons with members who not only invited current investigators to come to their home, but who introduced us to new people as well! I just testify that there are people you see and know each and everyday who are prepared and searching for the truth. You may or may not know who they are, but The Lord does! Trust him, fear God more than man! Invite invite invite, and watch The Lord work miracles through you. I know he will if you follow his Method.  So some of these new people I mentioned are Steve and Jacob. Steve has a girlfriend who is a member and is helping us teach him. He is
soaking everything up and already wants to be baptized! Jacob is from Phoenix and is staying with his aunt in our ward. He's an awesome kid. Both of these people we would never have found if members hadn't
invited us to meet and teach them! The truth is, we can't do this work alone as members nor alone as missionaries. We are excited to see the hastening of the work in action!
I know this church is true!

Love,

Elder Collin Christensen

May 26, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,
It has been one heck of a week. It flew by and yet it seems like it
lasted forever. I got to go to a specialized training for the mission
for music. It was pretty cool meeting, we had William Joseph come and
speak to us on how to use music to invite the Spirit, and fulfill our
calling to "Invite others to come unto Christ." He is a cool guy! He
got to play the piano a lot on his mission in Perth, Australia. He is
actually from Glendale, AZ! Anyways, you would have enjoyed it a lot mom. :D

So the real crazy part of the week started on the way back up to
Flagstaff! A brush fire closed down the highway, so after waiting in heavy traffic for 4 hours, we had to turn around and stay with some elders back down in the valley. Fortunately they had contained the fire so we went back up he next morning, only to get stopped by more fires between Sedona and Flagstaff. We found another way home, and by the time we got back the whole sky was filled with smoke and ash was falling all over. We probably spent at least 10 hours in the car those two days. As soon as we got back we were told by President Taylor to immediately pack 24 hour kits in case of evacuation. We spent the rest of that afternoon helping people pack and prepare for evacuation down in Kachina, where the fire was about 4-5 miles away. It was pretty cool, we just went from house to house helping people get prepared. One guy was pretty disabled and super stressed about not being able to pack. It was cool to be able to help him, and others, and tell the, what we do as missionaries. As of now no one has been evacuated as far as we know, but the last I heard the fire is still 0% contained and a National emergency. There's still smoke in the air but we aren't too worried about anything happening anymore since the wind is pushing it away from Flagstaff. So yea! It's been a crazy week!

Teaching wise, we set a baptismal date for June 21 for Leander,  a member of a part member family here. He is pretty cool, and really quiet with us still like most Navajo people. We are excited for him though. He came to church for the first time along with another new investigator named Ray! We had a lot of people at church actually, we didn't have enough chairs in our Gospel Principles class!
Well its crazy to think that May is already almost through. I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As we apply it, it gives us "hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise" (Moroni 7:41). I know we can be forgiven, that the burdenof guilt can be lifted from off our backs, if we choose to walk side by side with the Savior, and allow the burden he already bore to carry us through. It is true, it is real, and it's His promise to us! I am so grateful to know that is true, by personal experience and witnessing it in the lives of those we get to work with.
Thank you for all your prayers and support! I love you all and pray
for you regularly!

Elder Collin Christensen

May 19, 2014

Dear Family,
This has been a great week. We found three new people to teach, one is from a part member family. His name is Leander and we are teaching him again tonight and inviting him to be baptized! The other two are Dave and Christina, a couple who has a pretty rough past. We finally got in to teach them last week and they came to church yesterday! They are awesome people and want to get married and everything. We are pumped to work with them! Also at church was a recent convert family that we have been working with, and we found out they were taught by Elder
Brandon Royse!
We also taught a recent convert's husband named Mike last week who has talked to missionaries for a long time. He told us he didn't get anything out of missionary visits, and wanted to move on to some greater knowledge past what we teach. He said it was because he doesn't feel there is enough evidence to back up what we teach, especially from the Bible. We asked if he had ever read the Book of Mormon, and he said he'd never opened it. We promised him he would
never know what we taught was true, or not true, unless he read the
Book of Mormon, which is the true evidence of everything! He ended up
coming to church without his wife...so she didn't drag him there!
Hopefully he found some higher knowledge! :D It was a cool experience
for me, because I realized how small of a role we play as
missionaries, and how little we really can do for people. That's not
to degrade our role at all, but there comes a point where we all have
to act, and being acted upon is no longer enough. When we act, The
Lord blesses us with a knowledge that what we are doing is either
right or wrong. The gift of agency is amazing!

Well, we have been enjoying the Family History we've been working on.
A Chinese man sat by me in the library as I was working on mine, and
he told us he loved Mormon people. So we looked up his family on
www.familysearch.org with him and he thought that was cool! But then
he told us that 120 generations back he comes from a royal Emperor
Family, so he was satisfied with that. Haha oh yea then I found out we
weren't supposed to contact/proselyte in public places like
libraries...oops.

Well that's about it for this weeks update. I pray for you all each
day and feel your prayers for me! This mission is changing me slowly,
and that's really what the gospel should do to all of us! I know that
as we come unto Christ through covenants and continued obedience, we
can receive the healing and freeing blessings he promises us. It's
like a gift he's already given us, but because our agency is so
important to him, it's our choice to receive it or not.

Here is my favorite scripture of the week:
"And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should come unto
Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation,
and the power of his redemption. Yea, come unto him, and offer your
whole souls as an offering unto him, and continue in fasting and
praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be
saved" (Omni:26).

Elder Collin Christensen

May 12, 2014

Dear Family!
Well it was awesome to see/hear you all yesterday! As for the
appointments I told you about last night, one of them happened. We taught the older Mexican lady. We found out half way
through that she was not following what we were teaching at all. She may not be totally there, so we will see where that goes. Haha Besides her  we found 3 new people this week. 2 are
friends/coworkers of a less active member who invited them to listen to us.  We had a powerful lesson with
them about Enos' story. It helped me realize the truth of a Preach My Gospel phrase: "Although they may not know why, [those you teach] need relief from feelings of guilt that come from mistakes and sins. They need to experience the joy of redemption by receiving forgiveness of their sins and enjoying the gift of the Holy Ghost.... You are called to represent Jesus Christ in helping people become clean from their sins" (1: What Is My Purpose as a Missionary?). It's true that a lot of people don't even realize they are carrying burdens of guilt. Everyone needs the gift of forgiveness, whether they think so or not.

So Olin  was baptized Monday! He was part of another part member family and we are working to help that family become active again. It was a cool baptismal service, but it's been hard to get ward members to come.

Other than that we found out that at least three of our investigators
are on probation and/or are felons...explains why it's been so hard to find them!

Sorry this is a short email, but that's the basic update. I love you
all and hope you are doing well!

Elder Collin Christensen

Climbing Mt. Humphrey

Hola Familia y amigos!
Well we just got back from climbing Mt. Humphrey! It is the highest
mountain in Arizona! It took us almost 6 hours...I will say I am
sufficiently whooped. We weren't super prepared for the distance, or
the snow, or the 50 mph wind at the top. But it was definitely worth
it! From the top we could see part of the Grand Canyheon. I loved it! My
camera died so I didn't get many pictures...sorry. (this photo is off the web)

Elder Christensen's picture

Elder Christensen's picture

 

So this week was pretty good, I'm feeling pretty settled in and
finally starting to learn the area alright. Jr and Tracey  were
both both baptized this last Saturday! It has been cool teaching these
young kids, but they are solid and we are working on reactivating the
whole family so that they can have the support they need! Again, we
don't have pictures yet but we will send me when we get them!
There are so many Navajos up here! We cover the Flagstaff Hospital in
the area so we get called to give blessings at least 3 times a week.
That's been pretty cool.

We had some awesome meetings this week, we received training on Family
History work, which we are going to start doing as a mission! They
want us to know how to do our own so we can help others do theirs and
find new people to teach through it. Within the first minute of
working on it, I found out that my zone leader Elder Arave is my 5th
cousin or something like that! We have the same great great great
grandfather, Nelson Arave Arrivee! That's sweet! It's been cool
learning about all of this, the Spirit of Elijah is so real.

Also we had a focus on talking with everyone in our Zone meeting.
Since then, we made some changes in the way we do things and  have
found some solid new potentials just because we rent afraid to talk to
someone walking into their house, or sitting outside smoking. It's
been great.
Well, we don't have much time at all today, so that's the update!

Also, I need to know what time to call on Sunday! Please respond and
let me know before 6. Sorry it's late notice, but were just supposed
to have  set time. Looking forward to seeing you all! Let me know what
time works best!

I love you!

Elder Collin Christensen

4 PM Mother's Day call was scheduled.