Week 84 General Conference

First off I have good news and I just wanted to thank you all for the
many prayers for Ihita and Ivan.  They were able to move and have a
roof over their heads still.  They are so awesome. I actually had
another experience with muslins this week again, thankfully this one
was a more positive one.  We actually baptized a muslim man in our
zone and I was able to get to go to his baptism.  The baptism was
really cool because there was a ton of people there to see general
conference since they had to do it in between sessions.   When he came
up out of the water he stayed there standing still with his head bowed
for about 2 minutes.  It was an amazingly powerful experience for me
as I was aware of the significance of his decision to convert away
from being muslim.  Most of the congregation was just confused but for
those that knew what had just happened it was a really powerful
experience.  After he changed back into his Suit that he had recently
bought for church, we ended the meeting with him bearing his
testimony.  He bore a very powerful testimony of the holy ghost and
the confirming witness that he has received that he is making the
correct decision.  Even though he did have some things that were a bit
confused in his testimony that will have to be straitened out later,
he has a very strong testimony that this is truly the one and only
true church.  He explained a bit about the difficulties that he has
been going through with his parents and family members back in Africa
that did not want him to change and did not support him whatsoever in
this decision.  It was amazing to see a man turn his back on his
culture, people, country, way of life, and family all because of his
love for God.  It is inspiring and I hope and pray that he and his
family can be blessed and protected in this life and in the next for
this decision knowing that it will not be easy for any of them.  The
rules that we have to be able to teach and baptize a muslim are really
long and ridiculous making it almost impossible but he was able to do
it. Hopefully he will be able to continue to make the correct
decisions and progress.

This week has been fun to get to know a couple new missionaries and
work a little different.  Transfers are always a good refresher filled
with tons of new challenges which is a good thing.   I had to bring a
ton of things back to our area for our zone like copies of the book of
mórmon and things like that and because I was stupid and loaded up my
bag with about 120lbs of books and such I had one of the tires on my
big luggage bags blow out.  I am going to try and fix it, but just
kind of a bummer and a burden that comes from having to try and help
these other missionaries.

To respond to your question Dad, there has not been too much press
about the temple and stuff since the ground breaking ceremony.  It is
still in the very beginning stages of construction and I am sure as
they get more to the point where the walls are up there will be a lot
more commotion about it.  It has come up from a few people here and
there already on the street but it is still not out there super well.
I sure am excited to see where it is at more at the end of the summer,
hopefully it will have the basic structure visible by then.

We had a cool experience with Veronica a member from the azores that
is here for college now. She had a boy that had come down from a
different town to visit here this week that we found her showing him
around the church.  We took advantage and taught him a bit and then
after he came back for general conference we taught him again.  He is
really cool and as of now he claims to not really believe in God, but
after talking to him for 5 minutes that changed, and then after
watching a bit of General conference he recognized the answers that he
was receiving from the holy ghost and knew that it was definitely
something different and special.  Funny that he came down to Lisbon
this weekend to meet a girl and basically spent the whole weekend
getting converted to Jesus Christ.  That is what I call good dating,
well done Veronica.

We are working hard out here and having fun.  Thankfully now I have
finally caught back up on sleep after transfers and I am getting back
onto my typical schedule.  I am excited for this transfer and I really
want to make the most out of it because the weeks are flying by and
time is running short.  I feel more and more like President Hinkley
every day when asked why he walks fast and he said, "if you knew what
I know then you would walk faster too".  There is just too little time
to be able to help give as many people as possible a chance to hear
about the gospel as possible.   gotta use every moment well becuase we
do not have any time to waste and this life goes by really quickly
with all of its eternally significant decisions continuing on forever.

"You can have what you want now or something better" -Elder Holland

"DECISIONS DETERMINE DESTINY" - President Monson

Christ is always the right choice.
happy choosing

Love
Elder Hobson