Well as I look at all of those pictures and review all of the building
stages that you have sent me pictures of I am really glad that the age
change happened and I was able to be away on a mission for every
single one of them! You all are doing a great job getting everything
nice and organized again. But even still I do wish that I could have
been there to take some of the load off. But it sounds like Christina
and Jesse have been doing a really good job of steping up to the
challenge and getting the work done.
I am so excited that the Demers moved to Bosie. That will make it
easier for me to visit them when I come home. I am pretty sure that
they are indistructable or something getting in car accidents and
stuff at their age and lack of sight levels and coming out fine. I do
miss them and am sure glad for all that I learned from those years of
visiting with them and getting to know them. Being with them really
taught me the blessings of being able to visit people and be a home
teacher. I find it to be a great responsibility that I am glad we
have.
As a district we are a ways off of our meta this month still as we
have yet to baptise and we do not have any marchados. I do believe
though that the sisters are doing what they need to be to go out and
find the people that will progress and are already prepared. We had a
big change in our sucess this week with having 9 investigators in
church this week in the district which is a drastic improvement over
the previous weeks and we are going to work to get all of those people
marked. As for the bem estar of the district, I believe that the
sisters are working hard and having less conflict. Vila Franca B had
a division with the STLs this week however I did not recieve a report
on it from the STLs until I several days later when I found out about
it and called them.
Elder Suttons training has been going well still. He is focused and
has a real desire to his best. We are trying to improve his relations
with the members so that we can work more effectivly with them and
that he can work side by side with them sucessfully and gain their
respect and trust. I have been really trying to help him learn how it
is that we need to act as missionaries and as preisthood men for that
matter. It is tough to try and help someone quickly lose bad habits
and learn temper control which is also a challenge because it is a
really humbling experience to know how that it is then nescisarry to
always be a good example of those attributes.
In our area we have two people that we have plans to baptise this
month. We have Paula who we had marked but fell because of church last
week but went this week and is just a hesitant to accept a date again,
but we are close with it. Next we have a young man named Marcelo who
we recently met who has a desire to be baptised he just wants to learn
more before commiting. We know that we really do have prepared people
out here that are ready to accept the gospel and we are excited to be
finding some. I have learned alot about faith and how if we telling
the Lord that we have faith to find the elects but are not putting all
of the council that we have recieved from our mission leadership and
preach my gospel in action we are lacking the action and therefore are
lacking in faith. I am immensely grateful for PME and other
instrutions we have been given so that I can always know that I am
doing all I possibly can to show the Lord my Faith in him to guide his
work.
I have also been studying about how Christ has instructed the
missionaries that he personally sent out as his apostles and the
seventy. I love reading the insights and detailed discriptions that
they have in Jesus the Christ. It has really helped me to get to know
our lord and savior more and I am grateful for every single time that
my relationship with him improves. It is interesting how much you can
learn each time from studying the same things over and over and how
the spirit really can adapt the message to our needs in the moment.
Anyways we are happy and healthy my new question for my sisters every
night. Thanks mom :)
Com tanto amor
Elder Hobson
Well this was a fun week. as I talked a little with you about on Skype
we have been really just inviting everyone to be baptised and it is
pretty fun and a really useful way to see if the person is really
interested or if they are going to shut the door on us quickly. We
were at a lunch with some members and I was sitting on a couch next to
Bete and she told me that I would be recieve my recompence for the
service that I am doing to help develop ole elder sutton into a
missionary and a man. It was cool that she is able to see some
improvement it helps to know that the efforts are paying off. I have
definatly been learning alot about how i can teach by my example and
do be a loving leader when I have do really apply that scripture of
sharp reproofs and and A SHOW of INCREASED
love afterwards. not easy but it is a commanment and is nessicary for
us to be exalted. I am greatful for all the experiences that the lord
has trusted me with to help me grow and to be able to try and help
others around me grow as well.
Figureing out how to love everyone is one of the biggest struggles for
me every day. It really is not easy for me when someone is does not
even respond to us or answer our questions when we need directions or
some sort of help or when I am talking to someone and it is going well
and then the spouse or some sort of friend comes up and slams the door
or takes them away. I try to think how Christ was able to love his
people when the spit apon him and denied him, betraying him to death,
that is one christlike attribute that I still need to work on becuase
I often get the ugre to hit those people still. Good thing I always
have a comp to keep me from doing that! and christ did it all alone.
Ola Presidente
Esta semana tivemos nossa marchado caiu porque ela não foi a igreja.
Ela ficou doente e também ficou com temor para falar com as familiares
sobre a decisão dela. Quando ela cancelo nosso compromisso com ela
para sábado a noite em nossa ligação de verificar o compromisso sábado
de manha nos oferecemos para dar uma benção de saudê e ela finalmente
aceitou mas estava a dormir e não abriu a porta para nos na hora que
ela escolheu. depois ligamos de novo Domingo de manha e ela ainda
estava muito doente e dizemos que podemos dar a benção agora mas ela
estava na casa da filha dela fora de Alverca. Ela ainda vai ser
batizado. Para melhorar esta vez nos vamos ensinar mais com outros
membros que vão nos ajuda a lutar nos momentos mais importante em vez
de só aceitar desculpas.
Elder Sutton's training is continuing to improve. The 12 weeks fit
his needs perfectly this week because we were teaching the comandments
at the beginning of the week and he did not feel comfortable with his
understanding at that point to teach them but we have studied them all
together this week and he has shown much more confidence in the
lessons. We were really motivated by the zone leaders semana de fé
desafio and we did all that we could to put everything in practice and
exceed the expectations that they had set to show our faith that we
will baptize. We saw lots of small miracles and I leared alot about
what it really means to be a challenging missionary and I really feel
that the way I will go about the rest of my mission has taken a turn
this week.
So this week I have been studying about Nefi and how his brothers were
so ignorant and they would rebel and then have a divine manifestation
that brought them unto repentance just to quickly fall back into sin
and murmering. It makes me think about how frustrating it can be when
the people we come to love from being out here working with them do
not improve even after the perfect scripture to answer their question
or the most spiritually powerful lesson or experince that does not get
them to actually do anything. Knowing that pain and saddness it gives
me a lot of respect for Nefi as he was able to pass through that
throughout his entire life with his own brothers and always continue
to treat them with love. Even after being tied up for 4 days exposed
to a strom that was literally directly coming from the wrath of God,
and then be able to fall to his knees and ask for a blessing apon for
the storm to pass so that they could be saved, doing so without
thinking of his own pains or bitterness against his brothers for their
foolishness, and then staying in prayer, for an extended period of
time, to bless them all and calm the storm. and always continue to
try to help them when they are always trying to kill him. I hope that
i can show a little bit of the same love when dealing with people in
my lifetime. I love the scriptures and all the things that I get to
learn from them every day. I hope we are all taking advantage of what
we have been blessed with. enjoy the week!
Com amor
Elder Hobson
ok well this has officially been the most exhausting week of my
mission so far. one of the duplas in our district has been haveing
all sorts of companhionship problems and it has been causeing lots of
problems, distractions and stress for me. The mission is not meant to
be filled with girl drama, atleast that is what I thought but
apparently not. Anyways I am really sick of that stuff and would love
to have them end here soon so that we can get back to just worrying
about they people that we need to teach and baptise.
We had an investigator in the district that I interviewed for baptism
and he was not ready to be baptised and therefore wasen't. It was an
intimidating sitiuation to say the least to have that happen and to
have to decide to wait but I know that the Lord has his time for all
things and one day hopefully he will get himself ready to actually be
baptised.
We are working really hard with a woman that was a very strong
catholic and did all sorts of things to become basically a preist.
her name is paula. she is also an international judge that is working
on a case in Belgium so she has had to go their a lot, but we have
been really seeing miracles with her. She has been accepting all of
our challenges and has a really strong desire to be baptised. She is
a very interesting person and it is funny to teach her because she
lived in england for half of her life or more she goes back and forth
from portuguese to english all of the time which is kindof funny when
we have members with us that do not speak english. I have found it
interesting that so many people that acutally study and live in the
catholic church have things that they do not agree with but they
continue on anyways. I just cannot really understand that. She for
one never agreed that it is right to baptise babies by splashing water
on thier heads and wondered why we are not baptised as the bible
teaches that Christ was baptised, but she continued on in the church
for years and years. Anyway she is a really special person and we are
going to work really hard to help her get passed her challenges and be
baptised as soon as possible.
This week we have been fasting and praying alot as we have been
looking for new people to teach and to know what to do with the people
that we have been teaching whether or not they are going to start to
progress. It has been a powerful and helpful tool to do everything
that we can to see the changes that this area needs. The ward has been
helping a lot recently. We finally have ward council running as it
should talking about people and it is consistently every week. we are
also really getting going with english class and indexing night. It
is cool to see the ward really excited and getting lots of work done
helping out the people all around them.
This week I have been studying about the nefi's visions and it really
does amaze me how much he was able to see becase of his faith. I hope
that our faith can be suffiecient enough so that we can always have
the revelation, guidance and experiences that we need.
Love you all and see you sunday!!!
Elder Hobson
