4-30-12 Coming down the home stretch!

4-30-12

HELLO FAMILY!!
I WAS SUPPOSED TO SEND THE ZONE'S NUMBERS TODAY, BUT I WILL MAKE MY COMP DO IT SO I CAN READ YOUR EMAIL TUDINHO!!! HAHA
THIS WEEK WAS UNBELIEVABLE, AS TOM'S SALES PARTNERS FROM APEX WOULD SAY. WE ACTUALLY DID SEE THE HAND OF THE LORD IN A FEW INSTANCES, BUT STILL NOT ANY FRUITS WITH INVESTIGATORS. WE DID HELP A FEW LESS ACTIVES THAT HADN'T BEEN TO CHURCH FOR A WHILE TO GO TO CHURCH, AND TO MARK WITH THE BISHOP TO BE ABLE TO RETURN AND GET CALLINGS, SO AT LEAST SOMETHING VISIBLY GOOD HAPPENED.

 

SO MONDAY WE WERE FRUSTRATED AND DIDN'T KNOW WHO TO VISIT BECAUSE WE DIDN'T HAVE ANY INVESTIGATORS, SO WE PRAYED TO KNOW WHERE TO GO. WHEN WE WERE PRAYING I THOUGHT OF AN OLDER MEMBER LADY THAT WE HAD NEVER VISITED, THAT IS ALWAYS HAPPY AT CHURCH, BUT WHO PROBABLY HASN'T WORKED WITH THE MISSIONARIES LATELY. WHEN WE GOT TO HER HOUSE (WHERE SHE LIVES ALONE) SHE WAS ABOUT TO START HER FHE--- ALONE. SO SHE WAS SUPER HAPPY WE CAME AND WE DID A FAMILY NIGHT WITH HER ABOUT MISSIONARY WORK, AND SHE GAVE US SOME GREAT REFERENCES OF SOME PEOPLE AT WORK. WE THEN LEFT, AND SHE WALKED DOWN THE STREET WITH US INTRODUCING US TO ALL OF HER NEIGHBORS!! THAT IS THE GOOD PART THAT I REALLY BELIEVE WE WERE LED THERE....
BUT NONE OF HER NEIGHBORS WERE INTERESTED (EXCEPT MAYBE FOR ONE THAT WE WILL GO BACK TO VISIT). THE GIRLS FROM HER WORK WERE VERY CURIOUS AND WE MARKED TO TEACH THEM, BUT WHEN WE WENT THERE TO TEACH THEM IT WAS VERY EVIDENT THAT SOMEONE HAD SAID A BUNCH OF [STUFF] ABOUT THE CHURCH AND THEY MADE UP EXCUSES WHY THEY COULDN'T HEAR US THAT DAY. SUNDAY THEY ALSO DIDN'T GO TO CHURCH, DESPITE HAVING PROMISED THAT THEY WOULD. BUT THEIR MEMBER FRIEND WILL CONTINUE WORKING WITH THEM AND THEY DEFINITELY HAVE POTENTIAL.

WE GOT A FEW OTHER NEW INVESTIGATORS DURING THE WEEK, BUT NONE OF THEM ACTED (READ, PRAY, GO TO CHURCH) ON THE MESSAGE, SO ONCE AGAIN, WE DON'T HAVE INVESTIGATORS.

MANY PEOPLE IN THE WARD HAVE TOLD ME THAT [I WILL RECEIVE BLESSINGS LATER  BECAUSE I HAVE SERVED A MISSION] AS THEY HAVE NOTICED THAT WE ARE NOT HAVING ANY SUCCESS (VISIBLY). I REALLY HAVE TRIED, I DON'T KNOW IF I HAVE BEEN A GOOD  MISSIONARY, BUT I DID WHAT I COULD TO FULFILL MY CALLING AND I GUESS I SHOULDN'T BE DISAPPOINTED WITH THAT. I HOPE TO BE ABLE TO FIND MANY OF THE CONVERTS FROM MY MISSION STILL ACTIVE IN THE CHURCH WHEN WE VISIT THEM NEXT WEEK! BUT UNFORTUNATELY I ALREADY KNOW OF MANY WHO RETURNED TO THEIR PREVIOUS LIVES.

THANK YOU AND LOVE YOU ALL!
LOVE
ELDER HOOKE

4-23-12 Another hard week

4-23-12
HELLO FAMILY!

THIS LAST WEEK WAS PRETTY HARD. WE HAD TO DROP SEVERAL INVESTIGATORS THAT WE HAVE BEEN WASTING TIME WITH THAT DO NOT GO TO CHURCH AND MANY THAT DON'T EVEN READ OR PRAY. WE BASICALLY DON'T HAVE ANYONE NOW. LITERALLY. IT IS REALLY DISCOURAGING. 

TUESDAY WE WENT TO PALMARES TO ATTEND THE DISTRICT MEETING THERE AND GIVE A LITTLE TRAINING (ALTHOUGH I FEEL INADEQUATE FOR THAT BECAUSE MY AREA IS PRETTY MUCH THE WORST ONE IN THE ZONE RIGHT NOW). BUT ANYWAYS THAT WAS COOL AND WE ALSO HAD A CHURRASCO AFTER (BBQ), AND DID A DIVISION WITH THE ELDERS IN THE PALMARES AREA. THEN WE SPENT THE REST OF THE WEEK IN CABO.WE FOUND A FEW PEOPLE (DOING CONTACTS) THAT SEEM LIKE THEY COULD HAVE GOOD POTENTIAL BUT NONE WENT TO CHURCH. NO ONE. I HONESTLY DON'T KNOW WHY WE ARE HAVING NO RESULTS HERE BECAUSE I AM NOT WORKING LESS HARD THAN ANY OTHER TIME ON THE MISSION, AND AFTER 2 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE, ONE WOULD THINK THAT I WOULD BE A BETTER MISSIONARY AND A MORE EFFECTIVE ONE THAN AT ANY OTHER TIME, BUT NOTHING THAT WE ARE DOING WORKS OUT WELL. 

I DON'T REMEMBER IF I TOLD YOU ABOUT SUELY, A LADY THAT WE CONTACTED LIKE 3 MONTHS AGO IN GAIBU. SHE LIVES IN THE OTHER DUPLAS PART OF CABO, SO WE PASSED THE REFERRAL TO THEM. ANYWAYS SHE WAS BAPTIZED LAST WEEK AND CONFIRMED THIS WEEK AND SHE IS SUPER EXCITED TO SERVE IN THE CHURCH. THAT MEANS AT LEAST ONE 5 MINUTE CONTACT THAT WE DID MONTHS AGO MADE A DIFFERENCE, BUT BESIDES THAT, THERE ARE NO VISIBLE RESULTS.  BUT YEAH THERE ISN'T ANYTHING SPECIFIC TO PRAY FOR, JUST MAYBE THAT WE CAN HAVE SOME SORT OF MIRACLE HERE BEFORE MY MISSION ENDS!

A quote I sent to Jon, by President Howard W. Hunter, from April conference, 1994:

"Let us follow the Son of God in all ways and in all walks of life.  Let us make him our exemplar and our guide.  We should at every opportunity ask ourselves, 'What would Jesus do?' and then be more courageous to act upon the answer.  We must follow Christ, in the best sense of that word. We must be about his work as he was about his Father's.  We should try to be like him, even as the Primary children sing, 'Try, try, try.'  To the extent that our mortal powers permit, we should make every effort to become like Christ - the one perfect and sinless example this world has ever seen.

"His beloved disciple John often said of Christ, 'We beheld his glory' (John 1:14).  They observed the Savior's perfect life as he worked and taught and prayed.  So, too, ought we to 'behold his glory' in every way we can.

"We must know Christ better than we know him; we must remember him more often than we remember him; we must serve him more valiantly than we serve him.  Then we will drink water springing up unto eternal life and will eat the bread of life.

"What manner of men and women ought we to be?  Even as he is."

ALRIGHT THANKS FOR THE QUOTE! I LOVE YOU ALL

TCHAU

ELDER HOOKE 

4-16-12 Good attitude, not so good week

THIS WEEK WAS YET ONE MORE FRUITLESS WEEK. BUT I DECIDED THAT I AM GONNA DO MY PART UNTIL THE END AND NOT WORRY ABOUT THE RESULTS, BECAUSE I CAN'T CHANGE ANYTHING, SO WORRYING OR GETTING MAD OR FRUSTRATED DOESN'T HELP AT ALL. ALTHOUGH I HAVE TO ADMIT THAT IT IS VERY HARD TO FIGHT OFF THE FEELING OF FRUSTRATION RIGHT NOW.

[Elder Holland recently spoke to Harvard Law School students regarding

the church, and then had a question/answer period afterwards. I
transcribed the following from YouTube for Jon, because I thought it
was very pertinent to his current situation:

The question posed to Elder Holland was something like "Has having
generations of missionaries serving abroad changed the character of
the church?" 

 Elder Holland's response:
"Ostensibly, theoretically, and truthfully, it [missionary service] is
for the church. It is service to the kingdom and religious principles
and to spread Christianity. But in fact, I would do it, and I would
institutionalize it and I would include and encourage everyone to go
who can go and wants to go, if not a single solitary person joined the
church. If not one joined the church, I would still say do it, simply
because of what it meant to me. I think no young man in this church
was ever more affected by a mission than I was. And that partly is
simply the context out of which I have come in my childhood, in my
life, in my youth. So, I'm just a horribly biased person.

We're out to the tune of 56,000 missionaries. Probably soon, our
trajectory, just the demographics are that we'll probably be around
70,000 missionaries in about 3 or 4 years. And [the missionaries] are
supposed to go give service, they're supposed to love people where
they are, and if they join the church, fine, but if they don't, fine.
If they can do ANYthing...ANYthing they can do--ANY single, solitary,
Christian, decent, worthy, thing they can do--they're supposed to go
do. And if people join the church, great, and if they don't [the
missionaries] have left a nation or a community or a family or a
person better than they found them. And that's our call to a
missionary. And that can't help but do good to the individual, and
that can't help but have changed the face of the church in the 21st
century, because it has--there's no question about it."

I LIKE THAT QUOTE. I WILL STRIVE TO DO EVERY CHRISTIAN, DECENT, WORTHY ACT THAT APPEARS. IT IS INTERESTING THE DIFFERENCE IN EMPHASIS WHEN THEY TALK TO MISSIONARIES, AND WHEN THEY TALK TO NON MEMBERS. BECAUSE I DEFINITELY WOULD NOT HEAR THAT IN A MEETING OF JUST MISSIONARIES.

LOVE YOU TOO AND THANKS FOR THE GREAT FOTOS!!

LOVE

ELDER HOOKE

4-9-12 Oriane

THIS WEEK WAS EQUALLY DIFFICULT AND FRUSTRATING... BUT ORIANE WAS AT CHURCH WITH HER BROTHER (WE HAVE BEEN TEACHING HER AND SHE ALWAYS GOES TO CHURCH WITH HER NEIGHBOR). SHE IS 30 YRS OLD AND A MEMBER OF THE CHURCH OF THE VEIL. SHE IS NOW MISSING HER CHURCH TO GO TO OURS WHICH IS GOOD BUT SHE STILL HASN'T RECEIVED AN ANSWER ABOUT THE RESTORATION AND FOR THIS STILL HASN'T ACCEPTED BAPTISM.

HOPEFULLY I WILL BAPTIZE HERE! I HAVE BEEN MORE TIME HERE WITHOUT BAPTIZING THEN IN ANY OTHER PART OF MY MISSION. SAD HUH? RIGHT AT THE END.

TCHAU LOVE YOU ALL 

ELDER HOOKE

4-2-12 Starting last transfer!

4-2-12

THIS LAST WEEK WAS ONE MORE VERY TOUGH WEEK WITH VERY FEW FRUITS. I WAS PRETTY SURE I WOULD BE TRANSFERRED TODAY BECAUSE NOBODY GENERALLY ENDS THEIR MISSION AS A LZ, BUT FOR SOME REASON I STAYED HERE. NOBODY IN OUR ENTIRE ZONE WAS TRANSFERRED, WHICH I FOUND STRANGE. IT WILL STAY AS IT IS. WE MIGHT MOVE TO CABO THIS WEEK (AS WE WERE GONNA DO LIKE 2 MONTHS AGO, AND PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE DONE). YRIS GOES TO CHURCH BECAUSE HER MOM HAS A TESTIMONY, AND A GOOD FRIEND IN THE CHURCH, AND A CALLING. AND PEDRO IS DOING PRETTY WELL BECAUSE THE YOUNG MEN ARE REALLY STRONG AND HAVE BECOME FRIENDS WITH HIM.

AS FAR AS INVESTIGATORS GO, WE ARE PRETTY WEAK. IT HAS BEEN REALLY DISCOURAGING THESE LAST COUPLE WEEKS, WHICH IS ONE MORE REASON I WANTED TO BE TRANSFERRED BECAUSE THIS WOULD BE A BAD WAY TO END MY MISSION. OH WELL. THERE ARE SOME COOL MEMBERS HERE THAT I HAVE BECOME GOOD FRIENDS WITH, AND I SAID ALL MY GOOD BYES YESTERDAY AND THEN WHEN WE GOT HOME I FOUND OUT I'M NOT LEAVING!

OH YEAH HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! I REMEMBERED DURING THE WEEK LAST WEEK WHEN SOMEONE ASKED ME "WHEN IS YOUR MOMS BIRTHDAY?" RANDOM, HUH? THEN I THOUGHT A BOUT IT AND I WAS LIKE, WHAT DO YOU KNOW, IT IS THIS SUNDAY! I HOPE IT WAS A GOOD DAY AND THAT YOU DON'T FEEL ANY OLDER.

I WAS ABLE TO SEE THE MAJORITY OF CONFERENCE ALTHOUGH I MISSED SEVERAL PARTS. BUT THE TALKS I WAS ABLE TO PAY ATTENTION TO WERE GOOD, AND I WILL LIKE TO RECEIVE THE REST IN THE WRITTEN FORM IN A LITTLE WHILE.

THANKS FOR ALL, LOVE YOU!
ELDER HOOKE

3-26-12 Planting Seeds

THIS LAST WEEK WAS ROUGH, BUT BETTER THAN THE WEEK BEFORE. WE ARE A LITTLE MORE HOPEFUL IN THE AREA AT LEAST. SATURDAY NIGHT WE PLANNED AN ACTIVITY OF INTEGRATION WITH, INSTEAD OF A BUNCH OF USELESS GAMES AND A TINY MESSAGE, A FIRESIDE TYPE OF THING WITH A SPEAKER FROM THE STAKE PRESIDENCY. NOT TOO MANY OF THE MEMBERS IN GAIBU WENT, PROBABLY LIKE 12 OR SO, AND SEVERAL MEMBERS FROM CABO, BUT THE MESSAGE WAS REALLY COOL, AND IT HELPED THE MEMBERS OF THE GROUP TO FEEL MORE UNITED AND MORE HOPEFUL TO GROW THE GROUP. I PLAYED THE GUITAR TO ACCOMPANY THE HYMNS WE SANG, WHICH WAS FUN. THEN WE ATE A BUNCH OF BAHIAN FOOD.

 

WE ARE NOT TEACHING VERY MUCH, BUT I THINK I CAN DEFINITELY SAY THAT WE ARE PLANTING LOTS OF SEEDS.

 

SOME PEOPLE HAVE ASKED FOR YOU GUYS TO BRING RANDOM THINGS FROM THE U.S. THAT THEY DON'T HAVE HERE:

DARTS FOR A NERF GUN, N-STRIKE MAVERICK

MY COMP WANTS A BIGGER STYLE BACKPACK WITH A CAMELBAK, AND WILL PAY FOR IT

BASKETBALL SHORTS

LITTLE YOUNG WOMEN VALUES BRACELETS

THAT'S ALL FOR NOW.

[Jon's Dad was in the hospital with what turned out to be nothing serious]

WOW THAT SOUNDS LIKE A PRETTY BIG ADVENTURE. I GUESS DAD IS GETTING OLD! THAT IS GREAT THAT THE BISHOP WENT AND GAVE HIM A BLESSING. DID OTHER PEOPLE FROM THE WARD VISIT HIM? GLAD TO HEAR THAT HE IS ALL BETTER NOW AND THERE ARE NO PERMANENT PROBLEMS. I WILL PRAY FOR HIS HEALTH.

 

 I'VE BEEN PUMPIN SOME IRON HERE IN THE MORNING EXERCISE TIME, SO I SHOULDN'T BE TOO FAR BEHIND HAHA

 

SATURDAY NIGHT WE WERE ABLE TO DO THE ACTIVITY IN THE SCHOOL, BECAUSE LAST WEEK THE SCHOOL RECEIVED 18 BIG WALL FANS AND NEEDED THEM INSTALLED BUT DIDN'T HAVE MONEY, SO ME AND MY COMP AND ABOUT 5 MEN FROM THE CABO WARD WENT THERE TO INSTALL THEM. AND WHEN WE ASKED TO USE THE SCHOOL SATURDAY NIGHT THE PRINCIPAL DIDN'T EVEN HESITATE.

 

Here is a little quote from a talk by Elder Eyring that I thought was very good, although I hope you are no longer as discouraged as you were last week...

"For those who are discouraged by their circumstances and are therefore tempted to feel they cannot serve the Lord this day, I make you two promises. Hard as things seem today, they will be better in the next day if you choose to serve the Lord this day with your whole heart. Your circumstances may not be improved in all the ways which you desire. But you will have been given new strength to carry your burdens and new confidence that when your burdens become too heavy, the Lord, whom you have served, will carry what you cannot. He knows how. He prepared long ago. He suffered your infirmities and your sorrows when He was in the flesh so that He would know how to succor you.

The other promise I make to you is that by choosing to serve Him this day, you will feel His love and grow to love Him more.

By serving Him this day, you will come to know Him better. You will feel His love and appreciation. You would not want to delay receiving that blessing. And feeling His love will draw you back to His service, wiping away both complacency and discouragement."

THANKS FOR THE QUOTE. THOSE ARE WORTHY PROMISES, THAT MAY NOT MEAN THAT I WILL BAPTIZE HUNDREDS, BUT AT LEAST THE LORD WILL BE WITH ME.

 

ALRIGHT THANKS LOVE YOU ALL!

ELDER HOOKE

3-19-12 Discouraged

HELLO FAMILY

THIS WEEK WAS REALLY DISCOURAGING. DONT HAVE MUCH TO SAY ABOUT IT.

THERE WAS AN APOSTLE (I FORGOT WHO) WHO SAID THAT WE ARE FISHERS OF MEN, AND THAT WE HAVE TO HAVE OUR LINE IN THE WATER THE MOMENT WE LEAVE OUR HOUSE UNTIL THE MOMENT WE GET HOME AT NIGHT, RATHER THAN ONLY DURING APPOINTMENTS. THIS IS TRUE AND WE ARE DOING CONTACTS, BUT IT IS DISCOURAGING DOING CONTACTS HERE BECAUSE LITERALLY EVERY BAPTISM IN THIS GROUP SINCE THE START A YEAR AGO THAT WAS A CONTACT, IS NOW INACTIVE. THE ONLY PEOPLE THAT STILL GO WERE REFERRALS.

2 MORE WEEKS HERE. THANKS FOR THE PRAYERS, LOVE YOU ALL TOO!

LOVE

ELDER HOOKE