With great joy and anticipation, BBI welcomes Jaycee Jensen to its family of missionaries in Latvia. Listen to her tell her story.

    RIGA, Latvia – My name is Jaycee Jensen. I lived in Mesa Arizona before I moved to Latvia three years ago. The story of me becoming a missionary in Latvia is a long and very interesting one to say the least!  I will share bits and pieces of it here but mostly I want to share what God is doing here in Latvia through the Passion he has ignited in my heart.

    I have lived in Latvia since October 2006, during that time I have been working with an organization that is focused on youth and training youth leaders here in Latvia. My main responsibility was to direct Camp ministry here in Latvia. I really enjoyed this Ministry and saw God do amazing things through the work of this organization. Yet as this entire ministry was going on, I had a personal ministry going on in my home! I has opened up my home to some teen orphan girls, and through that ministry God started this new vision for Teen orphans in Latvia.

    In 2003 I came to Latvia for the summer (as I did for many years before that) to help run a few summer English camps. At this specific camp is where I met 5 orphan teens that obviously did not want to at that camp. Come to find out they were forced to be there because their orphanage was getting remodeled and they needed to go somewhere. They ended up at the camp with me! I was their small group leader and to be honest I was not that excited about that as well. I wanted the cool kids, kids excited about being there not a bunch of brat kids who hate everything and everyone!

    After several bumps in the road to building relationships with them, God broke through and bonds were made with them that year that have lasted up to this present day! Some of those girls are the ones who live with me right now!

    When I came to Latvia I started to meet with theses girls as much as I could. Visiting them at the orphanage and others at their schools in Riga. (After 9th grade, to continue education most kids from smaller towns move to dorms in Riga, the capital city, from Monday to Friday) one of the girls was about to turn 18 and told me that she would no longer be able to live in the orphanage. I asked where she would go. She said that the government is supposed to give an apartment in the town that she was born in but that there was a waiting list. So she had to wait to get a place to live. Not only that the town she was born in was two and a half hours away from Riga. If she lived there she would have no possible way to continue education or get a job. So I told her she could come live with me until we figured something out. As she lived with me I realized her needs were more than just a place to stay. Just basic life skills, cooking, paying bills, making a resume, applying for jobs, basic public manners, and that’s not even talking about the emotional issues! I found over and over again a lack of belief in herself to do

anything, and the fear of failure and rejection paralyzed her, she had no ability to dream of a future. She lived for the day. Just in survival mode.

    The need was deep and hard to put into words. But as she lived with me I saw things changing in her. I saw hope and trust forming from the inside out. Her confidence grew daily. She started to dream, started to look to what could be! As all of this was happening her twin sisters were getting ready to turn 18 and they were in the same situation as her.  My apartment was not very big, but I could not see another way. I took them in as well! So all four of us living in a one room apartment, but somehow God blessed and gave me all I needed to do what He wanted me to do for them. Again I saw the lack of life skills and also being very emotionally unstable, but as time has passed they also have grown tremendously!

    As of today I have moved to a larger apartment and have 5 girls living with me. Walking through life with them is a joy. Everyday there are struggles, it is not easy “raising” already adult teens with deep needs. But I have seen the healing power of Christ in each of their lives. And I cannot deny the call on my heart to continue to do this.

    I have set up some high expectations and goals for the girls living with me to help them move into independent living with a solid foundation of Christ love, and life skills that will help them in the future not just live but live life to the fullest!

    My dream is to continue this ministry personally and also expand it to help more teens in Latvia.