did the person who named the coconut have taste buds. . . i'm not entirely sure that he did.

dear those anyone who is currently under the age of a tree,

i've decided the spend the next minutes of my time in this day typing words on a keyboard in my local library. since i have so committed myself to this course of action i now find myself needing to fill these assembled words with meaning and direction and possibly a subject matter. this can be quite a difficult achievement and requires the focusment of mindly matters and speradicificity in making up words to fit with certaineous subjects and mental propelations. so i've decided to write about missionary work :) cuz i'm creative!

anywho first off we got the call yesterday and it turns out that nothing will be changing this transfer1 so i get to stay in farnborough at least another six weeks with my amazing companion. i'm super grateful that i have more time to work in this area and with this ward and especially with Elder Gill. (side note, the game monkey in the middle is called piggy in the middle over here. the real question is why?)

in other news Wendy was able to come to church for the first time yesterday! it was amazing she loved the service and especially the gospel principles class where she really connected with the teacher and with the things being taught. she got a long great with the ward members. (i don't know how anyone couldn't with this amazing ward) and we're going to be seeing her again tonight to read some from the book of mormon with her. we tried extending a baptismal date to her again this week but she isn't willing to commit for a date yet until she feels ready. so we're going to be working this week on helping her understand and feel the importance and power of the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

As well we started teaching two new FAMILIES this week!!!!! one we had actually met about three weeks ago but were able to see us for the first time this week. a great couple named billy and selena (or selestia we're not yet sure which one is the actual name) who also have kids. we also started teaching a younger couple named karis and derron just a few days ago. neither of them have much religious background but get this, their young daughter attends a catholic school ( a lot of people do) so she's been hearing a lot about god and has been asking her parents questions. this has been causing them to ask questions and hence caused them to let us in so they could ask us questions. it was an amazing teach and they really felt and understood what we were saying. we're going to see karis again this tuesday with her daughter so we can help her daughter begin to learn for herself as well. and then we'll be seeing them both together this next saturday.

i feel like this ward is being mobilized ( for lack of a better and less millitaryish word). it's such a great and strong ward that really desires to do missionary work but for some reason they just haven’t really had the tools to do it. and recently with the adjustments made in our ward mission team everything seems to be fitting together and just taking off. (have i mentioned that i've been blessed a lot?)

i learned something that really stuck out to me recently in my study that i want to share with you all. in preach my gospel there is a bit on the light of christ that i found to be quite meaningful. it says that every person that comes into the world is given the light of christ which will lead all that hearken unto it to the true gospel of Jesus Christ, the church, and the eventual reception of the Holy Ghost. every person that comes into this world has the ability and the opportunity to receive the fullness of truth. god wants all of his children, all of our brothers and sisters to know what is true and have a way to eventually return to live with him and he is continually seeking to guide each and every one of us back to him. the more i learn about the gospel the more i am amazed and awed at the depth of god’s love for each one of us. he truly loves us and he has provided the means for us to return home. and we all have the great and amazing opportunity to be part of this great work--to teach, to guide, to love, to listen, and to lift. i love being a missionary; absolutely my favorite calling i have ever received. and i'm so grateful to be a member of this church so i will forever have the opportunity to share this gospel with all who will listen throughout the rest of my life.

i'm grateful for all of your guy's love and support you guys send me.

with love

Elder Jarman

ps. recently i head that armenian turtle doves are actually bred in australia. but this may in fact be not be fact

pps. it recently dropped below scarf temperature here

ppps. i have great news! i found out where i can buy popcorn kernels here! this makes my life at least 4% more complete :)

pppps. as i am typing this i'm watching a collage of colors painting the wind with leaves. it makes me want to sing some sort of a song that may or may not be written by disney

sog and leaves would not that soggy would leaf {Monday, October 15th}

dear anyone that has used the chinese zodiac at some previous point,

you know you think that after being on amission for so long i would have figured out at some point how to write an adequite letter to describe the acti/fun/fantas;tivities that you get up to in the life of a full time missionary. buuuuuuuut i still can't :) sorry about that. so instead i will spend some time talking about the various people we've seen this last week. we've started teaching loads of new investigators (again) this last week. the first is named wendy. she has always had a strong beleif in god but has often been confused about different veiws and has ended up with some incorrect understandings that have realy troubled her because of it. so teaching her is an amazingly different experience. she ahs a strong trust in us as servents of the lord and beleives everything that we teach her but we feel what she realy needs is to just truly feel that the gospel is true by the witness of the Holy Ghost. i've noticed a lot about that witness in my study over the last week. one of the main focuses of our teaching and our commitments as missionaries is to help others receive that witness for themselves that the book of mormon is true and that therefore the gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored in it's fullness. it makes sense that this would be the focus of our teaching because our focus as missionaries is to invite others to come unto Christ. and every person, no matter who they are, needs to receive that witness from the Spirit at some point or other in the course of their eternal progression. for myself this witness came gradually, ever so slightly. bit by bit by bit until one day (i still remember the day) i looked back on my life and realized that i knew for myslef that the Church was true. that is why i love sharing the book of mormon and it's message with investigators because it was so instrumental in this process of my own conversion.

As well we also had a realy cool experiance in the first teach with a new investigator named paul. he had never realy had too much religous backround and as such didn't realy know too much about god. When we asked him why he let us into his house he thought about it for a moment and then told us that he realy didn't know but that he felt that he should. after teaching him for a while we commited him to say the closing prayer. he was realy hesitant because he hadn't realy had too much experiance with prayer so far in his life. most of his experiance was with scripted prayer. but after some counsel and after we said a prayer as well to help him get a feel for it he said an amazing kneeling prayer before we left. the spirit enveloped the room touching our hearts as well as his. when the prayer was finnished he looked up, was silent for a while, and then commented on how different he felt. we were more than happy to help him understand what he was experiancing. something i noticed specifically, that i later recorded in my journal, is that when we all felt the spirit we all felt a natural and powerfull increase of love for eachother. this isn't the first time i've experianced this either. when i feel the spirit i feel love for those that i am with. i beleive this is at least one way in which the love of god can "sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men"

as always i have loads of more experiaces that i could share but i'm kinda running out of time. and if i took the time to type out all the things that happened this week it would take about a week. which would make next weeks letter a little boring. . .

so i'll stop here :)

with love

Elder Jarman

ps. the leaves are changing!!!!!!!!!!!

pps.i've decided that i'm basically realy realy blessed to hav Elder Gill as a companion.

ppps. i've also decided that i'm basically just realy realy blessed. full stop. : D

see it's much like a general's conference but much less stars and guns are hardly ever mentioned

dear people who live, breathe, and read e-mails, (and maybe do other things as well in their spare time) General Conference was SO COOL! i feel that every single general conference just gets better and better from the last one. it always amazes me just how strong the spirit can be as saints gather from around the world to be united under the prophet’s voice and direction. one of the principles that really stood out to me was the necessity of serving others and the divine gift of being able to recognize the potential in others. it's something that kinda hit home for this last week because of an experience i had with an investigator named Gary. we've been teaching him for a while now and haven't been able to see much progress so i had recently been praying that i would be able to see Gary as the lord sees him and recognize him to be a child of god, and my brother. we taught him this last week once again about the necessity of baptism and how turning his life to the lord to prepare for the ordinance will help him. i was desperate to help him see the decision that was placed before him and what i could do to help him understand that the happiness he's been looking for is RIGHT THERE in front of him just his for the taking. god blessed me and i caught a glimpse of his potential and really felt love for him, maybe just a glimmer of the full and perfect love that our father in heaven has for him. Gary chose not to accept our invitations and chose to continue the way he has been going. it was hard for me to see him go and hard for me to see him turn away from the answer to all the problems that he is and will be facing. i know for myself that the heavens weep over those that make bad choices. i know that god cares more than we can even begin to comprehend about each of his children. our mistakes and trials pain him, He weeps with us when we weep. I am more determined than ever that i will do everything in my power to declare this message to everyone that i possibly can. it's true. it’s all gloriously, magnificently, and perfectly true. i love the lord and i want him to know that so i will do all i can to make every action of mine into an outward manifestation of my love for The Lord. we are so blessed to be members of this church. we have every opportunity and blessing out before us that we could ever possibly need and want. because we have been given much we too must give. and i just want to tell you all that i know that God is real and that He does love and care for each one of us personally, individually, and perfectly. Jesus Christ did atone for our sins and through his grace we can become exactly who God wants us to be. This is His church and is led by living apostles and prophets. the greatest happiness that i have found in my life is by applying the principles of the gospel and by sharing these diving principles with our fellow brothers and sisters. with love Elder Jarman ps. i may or may not be getting gray hair in about 9 days. . . . pps. three is a good number but i can change and i'll prove this to you ppps. who came up with peanut butter anyways. . . i mean really? or butter for that matter pppps. this one is number four :)

excuse me sir but i mustache you a question

dear qwerty typers of type face,

so we have miracles to share!!! one fantastic piece of news that relates to the news of this week is that lorraine is finally back from her trip to spain! so we were able to start teaching her again. Yay progress! she still doing fantastic and told us that while she read the book of Mormon on her trip her desire to keep on reading it kept on increasing. so ya the power of the book of Mormon is already kicking into gear. she as well really enjoyed church and contributes really well in the classes. one experience that I'm not likely to forget happened while we were in the gospel principles class. the question posed to the class was "what reasons to we have to believe that there is a god"? so we got this big long list of things like "all things denote there is a god" and how like the stars and the trees and the earth and all that surrounds us are proof that something bigger than us exists. and near the end of the lesson lorraine raised her hand and just said that she believe because she feels in her heart that he's there. It was so cool! and this is something that i've been really impressed with lorraine as we have been teaching her is that she is the kind of person that just has a firm and simple belief in the reality of god. even though she was not raised in a religious environment and had little opportunity in her life to learn about god she has always held on to that belief that he is there because she can just feel in her heart that he's there. i really like her :)

as well we started teaching christine and bobby, a part member family this week. christine has been a member since she was really little but hasn't been around the Church for the last few years. while bobby has absolutely no real previous experience even with the concept of god. it's something that’s hard really for me to comprehend what it would be like to just not Even know who god is or what he is like but unfortunately there are many people that aren't privileged enough to learn these basic truths while they are young. the understanding i have had of god has been one of the biggest grounding principles in my life. no matter what happened i always had the things i had learned, from the time i was tiny, about my heavenly father that i could turn to for help. i just want to share that with everyone, it gives me a lot of joy to share this good news. bobby in fact is really eager to learn, he's been searching for something more in his life for a while now and i feel that he will progress well in his understanding of the gospel.

something i've learned this week that has really stuck out to me is in mosiah chapter 5 verse thirteen when king benjamin says "For how knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?" two things stuck out to me about this verse. one is that it will be difficult to come to know god if we aren't willing to serve him (which we can do by serving our fellow man) and secondly the fact that if this is true it would seem that the opposite would be true as well. that as we serve god we can come to know him. it makes sense that as we engage in the same work the master preformed while he was here, in giving and sacrificing to serve those around us, we will come to know him better. i've found this on my mission that as i try and struggle to give my everything i am to him i've learned so much more about my savior and redeemer. the one who extended the invitation to "take my yoke upon you, and learn of me" and promises us that in return we will find rest for our souls.

i really really like this whole missionary work thing :)

with love

Elder Jarman

ps. the leaves are starting to change here!!!!!!

pps.i would like to publicly announce (without too much ado) that i now regularly eat both porridge and lasagna.

ppps. someone should probably go resuscitate mom right about now :)