Sain uu,

Hey guys! I hope the farewell party has died down a little bit and it's been a good day all around. How was Brayden's farewell? Let me know how it was Brayd (Hint... hint)! This has been a nice week in that we've been in the city for a week, not to mention the Conference weekend on top of it. Earlier this week we had a few reports and things to get done in the office and then spent the weekend watching conference reports and teaching lessons in between. We found a golden new family! That was the crowning point of the week! Last night we met with Brother Ganbold, his wife and son; they are friends of our new member and we taught them about the restoration.

This week more than anything I've been grateful for missionary work. We found a copy of the world report and watched a few of the Mongolian highlights and for the thousandth time I stand in awe that I am assigned to be apart of this great work here in Mongolia! With only 8 months left I'm not prepared for the thought of returning. This place feels like home. Traveling lately has helped me realize that, every time we get back into UB's city limits it feels like driving back into Utah County did before my mission. I've had the unique opportunity to have worked in Ulaanbaatar my entire mission, in different areas as to see the different sides of this city. I hope that we can all come back to UB at some later date so you can see it for yourselves. By the way, I included some flashback pictures from Elder Verdusco's camera, I was able to get them from him today. They're all of my time in Khailaast: the first one you'll see is Elder Verdusco in I in red metal box. That is a broken down car we stayed in during one of those big rainstorms that Khailaast had.


The second is Elder Batsaikhan and I after he spent 5 minutes chucking barbs at my back (he was super pleased with himself), at a family home evening with Brother Mugii and Sister Battsetseg (our mission office financial clerk).


The next 2 pictures were taken on a district activity we had on preparation day going to the Zaisan monument (The Elder I'm with is my old Zone Leader Elder Mungunsukh).

So we're off to Khovd! This Wednesday morning we leave early with President Batbold, Brother Batzorigt (the Sukhbaatar Branch President) and will arrive in Khovd Thursday night. The first 500 km is paved road and the next 1000 is all countryside roads, so we'll sleep at a hotel or on the road Wednesday night and should make it in Thursday late. I know I didn't write a ton about the Murun conference, but these outlying countryside branches are part of the mission district and so we are conducting these conferences as a way to train the branch leaders how to strengthen their young men/women programs. It's an all day conference so we spend most of our day at the church translating, running activities, and everything in between! It will be a great opportunity and it will continue to bless the incredible youth in these branches. Then after that we will be welcoming 8 new foreign Elders to the mission (for us, foreign is your domestic!) right on transfer weekends. Some big changes are coming up as they all will need trainers and they, like my MTC group, are coming in with English sponsors and must stay in UB. This all should be happening in the end of October and I'll be keeping you in touch. Let me know what ends up happening with the family trip this weekend, word on the street is it's kind of a surprise ya? Man I loved getting the family pictures! Especially Kendyl, Andraya, and Mom look beautiful! The boys.... yax uu dee? I love you guys!

Elder Jolley

P.S. My email next week may not come at the normal time.... I'll try my best to get it out on Monday.Sain uu,

Hey Family!

Sorry this is late and short, we were on the road all of Monday, but I was able to check your emails really quick and loved reading about all your adventures this week! Murun was incredible and we had a lot of great experiences hosting their first branch youth conference! We left last Thursday at 6 a.m., Elder Tuvshinbayar and I along with President Batbold headed off to Murun in one of the two mission Land Cruisers. Murun is about 12 hours away by car, 6 hours on paved roads and 6 hours of off road- we spent 2 hours in Erdenet while Pres. Batbold looked for new missionary apartments and got into Murun about 10:00 that evening. I've sent a couple of pictures of what we saw "on the road," everything from snow covered valleys to sand dunes along the way.

En route to Murun

The conference was all Friday and Saturday and then a closing testimony meeting Sunday morning before Branch Conference. We had a total of 23 youth who participated, 5 or 6 were first time investigators and that was a really cool introduction for them into the Church! A quick explanation of a couple of the pictures: Elder Tuvshinbayar and I did a skit with Elder Ford and President Clark on Saturday- we stood behind the black plastic and did the missionaries "morning routine" on Elder Ford and President Clark- I was President Clark's "arms" and proceeded with caution! In one of the pictures a 8 year old investigator, Elbegdorj is standing with Elder Zorigtbaatar and I; and I think the rest are pictures that I snapped on the way.

Skit with President Clark and Elder Ford
(Elder Tuvshinbayar and Elder Jolley back behind)

Elder Zorigtbaatar, Elbegdorj and Elder Jolley

I love you guys! Excited for General Conference this weekend and to share remarks with you guys. Also, go look up a place called Khovd on the far west side of Mongolia (next to Kazakistan), we're heading there next Tuesday for another youth conference. I love the work and this great opportunity to be apart of this the Lord's work.

Elder Jolley

Hey Family,

Za sain uu? Xuu n uuchlaarai, uchigdur zakhia bichsengui.... I loved hearing about your week and I'm excited to tell you about this last week here in Mongolia. Somehow the 6 month date is upon us? I've been loving my time in Sansar and this week has been a rush! With October around the corner we have a lot of big things in the works! This week I've been learning to be more grateful for the work that I have the opportunity to do. Throughout my mission I've seen two different types of assistants- one begins to be worn out by work in the office, the coordination work, and the other day-to-day tasks that involve this assignment; and the other missionary is able to continue with seeming unweariness the tasks that come with the assignment. Sometimes missionaries feel like they have lost touch with the spirit of missionary work and so they begin to feel discouraged or get "trunky" to get out of the office and back out in the field. But even if the Lord has given a missionary a certain assignment- his calling as a missionary remains the same! I have been working to keep a missionary perspective on all that I do and to accept each assignment and task with gratitude and it's helped me to see that I can be the Lord's servant and a representative of Christ no matter what assignment I'm given. And then after all that we teach our investigators and it's icing on the cake! Not to mention the blessing of being able to work so close with my mission president- it's a blessing and a privilege that I'm grateful for every day. The scripture I really liked this week and want to share with you is Philippians 4:11-13.

11 Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be ^acontent.

12 I know both how to be ^aabased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.

13 I can do all things through ^aChrist which ^bstrengtheneth me.

President Clark shared this in a meeting this last week. As I've been thinking about it's meaning- this is a characteristic of a true disciple of Christ and something that I have had the opportunity to learn throughout my mission. Regardless of what situation we are placed in- if we can remember that this is a God-given opportunity for our benefit, and then press forward (have faith), then we can do all things.

I can't believe we're getting so close to Brayden leaving. Since I'm a missionary right now I can't comprehend that all the way right now- I feel like he's coming rather then leaving. So come on Brayd! It's really a cool blessing to be able to soon be serving in the Lord's vineyard with him and to hear his experiences. These last few weeks have been a rush, but we've been able to keep meeting steadily with 2 investigators who have their baptisms set for the 7th of October! We have been blessed (as is Sansar) with so many prepared people to meet with and these to are incredible! One is a 22 year old young man named Bilguun and the other is one of the old Sansar Sister's investigator, a 19 year old Munkh-Orchlon. Both attend church faithfully and have gotten to know the ward, attend institute and one sings in the Stake Choir! So their baptisms will be on the weekend of General Conference in Mongolia- so they will have a great opportunity as new members to attend General Conference. I mentioned this to Andraya (I think?), but we're off to Murun this week! Murun is a small town in North Mongolia right next to the huge Lake Khuvskhult. We will be going there to host a Youth Conference that will train youth leaders to be able to do their own branch youth conferences in the future! So we leave this Thursday and return next Monday late. So my email may be a bit late next week, but I will include lots of pictures of the conference- it's going to be a great weekend! Lots of times I hear the family wanting to hear more about how I'm "doing" (I guess I'm not the best at that), but it's mostly because my mission is nothing but a blessing. I'm grateful for my time here and my time to serve the Lord.

Love,

Elder Jolley

Sain Uu,

Hey family, you guys all look b-e-a-utiful! I loved the pictures that you sent (are there a mother/father shot as well?), and I'm sending some pictures your way. You asked how cold it was... it's starting to get really chilly! A couple of towns got snow this week. We haven't had hot water in our apartment for the last week or so and so showers have been like Deer Creek water... so with that and a couple of cold nights I've gotten a bit of a cold. Then the hot water came in today.... it felt like a million dollars!

This last week the office was really quiet while President and Sister Clark went to Hong Kong for Area Mission President Training. So we had a great opportunity to do a little bit of catching up in the office and then lots of lessons from the afternoon on! It was a great week and I continue to love being in the Sansar ward. We have so many people that are ready to accept the Gospel, to follow Christ and have had a lot of success with part-member-families in the last couple of weeks. There is a returned missionary named Bayasgalan who ran into a relative that he hadn't seen in the last several years (Sodoo) and invited him to learn more about the Gospel and he agreed to meet with Elder Tuvshinbayar and I. We enjoyed a great discussion as we taught him the Restoration and then gave him a new Book of Mormon and committed him to read from Moroni 10. The next time we met I had to teach English and so my companion and I did splits with two ward missionaries. They met while me and my companion went to teach at the New West. Right before I left Sodoo came up to me and was excited to tell me that he had read the chapter, but that's all I was able to find out. Later as Elder Tuvshinbayar met with him he said that as he prayed he had received a confirmation that night that the Book of Mormon was true. Truly the Lord works by faith! We've been gone all weekend, but will hopefully meet with him tonight. I love Mongolia! There are so many people here that are ready to come unto Christ and this is a place and a people that have been prepared for the Gospel. We have 5 investigators that have been faithfully preparing for baptism and so I will be excited to let you know what happens in the next 2 weeks! My only regret is not having been to Sansar's sacrament in the last few weeks (the Sansar missionaries have become less active in their own ward) as we've been attending different sacrament meetings throughout Mongolia. Last week we were in Khailaast, this Sunday we were in Selenge, and we may be in Darkhan next weekend. But it's a great blessing to be able to go around and see all the areas of the Church in Mongolia. I'll take the rest of the email to talk about our trip:

President and Sister Clark flew in Saturday at 11, took a few minutes to re-pack, and then we loaded up and headed off to Darkhan. We took the 2 mission cars, the Clarks and my companion and I in one car, and the Fords and our mission secretary Jiguur and his wife in the other car. We arrived about 7 o'clock, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and then while President and Elder Ford met with the district presidency, Elder Tuvshinbayar and I headed off to meet with a new member of his in town. We weren't able to meet with Brother Raixan, but had a great chance to explore the city a little bit (see the picture I sent with the technicolor bridge)- Darkhan's a beautiful city!

Elder Tuvshinbayar and Elder Jolley in Darkhan

We then spent the night in the District Leader's apartment, in the un-used bedroom (with the bug bites to prove it!) with Elder Mungunsukh (who was my old zone leader) and his new companion Elder Bayartsogt. Sunday morning we got up early and went to Selenge! We were scheduled to be at Sacrament meeting by 12 noon and with the extra time we had President Clark take us up to the Russian border. 1 check off the bucket- list as I saw "Mother Russia" with some comrades (pardon the lame Russian jokes). But it was an area where 90 years before the Mongolian general Sukhbaatar fought the Chinese in the last battle for Mongolia's independance from China. The red wooden building that Elder Tuvshinbayar and I got a picture with was Sukhbaatars battle headquarters/office. But no one was home...

Sukhbaatars battle headquarters

Russian border

We had a great branch meeting with the saints in Selenge (I translated for the Ford's and then Jiguur translated for the Clarks), and meetings until late evening where we then headed back to Darkhan for the night. The Fords and the Clarks stayed at the classy Jasper Hotel and we spent the night with Elder Myagmardorj, the Darkhan zone leader. We then woke up this morning and headed back to UB.

I'm truly blessed to have the opportunity to work in this area and have this assignment. Besides a constant dose of humbling, I have been blessed from the Lord to help do the needed work and receive way too many blessings from Him. This morning as we drove back, speaking with President Clark, I counted it an incredible opportunity to be able to work so close with him and the list goes on and on! I love you all, I love this Gospel, and I am blessed to be counted worthy to do the Lord's work.

Elder Jolley

Sain Uu,

Hey family! It has felt like a really really long time since I've spoken with you.... so first off a big apology from me for not writing last week. I was able to write a couple quick emails and then had a couple things come up and then before I know it we were on the road to Darkhan! But I won't let that happen again without at least giving a quick email reply. This has been an amazing week, 3 Zone Conferences and a mission tour! Elder Adrian Ochoa of the Young Men's General Presidency along with Elder Gerrit W. Gong of the Asia Area Presidency were both here last week, Elder Ochoa for training and District Conference and Elder Gong conducting the yearly mission tour. It was an incredible week! Lots and lots of great conferences, firesides and training. Here's a little run down of the week:

Monday we went to Darkhan at 3, arrived about 8 o'clock and went to dinner with the District Presidency, set up a few things for the upcoming Zone Conference at the church. Darkhan has a really cool atmosphere, if you think of UB as Utah County it felt being in St. George, but chilly. Fall is really setting in and I've almost forgot that Mongolia's cold most of the time! We then piled into the zone leaders apartment for the night with 3 other companionships, it was a full house shuu dee, but Elder Zolbayar was there and it was cool to spend a few minutes chatting with him again. Our theme for this months zone conference was the First Vision and 1 Minute Gospel Message. I thought of President Uchtdorf's words in the most recent First Presidency message:

"Prophets have always taught by repetition; it is a law of learning. You will hear repetition in themes and doctrines in general conference. Let me reassure you: this is not due to a lack of creativity or imagination. We continue to hear messages on similar issues because the Lord is teaching and impressing upon our minds and hearts certain foundational principles of great eternal importance that must be understood and acted upon before we can move on to other things. A wise builder first lays the foundation before erecting the walls and the roof."

This is certainly the foundation of everything that relates to missionary work- the message of the restoration is our unique message to the world! Elder Tuvshinbayar and I were doing a lot of behind-the-scenes work for these conferences and besides the sections that we lead the discussion we were doing a lot of running around. The focus was to help the missionaries teach more powerfully by using the exact words of the Prophet Joseph when teaching about the First Vision. There is a undeniable difference in the spirituality of lessons taught using the prophet's words and I received another confirmation of that this week. After Tuesday's conference was over it was back in the car and off to the city. We got home about 9:30 and prepped for the next day.

Wednesday was Bayanzurkh's zone conference, my favorite conference of the 3. After every zone conference we met with President Clark and Elder Gong to discuss what went well and what we would like to change for the following day. We especially wanted to apply the missionary training model (explain, demonstrate, practice, evaluate, repractice) to really help the missionaries understand and apply the principles being taught. To make our demonstration more effective and clear it was decided that Elder Tuvshinbayar and I would be demonstrating the end of the first lesson, using the exact words of the First Vision and the baptismal invitation found in PMG. This conference there wasn't as much running around and we took more of a teaching role this conference. The missionaries came up with great responses and insights and the training went really well, and our demonstration of the lesson fit well into the training. Even though it was only practice the Spirit bore a strong testimony that the things we were testifying were true and the whole conference in general was great.

Thursday was our third and last conference, the Songino zone finished things off. Each conference concluded about 1 or so and the following 4 hours was spent interviewing missionaries, 1 companionship at a time, with one companion meeting with President Clark and the other with Elder Gong. Our mission office secretary, Enkhjiguur (an RM Elder from Hawaii), did most of the translating and then I filled in with whatever he didn't do and everything went really great there. Then after zone conferences we held a trainers training meeting for the 13 new trainers in our mission. All the new missionaries were coming that night on a 10:10 flight from Seoul, so we held a training for them from 6-8 in the Mission President's home. Enkhjiguur and I did a live-translation of a PMG clip which made things interesting, but the training went well. I'm especially impressed with the younger missionaries in our mission! Lots of them recently became trainers and they are taking responsibility and faithfully filling out their callings. Our mission right now is lacking "old" or seasoned missionaries in general and so to fill in the gap these missionaries are stepping up. Then after training we headed to the airport and picked up all the new missionaries! Even though they were returning to their home city, they had the "MTC glow," a lot of these missionaries have been serving as mini missions or temporary companions to full time missionaries and are a great addition to our mission- 6 Elders and 7 Sisters (I'll get the picture that we took on top of Zaisan from Sister Clark and get it to you later). So we got home from the airport "aimar" late and hit the sack.

Friday was transfers! We started the morning with a combined meeting for the trainers and their new companions along with breakfast on the 5th floor (mission home), and then spent most of the rest of the day getting Elders and Sisters to their new areas. Because I've had to renew my visa I haven't been able to get a drivers license and it's been a big setback on days like transfer day. But with the help of a few of the senior couples we were able to get everyone out and on their way. Do you remember my old companion Elder Ganbold? He finished his mission! We were companions almost a year ago now.... time flies. Elder and Sister Gong had an early flight to Hong Kong and to finish the night we had a mission tour debrief up in the Presidents home. I'll tell you a little about Elder Gong. The first impression I had about him was that he had a perfect idea of everything that was going on around him. Very humble, quiet, and intelligent. The ideas that he would propose or the things he would say were well placed, well thought out, and always what was needed at the time. His wife is the same, both were very kind, and a great influence on the missionaries and the conferences in general. We also went out and taught 2 lessons with Elder Gong and President Clark. Both very cool experiences! One appointment was with a family that our Bayanzurkh Elders are meeting with and the other was a part-member family, the mother and father of Elder Bayarlkhavga, the Bayanzurkh District Leader. After the debrief it was late but Elder Gong took a few minutes to meet individually with Elder Tuvshinbayar and I. He started off by asking me a little bit about my family, and the basics but I was really impressed by one comment that he made. After asking me if I was worthy of my temple recommend he followed by saying, "Doesn't that feel good?" That question really struck me and I realized how good it did feel, and how important that was to me. Of all the questions that can be asked about life, accomplishments, and talents, none are as important as our standing before the Lord. That was something I really enjoyed from our interview and wanted to share with all of you!

Saturday and Sunday were a little more relaxed. Sunday we went with President and Sister Clark to the Khailaast branch (felt great to be back!), and sat in on a great fast and testimony meeting. Then we had a dinner up at the mission home for all the missionaries who finished their missions this transfer followed by a fireside where the new RM's bore their testimonies. Usually the Assistants translate through the headsets for couple missionaries, but I also had the opportunity to translate for President Clark and his talk. Nerve racking! I still feel that my language is just not there yet, especially in the last few weeks with language study opportunities at a minimum; but with a little help from up above it went really well and ended off an incredible week! I love this work and I am grateful for the opportunity to serve in this end of this corner of the vineyard. President and Sister Clark left this morning for Hong Kong to attend a Mission Presidents Training and so this week we're hitting the streets and getting lots of lessons taught! I'll let you know how it goes!

Love,

Elder Jolley

Pictures from the training and district conferences and mission tour:

Elder Tuvshinbayar, Elder Jolley and another Elder

Training

A Mongolian Family with Elder Jolley, a couple other Elders, Elder Gong and President Clark

Sister and Elder Gong, Elder Tuvshinbayar, Elder Jolley, President and Sister Clark

Sain Uu Ger Bul ee,

It's been an incredible week with lots of stuff going on and lots coming up! This last week two former mission presidents, President Clark (1999-2002) and President Anderson (2007-2010) came and it's been incredible to hear from them how Mongolia was in their time and how it has changed. There was a special fireside last night and we went with the Clarks, the Andersons, and the Clarks to Baganuur and attended sacrament meeting. Baganuur is a small city 2 hours outside of Ulaanbaatar. The area has been open now for just over 10 years (the former President Clark opened it) and has just received the approval to build a new chapel! I was especially grateful for the opportunity to partake of the sacrament yesterday, in a humble, rented branch meeting house and to meet the members there. There's a different spirit in these small meetings and I am impressed with the faith of the members as they are literally building Zion from the ground up here! After sacrament meeting we went with Branch President Gantigchuluun to the spot of the new branch building. I've sent a picture of Elder Tuvshinbayar and I with the 3 Presidents.

Elder Tuvshinbayar, President Anderson, President Clark (current),
President Clark and Elder Jolley

Being able to see these 3 mission presidents all together gave me a look into the different personalities and leadership styles of all 3. President Anderson gave a constant flow of spiritual insights, President Clark (the former one) was a great example of faith and diligence, and President Clark is all of that! I can see the blessings that have come because the Lord sent these men to Mongolia at certain times and I'm continually grateful for the opportunity to work with President Clark! There's still nothing better than going out and meeting with people. I love sharing the Gospel with people, and so I was worried that I'd be living a "double life" between office and missionary work. But in this last week I've come to realize that if I choose, these can be one and the same in purpose.

This next week marks 1 year in Mongolia. I'm getting deja vu of last year and it's been weird to try and think that I'm entering the "last" of everything. This year I want to be more goal oriented, to be better at aspiring, attaining, and measuring progress. Part of that is improving my ability to recognize and act upon spiritual guidance. If you will remember, I bought that cool Moleskin notebook before I left and haven't done anything with it this last year. But I finally found something to do with it! Starting this week I'll be using it to record spiritual insights, blessings received and other thoughts. I got this idea reading a talk from Elder Richard G. Hinckley that he gave in April 2006. Read this talk! I've noticed that as I have been more careful to write down these small promptings, they have come with more clarity and more powerfully!

Sorry, no time for more. I love you guys! Thanks for the pictures, and I hope you have a great week!

Elder Jolley

P.S. I thought you'd like to see Mongolia's newest grocery store, the "Well- Mart".

Sain baina uu

Za hey family! I'm glad you ran into the Mellors, cool eh? It's funny, every couple of months I run into people from Utah, wondering around Mongolia. They were super nice to pass those ties along- a great couple with a really interesting mission. Today, as always is crazy and so I hope to get enough time to write a couple of emails to the youngins after this email. If I don't guys, thanks for all the great emails I get from you each week! I included a couple of pictures in this weeks email from my last week in Khailaast... I got them from Elder and Sister Richardson and I thought I'd pass them along. Two are pictures with Ijil od and Ixer od (Which means twin star and pair star), our Khailaast new members. The other is me and the monstrous noith hole (noith means zero... or bathroom).

Elder Jolley with Ijil od, Ixer od, Elder Mellors and Elder Richardson

Elder Verdusco, Elder Jolley and the Mellors working on the monstrous noith hole

Elder Jolley and Elder Verdusco... last week in Khailaast

Mongolia's school calender starts from September the first and it will be nice to have people not running off to the countryside on us as fall begins, it should help our work out a lot. I sat in Sansar ward for the first time since coming here (no trips to other branches this week or next I think), and it felt like sitting in my home ward again! It was really cool for me to be greeted be so many familiar people, and the work here is good and going to be getting better! There's a couple people that Elder Zolbayar and I began meeting with back in the day and are ready for baptism, but the Assistants have been really busy so they will hopefully be baptized here real soon. Plus- we got new missionaries! We sent 14 Mongolian missionaries to the Philippines MTC and 2 missionaries and one senior missionary couple came from the United States. A crazy week shuu dee! Elder Wilson and Elder Huff have become trainers to Elder Titensor and Elder Woodward. I didn't get any pictures of us on Zaisan, but I'll have plenty of cool pictures to be showing you in the next couple of weeks. Just to let you guys know (I may have said this before...), Elder Gong (newly called to the Asia Area Presidency) and Elder Ochoa of the YM General Presidency are coming to Mongolia in the first week of September for a mission tour. It's going to be an amazing week! Now that I wrote that I'm getting deja vu... I think I've already written this before. But it's worth saying twice. We will be doing 3 zone conferences that week; 2 in the city and one out in Darkhan.

This week was a lot of office work with all these new missionaries coming in and out, but Saturday President Clark left for Darkhan and all the missionaries were back in their areas and so Elder Tuvshinbayar and I had 2 days of just missionary work. Being an assistant has really made me treasure every teaching appointment! And if we focus on them, the investigators needs become clear through the Holy Ghost. Sometimes we want to dig in and get deep with the solutions, but time and time again as we step back, and focus on listening (to the person and the Spirit), the way is revealed to us! I'm constantly grateful for that blessing from our Heavenly Father, no specific experiences but just a general appreciation for the Lord for that blessing!

Love, Elder Ryan Jolley